Whether it’s your personal brand, or your employer’s brand, you can’t expect others to extol its virtues if you aren’t willing to do so yourself. My favorite example of this is a concierge physician I met who has been known to go out to dinner and convince her server to call the office for an appointment the next morning. We’ll call her “Dr. Tobias.” She’s a brilliant, confident woman who lives and breathes her brand and mission from the moment she wakes up until she goes to sleep.

It’s this level of dedication — to offering value and solving problems — that convinces patients to travel from around the world for a consultation.

On a scale of “Never” to “Dr. Tobias,” how often do you connect with others about the value of your brand’s offerings? I know it’s uncomfortable, but the truth is everyone else is already selling something. To be successful you need to cut through the noise and make sure they remember you. How? By knowing what you want to say BEFORE it’s time to say it. It’s called the “elevator pitch” for a reason. When opportunity knocks, you often have no time to prepare your remarks, and only about 30 seconds to deliver them.

Does the idea of selling your brand to complete strangers sound overwhelming? If so, start by practicing your narrative in a more controlled environment. There are countless business networking events throughout the year where you can refine a thirty-second, three-minute and five-minute version of your answer to “Hello, what do you do?”

While it’s true that nobody likes a blowhard, the whole point of networking is to make connections that can help people accomplish their goals. Have you ever heard someone attend a networking event and complain they encountered too many potentially beneficial contacts? Of course not, that’s why they went to the event in the first place!

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… It may resemble you, and it may sound like you. But in the end, your social media is only a very thin sliver of who you actually are. The real you is far more robust and interesting.

The truth is that social media was never meant to be  a replacement for live, in-person handshaking and networking. Instead it’s a complementary tactic, a supportive endeavor — at least on a local level.

Don’t get me wrong, you can attract a good amount of business from well-conceived social media efforts — especially when you’re sharing relevant info, or having a dialog on the social media channels where your customers spend their time. But if you’re a company that does business locally, at least to some extent, you can still get a fair share of clients from in-person networking. Of course, you’ve got to know which groups to network in, which may take some trial and error.

Avoiding the Hungry Wolf Syndrome

Have you ever been to a networking event where you’ve seen someone suffering from “hungry wolf syndrome?” Have you ever suffered from it yourself?

Classic signs are a tad of wildness in the eyes, a bit of a snarl — even some drooling might be seen — where someone is so desperate to make a sale or land a customer that they come off looking like a hungry wolf who’s only concern is finding his next meal. Avoid this syndrome at all costs, because people will see you coming from a mile away!

You’re much better off going to a networking event with one simple goal in mind:

Develop relationships.

This is the same philosophy that goes into the creation of a successful blog, website, social media or email campaign. Some of the relationships you develop will lead to learnings, some to friendships, some to customers. When your intention is to develop relationships, you can be your authentic self, not your “selling self.” And if you’re developing healthy relationships, when someone you know needs a service or product you provide, there’s a very good chance they’ll come to you. You might even get a recommendation or two.

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