Notes

Building Valuable Connections
Forward

"Building Valuable Connections: Inside & Out" was written to meet the countless demands from my clients and associates to learn more with this important topic.

Four years ago, when I founded my own consulting & training company, I was primarily worried about increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of sales organizations. There I was, happily doing GAP Analyses to find out that which was wrong, and delivering tips for improvement. This would frequently be followed by an application of training & coaching.

My business expanded, and I was often asked to speak on topics such as for example selling and business networking. SINCE I HAVE was an avid member of Toastmaster's International and the National Speaker's Association, I'd jump at the opportunity to speak to these audiences.

The demands for my services changed over time, partly because of my speaking requests. They evolved from expounding on sales ways to topics such as for example Career Networking Strategies, and How to Influence from the Podium. The common thread uniting these topics was the underlying theme of creating Valuable Connections.

Whether selling, presenting, or networking, the skilled professional seeks to create a number of trusted connections.
WHEN I delved deeper into this subject, I began collecting my thoughts and putting them down in writing.

An additional twist was added when it had been requested that my workshop be expanded to include the topic of internal communications and team development. Once again, this issue fit well under the umbrella heading of building connections of value, and a fresh theme was created.

Everything you read today in this simple booklet is a brief summary of my thoughts regarding how to become better in establishing and growing our relationships with other individuals and groups. A large section of that proficiency rests on increasing one's ability to connect, communicate, also to build value.

Success is largely dependant on one's capability to build lasting relationships with individuals who most matter.

It is my hope that this work will set you on the path to greater connections, enhanced networking, and improved relationships.

To Your Success!

Building Valuable Connections

Inside & Out

Nobody achieves excellence on their own. Whether your organization is creating a meaningful career, creating a loving family, discovering a forward thinking idea, crafting a masterpiece of design, or creating a vast commercial empire, your success depends on others, and theirs depends upon you.

Walt Disney had this to say: "It is possible to dream, create, design, and build probably the most wonderful idea on the globe, but it requires people to make the dream possible."

The daddy of Mickey Mouse, Disneyland, and the Epcot center knew what he was discussing. He was a creative genius with innovative ideas, tremendous energy, and the will to succeed. Yet, without others joining his cause, his best ideas would have died before ever becoming reality.

You may be experiencing the ditto. You have good ideas, great experience, valuable insights, and tremendous energy. You've taken the initiative and launched your own business. Now, confidently and optimism, you anticipate the planet to beat a path to your door. And so you wait. And wait. And wait even more.

What you ought to do is build a Team! It is advisable to set up a network of valuable connections which work together to help one another out. You should create an army of advocates that willingly take the initiative to recommend your organization to whomever they meet. Likewise, they need YOU on the team to recommend their services.

Every person on the team can win the game, if they all work together for the normal good. Every person can perform their goals by helping one another.

The main element to success in life and in the business world is to Build Valuable Connections!

You can find two deceptively simple steps to get this done:

1. Build Connections

2. Create Value

It's about Building Connections and Creating Value.

To accelerate performance you must first make a connection. On a personal level, we spend 90% of our lives alone, surviving in fear and loneliness. We simply assume that everybody else is "normal" and that we're the only ones who have

these strange feelings of alienation. We realize, deep down inside, that people don't belong here and that we never will. Everyone else appears to be happier, more adjusted, more affluent, and more satisfied with just how things are going.

Perhaps Robert Heinlein was correct when he wrote his science-fiction classic "Stranger in a Strange Land." His main character, Michael Valentine Smith, was raised by Martians and had somehow developed highly-evolved skills including mental telepathy. When meeting people from this planet for the first time, he noticed how lonely and unhappy they were. There was no bond, no connection between them. They were all strangers, even to each other.

These concepts are equally highly relevant to the business world. Getting connected and staying connected haven't been more important. Companies spend millions of dollars annually in an attempt to "create a connection" with their consumers. Besides media & advertising exposure, you might also need various technologically-enabled solutions such as for example website s, blogs, and Podcasts, and newsletters.

Needless to say, consumers and businesses have adopted defensive strategies to filter out the unwanted connections (spam) and to spot the desired communications with sophisticated electronic defense systems such as for example firewalls, "denied lists", voicemail, and elaborate security systems to protect their resources and people.

The driving goal of all business communication would be to create visibility (i.e. connection with) your potential consumers. Success in business demands that you get on the internal "loneliness" and self-centeredness, and focus your energy and messages outside, on your customers.

Your success running a business, in your job, and that you experienced depends upon your capability to create value AND to established new connections. To build your personal team takes a deeper understanding and mastering the procedure of Building Valuable Connections.

Building Basics

First, some general comments on the topic of Building Connections.

As the title implies, connections don't just happen, they are built. This involves taking action! In the event that you wait for connections to happen, you'll be looking forward to a long time! You should take the time to create an Action Plan which has the objective of building the proper Connections you must forward your purposes. You will also need to review all of your current connections and classify them. Here are some sample categories:

Friends and Family

Associates

Partners

Prospects

Qualified Prospects

Customers & Clients

Referral Sources

Super-Connectors

Who do you INTERACT WITH?

The short answer is "everyone important to my business."

Harvey MacKay, among the world's best networking experts and writer of "Dig your well before you're thirsty," explains some maxims about who you should be networking (connecting) with:

1) If everyone in your network is equivalent to you, it isn't a network, it's an anthill.

2) Networking isn't a numbers game. The idea is not to observe how many people it is possible to meet. The idea is to compile a listing of people you can depend on.

3) You can't always be an expert. You can't always know a specialist. But you can always hire a specialist.

Below are a few other tips about who for connecting with:

-- Once you find someone that's well-connected, connect with them. If "everyone knows" Joe, so should you.

-- Ask around. If you're new to a gathering or group, learn who is running the meeting and obtain introduced to them. Then you can tell them who you are and who you want to meet.

-- Get introduced. When you create a valuable connection, keep these things expose you to others within their personal network. And become sure to come back the favor by introducing them to others in your network.

-- Plan in Advance. Try to find out who'll be at the event beforehand. Should you choose your quest, you'll know who you truly want to meet.

Where do people connect?

Everywhere! Any time two or more people are meeting there is an opportunity to create a connection. After learning more about each other and their businesses, they'll make decisions about whether this chance meeting has potential, and whether it ought to be expanded and became a more productive business connection.

There are a large number of locations where people congregate, and you should make it your organization to get and use every one of them. Here's a short list:

Industry Associations

Networking Groups (BNI, RBN etc)

Company-wide meetings

Clubs & Hobbyists

Churches

Volunteer Groups

Chamber of Commerce, Rotary, Lions

Toastmasters International

Political Action Groups

Fundraising Groups & Events

ACTIVITIES (golf, baseball)

Alumni Groups

Special Interest Groups

College & University Events

Social Events (Plays, Opera, Music)

Any moment people congregate, there is a chance to "meet & greet" also to connect with people who may be important. Needless to say, this can also be their possibility to meet and connect to you. Whenever building connections, remember to take the initiative and offer to give first. The easiest way to get yourself a valuable connection started is usually to be the first ever to connect them with someone of value.

Since time is really a critically scarce commodity, you should spend it with folks who are the most relevant to your success. Therefore, you need a method of selecting who, from among the vast amounts of people available, would you like to make connection with.

You can certainly do this right now. Create a list of all of the people you would like to meet. This will include business leaders among others that would be most helpful to your job. Include companies that could be candidates for your products or services. Give it some careful thought, and think of a complete list. Once the list is done, at this point you have a high impact "target list".

The next step is to discover who you know that may know someone on the list. Or who have you any idea that may know a person who.......? You get the idea. Now you know exactly who you are looking for and you have a better plan.

Besides the planned list, you should always look for new potential connections. This normally occurs if you find yourself among a crowd of individuals, mostly strangers. How would you make the optimum connections then?

Here's the ultimate way to do this. When meeting someone new, find out their "sphere of influence." Utilize the following Connecting Drill at group events:

BUILDING CONNECTIONS DRILL

What do you do with your Connections?

Follow Up! If you've spent the time to meet and greet new people, and have sorted out the people you want to create a relationship with, follow-up! Enter the information into your contact database and follow up within 2 days with a telephone call or an email at a minimum.

Set up a coffee meeting or luncheon. Take action within two days or the person might just forget who you are and why it is critical to meet? This LAW ought to be cast in concrete and encased in gold. Follow up NOW!

Once you do meet, that is when you have the chance to really establish your value and build the partnership. Remember, it needs to be a mutually beneficial relationship. Try to be the main one who gives first! Discover what you can do to help the other person, and do it. Connect them together with your other valuable connections whenever possible.

Your personal network of connections operates nearly the same as the World Wide Web. The linkages you build between and among your connections establish your value (ranking) in the search engines. The more you connect others with others, the more valuable you become. When you make a connection and help someone else, you have built good will among two people. Each of them will now be actively seeking to promote you as well as your services to their circle of friends.

There is no more powerful connecting tool available than this. Connecting others with others builds your value over the network and will improve your worth by an exponential basis.

Think about the "Godfather" group of movies. Don Corleone was the main person in the complete movie because he was the "go to" person. He knew everyone worth focusing on and he could easily get the work done. He actively looked out for his friends and he made sure they were introduced to one another. He sat at the nexus of most of these communication lines. He was the crossing point, and he created the connections!

The Inside Connection

This is called "Looking after Business." Your established network (your rolodex) includes your present associates, friends, contacts, and partners. You already have built a Community of Contacts. Now you have to deliver VALUE to the existing network and look after them like they're family. Here's how:

Deliver Great Service

Make them Special

Get Testimonials

Distribute Testimonials/Post them

Give Referrals to

Get Referrals from

Expand your Database of Contacts

--- friends

--- clients

--- referral sources

--- Super Connectors

Publish Newsletters & Blogs

Special Website login for the "secret sauce"

INTERNET AFFILIATE MARKETING --- Web

Co-Branded Events (Seminars, Workshops)

Co-Sponsor Events

Remember their Important Dates

Make it Personal

Hand out Valuable Reports/White Papers

Special Offers

Free attendance at your Events

Rewards Programs

Spiffs for Referrals

Cultivate Referral Sources (parallel services)

When asked, consultants will tell you that 80-90% of these business originates from referrals, in fact it is vitally important to deal with these "inside" connections. So in the event you.

The Outside Connection

Here is the extremely powerful business expansion system which most people call networking. I favor calling it Creating HOME BASED BUSINESS Connections because they build Value.

A network filled hastily with anyone and everyone does not have any value. Rushing through networking meetings and offering your business card to anyone who breathes may feel just like it's networking, but it has no value. Sending out email blasts or mailings to "the planet" is a waste of time and money. Today's smart marketers would rather TARGET their marketing. When building your personal/business network, it is advisable to adopt exactly the same principles. This means you target exactly who ought to be in your network, and then you find a method to build a connection to them. It is a precise activity, not haphazard.

Here are come of the best methods you need to use to build external connections:

Newsletter

Networking Groups

Industry Associations

Speaking Opportunities

Writing

Prove your Expertise

Positive Press

Communicate Your Value

Give Away Something

"Who have you any idea who"

Networking Meetings --- Strategies

Research

Target Market Analysis

Target your Networking

Be Helpful

Target who you wish to Meet

Discover the Super Connectors--and connect

Working a Networking Event- Tips & Techniques

A networking event can be explained as anytime several people gather alongside the reason for exchanging ideas, information, or resources.

The main element component is RESOURCES. You're a resource to them. They're a resource to you. You're already exchanging information and ideas. Where it becomes most effective is when you can now connect them with other resources in your network and vice-versa.

You want to become the Conductor....the one who is directing traffic. You are at the intersection and you are directing traffic from one indicate another. Without you in the middle, both of these other connecting points would never know about one another. You are the glue which attaches them. Therefore, you are the ready of power and influence.

The correct networking attitude is usually to be a Resource, Not just a Vendor. You should approach the ending up in the resolve to help make everyone else in the meeting more lucrative. Your talent in connecting them with other folks, resources, and ideas may be the key to your individual success.

To make the most effective use of your time, you must spend it with the people who find themselves most important to your business.

There are three Kinds of People at a Networking Event:

1. Decision Makers

2. Centers of Influence to Decision Makers

3. All Others

Your key objective is to identify your choice Makers or Centers of Influence and to minimize spending excessive amounts of time with anyone else.

Some more Ideas for Effective Networking

1. Carry Business Cards at all Times

2. The objective of Networking is to WIDEN your circle of Friends. Don't just hang out with people you already know.

3. Speak to Everyone. Whenever two different people meet, it is a networking event.

4. Let the other person speak, and you LISTEN.

5. Be Helpful. Give first. "How do i assist you to" is MAGIC.

6. Be Memorable. Short and Sweet and Memorable.

7. Networking isn't Sales, it's about developing relationships.

Building Value

How do you go about building value? Let's start with a definition.

"the worth of something in money or goods at a certain time"

"the quality of a thing which makes it be regarded as more desirable, useful, important"

Notice something? It's all in accordance with one person. Exactly like "beauty is in the attention of the beholder," so too is value. It really is an intangible quality that is assigned by one person. It is all tangled up for the reason that person's perception of what is being evaluated.

If you fall into line 3 different cars and have people select which they like, it’s likely that they will pick differently. They'll choose the car they like based on their perception and their values. They'll choose based upon their PERCEPTION of the most important thing, desirable, and useful at that time. There is no very best choice; it really is all based on the values held by the individual.

How can you use this precept to your advantage as a consultant?

You're selling yourself and your ability to deliver a service. To carry out this, you must create a perception that you will be an expert, you can get results, that you will be the right person for the job. You are selling the VALUE of your service, not the service itself. And the person/company you are selling to is evaluating that value based on their PERCEPTION of the most important thing, not what is actually important.

You are projecting an intangible value and it is being evaluated by an intangible perception. It's all pretty intangible. It can't really be measured, weighed, felt, tasted, or touched. It's intangible.

The Value Equation

However, there's one critical component that's tangible. It could be seen, felt, measured, weighed and also smelled. That is your body.

If you've done any public speaking, you already know this startling fact: 80 % of the "message" that's delivered to an audience is delivered by the Body Motion (BODY GESTURES). And 60% of that BM comes from the facial skin!

Your customer can easily see your body and your face. They can and can make dozens of decisions about you within seconds of first being introduced. The "first impression" they receive after greeting you, shaking your hand, looking you in the eye and reviewing the rest of your body parts will generate an indelible impression.

Like it or not, your client or prospect will make a preliminary decision within the first 40 seconds if they like you and when you will be trusted. That is why experts always emphasize making a good first impression in a business setting.

You can overcome an initially poor first impression, nevertheless, you are fighting contrary to the odds. Once made, a poor impression is hard to overcome.

So, the initial rule of creating value is to create a positive first impression. This requires that you project you are professional, poised, confident, and friendly. The body language, your spoken word, the clothes you wear, the expression on your face, will all donate to this image. You want your image to project in probably the most positive manner.

Needless to say, the intangibles are increasingly being communicated concurrently. We human beings project energy that is distinct from basically the body. The emotions we project create an "emotional impact" on other folks. We rub off on other people quite easily.

The second section of selling yourself is to project the proper energy, to use the right emotion also to "broadcast" on the proper wave length. This can contribute to the impression that you will be poised. What energy you decide to project is totally up to you, but you should ensure it is appropriate to the situation. Most importantly, it should be under your full control, and not a reaction to what is occurring in the meeting.

The third area of the value equation is Confidence. This is achieved by being prepared and ready for the meeting. This means action and research prior to the face-to-face meeting. The only real reason people display a lack of confidence is because they're not prepared and have not practiced enough. You have to know whenever you can about the person before the meeting, wherever this is practical. For anyone who is entering a meeting, there should be an agenda and a target. Should you be reviewing a proposal, it should be clear and concise. There must be as few variables as you possibly can.

Finally, & most importantly, is Delivery. You have made an excellent first impression, you've created probably the most optimal energy for the occasion, and you also are prepared and ready for the encounter. You're now connected, primed, and prepared to deliver your message - and it must be regarded as valuable to your partner.

Your client/prospect can make decisions based on their PERCEPTION of reality based on their very own background and experience. Your task will be to break through this false image and connect with them instantly.

People in general are often listening to the within of their head ("the committee"). They're mostly concerned with themselves, plus they have hardly any spare attention for you personally. Until you give them a compelling reason to hear you, they'll remain unfocused. Until you tap into the "WIFT" factor, you won't capture their full attention.

Your initial delivery, therefore, should be directed at them. It ought to be valuable to them, within their terms. It ought to be regarded as interesting, valuable, humorous, helpful, or educational within their WORLD. In short, concentrate on the other person and meeting their immediate needs. The easiest way to do this is to ask them simple questions and show them the thanks to listening. People love to talk about themselves, plus they are always searching for a good listener. If you're a good listener, you will be perceived in a confident light, and they'll recognize you as a valuable connection and a significant person. Once this initial rapport is set up, upon a company foundation of value, you will then have the basis to conduct mutually beneficial business.

To recap, selling yourself as a professional requires building value. To do this, you must master the tangibles and the intangibles. You build value by focusing on developing a positive first impression, projecting the proper energy, by displaying confidence and by delivering messages that induce rapport and establish the basis for doing business together.

Boosting Performance

To accomplish your life's goals, you must recruit a team and inspire them into action. The positive energy which a network of professionals can generate is astonishing, because there is no limit to their accomplishments. Each teammate can recruit an entirely new group of connections, plus they can recruit another band of connections, and so on and so forth. Building Connections of Value leads to exponential growth!

Use these easy steps to Build Your Connections of Value.

To your Success!
My Website: https://udyamoldisgold.com/