It all started with the Super Bowl. In our household (males are well represented) the Super Bowl is the evening program that is not to be missed. This year, like many other folks, I found my entertainment in the commercials and conversations on Twitter. I have found Twitter to be a delightful way to keep up with content delivered by thought leaders across many industries and listen in on great conversations. One of the conversations I was enjoying regarding commercials was led by my Linked In hero – JD Gershbein. This blog post features how social media created one of the most exciting events I have been privileged to participate in and has opened the door to a fabulous relationship. There’s a lot to this experience and we will be sharing in several posts over the next few weeks along with lessons we learned along the way.
My mentor on social media is my business partner, Joyce Layman. I have listened to many ideas she shares on making the most of Twitter. One of the basic tasks on Twitter that often gets missed is acknowledgement of mentions. It is one of the few platforms that you can stand out amongst a lot of noise and engage directly with some pretty cool people. During the Super Bowl JD shared a great article that I enjoyed enough to retweet to my followers (all 186 of them want to be my friend on Twitter? I need more friends). Of course JD immediately acknowledged my retweet (He is the most gracious gentleman you will ever meet) and I responded with a reply to his thanks. Once our festival of thank yous concluded, he stopped by my Linked In profile to check me out. By this point I was positively giddy with receiving attention from someone I hold in very high regard. He invited me to connect on Linked In, which I was delighted to accept, upon receipt of my acceptance he then sent me ‘the ask’- A suggestion we discuss a potential collaboration opportunity!
Now let’s talk about the lessons on prospecting found in this example;
1. Twitter is a great tool to identify great opportunities to connect. Find smart people you admire and potentially could partner with. Try out their philosophy for a while before engaging, make sure you mesh.
2. Share their information. Twitter is a noisy place and people who get shared gain visibility. To get what you want help others get what they want is Emerson’s Law of Compensation and it works in social media, just like in referral partnerships. Invest in a relationship with an influencer by expanding their reach into your follower audience.
3. Engage. Twitter etiquette suggests you respond to all mentions with an acknowledgement. Many people have outsourced their Twitter activity to someone else, but often you may get the real person on the other end, when that happens, open a dialogue.
4. Connect across channels. Twitter is like a conversation at a cocktail party. You connect at a very superficial level that makes it difficult for a deeper conversation. The venue isn’t appropriate. So go to Linked In for a professional conversation and connection. Review their profile, they are watching profile views and it indicates an area of mutual exploration.
5. Invite to connect. Send a message via Linked In with an invitation to connect for an area you find of particular interest in their profile.
6. Once the door is opened, suggest a meeting or conversation. Not in your initial invitation, it gets lost and appears as if you are only approaching with your hand out instead of opening a relationship. Now I could give away the ending of the story, but there is so much more to be learned on how to prospect using social media to discover amazing people, engage and create relationships.
Stay tuned for the next installment – the First Date with a New potential Referral Partner…
Until next time, we wish you…
Good Selling!