by Dave ClarkeUK Bureau Chief
In some recent research Alan Rae and Lisa Harris studied how small companies network and establish the best balance between on line and offline networking.650 people from BNI, Ecademy, NRG-networks and from UK, Europe, US and the Far East were asked how much time they spent networking online and offline and how much time they spent on sales and marketing. In particular
• What networking environments they used
• What other marketing tools they used
• What their attitude to growth was
• How they went about building trust and deciding who to refer
• What size of networking group they preferred
There were some interesting findings.
1) Online and off line are not opposites. 40% of the people who spend more than 8 hours a week online also spend 8 hours networking face to face. And vice versa. This supported earlier observations that suggested that those best online were also good face to face networkers.
2) Offline networking peaks at 2-4 hours a week, online networking shows a U shaped curve – people either do less than 2 hours (46.3%) or more than 6 hours (24%)
3) Most people use traditional face to face selling and networking but about 15% did more than 8 hours on line.
4) Linked-in was the most popular online environment. Over 30% people used it regularly or depended on it compared to 15.7% for Facebook and 7.2 % for twitter.
5) PR, workshops, email shots and online advertising were used by between 26 & 30%
6) Most (55%) favoured a networking group of between 20 and 40
7) The process of building trust did not vary
a. Evidence of reliability evidenced by speed of response
b. Being clear about what they do
c. Knowing their subject
d. Positive Attitude including “Givers Gain" ®
The process of building trust support the findings of some research we did 3 years ago into the process of building trust in business relationships through networking.
Dave Clarke, high trust business relationships, offline networking, online networking, social networking research paper, the national networker, TNNW, UKAlan & Lisa concluded that going on line depended on whether the business was scalable or non scalable, local or national /global. Most wanted a “home networking group” for mutual support and referrals. Some, however, needed the greater numbers that the online social media permit. They identified 3 groups
Group 1 is like Alan & Isobel Rae's vegetable business – everything is sold within a 25 mile radius and when they’ve sold it -its gone. Group 2 is like their plants4presents business. National and scalable so they need as many, often random, connections as they can. Group 3 are like Alan Rae himself. His business is not scalable – He's selling his time but he does work for people in other countries. It pays him to have thousands of contacts to find those that can fully use his skills
They estimated there are roughly 50% in category 1, 40% in category 2 and 10% in category 3.
Where do you and your business fit? Maybe you can use these findings to work out the best balance for your online & offline networking activities.
Good Networking!
Dave Clarke
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