Random Networking: A simple trick to enhance your business — a must for any small business or solopreneur

This is part 3 of a 3-part blog series designed to help small business owners and solopreneurs (new and old). Part 1 and Part 2 are here

When was the last time you made a new connection? 🤔

I’m not talking about a social media connection where it’s nothing more than: “Ooh, look at all the things they are posting”.

I’m talking about making the space to meet someone new, find out more about them and share some interesting stuff about yourself 🤝.

Invariably for most people the last new connection they’ve made has come about because of an event or fate (e.g. through starting a new job, picking up a new hobby or going through a shared experience) but even then we go a long way to making it more difficult for ourselves ⛔.

But, how about intentionally looking to up the number of new connections you make?

This is exactly my approach to life 🙌.

I’m not sure exactly why this approach grabbed hold of me but I certainly know the moment it went into overdrive — and that is the moment I started my own business.

Why was starting my own business such a pivotal moment?

Unbeknownst to me, but the simple act of walking away from full time employment meant that new connections would become vital 😔.

Quite simply I needed them as potential clients, as potential business partners, as potential co-workers, as potential inspirers and, heck, even as potential friends.

I’ve written before about the importance and consequences of making these new connections 😊.

What I haven’t written about before is how I make these new connections, a users guide so to speak.

Considering how tough the current business market is and the number of times I get asked this question, I though it apt to dive into this a bit deeper and this makes a perfect accompaniment to my two previous blogs on The 21 Rules for Anyone Starting a Business and How to Cut Through The Noise As a Small Business or Solopreneurs 🤓.

Let me introduce you to Random Networking

Most people are terrible at making new connections; they don’t go looking for them, they don’t open themselves up to being approached and they don’t show genuine interest when they find a new connection.

Don’t be one of those people!

Sure, I’ve previously explained why it’s good to talk to strangers in a lift but for many people (introverts in particular) that’s a bridge too far so let me share a far more gentle approach: RANDOM NETWORKING .

As the name suggests, this is the art of meeting new, random people.

Many people scoff at the idea of adding random people to their network, preferring to focus on specific ICPs (a fancy title for ideal clients) but I genuinely believe random connections are just as good as targeted connections (check out this story of how it was random connections that helped me grow my business initially).

Further to this it’s healthy to add new connections because every relationship has a half life (and some of your old ones may have died as a result) and, even if you are still in touch, resetting old relationships is tricky.

Great ways to make new random, new connections:

1. Sign up for networking events — there are so many to choose from nowadays
2. Join clubs and societies — this brings lots of benefits beyond just meeting new people as you may get to go to more events and learn new things
3. Raise your profile and new connections head your way- it could be podcasting, public talks, doing stupid challenges on LinkedIn or anything to make people want to speak to you; thanks to this I now add many new connections a week
4. Go find new connections through any means possible — you can stimulate your own gene pool and there are several ways to do this.

During Covid I would use an app called LunchClub to chat with fascinating new people around the world. It’s an app that connects 2 people with shared interests from anywhere in the world to have a pre-scheduled call.

At peak I was doing 5–10 of these calls a week (alongside chatting to other new people); then as my business got busier I scaled this back and made the executive decision to focus all my new networking through LinkedIn (considering I was already using that tool a lot).

So instead of using LunchClub to select who I should meet, I decided to send connection requests to random people and see how they replied.

Those who accepted got a warm voice note from me suggesting we have a virtual coffee; in most cases this went well, although many people were sceptical that all I wanted was a getting-to-know-each-other call.

And the more I did it the more it was delivering amazing outcomes; it really vindicated the benefits of being nice, being more memorable and spreading some joy.

How do I pick the people to send random connections to on LinkedIn?

This has morphed over time and each week I choose a different approach including sending connection requests to:

• People that LinkedIn say are similar to me
• People that LinkedIn suggest I might know
• People that have interesting job titles
• Speakers from interesting events that I was unable to attend
• People that my trusted connections rave about
• People who have the same name as me [I once connected with every Aranki I could find on LinkedIn]
• People from a particular country that I’m interested in
• People from companies that I admire
• People who seem to be the complete opposite of me

Whatever the stimulus to connect with them, I always connect with them with warmth and a spirit of curiosity.

Conclusion

It’s been 5 years since I’ve followed this approach and it has been a gamechanger; it literally means that I will never run out of people to talk to about my business [a common problem for Small Businesses] and it brings a richness of new ideas, friendships and opportunities into my world 🙌.

If you’ve not thought of doing it before, I highly encourage you to give it a go.

If you want somewhere to start, I’d be happy to be one of your random connections. Even if not, I’d Love to hear how you get on 😊

Faris

Faris is the CEO and Founder of Shiageto Consulting, an innovative consultancy that helps firms and individuals sharpen their effectiveness. Connect with him here

Success = IQ x EQ x FQ

Want to assess your levels of IQ, EQ and FQ? click here

Originally Published on https://farisaranki.medium.com/

Faris Aranki Strategy & Emotional Intelligence

Having spent over 20 years delivering strategic change for the corporate and non-corporate worlds, Faris has experienced first-hand the fine differences between strategic success and failure.
His work has spanned numerous companies (from global behemoths to small start-ups), in numerous countries, across a range of sectors, supporting them all to unlock strategic success.

He came to realize that often what hinders institutions from achieving their goals goes beyond the quality of their strategy; it is their ability to engage effectively with others at all levels and remove barriers in their way. This has led to his passion for improving strategic effectiveness within all businesses and individuals and the foundation of Shiageto Consulting.

Over time, Faris has worked to distill his knowledge of how to solve complex problems in a structured manner combined with his skill on engaging effectively with others and his ability to quickly determine the barriers to a strategy's success. This knowledge has formed the foundation of Shiageto’s workshops, courses and methodologies. Faris believes that any firm or team can adopt these improvements; all it requires is a little of the right support -something Shiageto provides!

On top of leading our business, Faris is now an accomplished speaker and contributor for a variety of outlets.