Turn Networking into Dollars in 30 Seconds or Less

In George Bernard Shaw’s play, Mrs. Warren’s Profession, there is a line that reads: “The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can’t find them, make them.”

This is what successful people do. In fact, one of the most important characteristics in self-made millionaires and other successful people is that they create opportunities for themselves by networking everywhere, all the time. They do not wait around in hope that opportunity will knock on their door … because they know it won’t.

As Harvey Mackay, New York Times best-selling author of Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty, repeatedly demonstrates, networking is the primary and best way to gain access to friends, jobs, health, legal, and financial information, hobbies, and services. Whatever circumstances you seek, whatever opportunities you desire, you can achieve them through networking.

“Great!” you say. “I’ve been the networking route and I think it’s been a huge waste of my time.”

It can be ... IF you don’t follow the three essential networking criteria:

(1) Choose networking sites for who is there, what they do, what they know, and whom they know.

(2) Be prepared to create relationships first before trying to get what you want. And

(3) Express what you provide "emotionally" in 30 seconds of less.

It’s number three with which the majority of people have the most difficulty. When you introduce yourself, what do you tend to say? If you’re like most people, you say, “I’m a _____” (coach, lawyer, doctor, manager, etc.)” Blaggh! How boring! You can just watch their eyes glaze over.

Why? The moment you say you’re a label, they make their own emotional associations with that label, conjure up old expectations, and shut out what you have to say about it. After all, they already know.

For this reason, you don’t give them your label; you give them your action – what you DO. But you make it intriguing, like the title of this post, “I turn networking into dollars in 30 seconds or less.” You leave them wanting more.

Your first sentence is short, pithy, and suggests action. It zeroes in on tapping into your listener’s desires: making money and doing it quickly.

Then you elaborate, further emphasizing the benefits you have provided others: “One small business consultant using my ‘30 Seconds to Gold’ method increased his income 50 percent from only one chamber of commerce meeting. As a result, the Albuquerque Business Magazine did a feature on him and my method, and Acme Insurance retained me to train their agents to be even more successful.”

You’ve heard of an “elevator speech.” That’s where you tell someone about yourself in the time it takes to go from one floor to another. Well, this approach is an elevator speech on steroids.

Before you attend your next networking meeting, create, refine, and practice your own “networking to dollars in 30 seconds” speech … then see the difference it makes in how others respond to your introduction.