Business Development Blog

I recently spoke at the Increase Sales with Social Media conference in  San  Diego with David Carleton  (@DavidCarleton)  Denise Wakeman (@blogsquad) of the Blog Squad, Mari Smith  (@MariSmith) of Facebook fame, Paul Colligan (@colligan) - Social Media Strategist, and Warren Whitlock (@warrenwhitlock) of Twitter fame.  I'll write more about what I learned in a future post.

But the thing that sticks in my mind was that the place was "tweeting" like mad.

Now, I had been on Twitter.com for some time.  But I had no idea about the power of the platform.

For those of you new to Twitter, it is a micro-blogging platform (you have 140 characters to get your message out) which allows you to follow key people in your networks and to build a following of friends, fans, customers, and partners.

Imagine this - as each speaker was presenting, people from the audience were taking the gems and sending them out to the people in their Twitter network.  And a buzz got created out in the real world about what was happening in a conference center in San Diego.

Think about that.  People built a following on Twitter, and then fed them with valuable information that they were getting at a conference which their followers couldn't or didn't attend.  Talk about delivering value & building customer and partner intimacy.

This is something that savvy business development people have been doing for years offline - and now they can do it online - and deliver incredible value to the stakeholders in their success.

I also learned about a few cool management tools to keep up on what was happening in the Twitterverse.

1. Tweetdeck - this platform allows me to search for exact terms out in the Twitterverse and respond personally to people who have an interest or ask questions in my area of expertise.  I have been steadily building a following by doing just that.  One of my students, Anita Leafty, introduced me to it.
2. Twitter Search - Search allows you to do much the same as above, but doesn't update automatically like Tweetdeck.  Very powerful, however, to find people who are interested in areas in which you have interest.
3. Hash Marks - If you want to be able to easily aggregate information or a flow of information, us the "#" followed by a short moniker.  For example, the ISSM conference was #ISSM (go ahead, Twitter-Search it).  I've started #LinkedInTips, #BizDevTips (go ahead, check them out too)
4. Direct Messaging - While some people dislike it, DM, as it is referred to, allows you to send a special message directly to someone on Twitter, much like an email.  This helps when you have something private to say and don't have their email address.  Very Useful
5. Socialtoo.com - This service allows me to follow the people who follow me and to send them a special thank you message.  As my following grows, it can be time consuming to do all the followup.  This program automates the process.  Now I just go and change the message every few days.
6. Mr Tweet - A very cool service that tells me who I should be following given my "tweet" content and the people I follow & who they follow.  Very good for network building and visibility.

Results, you ask?

I've been booked to speak at several more conferences (I'll keep you in the loop); I had more sales come through for our LinkedIn Training Webinars from people who have followed me; Jack Canfield is now following me (wow - what an honor!); And with some generous help from Mari Smith and folks in the Twitterverse, I now have close to 300 people following me - in less than a week.

And I'm just starting to get the hang of this.

I HIGHLY recommend that you start to learn about Twitter.  It can revolutionize the way you interact with, build, and leverage your network.

Find me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/chiplambert73

Raymond Chip Lambert
Network2Networth
Your Outsourced Business Development Training Partner

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Inbox spelled backwards - it does just that.  It turns your experience of your email on it's ear.  And it's FREE

Instead of having to fish through thousands of emails in your inbox, or setting up complex rules - that sometime work, sometimes don't work - Xobni's add-on to outlook shows you all the key data related to your contact, the communication you've had with that contact, and the documents that you've exchanged between you.  

All this happens outside of Outlook itself - in Xobni's indexing process.  This means that you can preview all of these pieces of the interaction jungle  before you need to open any relevant communications.

You can easily search for people with their built in search bar and it calculate the pattern for when you receive emails from the contact.  That way you know when you are most likely to catch them at their computer.  The analytics tell you how many emails you've sent, how many you've received, and ranks the contact via the number of communications you've had.  . 

Are you interacting enough with the key people in your network?  Quite an eye opener

Another very cool function is the "Schedule time with" link.  It will check your Outlook calendar and open up an email with your availability for the next 5 business days so you can send it to your contact to set meeting.  Very Handy!

Xobni also has a built-in LinkedIn function which allows you to click right over to a contact's LinkedIn Profile.  

All in all a very handy tool

A special thanks to N2N Student Toni Allen who called me raving about it's functionality.

Raymond Chip Lambert
Network 2 Networth
Your Outsourced Business Development Training Partner

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Technorati Tags: business development,linkedin,productivity,productivity tools,sources of business

Originally published in the inaugural Edition of The Rainmaker Advisor - for attorneys

Let’s face it – you’re busy. You may even fall under the classification of “very busy”. When it comes to developing business, you are faced with all kinds of options: a website, blogging, networking, referrals from current clients. The question is often where do I start? And how do I manage the ethical considerations? Especially because I’m so busy.

My advice – start with what you’ve already got. Then leverage it.

Enter LinkedIn.com, a free online social networking site for professionals.

Unlike Facebook.com or Myspace.com, LinkedIn® focuses on a business demographic¹:

• Average Age – 41; 
• Average Years of Experience – 15;
• Average Household Income – $109,000;
• 46% of it’s users are Decision Makers;
• Executive from All Fortune 500 companies are represented inside LinkedIn®.

These are folks who use legal services.

I train my clients to view LinkedIn® as a technological backbone to place underneath their already existing network of relationships. With 21 million people using the service, you may be surprised to find that many of the people that you know professionally are already users.

Add three levels of depth (seeing who your contacts know, and who their contacts know) and a search engine to explore those resources, and you have an extremely valuable resource to leverage.

By having a systematic approach, you can use this free service to become a magnet for referrals, business opportunities, and profitable alliances.

Here are the Seven Steps for Using LinkedIn® as a Business Development Magnet:

1. Perfect your Profile

Your LinkedIn® Profile is an online hub for Business Development Objectives. A well designed profile lets your contacts, prospective clients, and prospective referral sources know who you are, what you do, and what you are looking to accomplish. Make sure that you spend plenty of time perfecting it. Fill out all of your education. Fill out your past employment and experience. People feel like they know you when you disclose those things. Because LinkedIn is a Social Media, you want to bring down the barriers that people experience to getting to know you and your firm. This step is critical.

2. Learn the system

The power of LinkedIn® is the platform. The social software allows you to do advanced searches, connect to your current websites and blogs, promote your profile to current connections and people who could be connections, answer questions of users who are looking for someone like you and your firm, etc. Understanding the capabilities of LinkedIn® will allow you to leverage them once you’ve built out your network in their system.

3. Reach out to people you already know and build your network

You’ve spent a lifetime making connections. You already belong to multiple networks: your firm, your law school, your alma mater, your professional organizations, your place of worship, the PTA. All of these people know people. They all have connections that have potential value to you. And you have connections that have potential value to them. By reaching out to your already existing contacts, you will quickly reproduce your existing networks and be ready to use the technology to explore the opportunities that already exist in your first level connections, as well as your second and third level connections. You will never know if you don’t build it.

4. Get strategic

Know exactly what you want to accomplish. Write out your Business Development Objectives clearly and concisely such that anyone who read them could tell if you reached them or not. Are they specific? Are they measurable? Once you are clear, consider that you have an enormous network of resources available to you via your LinkedIn® network. Now answer the following questions:

• · How are you positioned with the people in your network?
• · Do they really know what you and your firm offer? If not, why not?
• · How could you communicate that to them?
• · Does your firm have a newsletter? Put a link in your profile so people can subscribe.
• · Do you blog? Via your profile you can direct people to your blog so they can read more about you.
• · Who refers you on a regular basis and why?
• · Do you have enough of these people in your network?
• · Do the people you know have contacts that could be referring you?
• · Do you know the characteristics of the people who refer you?

Once you have the answers, look newly at the network you’ve built. You will see opportunities that you didn’t see before. They were always there. Now leverage them.

5. Use the system to manage relationships

The advanced features contained in the toolbars that LinkedIn® offers give you powerful tools to manage your interactions with the people in your network. Download them and learn to use them. You can keep track of birthdays and overlooked emails. You can get updates from the people in your network as their profile information changes. You can keep track of your searches. Via a scan of your regular emails, you can find new people to connect with and continue to build and cultivate your network.

6. Reach out to meet new people through your contacts

Once you’ve built out your network and cultivated deeper relationships with the people you already know, begin to browse their networks. Look to see if they know people that will help you achieve your Business Development Objectives. You can even do deep, specific searches to find experts, vendors, specific people, and specific companies. Using the built in features of LinkedIn®, reach out to those people through the people that you already know. Use some of that Social Capital that you’ve built up with people. You’ll be surprised how willing they are to help you achieve your goals.

7. Be Consistent

The key to any Business Development strategy is consistency. Schedule 10 minutes a day for the next 90 days to work inside the LinkedIn® system. Not only will you find it enjoyable discovering new sources of business, but you will also build a habit that will transfer into your day-to-day habits and translate into a profitable world of new opportunities.

Social Networking is not a new thing. Professionals have been doing it from the dawn of commerce. Social Networking Software like LinkedIn, however, provides an opportunity to take those networks you’ve built over a lifetime and put them to use.

By developing a systematic approach to developing your network, and a technological backbone to uncover the hidden connections contained in that network, you have the opportunity to set yourself apart from other firms, and produce the kinds of result that Senior Partners in the big firms produce on a regular basis.

In our next article, we’ll address privacy concerns, ethical concerns, and demonstrate how LinkedIn®’s system is built to handle this.

Meanwhile, enjoy building what will likely be one of the best Business Development tools you will ever encounter.

Raymond Chip Lambert, of Network2Networth, is a Business Development expert who works exclusively with seasoned professionals to leverage their existing relationships through time tested Business Development strategies and online Social Media strategy thereby unlocking the value of their existing network connections. He can be reached at 602-635-4541 or www.network2networth.com.

¹Linkedin.com-http://www.linkedin.com/static?key=advertising_info&trk=hb_ft_ads

One of the beauties of having a wide and diverse network is that I get some great things in my mailbox.

Gary Freed, a Partner of Valuation and Forensic Services at Clifton Gunderson, CPAs, and also colleague of mine who sat on the East Valley Board of the University of Arizona Alumni Association, sent me an email with this telling look at the financial mess.

(click for a larger picture)

Always one for proper attribution, with a little work I found the author to be Mark "Spumoni" Slavonia.

Makes you wonder where we're heading.

Raymond Chip Lambert
Network 2 Networth
Your Outsourced Business Development Training Partner

Many of you have been hearing about Online Social Networks for some time.

You may even have a LinkedIn.com, Facebook.com, or MySpace.com account.

But how do you use it?  What do you DO to get the most out of it?

Each of these networks serve a different audience and have distinctly different purposes.

And given your busy days, with a focus on results - it's important to use the right system for maximum bottom line impact.

I'd like to focus on LinkedIn - primarily because if it's demographic - 27 million and growing business professionals.

Some stats:

Growing by 1.3 million members per month
750,000+ Senior Executives
Executives from all Fortune 500 companies
46% are Business Decision Makers
Average Household Income - $109,000
Average Years of Experience – 15
Average Age: 41

                   (source: LinkedIn.com)

This is a group of people that are not only your prospects, but also have access to your prospects. (Centers Of Influence)

The key with LinkedIn is to Map your current business network onto the system and begin to look for leverage points. 

LinkedIn is designed with a search engine that allows you to target your searches, via name, industry, location, etc., and see the direct introduction/referral pathway THROUGH THE PEOPLE YOU ALREADY KNOW.

Think "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon"

You can approach the people you already have developed relationships with to make introductions to great prospects - and decrease the resistance that those prospects could experience because you are leveraging social capital.

I understand that some of you are simply technology averse.  And you can continue to do what you've done and continue to produce the results that you produce. No harm, no foul.

But for those of you that are looking for a way to increase your productivity, shorten your sales cycle, and increase your closing rate, you may want to consider learning to utilize and integrate LinkedIn to your prospecting strategy.

Raymond Chip Lambert
Network 2 Networth
Your Outsourced Business Development Training Partner

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In a recent radio interview I did with Boomer and the Babe in the Phoenix market, we had a passing conversation about getting out there to network.

It seems that everyone knows they should be "networking".

People are telling them they should "get out there and network".

But what does that mean?  And do you really have the time to spend "networking" if you don't know what you are doing.

Isn't time one of your most precious commodities?

I got to thinking about what I could share that would make the biggest impact for readers regarding networking - what I call network development or business development.

First of all, know your markets. If you are like me, you are looking for leverage.  Go to events, or sites where your perfect client get together.  Then it's like shooting fish in a barrel.  You can take those time tested sales skills and go to work qualifying people and setting appointments.  Don't make the mistake of trying to sell in those places.  Use your time to meet prospects and schedule appointments to get people into your sales process.

Secondly, identify the vendors who serve the same markets you do.  They are potentially a great source of business for you.  But you have got to position yourself with something to offer them as well.  The law of reciprocity demands that you bring value to the table and have something attractive for them.  It could be that you make them look good to their clients.  It could be that you offer a product or service that enhances your prospective referral partner's business or value proposition.  The key here is to know what you offer and approach them with the intention to build shared value.  Set an appointment to meet and explore how you might be able to help each other grow your respective reach and influence in your market.  Be mindful that you are potentially putting your reputation on the line by referring someone - so take time to get to know these folks.

Finally, follow up and follow through with the people you meet.

Most sales folks fail in the follow up.  A friend and mentor once said to me that "The fortune is in the follow up."  Have a system and work the system.  If you don't have a good CRM (customer relationship manager) system, get one.  Your profitability depends on it.

Raymond Chip Lambert
Network 2 Networth
Your Outsourced Business Development Training Partner

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I logged into my LinkedIn account today and saw a little box in the upper header area of the site that says they have updated their User Agreement and their Privacy Policy.

Take note!

There are some things in here that we have been telling our clients for some time now - including specific things that you can and cannot do with the LinkedIn system.

In the next couple of days I will share my observations on the changes that have been made and how they may effect you and how you use the LinkedIn system.

Read the new User Agreement or Privacy Policy.

I'd love to get your feedback.  This could be pretty disruptive to the strategies some of you have been employing.  Let me know.

Raymond Chip Lambert
Network 2 Networth
Your Outsourced Business Development Training Partner

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