Networking Online & Offline - Part II

This is the second part of my investigation as to whether offline networking techniques will also work for online social networking. For this exercise I'm looking at some mini-articles I originally wrote about networking for my ezine 'Competitive Advantage'.

Choosing which networking events to go to can be tricky – and trying to get to them all would take you away from your business for too long, especially once you factor in preparation and travelling time.

Look through your invitations carefully. Are the events where your potential clients are likely to be found? Do you believe you could meet useful contacts there? Be selective. Once you’ve identified networks that meet the criteria, put future meeting dates in your diary so that your business gets lots of exposure by showing up regularly and you build long term, mutually beneficial relationships.

With online networking, it's just as important to know where you're going to find the contacts you most want to meet. While you don't have travel time to consider, it can be all too easy to spend more time than you can really spare on social networking sites!

I think this works offline and online - what do you think?

How do they do it?

Over the last few months I've been taking notice of the latest thinking for business building by doing a bit of social networking. Starting this blog, leaving comments on other peoples' blogs, writing articles, joining Ecademy, putting up a Facebook profile, joining some forums and posting questions and comments. I still can't see the point of Twitter (but please feel free to post a comment here if you do!)

It's all good fun and I'm 'meeting' some interesting new people while becoming reacquainted with others I'd lost contact with. So far so good.

I try not to spend too long on each website because time can easily run away while you're clicking around. What I've noticed is that some people must spend literally hours answering questions, posting comments and refining their profiles. Don't they have anything else to do? Or do they they stay up really late just to catch up? I'd really love to know how they do it.

The best piece of advice I've been given is to set a timer and stop when the alarm sounds!

How do you manage your social networking?