A few lessons in networking

I really enjoyed reading an interview by Rosamund Urwin in the ‘Evening Standard’ 9^th January 2012 where she interviewed Julia Hobsbawn ‘London’s networking queen’.

Julia talks about the importance of face to face networking as well as spending time on Social Media.

As a small business owner, networker & host of a monthly networking meeting myself I found these particular lessons in networking from the article to contain some useful tips:

Choose face-to-face meetings over Facebook

I agree that from my experience the best connections I have made so far are face-to-face however it is best to get a balance.  One of my New Year’s resolutions is to get a good time balance between spending time online and also diarising specific networking events so I don’t miss out.

Eye contact really matters

When networking never look over someone’s shoulder – eye contact is critical especially if you are only speaking to them for a short amount of time.  This will help the other person relax and make them know that you are genuinely interested.

Ask “how are you” not “who are you”

I especially love this tip and will be putting it into practice.  The article explains that we can easily put too much emphasis and importance on job titles.  We should be finding out whether people like the same things as we do.

Be curious at all times

Be as natural as you can and as curious as you can.  You will connect with someone faster this way and you will soon be able to share and exchange valuable information with each other.

Network for the long term

You shouldn’t measure your success on one networking event.  Networking is about seeing where conversations lead.  This can take time and people need to meet you several times before they even remember what you do, let alone remember your name sometimes!

De-clutter your contacts book

Try to avoid the competition of how many ‘friends’ or ‘followers’ you have.  This is an important point and it is worth de-cluttering on a regular basis to save you time on-going.  Don’t feel that you have to keep every business card you receive!   I am currently looking at building lists on my twitter account so I can easily keep track of the various people I am following.

I hope you too found these tips interesting - happy networking!