Networking when you own and run a business is one of the most important and useful strategies that you can implement. It means you can take advantage of other experienced business owners’ knowledge bases and get some helpful advice along the way. It is also a way to gain new clients and build a good, sustainable, long-term business. So here are some other great reasons to go networking whenever and however you can – it will change the way you do business forever.
Referrals and Increased Business
One of the biggest and most obvious benefits to business networking is that you will build your base of customers, clients, and suppliers. This is why it is so important to join in with networking activities such as conferences and exhibitions. If you do decide to go down this route, then it is important to give a good impression of your business. Make sure you have marketing material such as flyers, pens or even mugs to give away and have some professionally printed brochures to hand out to prospective customers too. Investing in products that will help you network effectively is another good idea. Buying exhibition gantry stands will be a one-off cost that can stand you in good stead for future events and will pay for themselves thanks to the leads and referrals from the exhibition or conference you’re attending.
What’s really great about the leads you get from events such as these is that they are pre-qualified; those people are there for a reason, and they want to buy what you are selling. This will save you time and money, and you can make sales much more quickly and easily.
Further Opportunities
When you get together with a group of business experts, you never really know who you are going to meet and what they might be able to offer you – or what you might be able to offer them. There are always many different opportunities available to you when networking, and it’s important that you look out for them.
These opportunities can take many different forms including partnerships, joint ventures, client leads, asset sales, new suppliers and much more. Remember not to jump at every single opportunity that comes your way; some will be more worthwhile than others, and you don’t want to find that your time is taken up with less profitable ventures when you could be building and growing your business in other ways.
Connections
Remember that old phrase that goes ‘It’s not what you know but who you know’? In business, this is truer than in any other part of life. If you want to be successful in business, you must have a variety of different connections that you get to ask for help as and when you need them.
Networking is the best way of building this group of connections; this is the way to open the door to more successful business work. You can find that your connections are able to introduce you to other people – perhaps people who are more influential and who can help you even further. Keep meeting new people in business, and you will come across the right ones who can make all the difference to your own company.
Advice
Networking with people who are going through the same issues as you in business or have had similar and have come out successfully on the other side can work to your advantage. This means that you will always have a wealth of advice that you can gain to help you succeed. That advice could be on anything at all from obtaining the ideal work-life balance to how to find a good accountant. Whatever you’re having trouble with, someone will have the answer. Equally, if you can help someone out who needs some advice, networking puts you in the right position to do just that.
Become Recognized
If you can network well, you will raise your company’s profile without having to spend out quite so much on marketing (although marketing is important as well). Attending as many business networking events and exhibitions as possible will ensure that your brand, your business, and even yourself as a representation of your business, will become well known, and this can produce better results than many other marketing techniques.
If you can also build your reputation by helping others and doing great work, your name, what you do, and even what you stand for will grow even further. This will give you many more chances to find new customers and make more sales. Becoming a positive influence in this way, surrounded by other positive people, can make a big difference to how you run your day to day work too; the more positive you are, the more opportunities you will spot.
More Confidence
The more you network in any format and put your company out there, the more confident you will become in regard to how you sell your company. This is the point of networking, after all; you need to sell your company to others who will want to become a part of it, either through becoming a supplier, a client, or a partner.
Networking is an ideal endeavor for shy or less confident business owners to do, as it gives them the chance to grow and learn how to make new connections. Networking involves talking to people in a business framework, which is often different to how you would speak to people in normal everyday conversation. The more networking you carry out, the more you will learn and the better the results will be.
Make Friends
Although business is important, so too is having a good personal life – it’s that elusive work-life balance that needs to be met. Networking is great for growing a business, but it is also good for making new peers and acquaintances. Even if you find that you can’t necessarily help one another in terms of your companies, you still have something in common; you are both entrepreneurs and business owners. This can be enough to start off a great friendship which is just one of the wonderful reasons for networking.