Business success is extremely simple 5 steps

There are 5 essential steps to building business through business networking;
1. Set your networking objectives
2. Identify your target market 3. Develop your proposition
4. Define your inner network
5. Build your advocates
Go to the full article, Business Networking in 5 Simple Steps, for more and a complimentary ebook to help you build a plan based on these 5 steps.

I wish you success and will be effectively put in 5 steps to successful business on.
Good Luck.!!

Money can not buy everything you think !

If you nodded your head saying money can't buy love, that wasn't what I meant ! After all this is a business blog and starry eyed affairs of the heart seldom feature here !!.

Money can't even buy the thing money is supposed to be good at buying - a major sports championship. The trigger for this post is the NBA finals that concluded yesterday. The San Antonio Spurs defeated the Miami Heat to win the "World Championship" of basketball . For the sports purist, it was a wonderful result. The Spurs played sublime basketball. They came back after a heartbreaking loss last year to win it this time around. This is their fifth championship. But this post isn't about the sport - its about the money. In sports, superstars make insane amounts of money as salaries. If ever there is a breed even more mercenary than bankers, it is sports stars. Salary levels are simply insane. Kobe Bryant the highest paid NBA star, earned a salary of $ 1 per second ! There are 31 m seconds in a year and that's what he earned - $ 31m in a year. Or if you prefer $ 85,000 every day. And he was injured for most of the season and hardly played - he made all that money sitting on his butt (Sriram please note !). At least Kobe Bryant is one of the world's top players. What about Amar'e Stoudamire making $ 22m. He can't even make it into his own team. NBA salaries are guaranteed by contract - it doesn't matter if the player plays well or awfully. It doesn't even matter if he is dropped. He just banks the money. The most outrageous case happened five seasons ago and I blogged about it here. In every other field of human endeavour, pay has some link to performance. Not in most sports and certainly not in the NBA. Player salaries inflate to obscene levels and for the contract duration it absolutely does not matter what the player does. In this mad world of the NBA, the San Antonio Spurs stand out. Their top players take pay cuts so that the team can afford to hire good players. Their top players - Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili, have stayed together in the same team from the beginning. They could have doubled their salaries going elsewhere. They didn't and instead took pay cuts. Their coach Greg Popovich has been coaching them for 17 years. They play together as a team. They are unselfish - there are no giant sized egos. Their young rising star, Kawhi Leonard, won the Most Valuable Player award of the Finals. His salary ? $ 1.9 m. Now you can understand, why I am incredibly happy that the Spurs won. This is sports at its best. In a world of giant sized egos, obscene salaries, switching teams at the drop of a hat, the San Antonio Spurs represent modesty, team work and the spirit of sport. There is simply no other major team in any sport, even remotely like them. Think of Tim Duncan. One of the greatest players the game has ever seen. He's into his 17th year - his contemporaries have long retired. He is still a great player. He takes pay cuts year after year to help the team . He is self effacing to a fault. And he just wins. He played brilliantly in the Finals. It is his fifth NBA championship. This is what sports, and a sportsman, ought to be like. And here's another reason to love them . In the backwaters of Texas, where you would least expect it, is the most international of NBA teams. Their team consists of two Frenchmen, one Brazilian, one Argentinian, one Italian, one Australian and one Virgin Islander. Of the players who took the court in the last game only 3 were American. All hail the San Antonio Spurs.

Business networking and user psychology

Business networking and user psychology.

Advice on successful networking for building business through word of mouth has tended to be anecdotal and based on the opinion of people sharing what works for them. This was one of the reasons for the research we did into efective networking some years ago. We wanted to find the science behind it and that led to us developing the NRG Advocacy Model. The model is all about building your influence within your business network by developing trusted relationships with others who will be motivated to help you. A basic understanding of how people are influenced is useful when applying this advocacy model to your networking. The leading text book on the psychology of persuasion is 'Influence: Science and Practice' by Dr. Robert B. Cialdini. In the book he examines the key ways people are influenced. The six are Reciprocity, Commitment & Consistency, Social Proof, Liking, Authority and Scarcity. Many of the activities you need to undertake for building Word of Mouth through networking are under the heading of Reciprocity. Whatever it is that you want from your network then you need to be doing it for others first. The NRG Advocacy Model is all about developing business relationships to the point where you are regularly getting new opportunities, support, relevant information, the right introductions, testimonials and unqualified referrals. For people to be doing that for you means you probably need to take the lead in doing that for them. In the course of doing that you get to demonstrate the other key ways of building your influence. You demonstrate commitment and consistency by regularly doing the stuff you say you will do. You get commitment from others by always being clear about what you want. You provide social proof to others by working this way and by introducing them to other people you do business with. It makes sense to build relationships with people you like as per the old phrase "people do business with people they know, like and trust". By being clear about your your target market and proposition and sharing your stories you build your reputation as THE expert in your niche. When someone comes across a problem that you can solve your authority and scarcity are demonstrated when your contact says, "I will introduce you to..

What is a Business Networking Group?

I wrote this after a dinner party when one of the other guests asked me what I do.

I used the phrase 'Business Networking Group' in my reply and she said, "What's a Business Networking Group?" I was a little thrown at first, but realised I shouldn't be. I think we often assume that everyone knows more about whatever it is we do than they actually do. I once met someone on a Referral Institute training course who had written technical manuals. He said that the instructions included the advice to write so that an 8 year old can understand.

Wikipedia describes Business Networking as 'a socioeconomic activity by which groups of like-minded businesspeople recognize, create, or act upon business opportunities. A business network is a type of social network whose reason for existing is business activity'. A little complicated so I realised that I needed to explain a little bit more. I explained that there are now many more people running their own business than ever before. Many of them are specialists in what they do and do not have any marketing or sales people. They rely on personal recommendation or word of mouth for their business. Their main problem is that they need more of these opportunities than they currently have. Many of the older business support services in the public and private sector do not really help these business people with generating positive word of mouth. As a result specialist business networking organisations have emerged. Any club or group group exists because the members share and are committed to a common cause. The common cause for the members of a business networking group will usually be helping each other in business. This may be around sharing business, support and information (or all 3). It is mainly the need to generate more business by recommendation that has lead to the growth in the market of specialist business networking groups. A business networking group is a club where the common cause is helping each other become more successful in business. The most important thing in an effective business networking group is that the members don't just share the same needs. They must be in a position to really help each other. That will often mean that the members share similar target markets and provide similar value services. Success is then down to the commitment and contribution they make. Would an 8 year old understand how you describe what you do?