From Networking Event Guests to Clients

Do you usually get clients from attending business networking events and tradeshows? If you answered yes, that’s great! You’ve found the formula. If you don’t, why not? What do some entrepreneurs have that gets them clients that you don’t have?

First of all, let me explain what I mean by, “…get clients from attending business networking events and tradeshows.” This doesn’t mean that you would necessarily sign new clients at the event. 99% of the time that won’t happen, unless perhaps you have an exhibitor booth and sell products or something else that doesn’t require an in-depth conversation or a significant investment.

For the 99% of the time where you don’t sign a client on the spot, how do you convert event guests into clients? FOLLOW-UP

*Networking success lies in the follow-up with people you met in the 24-48 hours, ideally, after the event. You can still follow up later than this time frame, but, as time goes on the guests will forget you and may be less inclined to want to meet you later.

If you attend a GTApreneurs in-person networking event, the Premium version of our virtual events or you are a member or prize donor at one of our BizX business expos, we will email you a guest contact sheet the day after the event. This is very handy for a few reasons.

• If saves you time from manually adding those you collect business cards from information into your CRM
• You can easily sort and filter the data (Name, Professional Title, Organization name, website, city, LinkedIn ID and email and phone number if guests give us permission to share it in the contact sheet) to determine who you think is mostly likely in your target market (TM) and keep track of who you followed up with.
• You have the information for those at the event who you didn’t have the chance to talk with, so you can follow-up with them.

WHAT IS FOLLOW-UP?

Follow-up means reaching out to event guests to continue your conversation or to start a conversation with those you didn’t have time to talk to, which will hopefully move closer to them becoming your client.

For most businesses it takes an average of 7 times for a prospect to be made aware of/have contact with a business before making a purchase/hiring a service provider. Think about this, you go shopping and you naturally see the chocolate bars near the checkout. Maybe you don’t buy them as you just loaded a bunch of groceries into your cart, so you need the extra food or because you want to stick with the healthy food you loaded in your cart or the unhealthy food you already loaded in your cart.

You go to another store, they have the same chocolate bars, near the checkout, to encourage impulse buying. Let’s say Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are one of your favorite chocolate treats. You manage to not buy any at the grocery store, but, then you sit down to watch TV / YouTube in the evening and they have a commercial for Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.. They show the package, and slowly unwrap it as the sensuous music plays and a deep voice tells you how you love them, both the smooth rich chocolate coating and the one-of-a-kind peanut butter centre. There is a woman in the commercial who takes a bite of the chocolate while the commercial is being narrated, and she shows how much she is enjoying it which coincides with the narrator saying how rich and delicious they are. All of a sudden you are salivating for Reese Peanut Butter cups and pick one up as soon as possible from a store or you order Uber Eats or Skip the Dishes to deliver some to your house. 

So, all of the times you saw the Reese wrappers containing the tasty treats in them are touch points. After enough touch points and one final one that put you over the top, you make the purchase.

Average of 7 touches, means that some consumers may buy from you or hire you the first time they meet you or learn about your offerings or it could take 20 or more touches over the course of a year or more for some consumers to buy from you or hire you. You will never have 100% of people you meet becoming your clients, and that’s ok.. that’s why you have to keep meeting lots of people, and also follow-up with those who were not ready to buy or hire you at that time, as they might be in the future or know someone who is interested.

For relationship-based businesses, a similar multi-touch concept applies, except we call it the “Business Development Process” or the “Sales Process.” When you meet a person at a business networking event or another event, you may be able to hit 1-4 touch points during the event, which is a great start to moving prospects into your sales funnel.

WHAT ARE TOUCH POINTS FOR RELATIONSHIP-BASED BUSINESSES?

At the event, you could hit these touch points:

1. Elevator Pitch at the front of the room or over video if you are at a virtual event
2. If you have an exhibitor booth with a large banner displayed
3. Conversation with guests at the event – you ask about them, they ask about you, then one or both of you suggests continuing the conversation at another time, and that you will send him/her/them an email tomorrow
4. A prospect asks for your business card or brochure and you give it to them – they may look at it briefly before putting it in their pocket or purse, then look at it again later when they take it out of their pocket or purse.

The day after the event, you look at the guest contact sheet and identify who you think is most likely in your target market for either becoming your client or your referral partner, or service-provider partner. Then, you follow up with them by:

• Calling them on the phone
• Sending them an email
• Sending them a social media connection request (with a note for LinkedIn requests)
• Visiting their store or office (if appropriate)

Make your goal to book meetings with event guests you believe are in your target market. The initial reach out after the event is the first part of event follow-up and it another touch point, so you may be up to as many as 5 touch points at this time. You agree to a meeting time with them and send them a calendar invitation (with video call link if it’s a virtual meeting). When they receive it, it is a another touch point. When you have the meeting with them, it is another extremely important touch point, which may make it touch point #3 – #7. You are really on track for success now, as you have been moving the prospect through your sales funnel closer to becoming your client, referral partner or joint venture partner.

During the meeting, the prospect may or may not become your client or partner, and that’s ok, just count it as a touch point, follow-up with them after the meeting (i.e. send them a link to register for your event, send them the information they asked for, etc.), plan to see them at future events, etc. Also, post on social media regularly so they see you more often, adding more and more touch points.

How to conduct a successful 1-1 meeting, is a whole separate topic, and even the information I have given above could be delved into deeper, but, for now just focus on having great reciprocal conversations at events, pre-qualifying those you meet, suggesting further contact, getting their contact information, then reaching out to them within 24-28 hours to try to book a meeting.

If you want 1-1 assistance with getting better networking event outcomes, book a free video consultation with me to learn about my custom business coaching programs and business consulting plans. Here’s the link: https://calendly.com/gtapreneurs