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I recently hosted a LinkedIn Best Practices Webinar.  We had 500+ attendees, a testament to the popularity of this site as a professional social networking platform AND the fact that most people on LinkedIn (or most of the social networking applications out there) really don’t know how to get the most out of it! 

To reiterate, here are my top 10 recommendations:

1. Build a Content-Rich Profile – see template under Global Resources on RENetworks
2. Download the Outlook Toolbar and learn how to integrate the two
3. Invite your most trusted relationships to join your LinkedIn Network via Outlook or CSV upload
4. Join up to 10 strategic groups from your education and professional background / affiliations
5. Explore LinkedIn Applications to see if you can tie your blog, presentations, or other functionality into your profile
6. Include your LinkedIn public profile (looks like this: http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidnour) in your email signature, articles, event announcements
7. Create LinkedIn Events for your upcoming programs and include links where they can learn more (ideally back on your website)
8. Engage your network with daily invites & introductions, questions and answers, and group discussions
9. Recommend only those you wholeheartedly endorse
10. Use ping.fm to update 30+ social networking sites at once!

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Amazing how often we need to be reminded much more so than taught!  I found Dale Carnegie’s book on my bookshelf – this one from 1936.  Which advice here wouldn’t be an asset to your efforts today?

Best,

David

How to Win Friends and Influence People

Fundamental Techniques in Handling People

1. Don’t criticize, condemn or complain.
2. Give honest and sincere appreciation.
3. Arouse in the other person an eager want.

Six ways to make people like you

1. Become genuinely interested in other people.
2. Smile.
3. Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
4. Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
5. Talk in terms of the other person’s interests.
6. Make the other person feel important - and do it sincerely.

Win people to your way of thinking

1. The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it.
2. Show respect for the other person’s opinions. Never say, “You’re wrong.”
3. If you are wrong, admit it quickly and emphatically.
4. Begin in a friendly way.
5. Get the other person saying “yes, yes” immediately.
6. Let the other person do a great deal of the talking.
7. Let the other person feel that the idea is his or hers.
8. Try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view.
9. Be sympathetic with the other person’s ideas and desires.
10. Appeal to the nobler motives.
11. Dramatize your ideas.
12. Throw down a challenge.

Be a Leader: How to Change People Without Giving Offense or Arousing Resentment

A leader’s job often includes changing your people’s attitudes and behavior. Some suggestions to accomplish this:

1. Begin with praise and honest appreciation.
2. Call attention to people’s mistakes indirectly.
3. Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person.
4. Ask questions instead of giving direct orders.
5. Let the other person save face.
6. Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement. Be “hearty in your approbation and lavish in your praise.”
7. Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to.
8. Use encouragement. Make the fault seem easy to correct.
9. Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest.

—–Original Message—–
From: Jansen Chazanof
Sent: Sunday, April 19, 2009 6:00 PM

Thought you would enjoy this article — I think it’s from the New Yorker:

Hanging Tough

In the late nineteen-twenties, two companies—Kellogg and Post—dominated the market for packaged cereal. It was still a relatively new market: ready-to-eat cereal had been around for decades, but Americans didn’t see it as a real alternative to oatmeal or cream of wheat until the twenties. So, when the Depression hit, no one knew what would happen to consumer demand. Post did the predictable thing: it reined in expenses and cut back on advertising. But Kellogg doubled its ad budget, moved aggressively into radio advertising, and heavily pushed its new cereal, Rice Krispies. (Snap, Crackle, and Pop first appeared in the thirties.) By 1933, even as the economy cratered, Kellogg’s profits had risen almost thirty per cent and it had become what it remains today: the industry’s dominant player.

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My wife and I were at a great local restaurant recently and noticed that they were doing terrific business, while many others are suffering.  I couldn’t help but wonder why? 

Through a closer lens, I noticed:

• Seemingly loyal customers (you can tell, because they know the menu without having to look at it!) created by great past service which reinforce strong personal and business relationships;
• Extremely attractive ambiance where people want to hang out (casual, comfortable with an understated elegance);
• Appeal to diverse age groups (our favorite three categories: just married – still gagah over each other, married with kids – typical conversations about school issues and concerned about the babysitter back at the house, and empty nesters – free at last!)
• Diversity of menu items (notice I didn’t say quantity of menu items!)

Which made me think about some of the companies all around us: when any organization reduces staff, cuts back on travel and entertainment, minimizes its marketing or advertising campaigns, and generally shrinks its market presence, it is in a doom loop.  A critical part of any company’s reputation is its brand equity - a fundamental contributor to that brand equity, is the organizations portfolio of relationships.  In many companies, those relationships (within as well as external to the organization) are being ignored! 

You simply can not cut your way to growth!

How are you preparing for the market recovery?

I decided to attend The Sales 2.0 Conference in San Francisco this week. 

It kicked off this morning with a presentation by Gerhard Gschwantner, CEO of Selling Power. He set the stage by pointing to Sales 2.0 as a question vs. the answer - questioning the value of the information overload between various constitutents; questioning the processes, the people, and the technologies aimed at enhancing / enabling / empowering alignment, collaboration, and performance results from sales, marketing and business development.  Gerhard also talked about key trends facing sellers today: Read the rest of this entry »

As a mentor of mine often says, “If you’re not tooting your own horn there is no music!” Those whose livelihoods depend on externally focused relationships such as business development professionals, all understand the power of reference selling.  In any economy there is an enormous level of comfort in a buyer’s journey when they get unsolicited recommendations from other satisfied buyers – it’s simply called “credibility by association.”

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