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Archive for the ‘referral networking’ Category

Social Media Marketers Still Prefer Face to Face

Thursday, October 1st, 2009

We randomly selected 100 social media-savvy small business owners and asked them the following question:

“Do you generate more new from professional relationships with at least some face to face networking or do you generate more new business from exclusively online networking relationships?”

facer

While this is not the largest sample size, it reminds us that a small trusted business network is much more effective at generating sales leads than a massive network of loose social media connections. The optimal idea is to incorporate both social media technology and your trusted business network into a sales focused referral marketing strategy.

Avid Twitter user and Toronto area networker Tad Mclaughlin:

“As great as social media is, and as much as it can enrich your existing relationships,  the bottom line is that the majority of your new business is going to come from networking with professionals you already know and trust.”

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Referral Networking Should be Simple

Friday, April 18th, 2008

Decrease the Noise

Large networking sites seem to be offering everything under the sun accept a viable business solution. Surprisingly though it is the simple methods that seem to have been able to add the most value to our small business networking.

“Net noise” hurts productivity. You may be asking, “what’s net noise?”. “Net noise” is any distraction or application which provides little value to your business. Our corporate counterparts are learning the hard way as managers continue to fight the battle against lost productivity due to “net noise”.

What about those of us who are managing ourselves? It becomes increasingly important that small business owners evaluate the gains we experience from referral networking, against the time spent networking. Larry Bodine at Law.com agrees, “What if you gave a party, hundreds of people showed up, but almost nobody talked to each other? That describes the state of social networking for lawyers on sites like LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace and the new Plaxo Pulse.” The real world equivalent would be setting up your office at your favorite tavern; you’d probably spend a lot of time socializing but that doesn’t mean that your business would be any better off for it.

Recently TechCrunch posted an article on why Web 3.0 will mean “less” and not “more”. Eric Schonfeld of TechCrunch explains,”I need to know what is important, and I don’t have time to sift through thousands of Tweets and Friendfeed messages and blog posts and emails and IMs a day to find the five things that I really need to know.”

Taking “the long way home” may be a good way to relax after work but it is not the most productive attitude to take when referral networking online. As technology causes our professional and casual life to collide, successful small business professionals will still differentiate the two.

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2008: The Year of the Hand Shake

Tuesday, December 18th, 2007

How Referral Networking Will Determine Small Business Success in the New Year

It’s been an interesting year within the small business community. It seems as though every day presents us with more news of the triumphs and follies for small business marketing. Economically and technologically, it’s been a tumultuous ride. We’ve witnessed the “Linked-In and Facebook show,” and we still aren’t sure what that means for generating actual business referrals; we are experiencing a universal disruption in the housing market; and we are amidst a niche networking phenomenon. Call it the New Year, a new financial quarter, or 2008; regardless, one thing is clear: How we strategically position ourselves now within our business referral network will dictate which small businesses thrive and which just tread in the New Year.

With the future of the U.S. economy unstable at best it is likely we will see small businesses spending less. “Faced with slower business at home, Americans would be more inclined to save,” according to the New York Times. As usual, the first cuts are likely to occur on advertising expenditure. According to a new report by Borell Associates, posted in News Factor, “Marketing budgets will accelerate their shift out of traditional advertising formats — both online and offline — and into non-ad activities such as promotions and public relations.” In other words, your personal and professional business referral exchange just got even more important.

Given the unpredictable cost/benefit nature of advertising, it is only logical that experienced professionals are going to want to make more secure investments. Advertising is expensive and contingent on uncontrollable economic factors - not what a small business wants to rely on. Referral marketing is less dependent on economic factors. The small business community is going to have to look toward secure and proven methods of generating new business. Those professionals who stick together and practice regular business to business referral exchange are best apt to weather the storm.

These shifts are not necessarily negative - in fact, it is during times of uncertainty that seasoned professionals maintain a strong track record while others seem to be sent in a tailspin over every pessimistic headline. Recall the dot-com bubble burst of 2000. Only businesses which were able to personalize and build trusted relationships, maintaining a strong and healthy referral network, survived to see Web 2.0. It’s an excellent time to capitalize on the important professional relationships you’ve been nurturing. At this point it would seem 2008 is going to be the year of the hand-shake and not the checkbook.

What are you doing to strengthen your referral marketing plan for 2008?

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