networking Archives - mcsquare marketing limited

I have today returned from an incredible few days in Newcastle in the United Kingdom, where I was attending a conference for Business Networking International (BNI) Directors 2017. So, I thought it was appropriate to share some of the knowledge, tips and quotes that I took away to apply for my businesses.

Before setting of last Thursday, as we should al do prior to attending any event, I had set my objectives for attending as a BNI Director Consultant in the Hertfordshire West Central Region. These were:

Learn new processes and initiatives that other leaders have tried and tested, that help professionals make more money
Network with over 250 other attendees, both those that I have now know for over 8 years as well as meeting new likeminded professionals
Share my knowledge and experience to hopefully add value to others.
Have some fun.

I am delighted to say I well and truly achieved all the above and a lot more and if I were to summarise my takeaways in just words they would be:

SUCCESS | RELATIONSHIPS | SMALL GAINS | CELEBRATE

Following some early morning business networking our event started on Friday with our great host for the 3 days Greg Davies introducing our guest speaker Martine Wright MBE.

A truly inspirational person that shared with us her “Power of 7” following her amazing journey since being injured in the 7/7 bombings in London. A great story to show that “Anything is Possible” and how that event changed her life forever but only through making Choices, Maximising Every Opportunity, Embracing Change, Teamwork, Marginal Gain, My Team Me and the Principal of Belief! WOW what a story and thank you for sharing this with us and I can’t wait to read her new book due out in July. You can actually pre order now on amazon too.

RELATIONSHIPS

The importance of building strong business relationships came through from several speakers including BNI UK National Directors, Charlie Lawson and Tim Cook as well as Phil Berg, Mike Holman and Ewan Sturman on “The Referral Process”. Do you know your staff, your team and what about your customers? Or should we say, “How well do you know them?” Do you really know what they enjoy doing out of work, what makes them tick, do they have any specific goals?

You need to be making time to ask and discover more about them so you can get to know them, help them achieve success too and to be able to also say “Thank You” to them appropriately – by giving them gifts that they like!! And guess what? During the process, they will also start learning more about you too and get to know “why” you do what you do! Put all this together and people will be happier to use and even promote your business to others for you.

SMALL GAINS

We all know that having goals and objectives are vital in business but how many of us have a process to help us achieve them?

Dan Kelly introduced us to his OST approach – Objectives, Strategy and Tactics which he has applied to his business. Your strategy and tactics must be kept simple and realistic and could be based on regular monthly campaigns, each delivering a small increase in results. Similarly, Julian Lewis as part of his “Do you Zig or Do you Zag” session highlighted how you could set challenges for your team over a period of time but with regularly weekly milestones. He also reminded us that as leaders our role is like a coach and how we can inspire people to achieve. This was brilliantly demonstrated through the short video clip of the “Death Crawl scene form Facing the Giants” I totally recommend you watch it.

https://youtu.be/-sUKoKQlEC4

CELEBRATE

Many speakers talked about how they congratulated and awarded their teams on achieving results and ensured they celebrate their success. And of course, not to forget thanking clients for using our products or services. Why? Because it shows appreciation and motivates people and helps with retaining your clients. People love recognition when they have achieved something.

From a simple phone call or thank you card – of course relevant to something they are interested in through having built your relationship! Invitation to exclusive events to feel like they belong to an elite group because of their achievements, such as Dan Kelly’s Pareto Club in Norfolk and The Green Club of Brian Gates and Kathryn Saggers. Or it could be a financial contribution, small or large, to an external social event or simple gift.

If I were to summarise my takeaway in one phrase it would be:

“Success in business is all about building strong relationships, achieving growth through bite size gains and celebrating every time.”

This is what BNI helps you achieve! As a member for 12 years, I am truly passionate about the organisation and the way we help other professional businesses make more money as it has done for my mc square marketing business. To find out more about how your business can benefit from the ethos of “Givers Gain” please do get in touch. Wherever you are around the world I can help introduce you to possibly your next biggest client!

And finally …

I couldn’t end my article without including some inspirational messages from some of the other top speakers I was privileged to listen to. A big thank you to you all for planting that important nugget in my mind to now act on.

“My knowledge is irrelevant without the ability to empower others to take action from it” – Phil Berg

“Ignorance on fire is better than knowledge on ice” – Kathryn Saggers

“The Upward Spiral – A positive ATTITUDE leads to Positive BEHAVIOUR which leads to Positive RESULTS!” – Niri Patel

“81% of employees are motivated to work harder through APPRECIATION” – Peter Higgs

“Get more deeper relationships, not just meet lots more people” – Ewan Sturman

“Leaders do things that followers are not expecting” – Julian Lewis

Social Media Marketing World 2016
San Diego

WOW – yet another amazing SMMW conference hearing from the experts and meeting like-minded professionals in the digital and social media industry.

Following a long flight to San Diego courtesy or Virgin Atlantic and Delta Airways the learning soon began with pre conference workshops on Sunday afternoon. I chose to attend a session on “How to create videos on your mobile device that your audience will watch and share”. Some great tips on how to capture better filming, use of light and depth of focus. Introduced me to the Filmic app which helps you shoot better films too. Now need to practice!

The official conference then kicked off in true social media style with a networking event on the USS Midway with over 3000 (only 42 from the UK!!!) delegates enjoying the food, drink, entertainment, including flight simulators and tours of the ship itself. For those not used to networking the Networking Bingo Card game was a great way and opportunity to meet lots of new people and sharing experience and knowledge.

The conference then kicked off the following morning with Mike Stelzner from Social Media Examiner sharing his findings from a recent survey they carried out. Some of these I have highlighted in my overview paper for you to download. Next we hit the road running with the streams of workshop sessions, 10 running at any one time!!!! This is where decisions had to be made as to which to attend. My plan was to focus on what I believed would benefit our clients to ensure we continue to add value and get them results.

The topics we chose were also in line with what I believed were the key MKT’s – Must Know Takeaways from the whole of the conference:

– Live Video is the answer to success
– Snapchat is here
– You have to Pay to Play – Social Advertising
– Content Marketing is still alive

Throughout the conference we were lucky to hear from some amazing experts including Mari Smith, Gary Vaynerchuk, Kim Garst, Mark Schaefer, Jon Loomer, Rick Mulready, Ian Cleary…. To name just a few. We were also delighted to have managed to get one of the Keynote Speakers, Mark Schaefer do a LIVE BLAB with us back to the UK and my business coach Denyse Whilier. Once again thank you Mark for your valuable time and contribution. If you missed this, look out for our video recording due to be uploaded soon or go and see him live in Dublin in May – Book here

So if you asked me what my 4 MKTs were, they would be:

1 – LIVE VIDEO
This was by far the biggest message that was consistently projected or touched upon in most sessions. Last year it was about “Native Videos” on Facebook this year it was about the power of using “Live Video” to engage with your following or to use it to grow your “tribe”. It’s about “Video in real time, at the right time”

As Kim Garst put it “LIVE VIDEO plays a big part in the know like trust factor”. It’s all about building relationships and showing your real self and not worrying about the actual broadcast itself but the content and messages you are sharing.

Whilst Facebook Live is probably the biggest player in this arena so far, we are also seeing growth in use of BLAB too and of course Periscope is still alive and kicking, unlike our little Meerkat who has left the social playing field. Look out too for YouTube who are already trialling their “Live streaming” offer.

2 – SNAPCHAT
Well until the conference I was not 1 of the 100 million users already snapping away on this social media channel!

With the number of daily video views going from 2 Billion to 8 Billion in less than a year, we need to jump on this opportunity. The time is right to join now and start building your following. As Gary Vaynerchuk said “you need to go to where the attention is at its highest” and Snapchat is where it is for him at the moment. Other big brands are using this channel through having key influencers like SHonduras, ShaunAyala and celebrities like DJKhaled endorse or promote their products.

Whilst 77% of users are 18+ it’s not just for millennials and one thing we should not forget is that they will also grow to potentially become your future customers. We are also living in the moment and want to know what is happening now and Snapchat gives us a network for story telling on mobile device. Short quick visuals, video and messages that are live for only 24 hours

3 – SOCIAL ADVERTISING
Have you noticed that organic traffic on and to your website from Facebook, is down?

This could be due to Content over load, Bad content, Poor tracking or simply Facebook Algorithms. This is because we are now in a PAY TO PLAY arena.

Again here the focus was on Facebook advertising and video advertising and little mention of Twitter. The message was also about not just placing ads or boosting posts but about how to integrate it into your sales funnel process and trigger for Re targeting marketing. No surprise either, that Facebook Video Ads are also performing and delivering results for clients. Being clear on the objective of your advert and including great relevant video content that adds value to the viewer is key.

4 – CONTENT MARKETING
Mark Schaefer, Michael Stelzner and Mitch Joel discussed at length whether there was a future for Content Marketing and Mark rightly stated that we have to adapt, so what was marketing content 2 years ago is dead, but it has now been replaced with different type of content marketing or channels to put your content on.

I totally agree with the team and what was also highlighted was that it’s not just about the numbers but also having the right people in that audience you are talking to. With organic reach falling it is also clear that our audiences are shrinking so engaging with key influencers is growing in importance, together with having a clear content marketing plan in the first place. Then you can decide on the appropriate channels to communicate through.

Mark Shaefer’s final keynote session to close the conference was likewise focused on both ROI of Social media and content marketing. I particularly liked his comment saying that “Content is the starting line not the finishing line” and can totally relate to the fact that “85% of people say reading content that other people share helps them understand and process brand information and events”. We really do value our friends’ opinions and continue to base buying decisions on this.

His final point to close the conference was all about what do we need to do to stand out in this noisy world?

He put it simply to “Be more human! It will create the awareness and gain loyalty”

A fantastic way to end 3 full on days of learning from the experts and now our goal is to put this into action for our social media management clients. You too can find out more about the key learnings by downloading my detailed white paper, full of notes from the sessions attended at the conference. Simply click here for access.

We will also be sharing more of our MKTs, top tips and ideas on our “Einstein’s Formulas to Success” group on Facebook so come along and join Einstein’s tribe. We’ll keep you up to date with the latest news and tips to help with marketing your business or organisation with guest speakers appearing and sharing their knowledge too. Join here

We met back up with people from last year’s conference and made some more new amazing friends too. Even met up with a fellow BNI member from Vermont, friends from Australia, Toronto, New Jersey, New Zealand, to name a few and a people from the UK too.

Category: networking

How to ACHIEVE and CELEBRATE SUCCESS