Kimberly Hobscheg debunks four networking myths: you don't need to impress people, tell your whole story, give complete answers, or hunt for clients. Networking is about human connection and being relevant and understandable.
Hello amazing entrepreneurs. I'm Kimberly Hobscheg with Entrepreneurs Rocket Fuel and I would like to bust some myths with you today, specifically about networking events. Alright? So I know as entrepreneurs we all have to get out there and get to networking events. And a lot of you are doing it. Some of you are still afraid to do it. If you are, get over it, get out there, get your message out. Nobody is going to say your message better than you or be more passionate about it. So definitely get out there, get your own, get your business out there in front of other people by doing some networking. But there are four things that people have myths about about networking events and I am here to bust them. Ready? So they're going to explode right now. The first one is that you are there to impress people. False. You are actually not there to impress people. You are there to connect with people. And if you are super impressive, you actually may be harder to connect with than if you are just normal like you, like us, human being. Right. That is just absolutely normal and amazing as you are. But you're not there to impress them. Right? Okay. Now I'm not saying if it's appropriate to wear a suit, don't wear a suit, wear jeans and T shirt. I'm not saying that at all. But I am saying your job going into this event is not primarily to impress them. It's primarily to connect with them. To connect with people. All right, While they're there. Because they're human beings and they want to like connect. All right. Now number two is that the biggest, the second biggest myth is that you need to tell them about you. False. Actually, you do not need to tell them about you. You will tell them about you. But what you need to do is become relevant to them. You have to make yourself relevant to the person that you're talking to. You don't have to vomit a whole bunch of information about you and who you are and all that kind of stuff. You, you just have to be relevant to them so that they will pay attention and be like, huh, that's interesting. That's what you're looking for. All right? You're not looking to tell them everything about you. And three, that goes right on to the number three that you have to give a complete answer. False. You do not actually have to give a complete answer to the question, so what do you do? And then you start from childhood and you go up to your 16 degrees and that you achieved at Harvard Business School. And then you start talking about your business. No, bad idea, right? So just give Them little understandable tidbits. So number three is you don't have to be complete. You have to be understandable. All right, got that one. And now number four, you're not there to get clients. What? Yes. You're not there to get clients. You are not there to sell every single person in the room your goods or services. All right? Because that's just gross. When you walk in and you're like, buy my stuff, buy my stuff, buy my stuff. I know you need my stuff. It's not what networking events are for. You know what they're for. They're for making connections. And you know who those people are. They're not your clients. They're your connectors. They're networkers who know other people. So if you go in and you make a statement like, I'm Kimberly. I help authors get more streams of revenue and a wider client base by creating audiobooks. It's nice and tight. It doesn't say, I want you to buy my audiobook services. It doesn't say that they're. You're going to dump a whole bunch of information on them. It doesn't something that's easily connect, that you're going to connect with them, that it's relevant to them in some way. They may know somebody who's an author that may be interested in it. It is understandable, and it's quick and easy to understand and digest. And I'm talking to you like you might be a connector of somebody who can connect me with somebody else. Now, if they happen to have a book and be looking for. I've always wanted to create an audiobook. They're going to say that, but then they're going to step in. Right. Rather than me forcing it down their throat. Does that make sense? Please go to networking events with these four myths busted, because you will be doing yourself and me and everybody else at that networking event, a huge, huge service. All right, ladies and gentlemen, I'm Kimberly Abshad with Entrepreneurs Rocket Fuel with another tip for you today. If you don't already have somebody that you're working with that can help you through these murky waters of becoming an entrepreneur and getting new business and driving revenue and making a change for the better in your life, I would love to work with you. Just go to entrepreneursrocketfuel.com apply and click on the button and you fill out an application. You and I will get on the phone, we'll chat a little bit, find out if any of our programs are right for you. Because I would love to work with you. Cheers.
