In an increasingly digital world, where does face to face, personal networking, come into place? Often, the common school of thought is that the ‘new way to network’ is to hit that connect button on Linkedin and hope for the best! 

Is it really surprising that the ‘connect and forget’ method gets no real, long term results? That having thousands of connections on Linkedin, and Facebook, doesn’t really mean a thing?

It’s not surprising because the fundamentals of building a business network have not changed, ever.

The foundation to a network that actively passes work to each other is trust. Without it, people won’t refer. They might say it’s because they haven’t had the opportunity – but it’s like going to watch an awesome movie. If the movie is absolutely fantastic, delivers on all fronts, and you like it – you’ll tell people to go see it. 

Why?

Because you look great for referring it!

So, similar to a great movie, if you come across someone who is an ‘A grade person’ – who delivers on all fronts (whatever their service is) – you will refer them.

But how do you find out what that person is really like? 

You can’t do that online.

You must meet them face-to-face!

Trust is developed by more than an online spiel. It’s developed by observing someone’s consistency in outcomes & inputs, personal attitude, friendliness, empathy, past results, and keenness to work their brains out to help someone.

Imagine referring to someone like that?

So to understand and get a feel for those qualities in a person (trust) – you need to see those qualities in action. 

How do you both get a feel for other people’s key qualities, and show them yours? Typically people ‘Go to a networking event.’ 

As if one is enough!

It’s easy to be on your best behaviour when meeting someone once. It’s like being on a first date. But what you’re really looking for, and looking to show, is consistency in actions & behaviours over the long term. So you need to attend one event, consistently. This could even be your daily MAMIL (Middle Aged Man in Lycra) cycling meetup – the point is – choose one event to meet people and be consistent! You’ll get to know everyone there over time. 

But networking is hard!

You might be building it up to more than it really is! Read our resource on how to network, linked below:

So we’ve established, that you not only need to display good qualities to people through face-to-face networking, you need to do it consistently over time. 

This is the whole reason that Relevant Networking Events exists. To provide you with events that you can attend, and build a network with over time.