Find a Networking Buddy

I attended my first networking event yesterday. I admit I was nervous, I never been to one of those events before, let alone, I was just there to do some research on what kind of writing services businesses may need. I sat at a table with one lady, who seemed to be quite shy herself. But she was friendly, so I continued to sit at her table. Luckily a gentleman approached us, and introduced himself. He told me he was new at networking at the chamber of commerce, I informed him that I was a novice networker as well. So after speaking I found out he was a photographer, which is right up my alley, for the ezine I plan to start. Anyway to make a long story short, we decided to partner up, and approach people together. And it worked out beautifully, it took us a few tries to get our feet wet, but once we met the first business owner, we were on a roll. We collected about 18-20 business cards each, and surprisingly enough, they were all good leads for the both of us. We stayed for about 2 hours, just chatting, getting to know the local businesses, and how we can use their services, and how they can use ours. It was a fun event, and thanks to my networking "wingman" it was a breeze. My new networking buddy and I had so much fun together, that we decided to become networking buddies at every other networking event. It was a great opportunity, and just to think a few weeks before hand I was nervous, and preparing millions of speeches of what I was going to say. Now I know how the networking scene works, I will be attending a lot more events, since networking seems to be an invaluable source to get quality leads. And it helps if you have a support system too, like my new networking buddy.