Member Article

The power of networking

By Steve Guest, managing director of Techconsult UK

Face-to-face networking is a necessary and powerful tool for making connections, meeting new contacts and possibly clinching that all-important lucrative deal. It enables like-minded people to come together to influence, engage, inspire, share ideas and build knowledge. In short, it’s good for business development – so why do so many people hate doing it or actively avoid doing it in the first place?

One potential deterrent is the fear of walking into a room alone and having to strike up conversations with strangers. Even some CEOs and MDs can be beset by anxiety in this situation. The best solution is to think of networking as a chance to meet and learn from people rather than simply an opportunity to sell a product or service to potential customers. Viewing networking as a social occasion will immediately relieve some of the pressure.

Some people don’t attend networking events because they simply don’t see the value in it. Perhaps they’ve been to a few, made some new contacts but haven’t yet managed to convert these leads into new business. While that’s the ultimate goal of networking, however, it’s not the be all and end all. Contacts made could lead to work later down the line, or they could act as a useful point of referral to other contacts who are willing to part with their money.

Others shun networking because, due to the proliferation of social media, they believe they’re already connected to the right people online. Social networking is becoming increasingly important in this digital age: Facebook provides a captive audience for companies that sell directly to the public; LinkedIn provides a forum to share conversations with peers in the same line of work. But is it really a substitute for pressing the flesh in a face-to-face networking environment?

It’s all well and good having more than 500 connections on LinkedIn, for example, but many of them will be distant acquaintances – friends of friends or former work colleagues, for example. How many of those 500-plus connections will directly generate business?

While that’s not to dismiss the value of social networking, it should complement, rather than replace, traditional face-to-face networking as a business development activity. Events organised locally by the Entrepreneurs’ Forum, the North East Chamber of Commerce, NOF Energy and other trade bodies offer the ideal opportunity to make direct personal connections that can be nurtured over time.

Genuinely valuable relationships are developed over several years based on mutual trust and respect. It sounds old-fashioned and probably is. But the most successful companies are generally the ones that generate the bulk of their recurring revenues on the back of strong relationships with long-standing clients.

For further information about Techconsult UK, call 01642 456300, email contact@techconsult.co.uk or visit www.techconsult.co.uk.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Techconsult UK .