That’s right, I said BRIBE. Before you go and start judging, hear me out. Lately, I’ve really been stroking my own ego about my ability to “network.” Needless to say I’ve been very pleased with the results I’ve been getting.

In the last 4 years, I’ve gone from being practically a “nobody” to being a very well connected person in our industry (and even outside this industry). I pretty much know everyone in our industry and if I don’t know them, I’m only one person away from getting to know them.

How Do I Do It?

Great question and until recently, I would have told you – I have no freaking clue.

However, lately, I’ve taken some time to really look at myself from a bird’s eye view and I definitely see some trends:

1. I’m pretty darn charismatic – I tend to switch on the “charm” the instant I meet someone new (more so in business settings, not sure why that doesn’t carry over at social situations like clubs).

2. I take it slow – I don’t snap right into “what you can do for me” or even business in general. I take my time to get to know the PERSON and go from there…

3. Give FIRST, Then Ask – Yes, try to DO something for the person first before you go asking them to do something for you. The principle of reciprocity is enormous and works 99.5% of the time.

You do something nice for someone (even if they never ask for it) and all of a sudden they are obliged to you.

4. I talk their talk - I almost feel like an iguana sometimes. You can see me at a networking event, I’ll be cursing with one person and then immediately turn around and grab a glass of wine (with my little finger sticking out as I sip).

I get to know someone and can pretty quickly talk their talk – this instantly creates a connection and makes others feel comfortable around me.

5. I BRIBE.

Let me explain before you judge. I’m not saying I go to them and slap $10,000 in front of them and say “do this…” Well, at least I don’t do it in THAT fashion.

I may very well HIRE someone for $10,000 to consult (but that’s a different strategy – I call it “buying your way to the top.”)

Allow me to use an example to make my point…

At the end of 2008, we were sitting on some profits and great cash flow. We had made some serious new relationships in 2008 that turned out to be very profitable. These new relationships also opened doors into many new possible relationships.

I wanted to do something to really STICK OUT at the end of the year. Going into 2009, I wanted to do something memorable.

Sending thank you e-mails, calling people, sending greeting cards, blah blah blah – BOOORING. EVERYONE does that and you’ll just blend right into the background.

I thought about the group in general that I was trying to “schmooze.” Mostly male, all young or middle aged and all making good money. Also, all these people are VERY used to competing in sales competitions where they win cool electronic gadgets.

“Ah hah…they like electronic gadgets, even the demographics fit.”

So, I thought, “rather than sending a stupid greeting card that gets thrown away, what if I go over the top and send some electronic gadget – a big box they get to unwrap and something they can’t really throw away – even if they won’t use it.”

Let’s face it, who doesn’t like unwrapping big boxes, who doesn’t like a new electronic gadget to play with (even if it’s only for minutes)?

I instantly made a list of all the people I wanted to be more *memorable* to and it came out to 30 people. Now, I didn’t want to “bankrupt” the company and I didn’t want to go OVERBOARD.

I pulled a random budget out of thin air and ran the numbers. I budgeted a $150 gift for everyone. $150*30 = $4,500. So, I would have to spend near $5,000 to make this happen.

Now, $5,000 may SOUND like a big number, but lets BREAK it down.

The people I was sending these too were all qualified to generate a MINIMUM of $10,000 in sales (easily) if they participate in just ONE product launch for the company.

So, if ALL I did was get ONE person (out of 30) to appreciate the gift enough that they would promote, I would instantly see a positive ROI.

You can’t argue with those numbers! I sure couldn’t…

Well, we sent the gift with nice notes. Wanna know the results?

Within 1 month of the gifts, we’ve SPECIFICALLY heard back from at least 7 people who have never promoted our products before (or at least not promoted hard). Each of these individuals is capable of making way more than $10,000 in sales. However, for consistency let’s just use $10,000 as the number.

Let’s also assume that these new relationships only promote ONE product the entire year of 2009 (unlikely since once we have the relationship they’ll likely support everything we do).

JUST worst case scenario, we can safely say that we have already created $70,000 in extra revenue - that is a REALLY conservative estimate!

So, let’s calculate the ROI on that. I spent $4,500 and created $70,000. That’s a 1,455% return on investment.

Take THAT to your stock broker and see what he says.

I don’t understand why we all don’t invest more into RELATIONSHIPS and NETWORKING – it’s the best kind of marketing. It will out do the results you get from investing in direct marketing, tv ads or brand building any day.

Bottom line, invest in your relationships and networks. Even if it’s not for business purposes, it can pay VERY large dividends in your personal life too.

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