Central to your networking strategy is the effect you have on those around you. Developing a strong business presence that ensures you leave an engaging impression on people you come into contact with will provide a cornerstone to your networking plan. This means that developing your business presence is critical if you want to guarantee that you consistently generate networking opportunities. However, understanding what makes up a strong business presence can often be difficult to grasp.
To make this process easier, we’ve split the idea of business presence into four key ingredients, which help you to focus on the necessary skills, behaviour and attitudes required to succeed.
Credibility
Delivering what you say you will and meeting promises. People are unlikely to risk their own reputation in recommending you if they do not feel you have a strong track record. They want to be confident that you will do what you say you will, meet targets achieve results and be consistently effective.
Personal Brand
Your image and how ‘marketable’ you are. A personal brand is about your values, attitudes and beliefs. It’s about showing people what makes you special and different and promoting that to people around you. It’s a statement of what you can do and how well you will do it.
Visibility
How aware of you your target market is. This is about making people think of you whenever they think of an opportunity that is linked to your skillset. It’s about ‘putting yourself out there’ and keeping yourself in the mind of others. After all, if people have never heard of you, they can never promote you.
Social Capital
Your influence and reach within your network. This is about being the person in your field of interest that is seen as being ‘useful’ and able to support the needs of others. Being someone who builds up social goodwill helps give you influence and puts you in demand. Social capital is built by aligning with key influencers and becoming one yourself. It’s about building strong relationships and personal goodwill.
This article is a short excerpt from the Trainer Bubble classroom training course materials, 'Business Networking', which can be purchased from our website at www.trainerbubble.com
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