5 Activities You Can Do Now to Stay Connected in Business
At this point, even the most introverted of us are starting to miss interactions with our colleagues, co-workers and clients, let alone the sales and business development community. As social beings, it’s important that we stay connected with other people to collaborate (or commiserate) and at the same time respect social distancing. Consider this, a study was done by Rush University Medical Center in Chicago and it showed that socializing can improve your overall mental function by 75 percent. In addition, the University of Michigan conducted a study that said engaging in frequent social interaction increases intellectual performance and will help maintain a higher sense of cognitive ability. More importantly, it’s also can be fun, educational and motivating. As a business development coach, I have had numerous conversations with clients and colleagues about how they are staying connected, so here are a few observations and ideas:
1). Take this opportunity to learn. Now is the perfect time invest in some new learning opportunities for your business, your clients and prospects. Connect with business or trade associations to see what learning opportunities they are presenting. If it’s for a client’s industry, invite them to attend as well or recap the presentation and send them the highlights. If it’s for your own industry, invite a colleague so you can collaborate on the presentations findings and look for opportunities. Consider taking those online classes that colleges and universities have available now and that you always wanted to take. There’s an endless supply of learning opportunity out there so now’s the time to increase your knowledge.
2). Host a breakfast, lunch or happy hour with colleagues, centers of influence and clients. I’ve attended and hosted a few of these and they’re great. You don’t need a complicated agenda and it doesn’t need to be big. I’ve attended a few in the past couple of weeks with only a few people and it was great. Don’t overthink it…just do it. The idea is to get in front of people you haven’t talked to in a while, your centers of influence or clients to offer advice, talk about each other’s concerns and opportunities or just to commiserate a little on the difficulty of the situation. The happy hours work best for me for the obvious reason.
3). Host a client or prospect roundtable. These are certainly gaining in popularity and I’ve hosted a few myself. My goal with meetings like this is to be a connector. I want to help people connect with their peers to talk about the current climate and more importantly how we’re all planning to get beyond the curve. It’s so important now that we talk to our peers and support each other in getting through this unprecedented time. I’ve always walked away feeling replenished and that I’ve done something to help a fellow businessperson. Keep it simple, have an agenda and stick to one hour.
4). Nurture and grow your centers of influence. This is a great time to think about how you can help your centers of influence and meet new ones. Having a good COI network is important to any companies’ growth plans and now’s the perfect time to give these individuals some attention. Some of the ways I do this are:
· Inviting them to a roundtable
· Posting or reposting a social media article about them or their company
· Send them reading material via the USPS. There’s nothing like getting a good book in the mail
· Hop on a video call and get reacquainted
· Introduce them to a potential client or other center of influence
5). Use social media. Now is the perfect time to increase your skills and usage of social media; whether it’s LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter or Alignable. I’ve been more active on LinkedIn over the past 3 weeks than ever before and I’m seeing a boost in connections and opportunities. Use the time to grow your network. Set daily or weekly goals on connections. Ask for recommendations and follow trade organizations and clients. I’d suggest stockpiling content so when we do get back to doing business (however that looks) you’re all set with a couple of months’ worth of content. There’s so much you can do now with social media to enhance your personal and company brand so use this time to take advantage of it.
I hope these were helpful and if you have any more ideas please send them my way!
