Networking numbers

I was thinking the other day about two guys I know that are really good at generating new business. Earlier in the day I had dismissed both of them with the comment – “they are only selling into their existing networks”. But at my afternoon coffee, I wondered whether I had thrown the “baby out with the bathwater”.

Mulling over the situation, I realised three things.
1. They found selling easy because generally their clients were buying off a mate.
2. They had very large networks that they maintained through regularly communications and catch-ups (they never ate breakfast or lunch alone). These catch-ups and communications never appeared mechanical or insincere.
3. They actively sought opportunities to grow their network.

I also started to think of the mathematics of what was happening.

For those who have read my work before, you would know that I regularly assert that only about 5% of your network has opportunity for you, and the average person has a network of around 150 people. This means that the average network has around 7.5 opportunities. Which explains to me why the vast majority of IT services firms I meet go down the gurgler after about two years – as they don’t market themselves, instead asserting that “people just know how good we are, so we get lots of work”. In truth, over the course of two to three years these firms soak up the opportunities within their network, plus a couple of referrals, never noticing they were accessing a finite resource.

If, however these firms expanded their networks – tenfold is the target that Dr Michael Hewitt-Gleeson likes, so that their network was 1,500 rather than 150 – they would have 75 opportunities in their network instead.

Or, if these people “activated” their networks so that they had mind share with everyone in their network – as well as goodwill and a clear message about what opportunities looked like to them – then their opportunities could explode exponentially. If every member of your 150 person network was also looking for opportunities for you and they each had around 150 people – you could have access to up to 1,125 opportunities.

So next week – how to expand your network.

Brendan Lewis is a serial technology entrepreneur having founded: Ideas Lighting, Carradale Media, Edion, Verve IT, The Churchill Club, Flinders Pacific and L2i Technology Advisory. He has set up businesses for others in Romania, Indonesia and Vietnam. Qualified in IT and Accounting, he has also spent time running an Advertising agency and as a Cavalry Officer with the Australian Army Reserve.

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