NBS – What to do and say after the Hub

Questions are the answers

After the Hub catch up and ask questions such as:

• From what you saw tonight, does the purpose of the platform resonate with you?
• Are you keen to deliberately build your network?
• Why do you see network building as being so important to you?
• What would be some of the most important things you’d like to achieve from building your network?
• Have you thought much about the difference between networking and network building?
• Do you like the idea of building relationships before expecting advocacy and ultimately transactions?
• How about we catch up for 15 minutes or so before the meeting next week?
  • Great, I’ll send you a link the video the MC mentioned and a calendar invite for next week

When you ask questions your guests you will often give you a good idea about how important network building is to them.

Most importantly, you may be able to determine any barriers they may have such as:

• If they are young, they may be concerned about whether they will be taken seriously by people who are already successful in business
• Some will be super-focused on developing new business for the business they have just started
• Employees may feel they have nothing to offer in a business environment
• Many will be concerned about how they can fit this in with everything they have on their plate (how much time commitment is this going to take)
• Some may be uncomfortable in large crowds interacting with strangers (even though they know they need to)

Explain the importance of the Workshop

• The Workshops have to be experienced to know just how great they are!
• They add a completely new and highly necessary dimension to the Hub
• At the Hub, our main job is to focus on our new guests
• We often have 2-3 or more guests attending the Hub
• Which means we are often unable to interact with the people who attended in prior weeks as much as we’d like
• We definitely want to build a relationship with those who have returned and that’s one of the main reasons we have the Workshops
• The Workshops provide a great opportunity for you to get to the other people who are committed to building their networks
• At the Workshops, you’ll hear great good news stories
• Which helps everyone to see just how effective this system is
• And we also have great talks which help equip people to build their networks

Your objective: Move people who have said networking is important to the next step

• You want to be building relationships with people who are looking for what we have to offer
• Most attendees will be looking to get ahead and will be at least curious as to how Network Building (our way) can help them
• Also, they will usually be impressed by the atmosphere in the room, how welcome they were made to feel, how they were introduced to others, what the speakers had to say and how you looked after them

Setting up another meeting is critical

• The invitation to meet again creates a decision point for them – they can listen to Video-1 and think about how important it would be for them to build a network
  • All you want to do at this point is to get the next step – the worst thing you can do is talk them into and keep talking till you talk them out of it!
  • Besides, you usually just don’t have time to spend with just one person
    • They are more than welcome to come back next week and soak up the atmosphere.
    • However, you probably won’t be able to spend much time with them because you will have more new people next week.
• In other words, it’s far better for them to have a 1-on-1 sit down with you where you can get to know more about what they are looking for and answer any questions they may have

Introduce them to relevant others

If you find that someone has a concern such as : I’m just out uni – will people take me seriously?
You can introduce them to people in the room who have had exactly that problem and have overcome it.
And you can let the person you are introducing them to know where they are at.
I thought you are one of the best people I could introduce Mary to as she is concerned about _____and I know that was also an issue for you.

Also, by introducing them to people at the Hub who could be good contacts for them, it demonstrates what could be possible for them if they decide to become consistent players.
Obviously, advocacy is better than a mere introduction.
However, before you can advocate for them, you need to know like and trust them.

Your Coach typically knows more people in the Connect Collaborative than you.
As such, they may be able to introduce your guest to more relevant others than you may be able to.

Don’t wait till your guest has attended several more Hubs – suggest a catch up while it’s fresh in their mind.
That way you can explain more about the Workshop so that they realise there is a lot more to this than just the Hub (as good as it is).

When you do sit with a guest following the Hub, they may not be ready to proceed to the NBS yet – that’s fine they can attend the Hub whenever they like.

However, when you do catch up, you’ll be explaining the benefits of the Workshop, NBS trial and the time flexibility permitted (eg every second Monday) with the consistency that is needed to make this work.

It’s up to them – you don’t want to be working with unwilling (or non-solution-oriented participants) – especially when you have a lot of others who are keen to go right now.

Equally, we don’t want others to miss out because they have a misunderstanding of the benefit / value or the time commitment required – it is a balance.