1. Engage with other active group members who are leaders in your field. By engaging I mean connecting with other thought leaders like yourself who enjoy collaborating and consider interviewing each other. One person’s perspectiveis very different from another and adds additional depth and dimension to your personal brand.
2. Connect with the head of the group. Consider requesting you become one of the group managers. If you are willing to lead a group then you can make your posts “featured” which brings them to the top of the list of posts. Now you have the opportunity to raise your profile and thought leadership.
3. Recommend your favorite groups to others in your field. Become an advocate for the groups you find most effective. Your recommendation will be seen as an added benefit in helping colleagues and those who get to know you through your colleagues as a step up in developing yourself as a leader online.
4. Consider starting your own group. I started my group Networlding on LinkedIn several years ago. Now it is one of the largest groups on LinkedIn. As such it enables me to be a member of a group called “The Super Group” which is just for the leaders of the largest groups. By becoming a member of that group I was able to meet many influential leaders and share lots of best practices for growing vibrant groups. I also connected with the leader of that group, Richard Chaplin, who is now going to be one of our authors in our soon-to-be-released series of books on the best social networking strategies for a wide variety of different professionals and initiatives.
5. Aggregate, synthesize and republish other articles, blogs and tweets that you found beneficial. I say it often but this one simple tip can go a long way. Many people have great ideas. It is the aggregation of these ideas where you showcase them and their authors and then add your unique wisdom as to why they are so important that helps your growing audience learn better and faster. There is room for many experts in this dynamic, growing area called social networking.

So what other strategies have you seen working well? Who do you like to follow? What is missing that no one is currently addressing? Please share your insights or comments.

Open the Door of Opportunity

I have been training people on LinkedIn now for more than six years and I keep hearing the same question,”Now that I am LinkedIn what do I do?” Following is a list of 10 things (this is Part I) you can be doing that are can really make a difference in your results. Currently I get about 40% of my business from LinkedIn. Maybe this will help you? Weigh in on your best strategies and if I use them I will be sure to acknowledge your idea!

1. Join a variety of LinkedIn Groups. Start by joining three to five groups. There are so many great groups on LinkedIn that it would be hard to give you a short list. There are literally thousands of groups. But the best advice I can give here is to join a local group. For instance, we have a LinkedIn Chicago group. Also consider joining alumni groups. Then join a couple of groups that are targeted to your industry. If you have a company and are a thought leader and speak, consider joining a professional speakers group. Joining diverse groups will help you grow your network faster as there won’t be as much cross over in your groups which means you will meet new people rather than experience what is called in the science of networks a “redundant network.”
2. Observe who the leaders are in each group for a couple of weeks and invite these people into your network. It won’t take you long to see you the leaders are in each group. They are actively posting great questions, getting other group members responding with great answers and complimentary comments. These are also people who have the most comments in response to their questions. Now look at these peoples’ profiles. Observe what other groups they are in. Look for patterns. You will see that these top leaders join similar groups. Either join those other groups as LinkedIn allows you to be in 50 groups (don’t worry as you can always remove yourself from a group whenever you choose) or just put the group name on a list you are growing for later when you want to join more groups.
3. Observe the type of entries that contain the most comments. As you start to observe the entries that contain the most comments by the other group members you will start seeing the types of questions that are of top current interest by that community. Of course these questions and the topics they are related to will also be great topics for you to be blogging about and researching and talking wth prospects or networking referral sources about which will help you grow your presence as a thought leader in your market.
4. Start creating a list of great questions that relate to your business. The questions that receive the most comments should have you thinking about other great questions that could be of value. For example you might ask what is the best advice you were ever given about social networking. An add-on question could be something like what is the worst advice you were ever given and why?
5. Post your questions and in your post share that you will provide additional insights you get from other replies you get. People love to get an aggregation of good ideas from a wide variety of people–the wisdom of crowds at work. Take the type to harvest your answers and then store them in a word document or somewhere like a private Google site (I love these sites and they are free!) where you can get copy and paste them later onto your blog when you have a significant number.

What other strategies have you seen working well?  What is missing that no one is currently addressing? Please share your insights or comments.

They will affect how individuals, communities, and companies organize themselves, where companies and communities stop and start, how individuals balance their different identities as consumers, employees, shareholders, and citizens, how people define themselves politically, and what role government plays in managing all of this flux.”

Thomas Friedman, The World is Flat

It was just a couple of years ago when I went to networking events that people would walk up to me and say, “I hear your name everywhere. But what surprises me is that I hear it from different people I know–people who I know, don’t know one another. What are the chances of that happening?” Today that statement would probably not come out many peoples’ mouths do to the rapid learning we have had around social networking. Now we know that six degrees of separation have now, when done right, turned into, rather, “Two Degrees of Connection.”

So what are some things around branding that if you leverage you can make useful for you and your organization? Here are just three to start with:

1. You are now more the brand than your employer–if you choose to be. Today employees, whether they realize it or not, are their companies brands even if they are no longer employees. Why? Well, if you are one of the millions who have a profile on LinkedIn your name can pull up along with your company’s name as readily as any article on your company–even if you are no longer employeed by your company. Remember that LinkedIn asks you in your profile to list past employers. Now that listing is part of Google or any other search engine search and stays there, for the most part, forever. 
    
2. With the combination of “Brand You” and company brand organizations can grow brand equity and loyalty exponentially. I was recently working with one of the top construction companies in Chicago. I was hosting a social media workshop and shared that if they rallied their fifty current employees and had them focus on the good things they were doing in the community already, potential clients would see that the organization was dedicated to making a difference and would stand out from their competitors. It gave their employees a focus for their social activities–one that would also grow each employee’s career as they got recognition for their good work.
    
3. Brand is now becoming a much bigger topic that companies and individuals MUST pay attention to daily. Two weeks ago I was at a talk for senior vice presidents of leadership at companies like UPS, Home Depot and Marriott. These were HR executives wondering about how to effectively build internal networks within their organizations. My team and I had done about six months of research on the growing interest but slow moving implementation compared to marketing departments, HR departments had around social networking. What our research showed was that there is a strong need for organizations to realize the convergence of marketing and HR. Why?What is happening is that companies are attracting or repelling new hires based on their social capital score if you will. Why would new hires want to work at a company that they can easily see has hundreds of communication bottlenecks and walls? All an employee has to do now is listen to one of the grapevines on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc. and know which companies have more open networks. Also, you can easily look on any of the company pages on LinkedIn and compare a company with any of their competitors. You can tell a lot from the levels of individuals who have many connections on LinkedIn which organizations have the better networkers. Why wouldn’t you want to be at those organizations? Wouldn’t you want to go to a live networking event  where is higher level management present? Now you can tell which companies have the best networks and join those organizations. So, now, with the science of networks as I call it staring us straight in the face, playing out every day inside and outside of companies–it is very self evident that companies need to take a look at their branding and realize just as the saying used often was, “Everyone in an organization is a sales person.” Now it will be, “Everyone in an organization is active in branding.” The best thing organizations large and small can do is to realize that you must involve not just the marketing department but sales, human resources, IT, accounting and so on and so on.  

Do you have something more to add?  What other questions to you have? 

But what made this exchange more meaningful was that John moved from a potential vendor to my company to a partnership. The brand of BookSurge grew more relevant and more personable especially when John sent me a LinkedIn invitation. Smart move, John.

Now the personless face of a company suddenly was “personalized” into a living brand with traits that are more human like compassion, creativity and lots of care. So just like SAS, the leader in business analytics software and services, and the largest independent vendor in the business intelligence market.,  that is on my favorite company list because they “got personal,” the employees at BookSurge are empowered to be more connective, and just like Frost’s “The Road Less Traveled,” when it comes to branding . . . that. . . . that has made al the difference.

p.s. And John even has his one blog. Check it out. It’s good.

There is no question that selling today bears no resemblance to selling a year ago. At the same time there has been one area in business that has realized a decided growth–the development of social networking. Social networking most simply defined as online networking has grown and will certainly continue to grow perhaps even more so during these fearful times. So what can you be doing as a business owner to capitalize on these low-cost, no-cost marketing and sales tools that are like super express trains helping accelerate top line sales success? Following are three key strategies you can implement immediately to capitalize on a real “Network Effect” for your sales initiatives.

First, choose just one social networking platform to master. Why? Over the last twenty years I have worked with some of the best companies–Motorola, CNA, American Express, Hewitt, UBS and so on with leaders who were constantly searching for the best and most successful tools to grow their markets.  When they asked me to offer my suggestions, the successful results I have seen kept leading me back to social networks and social networking strategies, but more specifically, the strategy I have found even more successful is to master just one platform rather than try to learn and then leverage mutiliple platforms.

My number one prediction since its inception has been that LinkedIn would become a leader in social networks for business.  Now with more than 35 million users, the average age being 41, with all Fortune 500 companies represented with literally hundreds of employees going up to the C-Level, LinkedIn is a platform that can help cut sales cycles by 30% or more. For the last six years my organization has used LinkedIn to help more than 3000 professionals use  how to use LinkedIn to grow their sales and recruit top talent.

Second, because networking at its core is based on building trust, I have seen that social networking strategies can help with not only generate new leads, prospects and customers but also upsell new account opportunities. The real question to ask when growing your network today would be, “Who are the super connectors who my company’s sales professionals can build trust with to create continuous introductions into new and existing accounts?”

With the many leaders I have met over the last two decades it was not until the development of online social networking sites that any of us discovered there would be millions of people who have top-level networking skills and be  “ready, willing and able” to make introductions to key decision makers, or at the very least, are people who are Two Degrees or just one person away from the key decision makers at almost any company. Semi-conductor companies, insurance , high tech–you name it, all industries have top-level networkers who are accessible. Why are these people so willing to help others? They see the networking as “opportunity expansive” instead of “opportunity limiting.” Another name for these people is “Open Networker.” ,The good news is that anyone can build a base of connections to these professionals who will make valuable introductions. And now an introduction has become the new referral. And the cost? Nothing. And the time? Well if a cold call would be considered a Six-Degree Connection what would be the time savings to realize, instead, a Two-Degree Connection?

Third , perhaps the most interesting reality is that social networks are just hitting their stride. As business professionals move from becoming aware of social networks for top line sales to a recognition that they are relevant to building trust faster to acquiring and taking ownership of new accounts to leveraging even more new sales as your customers begin to see you as a leader in your market and then choose to leverage your brand out to even more new potential customers, you will be well on your way to realizing your top line sales vision through your relationships.

Social Networks are here to stay. The only real question is will you be one of the early adopters who leverages their usefulness or will you be one of the Laggards (a company who progresses slowly and falls behind the others)? It’s really as simple as that.

Top Learning Point: Know the Four Stages of Branding to Take Optimum Advantage of Top Line Sales

1. Brand Awareness – Your market needs to first be aware you are out there before they can begin to recogize that you have something that might be of value to their business.
2. Brand Recognition – Once your market is aware you are out there they need to recognize that you offer products and services can help their business become more successful.
3. Brand Ownership - Once your market recognizes your value they are willing to engage you as a vendor partner. Youare first, more of a vendor than a partner perhaps, but, if you know how to continuously listen to your customers’ needs and respond sometimes even create new products and services to serve them, you will quickly turn into a partner.
4. Brand Leverage - And when your customers become real partners with you, you will then find even more opportunities such as co-creating with them through joint ventures and, most certainly, realizing the very real benefit of them naturally spreading word-of-mouth endorsements for you fine work. In other words you will realize the best top line sales opportunities.

The most interests were:

• 94%–say they have made a luxury purchase online in the last six months. Further 56% of the millionaires prefer to shop at a retailers website. It is interesting to see the stores then still spending so much to create a great in-store experience. Millionaires are also more likely to use department store Web sites and luxury brand Web sites than affluents.
• Just over 90% of millionaires say they always or often read other customers’ reviews online, for example, compared with 68% of affluent shoppers. And online advertising had an impact on 93% of millionaires’ clothing purchases, compared to 62% of the affluents.

The bottomline here is that the important thing to know is where your customers are shopping. With the growing economic decline price will be the most important consideration. Keep this in mind as you decide on your marketing strategies.

For more information visit Marketing Daily.

Melissa speaks from the heart with warmth and sincerity. She is able to take complex ideas and simplify them so that they are easy to implement immediately. She is able to speak to an audience and communicate with each person as if they were alone and talking one-on-one. She has designed and delivered dozens of customized leadership programs for senior executives and individually coached several hundred more. Winning a consummate speakers award created by a leading, national speakers bureau, Melissa has continued to engage and wow audiences with her creative, tailored presentations. She takes the extra time to thoroughly research her topic and customize her talk to the needs of the audience. 

If you do see something here of interest, please don’t hesitate to pick up the phone and call for more information at 312-421-4213.

Leading in Tough Times

With these increasingly difficult times more and more employers are wondering how they can stop their employees from continuing in a downward spiral of negativity. Throughout history, the greatest leaders have found ways to connect with their employees and inspire them to move through negativity, becoming proactive leaders themselves, gaining more success as they build internals networks of support. Melissa will show your audience participants how they can grow strong leadership skills and networks of support in their own organizations, quickly and effectively. 

The topics covered in this talk include:

• How to be right without making people wrong
• Dealing with resistance to change
• The truth about trust
• Listening like a leader
• Developing buy-in and loyalty 
• How to get difficult people engaged and more collaborative
• How to be more approachable
• Managing expectations and emotions 
• Miscommunication and how to handle it
• How to repair relationship damage fast
• Understanding your contributions

Networlding: Creating Success in Our New Networked Society

Building mutually beneficial business relationships today involves so much more than simply exchanging business cards and giving away promotional items. Those in your organization need to form relationships that produce win-win solutions for everyone involved to co-create transformational opportunities such as strategic alliances and new products and services. This process called Networlding, is a system that shows you how to build and leverage a more powerful and successful network that shares better information, knowledge, leads and referrals to create truly transformational opportunities.

People with complimentary values serve as Networlding partners who help you achieve your goals as you help them achieve theirs, cutting down sales cycels by upwards of 50%. Learn the powerful yet simple Networlding process from nationally renowned author, Melissa Giovagnoli, as she shares with you fast, effective strategies for thriving in today’s new Networlding society.

Word of Mouth Marketing Through Networlding

How do you build a network that will double your sales success? You must know how to reach those who are influential in their respective networks and then provide an easy, consistent and expanding process to turn those relationships into sales.

After more than twenty years helping people learn the power of Networlding or what Melissa calls “The Network Effect” you will learn the marketing strategies that will finally get the results that you deserve.

Questioneering:A Better Way to Innovate

Innovation is necessary to success but how do you make it happen in your organization more easily? Try using Melissa’s process she created with co-author, Dick Whitney in their best-selling book, 75 Cage Rattling Questions to Change the Way You Work! These presentations are fully interactive, fun and engaging. Your employees or association members will learn not just what to do but how to ask better questions to get better answers for business growth and innovation. Sal Marino, chairman emeritus of Penton Media, Inc. and a top columnist had this to say about the Questioneering process, “Melissa Giovagnoli and Dick Whitney are my kind of people. They’re out of the box, off the wall and out of this world.”

Tell me about how Rand McNally defines “socially responsible” and how they are accomplishing that goal?

We are dedicated to responsible purchasing practices because we purchase 4000 tons of paper a year, given the number of road atlases, street maps, local street guides and other products we print.  We use paper from sustainably managed forests, and we have made other strides in our efforts in this area, too.

We also work with an outside partner called NAEIR to donate obsolete or excess educational products to schools who might not otherwise be able to afford them.  And like a lot of companies, we have a paper recycling program.

Does your own definition of “socially responsible” differ at all from Rand McNally, and if so, how?

I was a political science major in college, and my minor was in environmental studies.  I did a lot of work on public policy related issues and sustainable development.  I got interested in the intersection of doing good but also doing well.  I was taking environmental economics classes as part of my minor, and a lot of classes were about how to solve the world’s problems but how to do that in a business-friendly way so that it made sense.  You’re not just trying to fight the good fight, but you’re also taking into account the cost to corporate America.  So as I explored careers, I tried to marry the “do good” and “do well” messages I encountered in college.

I also had a couple of career changes after college – I was a commercial banker for about four years.  Before that, I also worked at an international development consulting firm in Washington, D.C. for a couple years.  I then decided to go back to business school.  I wanted to look at how to combine all the different interests I had in the business world with my desire to get closer to the social responsibility issues I had encountered during and right after college.

I got my MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern here in Evanston, IL.  As I was looking at my job search, I wanted to work for a company whose products I felt good about and whose products made an impact in the world.  I had several friends who went to consumer packaged goods companies, but it just wasn’t my thing.

The CEO of Rand McNally happened to speak in one of my marketing classes.  I went up to him after our class and introduced myself.  He had spoken about the education business in his presentation.  I thought, “Wow, what’s better than helping kids discover the world?”  So I just approached him afterwards and chatted for a few minutes, and we agreed on the spot that I should send him my resume.  It was a great example of networking and taking advantage of opportunities that arise.

So I sent him my resume, and it took several months as it got passed around the company.  But it just so turned out that the company at the time was going through a transition, and our CEO wanted to invest more in our education business.  It had been ignored for quite a while under previous management.  They were looking for a marketing manager, and it was a perfect fit for me, in terms of getting involved with products that had an end-mission. 

What are the challenges as well as advantages to being a socially responsible company?

Every company faces the reality at any given time of the budgets and resources they can dedicate to socially responsible programs and initiatives.  There are some companies who take a holistic approach, though, and incorporate it into everything they do – companies like Stonyfield Farms, Starbucks, Home Depot and Timberland are all good examples.  They infuse it across the entire chain – not just the operations, but also the marketing and how they talk about themselves.  The message that the consumers get is that they are purchasing products from a company who eats, sleeps and breathes social responsibility. The idea is that this makes good business and will give these companies a competitive edge. It’s hard to get to that point, I think, but that would be my idealistic view of what it means to be socially responsible. 

What is necessary to make that leap?

I think it is often senior managements’ priorities.  There are just some CEOs who see social responsibility differently than others do.  Some take a one-off project approach, while others, based on their personal beliefs or views on the intersection of business and society, take a more systematic approach. 

Do you see how social networking can assist with this process or how it helps you with some of your marketing choices?

We’re always looking at ways to promote our educational products. Given the nature of Rand McNally’s educational product line, which I consider socially responsible, corporate partnerships are a great way to extend the reach of our marketing efforts with companies who may have a similar “mission” to help kids discover the world.  And this is a great time for that because of how these social networking technologies support those kinds of conversations.  That’s actually how I reconnected with a friend at a company, one whose mission is to get technology into the hands of students in developing countries.  I knew him from Kellogg, and he was a part of my LinkedIn network.  Through the LinkedIn network, we reconnected and are talking about ways in which we might partner in a win-win scenario.

I don’t know the full extent to which sites like LinkedIn are taken advantage of in terms of partnerships between companies.  I see a lot of job postings or requests for expertise.  But personally I haven’t seen a lot of people exploring partnerships, at least not openly. There’s a tendency, which is understandable, to be really cautious about anything that may compromise trade secrets; so using social networking sites openly for this purpose may not necessarily make sense in all cases.

To the extent that you can get companies (versus just the individual consumer) participating in the dialogue, there is a higher potential that social responsibility and sustainability will take off.  When you get companies really behind those issues engaging in those conversations with consumers on a social networking platform, that’s when you’ll start to see larger scale change. 

Lora Freeman, Networlding Partner Blogger
for more information on our interviews on social networks, social responsibility or the science of networks for your organization, email us at info@networlding.com.