Evaluating Event Contacts

Ever go to an event?

Meet a lot of people?

See some people at event after event?

How can you tell who you should be meeting and who is a waste of your effort?

Here’s the way I’ve come to prioritize my activities at an event.

Most important, I am looking to acknowledge my existing clients and partners.

Then I enjoy seeing people I have worked with on a successful project. Completed commercial, civic, and social projects, and successful events are evidence of our ability accomplish something together. I particularly like projects that can be completed and also celebrated in one afternoon.

I want to meet the people who routinely put up and then take down the decorations at the dance. People who hold office and drive the check-in table are important to me.

Then I enjoy meeting people who say they are interested in working with me.

After that, I am flattered to meet anyone who has commented and added to my writing.

I am thrilled when I meet a writer or speaker I follow.

I like to hear an entertaining story, or some information I can use. Tell me about an event or website that interests me.

I’m never busy as there aren’t many people like that.

I am bored with people bent on unloading business cards, and uncomfortable with purveyors of that limited special opportunity, or their pressing immediate need that I should fund.

Have you met them?

After you fine tune your own rating system, how might that change your actions during and after events?

April 10 is the next Capital Technology Management Hub featuring Sales Lab’s Rainmaker 13 - Are You Making The Most of Your Opportunity? 300 seconds of pure profit. The main speaker will be Tom Cooper of Bright Hill Group, presenting How to Deliver On a Project - When Your Team Doesn't Report To You.

Rainmaker 13 - Are You Making The Most of Your Opportunity?

Technology isn’t about electronics. Technology is about how we work. Moving forward is usually a random walk.

The first few versions of an improvement are often hilarious...after we’ve recovered.

Databases are capturing and holding a lot of information about our customers. That is supposed to give a great benefit for selling.

To err is human. To really mess up requires a computer.

So what’s the best way to use all this data about our customers and prospects?

I find the key to the sale is to be present when the customer figures out something new. People like to learn something new and if I’m associated with it, I’m welcome in the future, sometimes even desired.

The purpose of data is not to tell someone what they already know, or even to make a recommendation of how they should act. The purpose of learning about your customers is to put yourself in the position where they learn something new in your presence.

Definition: A Rainmaker creates a significant amount of new business for a company. The Sales Lab Rainmaker Series is one rainmaker technique for technologists during the first 300 seconds (five minutes) of the monthly Capital Technology Management Hub Meeting.

Here's the growing collection:

#12 - Makers - The Future is NOW (3-11-12)

#11 - What Have I Done For You Lately? (2-8-12)

#10 - Tune Your Work for the Internet (1-2-12)

# 9 - Convey your Business Personality - Easy, Simple, and Free (12-24-11)

# 8 - Google + Your Personal Website (9-15-11)

# 7 - Mark Your Territory (8-22-11)

# 6 - Networking - Are You Being Served? (5-25-11)

# 5 - Start With an Offer (4-27-11)

# 4 - Time, Talent, and Treasure - The Winner's Lemonade (4-10-11)

# 3 - Process to Purchase - How to Sell Your Skills (3-1-11)

# 2 - The Name Tag (1-5-11)

# 1 - Gifts (11-5-10)

The Beginning - Rainmakers (11-3-10)

April 10 is the next Capital Technology Management Hub featuring Rainmaker 13 - Are You Making The Most of Your Opportunity? The featured speaker is Tom Cooper of Bright Hill Group, presenting How to Deliver On a Project - When Your Team Doesn't Report To You.

Facebook As a Social Media Tool

Facebook has developed apps for business and government to make it easy to use as a channel for individuals and business/government to provide and exchange information.

Does it work? Yes – but it's not magic. Creative design and vibrant content are required.

Here's illustrations of an innovative approach – one by business and one by government.

Proctor & Gamble has moved its advertising from print to social media to help sell their product line – soap, personal care, and consumer products. Ads can be targeted based on location and preference of the individual users.

The Facebook pages provide a variety of ways to present P & G products – text and static pictures like print media, as well as audio tracks, video, and interactive navigation of material.

With this flexibility, the company feels they can create active content to entice the consumer to buy their products that will be more effectively than static print ads. They also expect to reduce cost in the process.

In Congress, House Republicans have created the Citizen Cosponsor Project app using Facebook. In their words, it is a dynamic communications platform to enable the user to follow legislation and receive first-hand information from the House as it moves through the legislative process, and express support by becoming a bill Citizen Cosponsor.

These two examples illustrate how social media is being used to raise awareness of products or legislation and engage the users by incorporating an interactive component. Accomplishing anything similar using traditional channels would be costly and cannot scale to an audience of even a small percentage of the 800,000,000+ users in Facebook..

How will you use social media to further your mission?

Sales Culture

The discipline of sales does more than provide the funds that power the organization. The skills developed in the practice of sales have a far-reaching effect on the organization.

Sales as Change Agent

The fastest way to change an organization’s culture is to change what customers buy.

Communication

The skill to enlarge influence is communication. Selling is about communication. The next new thing is that every effective salesman will have their own web presence, that they design and maintain as a business asset.

Leadership

If you think leading a group on a mission is difficult, try leading before consensus is developed. Oh, that’s the definition of selling.

Square Deal

Every salesman I know has a healthy respect of the power of the disappointed client. Most weren’t disappointed by design, which doesn’t lessen the pain, and it is better to learn that respect earlier rather than later.

Developing Others

I don’t develop people because it’s some right thing to do, I develop people’s skills to make my life easier and more productive. Training time is way too important to spend on trivial pursuits.

What benefits of the sales culture do you use?

The Mosaic of Social Media

Initially, social media may have been thought of as just a toy for the kids. A way to keep track of what friends are up to, to share snapshots of the grand kids, to write on walls and tweet, or whatever. In the early days was some sense of a potential for business, but plenty of confusion about what that meant in reality.

Time has passed and early adopters have shown that social media is a powerful tool to get the business message out – to a potential audience of over a billion now (YES that is a B for billion) and up to 10 billion devices within this decade – on the desktop, on the laptop, on the tablet, on the smartphone.

Many organizations have entered this arena and use social media channels to provide information about services and products, extend their electronic personality, and have rich two-way communication with clients and other interested parties.

Other organizations are trying to map out a use plan which would be of value to them. Here's a snapshot of how I make use social media:

• Facebook.com has a huge audience (more than 845 million) and a dual personality: family and friends pages, and business pages - people can 'like' a business page to show support. I find Facebook useful to alert readers of interesting business events and presentations where I am participating .
• Twitter.com has 350 million users and accepts messages limited to 140 characters – business users can quickly share links with people they know, and the links can be found via search. I find Twitter useful to alert readers of interesting business events and presentation where I am participating.
• LinkedIn.com has 150 million users and focus on business connections, topical discussions, jobs, and other business information for its members – most information in LinkedIn is not available via search because only members may access detailed LinkedIn information. I find LinkedIn to be useful for sharing professional information and offering thoughts in discussion forums.
• Google Plus Pages have over 100 million users have created personal Google Plus pages which include an accessible Profile (can find full profile via search), invited contacts, a video conference feature, and a stream of posts and other public information about people and organizations the users designates. I find the Profile is useful to serve as my introduction to others and the information is searchable, and can easily share information with my contacts.
• Google Plus Business Pages (over 50,000 created in its first 90 days) are similar to Personal Google Plus Pages, but designed for business entities. I find the Business Plus Page useful to highlight our business entities, blogs, and to keep in touch with key individuals professionally, and to have available a quick and easy video conferencing service for up to 10 locations.

Although not of the same flock, posting to a blog is another channel to share thoughts and stimulate discussion and comments on current topics. Posting a blog twice a week is an effective way to be first in line to share new knowledge that you have discovered, as well as continuing the learning from a meeting or presentation by initiating a discussion with a broader audience.

Just as a mosaic is a collection of parts which come together to create a work of art, use of social media is a mosaic of business tools to better communicate in a variety of ways to reach a broader audience then ever before, in a form that appeals to that reader. It takes a brief amount of time to set up each form of media, but it is easily updated for new content, and is agile enough to broadcast a business happening while it is fresh. As is often the case, breaking news shows up in social media first.

How do you use social media? Please share.