Free Online Marketing Ideas

Networking is Useless!

It never ceases to amaze me the number of people who promote networking as the best way of building new business. There are even organizations built on the premise.

Yet networking on its own has very little value! Unless of course, you are in the business of building the world’s biggest collection of business cards.

However, it is a great start if you have a referral-marketing plan and this is where many people fall down. They have no plan. Yet the very same people would never set out on a holiday trip without having given some thought to where they were going and what they would do when they got there.

So, here is the message! Networking is just step #1 in an overall plan of referral marketing.

Without the rest of the steps it is as useless as a snooze button on a smoke alarm.  

So, if you want to increase your business in 2009, or just protect the amount you have, then develop a plan that includes the following steps:-

• Attend at least 2 networking events a week.
• Make 5 meaningful connections at every event you attend.
• Have a plan of regular follow up.
• Decide who are your ideal referral partners.
• Build a team of preferred referral partners.
• Have a goal for the number and quality of referrals you want.
• Have a method of measuring your success.

One more thing you could do would be to attend one of my “How to Double Your Business in 365 Days” seminars.