It is ten months later and it is time to take stock. Are you on track with your goals? Are you half way there or did you get caught in your routine and forgot all about those goals? Did your goals change since you last evaluated?
It is not too late; you have two more months to go. Don't be overwhelmed by the holiday season. Yes, most people who do not have businesses centered on holiday goods and services slow down for the holiday season, but it is the perfect time to give a last boost to finish out the year on a high note.
Take your list back out, check it twice... No really, check each goal and rate it from 1 to 10 to see how far you are from achievement (1 being not started and 10 being complete). Select the 3 that rate the most and concentrate on those only. What could you do to reach those goals by the end of December?
What ever your goals (whether they be to get more clients, create new products, start a marketing plan, etc.) they are all related to your network. You can have the best product in the world but if you don't have clients you have no business. You get clients simply by building your list and your network which is filled with people who like you, trust you and will work with you or refer clients to you.
How did you focus your networking this year?
How many events did you attend, how many business cards did you collect, how many follow-up meetings did you schedule, and how many new clients did you get from your networking efforts. It is time to look back on what happened since the beginning of the year. Take this opportunity to organize and update your database and formally enter your contacts on software like Act, Outlook, or simply Excel. Even if you if you are not technology savvy, make sure to take all the business cards you collected off your selves or shoes box and create a database to set up a concrete follow-up system.
How can you reactivate all of your contacts and implement your follow-up system?
Send a greeting card just to say "Hi." Important: don't try to sell anything, you are here to build a relationship, not to do a sale pitch. Ask them how you could help, it is ALL ABOUT THEM NOT YOU. A couple of weeks after the card, give them a call to invite them for a drink or a coffee to learn more about their business. Invite them to join you at holiday parties. Listen to what they say and take notes to find out what you can do for them. Then write your notes down to use them later in your follow-up system.
If you know that their birthday is coming up, send them a birthday card. People always like nice attention and the fact that you remember personal information about them. The recipient will be impressed and you will be number one on their list when they will need your service or will have a referral for you.
Send a Holiday card, if it is the one action you will take by the end of the year, don't miss this opportunity. Even if you didn't see them or spoke with them for months, it is the perfect time to reactivate the connection and come back to the top of their mind. Don't forget to put them on your follow-up system so by next year you won't be months without keeping in touch with them on a regular basis.
Use the last two months to effectively implement your follow-up system, if you don't have one yet, so you will be ready to start the next year as a successful network. This strategy will give your more time to work on your marketing plan or to promote your product or service and grow your business.
The advantage of having a follow-up system in place, is that you work on it once, then your system is doing the work for you, telling you what to do with all of your contacts and when to do it. That will free up a lot of your time.
Need help to reconnect with your contacts and/or set-up your own follow-up system? Check my program "Power of Networking Secrets", I will walk you through my step-by-step proven follow-up system, and will show you how to keep in touch with your contacts on a regular basis (even years from now) without worrying about attracting new clients every day.
Biba F. Pédron, Business & Marketing Consultant, founder of Biba4Network, also knows as "The Connection Queen", helps solo-entrepreneurs to maximize their networking results and reveal proven strategies to attract more clients and double your business with simple but effective networking system.