As a business owner myself of a growing business I spend a great deal of time networking throughout the week with peers, service partners, customers and of course prospects.

What I am often surprised by is the number of business owners who introduce themselves and goes on to explain that they provide their services or products ‘to anyone that needs...”.

Make note of the comment ‘ to anyone...”.

Let me ask you something: if someone walked up to you, introduced themselves and after you asked them what they do they say (for example), “I provide coaching services to anyone that wants to improve their business, increase revenue, and wants a more productive team.”

Quick, were you able to identify someone within your network or ‘rolodex’ that fit his or her request? Were you able to visualize the type of customer that they are looking for as clients?

Most likely not.

Now, what if they said ” I work with women owned CPA and Law practices that are looking for...” Can you now visualize what they are looking for? What if they added “women owned CPA and Law practices that have 2 or more partners and revenues of $500K and above”.

Does that provide a much clearer picture for you? Can you now isolate those types of business acquaintances that you may know and have in your network so you could potentially provide a lead or introduction?

Most likely you can.

Now, this does not mean that they may not provide their services to other categories of customers, but if they want to acquire leads and intro’s, then you have to help those that you are meeting, and create a clear visual of the type of lead you are looking for. If you don’t, you are doing a disservice to both of you - you for a potential customer, and the referrer for wanting to help, and can’t.

Coaching Tip of the Day!

Before you leave your office for your very next networking event, conference, or gathering of any kind, define clearly and specifically the target client that you would really like to get introductions or leads to at that particular meeting. Then provide that visual to anyone you meet at the event and see how much more productive you can be with specifics and focus.

If you cannot picture the customer, they will not be able to.

NOTE: you can always switch up your target customer depending on the audience that may be at the event you will be attending. BUT, you do want to be focused on a few target clients, if not one target. This allows you to be known and established in an industry or sector. More on that later on another post.

Happy networking.