Who you have met does not matter. What matters is who trusts you, respects you, remembers you, has a deep understanding of what you do, and wants to help you. When you have been able to create all this with one of your contacts, you now have influence. Influence equals ease in creating what you want in business and in life.

Follow these steps to create more influence with everyone you already know and everyone you will meet in the future.

Connecting
This is the networking part. In addition to meeting people at business events and in professional situations, you will also meet people socially at parties, at family gatherings and online. Make sure you are doing something everyday online and every week offline that helps you to meet more people.

Creating Rapport
Once you have met someone, you then have to begin to get to know them and build trust. Some easy ways to do this are to remember people’s names, follow up on any action you agreed to take, and invite people to go where you are going to increase your exposure to them. Also of course invite them to join your online network within 24 hours of meeting them. Additionally because so few people send notes anymore a “nice to meet you” note will go a long way to begin to build up your influence.

Communicating Your Needs
Only once you have a strong rapport with people, this is the time to make requests of them for business or contacts. If you ask people to hire you as soon as they meet you, you will probably see hesitation on their part and sometimes even resentment. It is naive to expect people to use your services or refer others to you until you have created influence.

Take a look now at the people in your network. Do you have a strong rapport with them? Do you stay in regular contact so they remember you? If you have, then it is time to make a request that people work with you or refer others to work with you. If not, go back to step one. Remember, the more influence you have, the more of what you want will come to you with ease.

Leave a comment below to let me know what your experience or challenges have been!

Most groups these days do not have a requirement that you bring a lead for someone to the meetings. However, the more you look out for the other members of the group, the more they are likely to give you referrrals to people in their lives.

To find groups in your area just do a Google search
networking+(your geographic area)+ 2009

I am sure you will get lots of search results.

Otherwise start your own group. I have a innovative strategy to make this a business breakthrough strategy. I call it a Circle of Eight. Check out this concept here.

It was held at what I thought ahead of time was an unlikely location – Uptown Body & Fender in Oakland. Turns out the place is perfect, with its brick walls and clean floors. Owner Giovanna Tanzillo has a great event space that you can rent out.

I so enjoy these networking events where I meet new people and run into women I have known in the Bay Area Business community for many years now. Are you getting out there and meeting enough people these days to expand and keep up your network?

One of the highlights of the afternoon was hearing Meagan Connolly Haupt, owner of C5 custom jewelry http://www.c5company.com Meagan talked about the importance of making sure your business reflects your values. Her other two tips for business success were to be sure to take time to plan and to get out there and network.

Her company is one of about 20 jewelry companies in the United States that creates recycled and sustainable jewelry. That means when her jewelry is made it leaves a small carbon footprint, compared to the tons (I can not remember if she said 2 or 10 tons) of mining waste that is created for each gold ring we put on our fingers. Wow! That is a shocker.

I predict that buying only sustainable jewelry which also includes gems made in a lab instead of mined, will be the next big consumer trend, just like we no longer buy animal furs or aerosol products and the latest trend you are now seeing is organic fabrics being promoted and used in clothing manufacturing.

By the way my new favorite thing is my Hanes® Organically Grown Sleep Shirt, that is so soft you will love how it feels against your skin. I got mine from my Avon lady, Dortha Hise http://www.youravon.com/dhise. The sleep shirt is on sale right now.

In our business, and with our consumer spending dollars, it is so important to be sure that the way we do business and the way we spend our own money reflects who we want to be in the world. Equally important is to be aware of the environmental impact of the way we do business. I encourage you to be conscious of what you promote with the consumer dollars you spend. The fur industry tanked because people stopped buying furs.

Something to think about.  Anything for you to do?