Build a web and results follow. 

Networking isn’t always about the business connection right off the bat. There are times when the connection becomes someone you help find a resource who then thinks of you years later when they need your services, or perhaps they become a personal resource and you find the connection was never about business at all. Create a web and results follow. 

Women go into networking and whether they know it or not, they build a spiderweb during a conversation. They meet someone and connect with them on many levels. They chat business, but they also chat family, hobbies, volunteering, stories. They connect on a personal and deep level quickly. And because of that, connections are easier to nurture. 

There are many reasons they could be a resource to one another, either professionally or personally. That web strings them together in so many ways. Both kids in college, maybe it’s a connection to a new job. A recent example involved love of theatre. I was attending a networking event and a group of women gathered together. As the others around us heard us laughing and talking about wonderful plays we had seen, we attracted more women with the common interest. Before the end of the night, we were forming a theater group.  

Men and women are both great networkers, yet we do it differently. When my husband comes home from a business event and I ask about the people he was talking with, I will naturally ask about their families and questions like, are they dads, how old are their kids. I receive a blank stare. When I come home and he asks about my night, I have tons of details to share and he looks at me and asks where exactly I have been with a very curious expression and a look of, “that was not a business event, you were just out with the girls.”

Networking isn’t always about the business connection right off the bat. There are times when the connection becomes someone you help find a resource who then thinks of you years later when they need your services, or perhaps they become a personal resource and you find the connection was never about business at all. Create a web and results follow. 

I am happy to share personal stories about what this has done in my life and how one connection alone has connected me to seven-figures in sales. 

There was one woman whom I met at the networking group I mentioned above and we both enjoy the theater. She reached out to meet for coffee and I was excited about it because I wanted to tap her resources of what shows I should be looking to get tickets to for after the summer. As we sat to enjoy a cup of coffee, I brought up the theater and she said we will get to that, she was interested in how I work with attorneys. I laughed and mentioned I work with a lot of attorneys, she said, she had heard. She was interested in hiring me and I was shocked because I did not see that purpose of the coffee date being business. Lesson learned, there is an opportunity in all relationships.

Another story is about a woman whom I go back close to 20 years. We met through introductions when she was a director of marketing and I was selling printing. We have expended our network through non-profit work together, working together as a client in my printing business, as well as in Slater Success. We both love to travel, she is an amazing baker and I love to cook. When we get together for business we talk a wide variety of topics. When I tracked financially how much business we have done together over the years, it comes into the 7-figure mark.