Latest / Amplify Your Marketing Message with Christine Campbell Rapin / 167 - Turn Networking Into Sales Success

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167 - Turn Networking Into Sales Success · Amplify Your Marketing Message with Christine Campbell Rapin

0:02
Recently I saw a lightning rod on LinkedIn.
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A comment from a friend of mine that said networking is broken.
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It's become a social club where you think showing up gives you a
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Gold Star, when in fact it's a room full of fellow
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procrastinators who are afraid to sell, and they think that by
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showing up, they'll sell to somebody in that room.
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You feel cringing right now in your gut and you're like ohe
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Christine's coming in half and hard today, stay with me.
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I want you to win when you're networking, but too many people
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I know are in endless meetings that are going nowhere.
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So today on Amplifier Marketing message, I want to talk about
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this. I want to talk about the problem
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with networking. And I want to invite you to
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audit the rooms you're in, to audit how you're approaching it,
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and to check are you busy or are you productive?
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Because networking can be one of the smartest ways to find access
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to new collaborations that bring you into visibility of new
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prospects. And never mistake.
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That's the goal of collaboration.
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That's the goal of networking. This is an income producing
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activity. If it is not generating leads,
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what you're doing is broken, and broken leads to burnout, and
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it's avoidable. So get out your pens papers,
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make sure you record, download and save this episode and share
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it to somebody you know. Because too many networking
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groups are simple playgrounds of procrastination.
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You're surrounded by rooms of business owners who are broke,
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who aren't seeing significant client volumes, and you're in
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rooms of people who fail to make decisions.
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And that's dangerous. Every year at this time of year,
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I audit the rooms I'm in and I say am I generating activity
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that is income producing? Am I seeing consistent lead flow
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from that activity? Am I committed to contributing
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to the community as a whole? And am I visible in all the ways
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I can be for the money I'm spending to be in that space?
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And I just want watched you go wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
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What? I'm like, I do not spend time in
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free networking spaces. I don't need to go into rooms
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where broke. People are only looking for a
3:01
free option. My services are not a free
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option. Podcast is a free option.
3:06
Events may or may not be a free option, but my services are not
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free. And so I go into rooms where
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people who are already buyers, people who buy into paid
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networking spaces go into paid referral communities.
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And that is a measure that has proven solid gold.
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And if I'm in the wrong rooms, I exit.
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And so should you, because too many business owners that I have
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encountered, almost every client who's come and joined our
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business services this calendar year have said this in a
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paraphrased way to me. I'm in a lot of networking, I'm
3:48
having lots of 1 to ones, I'm not seeing any sales activity
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and I feel a question deep in my gut.
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Is it worth it? The results indicate no.
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It saddens me because they're in rooms of broke entrepreneurs who
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are showing up thinking showing up gives them a Gold Star.
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They show up with the intent to sell to others in the community,
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and they are transactional in their mindset and in the
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experience. And when I hear that, you know
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what I think? I think that you've been sold a
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social club where the only money moving hands is yours to the
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network owner, and if that's the only money that's moving hands,
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exit fast. I belong to paid networking
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communities where we pay referrals to each other, so
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there's a clear goal. The revenue shared from deals
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one far outstrips my dues to being a member.
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Did you hear me say that that's the kind of room you want to be
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in? So if you're not in one of those
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rooms, come find me and ask me to introduce you to the rooms I
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play in. If I think you're a fit, I'll
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refer you. And you can be in spaces that
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win because you need to be in a room of winners, not in a room
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of people who are procrastinating.
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Because if you think that simply showing up and going through the
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motions is the same as creating sales success, let's be clear.
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One is busy, 1 is revenue generating.
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So in your work day you need to be focused on revenue generating
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activities. So if you're in networking rooms
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where you are invited to add value but no one asked for that
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value, where you spend hours in pods trying to socially gamify
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your social platform, adding comments that go nowhere.
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Or you're building relationships with people who are broken their
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mentality, looking for the freebie path, and are not
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investing and not selling successfully.
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You're in the wrong room, and that's not the only room that's
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out there. Even if it might be what you are
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experiencing today, I want you to get clear your goal is about
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productivity. If I'm in that room it has to be
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a good return on time and money and if it's not, prune, exit and
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re invest in another space because number one, you've got
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to stop hiding. Showing up is not the same as
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creating success. I want you to invest in real
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relationships, and you never know how one conversation could
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change everything. But if you don't have
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intentionality about building that relationship and ensuring
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that you're aligned in your values, you're moving in the
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same direction, and you have faith, trust to advocate for
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each other, it's a lot of noise. A busy is not the same as
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success and busy that doesn't go success leads to broke and
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overwhelm. I want you to trail and track
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for the next 30 days. How many hours do you spend in
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networking rooms? How many identified leads did
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you create? Sometimes those leads are
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created through collaborative partners.
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But collaborations are about one thing, sharing leads together.
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If collaboration is not leading to a lead and you aren't
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tracking leads effectively and it's not above 0, boy, you're
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just stuck in busy work, my friend.
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So I want you to track how many rooms did I go into, How many
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calls did I spend? How many hours have I invested?
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How many leads have I created? And here's an important piece,
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my friends. What did you do with the leads?
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Did you build the relationships with them?
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Did you engage directly? Did you call, engage, talk to
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them? Because you must actually do the
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sales work. I don't care how you do the
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sales work, whether you want to do it in person, you want to do
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it screen to screen, you want to use it a tech platform with that
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e-mail, DM's or other ways, video and animations, all kinds
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of choices. But you can't skip the step.
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And I want you to track work that matters because when people
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do come to me and they do saying I invest, Christine, I invest.
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I know I have to find people. I know I've been listening to
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you for years. I listened to your podcast.
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I've been in lots of your events and you always say you need to
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find strangers. Your business will be built on
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strangers. And so to get in front of
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strangers, the effective way to do this is networking.
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It's one option and it should be an effective one if done well.
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So you're like, I've met all these networking meetings and
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I've joined all these communities and I spend 10 hours
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a week on networking activity. And I say, what's the result?
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And they go back to me, Christine, I spend 10 hours a
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week in networking activity. And I'm like, is that the only
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result that you're seeing that you are in spaces?
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Are you effective in those spaces?
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I'm going to say that the cookie starts to crumble.
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Well, I've had all these one to 1, so I said.
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And what happened in the one to ones?
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Well, we just told each other about our business.
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I said, and they say Christine, I just told him about my
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business and they told me about theirs.
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And I said, well, what did you take as your next step?
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I told them about my business, my friends.
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It's a good start that's not effective, so I want to build on
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that. When you are in an effective one
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to one, this is what it should look like.
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You are clear on the time committed for the call.
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You go in and you are sharing equally about your business.
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But here's how you share about your business.
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I stand for this result. It's a statement, 10 words or
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less. People who desire that result
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are looking for the following or encountering the following or
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can be observed doing the following.
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You need to give situational context so somebody could spot
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the pattern of somebody who seeks the result you deliver.
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And you say if that person experiences that, I want you to
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engage in introduction and you can think about how you want to
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be introduced or where you want to be introduced or the platform
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that you're most visible on and you want the introduction to be
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made, that I observed this problem and you seek that
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result. I know a great person who can
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help you. Would you like me to make the
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introduction and you make it and in that meeting, you should not
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ever have a one to one that doesn't have an ROI beyond a
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shared information because if some of my friends, you're back
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being a likable expert, You're not positioning yourself as a
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must hire. You're not asking for an
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introduction and you're not going to get a lead.
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So once you've shared, you say, who do you know that you've met
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in the last 10 days, this week and the week prior or even in
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the last 30 days that you could observe that pattern?
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And you wait. And if you need prompts, you say
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get out your social media. Who have you been talking to on
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LinkedIn? Who have you been talking to on
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Instagram? Who have you been talking on in
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your emails? There are good a person.
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Let's make that introduction now.
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Get the work done in the meeting.
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And here's what's so important if you want to build your
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reputation and be a cut above everybody after they've made the
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introduction that let them know how it goes.
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Let them know that you met, that they deferred, that they
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cancelled, that they know showed.
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Let them know that you moved them to an offer and this was
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what the offer is. And here's how the offer
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reinforces the result they seek and that it was a good
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introduction. And I think this is not
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required, but we do it so you can expect it from us.
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We pay out a referral Commission.
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And that's why if you go to our website,
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christinecampbellwrapping.com, you'll see a button right on the
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top. We love referrals.
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You can refer somebody to us directly.
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There we will capture and serve and support and reward.
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I can feel you. Your mind's going, Christine.
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I think I am in a procrastination of playground.
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I think I'm surrounded by entrepreneurs afraid to sell.
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I think even rooms are the only person being sold or money
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moving hands is me paying the fee to be there.
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I can see you going, Oh my God, I'm spending so much time but I
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never track the ROI. No more, my friends.
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This kind of thinking, this kind of awareness, this kind of
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tracking and dashboards is essential if you want your
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business to reward you like a business, you must treat it like
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a business and you must get very clear on the hours you spend
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that are income producing activities.
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And you must go after the lead, serve the lead, make the offer
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and get to a decision. No if, ands or buts.
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And if all of that makes you go, I totally get it.
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How do I do it? Well, we help you people do that
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every day. My invitation would be come talk
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to us because we help you structure this and as a result
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when we do, here's what kind of happens.
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I want to just share some some Ahas from my clients recently
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because I said every single one of them in the last year has
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come to me saying I'm networking, I'm in social clubs.
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I am not in rooms of movers, I'm not in rooms of buyers.
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I'm not doing this particularly well and help because I know it
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could work, because I watch it work in your business, because
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for us, referrals are the second most important lead generation
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source we have. Here's what happens.
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People that have been in business 8 years have said to me
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I was never clear on the distinction between what a
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contact is, what a lead is, and what a referral or collaborative
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partner is. I'm not clear when I was
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messaging how to position myself because I kept talking about me,
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my name and my company instead of the result.
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I stand for the when we get clients and the system that we
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do to create it. Repeatedly I watched people say
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I'm booking more sales calls. I'm watching people be aware
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that they're intentionally slowing things down by going
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meeting to meeting to meeting to meeting to meeting instead of
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fewer meetings. More productive.
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Track the ROI and tweak and adjust your strategy when that
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happens. I say this to my clients all the
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time. I don't need you to necessarily
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commit more hours, although if you're not doing any hours,
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absolutely you can't build from zero.
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I want you to be more effective in the hours you're working.
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And this is something that we are human around.
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So we might have good seasons where we're highly productive,
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highly intentional, highly aware of our tracking and really in
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our flow, our A game all around. And it feels like we're magnetic
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and we're winning, but we also sometimes take our eye off the
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ball. Life.
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Life we get in our own way. We fall back into patterns.
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It's normal. It happens to me all the time
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and it happens to my clients all the time.
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What we build is an awareness to make the gaps as short as we
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can. We take horse correction
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decisively, but this is a calling card.
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I want you to save the episode. I want you to share with
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somebody you know because I watch a lot of networking rooms
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in my day. I've been in a lot.
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Most are social clubs. Most are filled with broadcast
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entrepreneurs who are afraid to sell, who think going in,
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sitting in the back row and talking for two minutes and 60
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is going to move the needle in their business.
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Before I poop with that too far, will it move the needle?
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Yes. But at the speed at which you're
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traveling, it will take you 800 years to build your client base,
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and you don't have that year. You don't have 800 years, even
17:19
with the longevity stuff that's making us all look great for
17:22
longer, you need to get there faster.
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So my ask to you today is to think prune, commit to
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productive income producing activities and if you feel lost,
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you feel overwhelmed, you think I just need a how to solve this,
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you come talk to me. Christine Campbell Rappin, you
17:51
know somebody who should be referred into our business.
17:53
Click that link on our home page.
17:55
You want to be curious about how we support?
17:58
Get the support, Stop wasting time, stop being ineffective.
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Your next client is out there, of that I am absolutely certain.
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Let's get them served. I'll see you on our next
18:17
episode.