Your "web" of contacts is your primary warm market. Whether you are
building a business clientele, a downline, a support group, or even just a
group of friends. The place to start is your warm market. And your warm
market is the group of people with whom you have a relationship.
Pre-internet, this was largely made up of people in your geographic
locale. Meaning that those you could touch were literally, people you
could hop in the car and see face to face. Enter the internet. And your
primary warm market just got a whole lot bigger!
Internet networking is like picking up your telephone list from your
community or your church and contacting the people who know you and who
you know well enough to share your "stuff". Your stuff might be a
business idea, a new product or service, a juicy piece of news, or a
mutually beneficial opportunity.
Only with the internet you begin with your email address book and your
community or portal type URLs.
When you need to build a team, whether it be a downline, a support line,
or a network; you want to begin with people you have already built a
rapport with. You need to work with folks who already see you as a
recognized brand or authority in your field so that you can skip the time
consuming hand-shake process of getting to know each other.
Inter-net-working step 1.
Go to your email address book and compose a
single email blind carbon copied to everyone who makes up your web of warm
contacts. Write in a familiar style as these are people who know and
trust you. Give them your best pitch and invite them to contact you for
more information regarding the great new idea you are sharing. Sell
sizzle and excitement, but don't share so much information as to negate
any reason for them to contact you for further information. Hit the send
button.
Inter-net-working step 2.
Go to the online communities and forums where
your presence is welcome and recognized. Give them your best pitch as
well and invite them to contact you for more information. In this
environment, you may wish to give a little bit more information. But you
still do not need to give away the farm.
Inter-net-working step 3.
Prepare the first response email and/or
telephone outline for your warm market respondees. You don't need to work
directly from a script, or to send a form or autoresponder email, but you
don't want to have to reinvent the wheel 100 times for every 100 inquiries
you receive. Don't make the mistake of waiting for the responses to roll
in before you begin step 3.
When people respond to your initial contact,
they are actively interested. If they have to wait a week to hear back
from you, they won't be quite so actively interested and they may have
lost some faith in you for your tardy response.
Inter-net-working step 4.
Recruit into your plan as many of the
respondees as you can. Follow up with the maybes. And file the no's away
for further contact after you round up the affirmative folks and crank out
your initiative. Step 4A. Show everyone who comes on board with you how
to do the same thing with their web of warm contacts. Remember that all
networking, both online and offline, follows along the lines of six
degrees. This theory states that you are never more than six recognized
relationships away from any other person that you wish to bring into your
sphere of influence.
Inter-net-working step 5.
Roll out your plan and repeat with step 1. You
will either have come up with additional programs and agendas that you
wish to implement or you will need to bring additional players to the
table of your original plan. Either way, networking is a never ending
process.
By planning and implementing your networking in this manner, you will
continue to enhance your presence with your existing warm contacts and to
grow the size of this contact base. And that's what successful networking
is all about. And with the internet, the possibilities are truly
limitless!
Shannan Hearne is the President and Wizard of
http://www.SuccessPromotions.com Marketing Your e-Business Better through
creative marketing and knowledge. Guerrilla Marketing. One-to-One
Marketing. Relationship Marketing. Your Marketing. Founding team member of Inspiring Parents, a network of people
building an income and saving money on the things they buy every day. email: shannan@successpromotions.com
