I got away this weekend with my family. We left Friday afternoon for fabulous Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. My wife had a family reunion to go to (she usually has about 47 a year to attend and I almost never go) and I just wanted to get away from Kansas City for a few days and spend time with her and my kids.
The reunion was tortuous as usual. I would never even see these people EVER unless we had the mandatory get together every year. (And what would be wrong with that?) (If my wife, Marie, is reading this...I'm only kidding honey.) (Sort of.) But the time around the hotel afterwards was a lot of fun.
Saturday evening we just hung around the pool with Marie's parents and her brother and his wife and out 6 combined kids. I loved watching the kids interact with each other and with total strangers. Especially my 9 year old. (I would show photos but I left the camera on my desk at work...Freudian slip?)
My 9 year old knows how to network. It just comes naturally to her. She will walk into a room, size up the people therein, and decide who she's going to talk to. In this particular case she picked out an athletic young man about her age. She had a sponge football and they began, at first, just throwing it back and forth. Pretty soon they were talking. Making up games. Having a great time. Like they were old friends.
She was relationship building. She wasn't card collecting. In fact, when the night was over and she was telling me all about her new friend she couldn't even tell me his name when I asked! Now they had traded stories. Traded toys. But they didn't require anything from each other at that meeting.
My Tuesday Morning Networking
I belong to the Kansas City Breakfast Club which is a business reciprocity group here in the KC. Members come from all corners of Kansas City. And I really like being a member. It cost me about $600 a year and from that I average about 2.5 transactions a year. But that's probably because I spend my time building relationships through the club and not begging for business.
The funny thing is I see members, new and old, spend most of their time trying to muster up business from every conversation. Yes, it's a business reciprocity club. But no, I don't want to hear about how I could be doing business with you every conversation. And neither do your clients.
Relating This To Real Estate
Spend time with your clients on the phone or in the car getting to know them. Ask about their work. Some jobs out there are pretty darned interesting. Ask about their kids and watch their eyes light up. Give them a call 6 weeks after closing and ask them how things are going. And then listen.
Maybe it's just and obscure point of view I have. But I believe business comes through the relationships I have with people either personally, on-line or by referral. Networking can create that so long as relationships tend to be the primary focus. When networking becomes another word for "solicitation", then your luck at networking events may not be so good.
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Great Advice!!!!