Networking – Face to Face Contact With People You Want to Work With – What Should You Take With You?

Posted on April 15th, 2009, by Meggin McIntosh, Ph.D.

You are your business. You are your profession. You are your best representative. However you want to think about it, in nearly every profession, you need to be out there ‘selling’ yourself, regardless of whether you’re in sales or not. Networking may be very natural to you – or not so much.

If you are going to be making calls on colleagues, schools, businesses, individuals, vendors, or any other individual or group with whom you want to work, you might wonder what to take with you – and how not to spend a fortune on your materials. Here are some ideas to consider:

I recommend bringing the following:

Business cards; people expect to receive a business card, so you want to have one ready to hand to your contact.
Document (flyer, handout, brochure, special report, pamphlet, booklet, fact sheet, or the like) that you can leave behind with the person. It needs to be useful and something that provides your contact information and an indication of what you do and/or who you are.
Your planner; you want to have this available so that you can schedule a time to call back, to set up a program, to visit with some students, to address a meeting, or whatever is appropriate. You want to help the person you’re visiting making some kind of commitment and you want to be ready to schedule that.
Some prepared questions to ask to get the person talking about whatever the issue is (i.e., the issue that is connected to your reason for calling on the person). You are in an inquisitive mode, not a full-on sales mode. You need to find out what his/her issues are and then see whether what you have to offer can help with that. And if there’s not a match between their needs and your skills and expertise, be a resource and recommend someone else or another service.

Whatever you take, make sure you have things easily accessible and organized so you’re not shuffling around in your briefcase or folder. Leave any excess “stuff” in the car and just have what you need. Everyone is busy and you don’t want to be wasting time trying to find what you brought with you. You want to be able to carry your materials with you in one hand so that your other hand is free to shake hands, get the door, etc. Fumbling around never makes the best impression.

When creating the materials you leave behind, you could use MS Word, MS PowerPoint, MS Publisher, Adobe Acrobat (or other PDF creator). Each of these products have something to say for themselves in terms of ease of use and functionality, but most often, I use Word, especially when it’s just a one page flyer. SIMPLE is what to keep in mind (vs. cluttered).

If you don’t want to create your own materials, you could post the job on on Elance or Craigslist, but before doing that, you can always just give it a try to create your own materials. Just agree with yourself to spend an hour on it and see how it looks. Your flyers and materials need to be correct and informative, not perfect. I remind myself of this often.

Remember, we all need to be aware that we are marketing ourselves–and so the more people can get to know us, the better it is.

And, to make sure you are productive in your personal and professional life, you’ll want to access the resources at

**http://www.TopTenProductivityTips.com

Through her company, Emphasis on Excellence, Inc., Meggin McIntosh changes what people know, feel, dream, and do via seminars, workshops, writing, coaching, & consulting.

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