Instigator Blog

There seems to be a bit of confusion over my post, The Secret to Networking Successfully.

I wrote that the secret to networking successfully is simple:

Know What People Have To Offer and Know What People Need

The post was brief (perhaps too brief!) but it’s all about connecting other people together by matching them up. When you know what people are offering, and you know what people need, you’re able to bring them together. It’s not about selling people on your services/products or being sold - you’re playing matchmaker.

And matchmaking is uber-powerful when it comes to networking because it:

• Keeps you in touch with people
• Raises your profile
• Leads others to reciprocate
• Boosts your networking karma

The idea of network matchmaking is summed up very nicely in this email message (just a sample of what I might send):

Dear Bob,

I hope you’re doing well. It was great speaking with you the other day, and I wish you the best with your new project.

I wanted to introduce you to Leslie (who is cc:’d on this email.) She’s a great graphic designer that I met a few years ago, and I’m confident she could help you out with your project. Her blog is at http://www.greatgraphicdesigner.com. I spoke to her briefly about what you’re doing and it’s right up her alley.

Her email address is leslie@greatgraphicdesigner.com.

Let me know if it works out and if I can help out in any other way.

Sincerely,

Ben

Short, sweet and to-the-point. You’ve just connected two people that need each other. You have put your reputation on the line (so do this cautiously) but even if it doesn’t work out you’ve gained bonus points with Bob and Leslie. They’ll appreciate the effort, thought and willingness to take some time out of your day to connect them.

1. Know What People Need.
2. Know What People Have To Offer.
3. Match ‘em Up!

My friend Julien Smith has one of the most popular podcasts around, and he’s an opinionated fellow when it comes to doing good and connecting.

Julien feels there’s not enough community-driven things going on in Montreal. He unleashed a hailstorm of comments from people with opinions across the board. Many people disagreed, saying that the community is strong, vibrant and active.

Here’s my take - Montreal has a lot going on. But, there is a disconnect. That disconnect lies between the various groups of people in the technology space doing things for different reasons. Some are working exclusively on non-profit projects, others are more business-focused. Some do it for the art, others do it for the money. And, with a smaller city, you do get pockets of expertise - programmers in their Linux User Group meetings, artists collecting at art galleries, entrepreneurs…well…

Hugh McGuire (great guy behind LibriVox and blogging at dose) hits the nail on the head:

I have been around the world, and Montreal has something very particular, but also less cash and less alpha attack (maybe because of that). For me that’s a good thing: rents are cheap, people do art for art, and not to make a name for themselves (see what it’s like in NYC). (on the downside, no one can sell anything here).

A few things stand out there:

• less alpha attack - that’s bad.
• people do art for art - that’s good, but when art and business come together it’s even better.
• no one can sell anything - that’s bad.

The problem doesn’t lie with artists, technologists, a lack of resources, people too spread out (although it wouldn’t hurt to be geographically focused), etc. The problem is a lack of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial spirit.

When entrepreneurs get together magic can happen. Ideas are exchanged. The right questions are asked. People help each other more.

We need more entrepreneurs.

We need to bring them together on a regular basis, to share ideas, goals, contacts, leads, etc.

With that in mind, I’m proposing a weekly (or regularly scheduled) breakfast meeting for every entrepreneur out there doing something in the technology space. That’s a broad swath; from social media experts to hardcore geeks to business people in the Web world…If you’re an entrepreneur in the technology space in Montreal, you should attend.

Breakfast is easier for me (I got a young kid at home!) and meeting up with everyone would be a great way to start any day. How about Wednesday? Thursday? (I’m flexible on location.)

If others are interested, I’d also propose we think about ways of connecting at the breakfast. I don’t think we need to play musical chairs or introduce each other in a kumbaya circle, but what if each of us asked everyone else casually in conversation, “Is there any way I can help you out?”

I wonder what kinds of connections we’d create then.

So, anyone interested? Fellow entrepreneurs…you folks out there?

(PS. If you’re counting, I’m going to use this effort to cross off one of Ron McDaniel’s buzz marketing challenges. Ron suggests that you arrange a networking lunch. He recommends inviting 2 or 3 people together that don’t know each other. To help kickstart the idea, meet with 1 person and ask them who they’d like to meet. Then call up the 2nd person and bring ‘em together. I think this is insanely cool and powerful. My networking breakfast isn’t quite the same, but it should still bring people together that don’t know each other!)

It’s always a good idea to include images on your site, landing page or online sales letter. I’ve seen studies done on the effectiveness of landing pages (although I don’t have a reference to point you to right now) that indicate the use of images is very important.

I think this is even more critical when selling a non-tangible item, something people won’t touch and feel.

For example - you might be selling software that’s dowloaded or hosted, so the client never gets any actual software box. Or e-books, white papers, audio books, etc. — all great examples of items that might not have a physical component to them, but benefit from the use of an image.

People like to see what they’re buying.

I wanted to create a 3-D Product Box for my business blogging site precisely for that reason. To give people a more tangible feeling, to show them that my services include documentation. I think it adds a more comfortable feeling to the site and my approach.

Creating the 3-D Product Box is quite easy using Photoshop, and I found a very helpful guide: Create a Product Box in Photoshop.

If you’ve got a bit of experience with Photoshop this should be very straightforward. I did have to fiddle around with the final steps regarding the shadow behind the box, otherwise they were spot on.

Admittedly, my example above isn’t great - the text isn’t ultra-clear and the URL is totally lost. But I did it quickly as a demonstration - work a bit more with the colors, layout, fonts, etc. - and you can produce a 3-D Product Box that is extremely clear, easy to read and effective at giving people an image of what you’re selling.

Commenting on blog posts, forums, websites, etc. will generate the most buzz you can get. Even if you don’t write your own blog, you can still generate buzz via comments.

Why are comments so important?

Click to continue →

1 week into my 3 week Buzz Challenge and I need to pick up the pace. I’ve only accomplished 4 of the 57 buzz challenges in Ron McDaniel’s book Buzzoodle Buzz Marketing.

Admittedly, a few of the buzz challenges I’ve always done, but I’m trying to find new twists on the ideas or bring you resources of value.

With that in mind, let’s tackle tagging.

Ron’s challenge describes tagging as a way of bookmarking your website or blog content using a site like del.icio.us. Del.icio.us is a social bookmarking site, where anyone can bookmark interesting content. The more people that bookmark a blog post for example, the more likely it will receive more traffic from the social bookmarking site.

The traffic from del.icio.us can be quite good; people have taken the time to bookmark something and often others will be following the bookmarks of specific people. And you’ll gain long tail traffic from bookmarks (unlike sites like digg and reddit which usually just create spikes.) Long tail traffic means traffic will keep filtering through over time as people search other people’s bookmarks.

Another form of tagging is for Technorati, which is a blog search engine. At the bottom of all my posts you’ll see these tags — keywords that highlight what the post is about.

Those tags help Technorati figure out what your content is about. They’ll also help drive traffic from people searching on Technorati (although I’ve never gotten a ton of traffic this way.)

On Technorati you can see what tags are popular or look up any specific tag. For example, here’s what Technorati has on the tag entrepreneurship.

Putting tags on your posts is very easy.

If you use WordPress, I recommend the plugin SimpleTags. It’s ultra-easy to setup and makes tagging very simple. I prefer it to the more popular Ultimate Tag Warrior because SimpleTags is lightweight. I’ve had problems with UltimateTagWarrior slowing things down while posting (and heard other complaints.)

When you install SimpleTags, all you need to do is put tag code around a comma-separated list and it creates the tags for you. The tag code looks like this:

If you’re not on WordPress and your blog software doesn’t offer a plugin to help you out, you can use a tagging service like Free Tag Generator. It does more than create Technorati tags, but it’s simple enough to use. Fill in the words (comma-separated) and submit. The site generates the code you can copy and paste into your blog post.

Tagging your posts through social-bookmarking sites and for Technorati are both simple, easy ways of helping people become aware of your content - and that’s always a good thing!