5 Business Development Ideas To Keep You On Top Of Your Game During The Coronavirus Shutdown
These are interesting times. Networking events and other group meetings are being cancelled or postponed on a daily basis right now which leaves many of us to wonder what we can do to continue to build our businesses. Although networking is a key component to any good business development plan, there are many other things you can do to keep on top of your game. Here are five ideas that I’ll be doing to build my brand and grow relationships.
1). MEET WITH YOUR CENTERS OF INFLUENCE. Now’s the perfect time to reach out to your list of COI’s that you may have been neglecting so far this year (and you can do it via video conference). COI strategy is a great way to build your brand with highly networked professionals. Think of ways to give them value by understanding who they would like to meet with and what information they need to grow their business. Do you have information about the industry? Or a competitor of theirs? Do you have any contacts that would bring them value? Remember, having a good COI strategy means information and introductions go both ways. Before you meet with them, check out their LinkedIn profile to see if they have any connections that make sense for you. Invite them to do the same with your LinkedIn connections.
2). PRODUCE CONTENT. Now that you have some extra time on your hands, sit down and develop some content. I hear all the time from colleagues that they know they need to write a blog or push content on social media but they don’t have time. Now you do. Set a weekly goal for yourself to produce at least one original piece of content. It could be as simple as finding an article to post and comment, developing your own article around your company and services or sharing a personal story. There are million things you could write about. Build up a nest egg of articles and posts so that when things get back to normal, you now have a large pool of articles to choose from.
3). ASK YOUR CLIENTS FOR REFERRALS. In my experience, there are many of us who don’t do this on a consistent basis. I’m guilty of this at times. This is a great time to sit down with your clients to see how you can further help them with their business and at the same time ask them about an introduction. Just like your COI strategy, look at their client list or LinkedIn profile to see if there are any companies that make sense for you to meet. Ask them for an introduction to a specific person. Give them a pre-written email that they can use to execute on the introduction, so they don’t have to think about it. By sitting down with them and learning more about how you can help them through this situation, it may uncover clients or relationships they have that you can help as well.
4). WORK ON YOUR BD PLAN. Now’s the perfect time to sit down and develop a plan and processes around your business development activity if you don’t have one. Develop a vision, goals and tactics that you plan to use. Discuss with your team members and brainstorm some ideas on different tactics to use. Set some timelines up for those tactics and how you’re going to hold yourself accountable. Think of how you can integrate your CRM into your business development process to help in execution. If you have a business development plan already, what can you do to add to it? What are some additional tactics you can add to your current plan during these uncertain times?
5). HOST A NETWORKING ROUNDTABLE. This is a great way to get several people together to discuss your businesses and collaborate on ideas. I prefer smaller roundtables from 6-8 people over lunch. However, breakfast or happy hour works well too. I usually keep the meetings to 90 minutes, that way everyone gets ample time to talk about their businesses and build relationships. You can also use a roundtable to discuss a particular topic like how everyone else is coping during these times. Or bring in an expert on a topic that everyone would like to hear about. There are a bunch of different ways to execute on this and hosting a roundtable also helps support our local restaurants who are suffering during this time.
I hope this helps you think of some different things to do to keep your business development activity high during this time. If you have any other ideas, I’d love to hear about them. Email me at john@dinkelbd.com.
