Networking is a great way to promote your business. If you are a small business owner, then it should be an integral part of how you market yourself and your business. But not all networking fits all businesses – sometimes you have to kiss a few frogs before you find your networking prince!
I’m going to talk about a few ways you can build networking into your marketing strategy for your business, so you can think about what works for you & what doesn’t. I talk about this a lot with my coaching clients – it’s really important that they find a way to network that works for what they are selling, but also works for them personally – they need to feel comfortable with it in order for it feel ‘right’. But what is also really important is that all of these elements need to blend together and not work in isolation – you need to have the ‘pick & mix’ mentality to make it work for you!
Social Media
Connecting and engaging on social media is a great way to market you & your business – but not if you are not comfortable letting your social audience know a bit more about you as a person. People buy from people for a reason – the personal connection – if you are simply posting stuff about your products/services, your business offers, your ‘corporate’ face, then you aren’t giving your audience the chance to connect & engage with you – there’s no relationship building going on. You don’t have to be an ‘oversharer’, but you do need to let them have at least a peak behind the ‘corporate’ façade. And you need to engage!
I have social media accounts across a range of platforms
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sheenawhyatt/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kapowsuperbusinesscoach
Instagram: @kapowsheena
Twitter - @kapowsheena
The one I use most is Facebook, because that’s where my ideal audience is – overwhelmed small business owners looking for focus, guidance & accountability to take themselves, their brand & their business where they want it to go with business coaching that works. If they let it.
I plan to do more with my LinkedIn account in the new year, and am holding myself accountable on that by planning to cover maximising your LinkedIn account potential during my Business Boardrooms (my monthly mastermind event for my coaching clients) in January & February.
I use Instagram & Twitter as signposts to my free stuff (my lead magnets) and my other content on Facebook & LinkedIn as that is where I get the most engagement.
And I use a scheduling tool to manage all of this without going round the bend!
If your social media networking isn’t working for you, then maybe it’s time to look at a new platform or a new approach?
Hybrid Networking
I get the most traction from this. By a long way. I recently was lucky enough to work on a corporate coaching project for three months, which meant my time to network virtually & in person completely disappeared. And boy, could I notice the difference in my business. I generate the most leads for my coaching from networking virtually – my free mini coaching sessions get booked out when I talk about them in my networking introduction – so by not being able to network for a while, that funnel pretty much disappeared. I’m getting back into face to face networking, & find that is also beginning to bring those leads into my business once again. The key thing with this is that hybrid networking really works for me. Being able to network virtually was a total gamechanger for my rural based business, it allowed me to develop a nationally recognised personal brand that continues to drive leads to my social channels, my 5 Day Challenge & my shop. It brings those free mini coaching session bookings in – the rest of it is up to me. But the last three months have shown how important it is to be consistent & visible when using networking to market yourself and your business. It doesn’t take long for people to forget about you, & I now have the challenge of getting back into it and getting visible again to look forward to.
One of the ways I am doing that is launching a new face to face networking group. I’m a very firm believer in getting stuck in, I needed more networking opportunities to continue to build my business, so I am creating one.
If your hybrid networking isn’t bringing you the leads you are looking for, ask yourself these questions:
- Are you visible enough?
- Are you following up & adding value?
- Are you blending your virtual & face to face networking?
If it isn’t working right now, think about how changing one, or all of these elements could make a difference. If you need help working out how your networking becomes part of your marketing strategy, help working out what networking is going work for you, and help working out how to make all that part of your growth plan for next year, then book one of those free mini sessions and let’s have a chat.