When you take a demographic snapshot of the members of your local Chamber of Commerce what do you see? You see a rainbow of complimentary and non-related businesses under one roof networking and seeking to build their, as well as their fellow members' businesses. Opportunities and chance meetings of highly influential key people abound with potential and probability and you have to be ready to seize them on a moment's notice or create them through every opened door.
When looking at what an open door looks like you may see various forms of that model:
Opportunities to present or give talks before the members and their guests [you never know who's in the market for a good personal chef or who you'll speak to and develop a rapport];
Openings to market your services by bringing in great samplers of your finger foods/appetizers to the Chamber meetings;
Coupons or vouchers for complimentary services you offer with the purchase of one or more of your food programs;
etc.
Sometimes its just a matter of starting a conversation with the right person, a business owner/manager, who has the authority to make decisions or has a connect to folks who do.
Think outside the box and create great offers to peek interests and to build with.
Here's a quick checklist of questions you should have the answers to and principles for you to keep in the forefront of your mind when you're marketing through your local Chamber of Commerce, Lions Club, Rotary, Kiwanis clubs, etc...
1. Who are you, what do you do and how is that relevant? [You should be able to give a clear presentation within 30 seconds, hitting all of your key elements: your name, credibility/qualifications, mission, key features and how it benefits them along with the resolve or, what I call, the wrap up of relevance.]
Here's an example:
Hi, I'm Jason Hodge. I'm the editor of the 2nd largest women's website on the Internet, bellaonline.com's, Personal Chef channel, in the food and wine category.
I create and publish content for personal chefs and other business owners to give them the tools to help boost their professional and business growth by applying online and offline techniques. I focus on delivering out-of-the-box concepts to make their process as turnkey as possible, so they can always walk away with something valuable and immediately usable, while I help them cut way down on their learning curves, wasted time and wasted money.
2. Make sure your presentation covers your information as well as causes the listener to want to know more. Whether it's 'How' questions, 'Why' or more 'What', 'When', 'Where' or a combination of them, you always want to lead them to ask the next question and you always want to fill them almost all the way up and leave them wanting to know more. Have a 90 second presentation, a three minute, five minute, 10 minute, 1/2 hour, etc. This way when you're called upon to present, your not only prepared and informative, you're intriguing.
3. Always make sure you ask for their business. More business is lost from not asking for it. Develop rapport and ask to deepen the relationship with good business between you and your audience. Always close with some type of call to action. It creates the right business building practices and gets you comfortable with the process.
4. Make sure you're not posing as a 'wall flower'. You are getting yourself out there to generate your client bases, not to just watch everything pass you by. So purpose, before you go: What type of person/client you want to meet; that you're going to actually get out of your comfort zone and meet them and that you're going to get involved and develop rapport. New clients come to those they like and or want to do business with.
What qualifies you to do business with your prospects? Why are you their best and only logical choice? [Answer that and hold onto the reality of that answer every time you are in your public's eye.]
As always, it's been my pleasure sharing these business building tips with you. Until next time...
