What are conventions good for? You can see what’s new in the industry. You can check out what your competitors are doing. You can try to attract potential customers to your booth. All of this is good, but a major part of any convention or trade show is the networking opportunities.
Networking is basically building mutually beneficial relationships. You meet someone, get to talking, and find out that you both share a need for a vendor-supplied part… and he’s getting them cheaper and better from someone else. You walk away from that conversation with a business card, a new friend, and the potential to cut your costs by 10%.
A downside of conventions is that they typically happen only once a year. What can you do in the meantime? Like for so many other problems, the internet has a solution for you. As described in a detailed article on BusinessKnowHow, Social networking sites have become far more than places where teenagers can gossip or make an identity for themselves. They now offer you a chance to network and talk-shop with others in your industry.
Some sites like Facebook or MySpace are a mix of business and personal… mostly personal, but a site like Linkedin was built from the ground up for business contacts and networking. Have a tricky problem? Send out a query to your contacts and “friends.” Another good way of getting a question answered is to ask it on Yahoo Answers. The point is that with the power of the millions of people on the internet, there is going to be a large number of people able to hear your cry for help.
Networking is a valuable business tool. So valuable, you shouldn’t constrict its use to once per year. Get out there and make contacts. It doesn’t matter if you gain anything from each new person, just get to know and help as many people as you can. You never know, one day you might need some help too.
