I do a lot of networking – like 24 hours a month. I meet many new people and some of them are really cool. My least favorite thing to hear when meeting a new person is, “I would love to pick your brain”. Yeah, I know. Now don’t get me wrong. When I first started my business I found this flattering. I would schedule coffee with the person, usually have to buy my own, sit and tell them the answers to many of their questions. They walked away feeling great about me and I knew I had helped someone. Go me. But over time I realized these people weren’t then sending me business or in some way returning the favor. Somehow they felt entitled to receiving free information and I had just done what I’m suppose to do. In fact the only referrals I got […] Continue reading
Do You Participate?
I had a wonderful opportunity today to speak to the Society of Human Resource Management group in Medina today. Â Tomorrow I will be speaking to a group from the Akron Chamber on LinkedIn. Â Last week I did a session with the Young Entrepreneurs Academy. Â In each session, you could clearly see who came for a reason and who came because they had to do so. Â And it got me thinking…. When you go to a meeting, why are you there? Â Do you know? Â Can you answer? Â I’m on the programming committee for the Medina Chamber and we plan speakers for meetings. Â There are those who believe the speaker topic is the reason people come out. Â One person told me attendance is largely driven by the weather and in bad weather people stay home. Â So does that mean a truly compelling topic would motivate them to […] Continue reading
You Want Me As A Customer? Prove It.
I meet with a lot of sales people wanting to sell products and services to my clients.  I am constantly amazed at how bad sales people can be! Here’s the latest tips I’ve picked up from those meetings. If I get to the meeting location first it isn’t personal.  Twice I’ve arrived 5 minutes early for a meeting this week and had the sales rep annoyed. And showed it! Before we’d even been introduced!  Seriously?  If you wanted to buy the coffee, buy yours and grab a gift card.  Don’t get annoyed! READ our website.  Seriously. Please.  Develop a list of questions before the meeting and see if any of the answers are on the website.  I had one person tell me proudly that he had read the site.  But then he didn’t understand  the service my client provides.  Foolishly, I started worrying we hadn’t […] Continue reading
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