Networking For Freelancers - How To Do It Well

0:00 - Introduction and Special Setup
0:34 - The Evolution of Networking in 2024
3:41 - Strategic Use of Landing Pages for Networking
10:27 - The Dos and Don'ts of Digital Business Cards
14:22 - Integrating Networking Efforts with CRM Systems
24:35 - Emphasizing Curiosity and Genuine Interactions

[00:00:00] So today we're not on a traditional setup because it is Pip's birthday. So we're out of town. Yeah, we're very excited about that. And but we still wanted to do the live today because we never want to miss it if we can help it.

[00:00:11] And especially today, cause we're so excited with the topic, which is going to be networking for freelancers. And so to do that, I brought in a help of our friend Aura McKay, who's a networking specialist. Hello. Thanks for having me. It's super exciting to get a chance to participate in front of the camera on GeeksBeak because I'm [00:00:30] so used to watching you guys live and sitting by with my pen and paper.

[00:00:34] But thanks for this opportunity. I'm excited. Yeah, it'll be a lot of fun. I know when we were doing the prep, we were pretty got, we had, it was a lot of fun back and forth of just figuring out ways to like maximizing your network because I think in this world of 2024, though, in person events are becoming more the norm and they're, things are shifted.

[00:00:52] And so a lot of people are going for these in person meetings. So we thought we'd give some helpful tips for you guys to get the most out of it to make sure [00:01:00] that, you're. You've got so many avenues to do for sales and marketing. And so it's, if you're going to do that, that you're making sure you're getting the most out of it.

[00:01:08] One of the things that I really love about network marketing and networking is that it really leverages the whole zeitgeist we're having right now, which is relationships. And people want to know they're connecting with real people. People care about people in a different way. So building and nurturing relationships through networking and expanding.

[00:01:27] Expanding your network to take advantage [00:01:30] of things like referrals and word of mouth. I know that's one of the ways that Seymour digital has grown has been because you do such great work for your clients And then they tell two people and then they tell two people and so how can we? Leverage networking and be able to track what we're doing, be able to know whether it's working and not have it be just like I don't know.

[00:01:55] It's word of mouth. I don't know where the clients come from. So that's really what I'm excited [00:02:00] to talk to you about is cause I know how to get the network, but then how do I, how do we track it? How do we make sure that we're really. Gathering the data and understanding the conversion path of in person network.

[00:02:17] Yeah, exactly. Cause I think that another kind of refrain about this that kind of came up was like the quality over the quantity. Like you're trying to talk to the right person at the right time. And what does that look like? And so you're trying [00:02:30] not to look for a huge numbers game per say, because that's just not how the business operates because it's really one or two people.

[00:02:37] And you've been in that room where there's that one person that's got a stack of their business cards and they're like, you get a business card and you get a business card and you get, and they're just trying to collect names. And that's not ever been an effective way to network well. I don't know what ever, but it's not, in my opinion, it's not a very effective way to network.

[00:02:57] And it's like marketing online, the [00:03:00] more targeted your message, the more focused who you're trying to attract and connect with and build those relationships, the more successful your efforts going to be. So that's definitely the first thing is to be selective about who you connect with. But I really want to go into like, how can we.

[00:03:20] Track that. Like, how do we know we're connecting with people who are going to take action and come and engage with our content and who are going to take the [00:03:30] action after meeting us in person or even online? Like, how do we measure that or track it? Yeah. Yeah. Cause I think that when we talked about was having like a dedicated landing page for the event.

[00:03:41] So if you're going into an event and I've got, the, these type of people are going to be there. You can tailor a landing page to those people. So the messaging is going to be, say, I don't know, it's social media, but it's instead of sending them to a link tree, which is a very generic kind of like great [00:04:00] tool, but building instead on your own site, a specific landing page to welcome those people that you are networking with and saying, Hey, thanks for connecting with me at the conference.

[00:04:14] This is who I am. This is where we met or even just specific links that you want them to follow next or specific journeys that you want them to take. Cause we know that not everybody who lands on the landing page, it wants to go in the same [00:04:30] direction. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And, or you can also have like giveaways that on there as well, but say you had something that was targeted for Hey, I actually have a giveaway there.

[00:04:39] And so they, you put them into an email sequence. And all you had to do was just have it targeted to them. And it's based on the issue that they're having. And so it's Oh, actually I have something for this. And so how do we measure that? Because I can build the landing page and I can even do something like create a pretty link.

[00:04:58] And I know we've talked [00:05:00] about like tiny URLs or using pretty links to. When we're networking so that we're directing people to a specific kind of trackable page through a pretty link or on a landing page. And that's great. Cause then I can see how many people clicked that pretty link. But what I can't see is what happened subsequently, or even, what was the conversion path that got them there in the first place?

[00:05:28] So how can I set [00:05:30] that up to be able to then, like you were talking, in your knowledge labs about your J4 analytics and okay, you can gather the data, but then how do you leverage it? And so how do we do that? Like, how do we bring that into our analytics? So it becomes part of our conversion path information or our marketing data.

[00:05:52] Yeah, that's definitely a good one. Cause we were talking about, you could use the pretty link to basically make it, so it's a typable [00:06:00] URL. So it's like your domain slash, I don't know, 2024 conference, something that's easy that anyone could type in. And then that pretty link will. Get sent to the landing page.

[00:06:10] And then in the link that you would send them on the landing page, we'll have the UTM parameters. And so that's going to feed in information to Google analytics that it's going to be this user that came from the UTM parameters you get to set. And so now that they're set, Google analytics is going to say Oh, this person that was added.

[00:06:28] At conference [00:06:30] and the medium is like a pretty long, something like that. You could, you can make it whatever you'd like as long as it's legible to you. And you know that these are the people that clicked on this, that typed in this link. And then Google analytics will even store that information.

[00:06:42] And then it's like a step on the journey that it's automatically it'll store that information. Or do I have to UTM parameters myself? You set the UTM, if you're doing like a conference one that's going to be totally targeted for yourself. So maybe you're going to multiple conferences.

[00:06:56] You can have conference, like the source is this conference. And then the [00:07:00] medium is just conference. And so that way you could see not only categorize them by medium meeting conference. But you can also categorize them by like specific conferences and you could say Oh, these people, this conference, they actually spent a lot longer on, on the landing page.

[00:07:14] They were spending like five minutes, but there was no conversions. Whereas these other, this other conference, I only had two people, but those two people like did what I wanted to got my guide. And now I'm, I've got them into my CRM. And so that's a way that you can. [00:07:30] break all these parts out of how to slice the data to be able to look at like different conferences, of course, you've got to be super strategic and like have it planned out of like how you know I think that people forget sometimes that networking can be very strategic and planned out in advance.

[00:07:49] Obviously we don't have any real control over who we're going to meet, but you can make a list of people that you would want to meet, or make a list of the kind of [00:08:00] prospect you're wanting to engage with or the kind of person you're wanting to network with, just like you would with any other marketing tool, thinking about your audience, thinking about what the message is, thinking about what is the next step that they want to having that mapped out.

[00:08:13] And I think people forget that we can be as focused and intentional with our real life interactions as we can be online. Speaking of that, you did share with me something that I didn't know that [00:08:30] when we were doing the pre show chat. Because I'm a super trusting person. And if somebody, gives me their business card and I'm like, Oh, great.

[00:08:39] It's got a QR code. I'm going to scan that. Of course, I'm going to scan that. And then we also talked about okay, digital business cards, are they okay? Are they suspect? And I didn't know that was like a potential danger zone that I was going into there. Yeah. So QR codes, because what had happened is people, you don't really know when you [00:09:00] scan it, you don't know what's on the other side.

[00:09:01] So that's the thing. And so if you're at a conference, I would be more trusting of someone else that's at the conference there than I would be, someone on the street, someone's just put up a QR code somewhere. Just don't scan those ones because you don't know what's going to happen when you scan that one.

[00:09:17] They could be QR codes was like the 2024 risky behavior out there on the street. Kids scan the QR. Yeah, exactly. And yeah, you definitely, you don't want to be [00:09:30] just scanning anything willy nilly. Generally the NFC codes are much safer. So that's the digital business cards where they're they're the same as like any, A credit card where you tap anything like that.

[00:09:41] So they're very set in what information they transmit. Who programs that NFC? Is it the card? Like you have to send it out and then get like basically a bank card, but it's your business information. So my understanding is it works like it's a radio signal that sounds like a specific signal. And then [00:10:00] that signal gets tied by the company that issued that card where you can actually set up like where that redirects to.

[00:10:05] And so you get to like we were looking at Vista VistaPrint with theirs, and they had something called Vista profiles and you would set up a profile and have all this meta information about you. So when they click, they would actually just get a scan of your Vista profile. And so that's how that's how they connected those ones, but they're much more set because you can't hack into Vista's servers to like change where they gets redirected.

[00:10:27] Whereas it's it's [00:10:30] programmable. You can set where it goes. So you can actually set it to go to a special spot where it injects some code and then goes on to do the next thing. And it looks like everything is fine. Yeah. See, your dogs don't even want me to do it. They're like, don't do it. Danger. So I'm, I don't know whether I'm just like two gen X for the digital.

[00:10:50] There's a piece of once you scan those cards at a conference or something and the person walks away, all of a sudden I've got their data and it gets just lost [00:11:00] in my phone. And then I don't know how to find them. And I don't know how to be able to make sure that like I get back to everybody who's digital card I scanned.

[00:11:10] So we were talking a little bit about how do you then move that information from a digital card. To a place that's really powerful. And my like cheap and cheerful old school hack for that is I'll just take a selfie with the person that I want to meet [00:11:30] and then I'll know, okay. I'll know who they are.

[00:11:33] I'll have a better sense of where we met. I will get them to enter their own data so that I don't spell it wrong. And we talked about if we can have a way of our own contact list. Maybe automatically connecting to our CRM. Yeah. That would be. So can you speak more to that one, Phelan? Yeah. Cause there's definitely, there's a lot of avenues that are opening up and [00:12:00] Zapier is most likely going to be your friend.

[00:12:01] And almost 90 percent of these situations is that you set up some sort of automatic like profile gets added that I've linked in my Vista. Like it's going to be dependent on your CRM and the digital business card tool that you're using. Zapier's pretty good when I was looking through that they have a lot of these automations that do automatic imports, and they import them to a specific sequence that you might have in your CRM.

[00:12:25] And then that metadata about them, from conference, blah, blah, blah. [00:12:30] We'll get automatically added as part of the zap. That's what I love about Zapier and things like that is you can actually set it up so it can add really helpful tags for you when it does auto import into your CRM. So then you can customize your automations to be any, anyone who was tagged with this specific conference, etc.

[00:12:50] Or anyone who was added between this and this date that can. Be helpful. Yeah, exactly. Cause then later on, yet, like you said, you can re engage people. Maybe they only made it to the first level. And [00:13:00] so it's like any person that was at the conference that made it to this level. I actually want to send them another follow up email.

[00:13:05] That's about, X, Y, Z thing that I'm now doing that might speak to them. And the more tags you put on users, the better experience you're going to have with this. I think that one other one that I really like that. The other thing that we're just quietly building out is the Google contacts.

[00:13:21] They're actually making a tip to a much closer to a CRM where it has custom fields. It has, and because it's Google, all of the APIs, [00:13:30] like the way they all speak to each other, all these services can talk to each other. So then all of a sudden you could then add, users get added to different lists or you can set them up into a drive or, different ways that you can connect it where these custom fields can really help you.

[00:13:44] Yeah, it actually blew my mind when we were sharing screens and you showed me like the Google contacts. I'm like, Oh my gosh, that's right there in Google now that you're doing that. And it works with your email as well, right? So your Gmail, you can have your contact list and then you can assign [00:14:00] let's tie all these things together of like how you can pull them in.

[00:14:03] It really makes for a pretty good CRM that way though. Streak as well is pretty good for that. Yeah. I'm not a Gmail or a Gmail user in that sense. I'm definitely active campaign and I have my own URLs and stuff that I use for my direct emails. I have a Gmail account to be able to.

[00:14:22] Some of the stuff. But one of the things that I think is really important to think if you get back to networking in real world or [00:14:30] online, is that like at the core, why are we there? Why are we at this networking event? Why are we there in the first place? And I think that a lot of people make the mistake of being at a networking event, trying to get clients.

[00:14:44] And it's not really understanding the buyer's journey. And it's like trying to. Market sort of marketing to someone you're trying to sell before you've done any of the marketing. And I think that's really important distinction to make. And one of the things that happens [00:15:00] is people get impatient with the process of nurturing relationships, which is why a CRM is important so that you can keep the engaging with people over the longterm and also so you can separate.

[00:15:14] One of the things that I find really powerful in networking opportunities is meeting other colleagues, people who are in the same business as I am that I might be able to collaborate with or network with or have a referral [00:15:30] relationship with. And so being able to identify. This is a person who is a network grower or a connector or a builder or a collaborator, versus this is someone who is a prospect.

[00:15:43] And being able to identify that either in your zap or being able to have a specific pretty link that you send people who are network versus prospects. Yeah. Anytime we can. give ourselves more information [00:16:00] so that when we follow up, we're following up from an informed position about who we're actually talking to.

[00:16:06] I think that's one of the goals. And that's really what you keep talking about failing is how to gather that information, how to organize it and how to read it effectively. Yeah, exactly. And it's, yeah, I would say that it reminds me of analogy is you want to have like your hopper filled. You're not going to have everyone at the very end of the process. You want to have people all throughout so that if there's ever a situation where it's oh, I need more [00:16:30] prospects at this point, like whatever that happens to be for your own funnel or your own sales process that you don't have, you don't have too many people coming at you, like ready to buy right away and you're overwhelmed and then you're just have too much work and you can't get it done.

[00:16:43] You also don't want to, so you want to have a nice and consistent. So this is also where the CRM really helps you where it lets you know where each of the funnel is. CRM and or database, because one of the things there's a couple of books that I have read recently on [00:17:00] networking and and it's absolutely extraordinary how businesses can be built just on word of mouth, referral, networking, connecting who, and not needing to be online at all.

[00:17:13] It is entirely possible to grow that kind of a business. And the important thing though, is that you see. You still need to be able to have that database or that CRM tracker to be able to say, Oh, I know an SEO person that would be great for that [00:17:30] business. So even doing that ability to connect people in your network to be that connector yourself is such a value add for all of your relationships.

[00:17:40] So I like a CRM, maybe it's a notion database, but being able to use those tools to be able to nurture those sort of farther outward networking relationships. Do you have any thoughts about like tools? Specifically that you would use to recommend that I [00:18:00] recommend. Yeah, definitely a notion.

[00:18:03] It would be really good air tables. Also really good as a very customizable table field. Yeah, it's a fun one that I always get a little overwhelmed, like like notion where it's just, so you have too many tools and it's a blank slate, I would find those to be a little I, your mind wanders a little too far of I can do this and this, and then you get nothing done.

[00:18:20] But yeah, it's definitely, you can, and it works. Both ways as well, right? That, like you said, if you build up a network of like potential [00:18:30] people that render services that aren't yours and you're helping other people, it could works the other way as well, ' cause you're gonna be well remembered by the person that you got the work for, that you're gonna come back to you and say, Hey I really appreciate that.

[00:18:41] I actually have someone that just reached out yesterday. They're not a good match for us, but you sent, you would be a really good match based on our conversations. Yeah. And so it's not necessarily direct. It's building out your network horizontally, not just like vertically of like new clients and leads and where they go, but it's also about people that are at [00:19:00] your level and you're helping each other out.

[00:19:02] Because you're not over, you don't overlap per se. And like different people that are doing different services, that it's always good to have for everybody. We don't have to live in this scarcity world of Oh, if I give you work then, Oh, maybe I, there won't be enough for me. Or I really love the book that I really love about this is the go giver, which is we can put that in the show notes later, but it's for sure.

[00:19:25] Yeah. Makes a big. We've been talking about in person networking and then [00:19:30] bringing that data into a tech world to be able to track it and leverage it and use it effectively. I want to just circle around a little bit to online networking, even though we've been doing, zoom rooms and Google meets for several years now, I still go into networking rooms and see people who are missing opportunities.

[00:19:54] For how they're showing up there. And one of them is just being really mindful about [00:20:00] your sign in name, your login name, when you're in a room that often your name is visible. And so I see some people in there that just have Or McKay, all one word, all lowercase. Cause that's just how I signed in and nobody can really read it.

[00:20:15] I often, in a zoom room, I really recommend that you go in and you change your name to be your name. And where do you want them to connect with you? So you can put I G at, and then your Instagram name, or you could [00:20:30] put L I for LinkedIn so that even if People never get to talk to you and they just see you in a room and you're being magnificent and you're helping other people and you're adding value and they think, Ooh, I want to connect with you.

[00:20:42] They have a really clear way to do that. Even if you're not allowed to share in the chat or do anything else still gives you that clear call to action that every time you're anywhere online, you want to have a clear call to action. So I recommend doing [00:21:00] that. What are your. Thoughts about putting links in the chat room.

[00:21:06] Is the, yeah, I definitely like your, yours is like a more subtle, like if someone wants to take that inbound step, I think that's a good way to do that. Part. I feel like people have abused it as well, like those chats and like posting the links and stuff like that, that I feel like it can get a little over, over tired.

[00:21:26] But I think that yeah, it also comes back to the number one rule [00:21:30] of being online, which is being helpful, right? Like as long as you're being helpful, like most people want to meet you, they want to work with you. That's the biggest takeaway I'd have. The other one that kind of came up is like an analogy in my head of when you're doing these in person or online, any sort of networking or meeting people, you should think of it more as like a survey.

[00:21:48] Then it is like you're trying to find out things about what's going on for you? What's hurting? Like, how can if you could fix one thing today, what would it be? Like you're, what you're doing is you're, you should be asking questions to figure [00:22:00] out where they are rather than try to push what you're doing because and you may find that because you may build like a product all by yourself or some solution, and then you find out like, Oh, that doesn't even solve the problem that they actually have.

[00:22:13] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you're sitting there like tooting your horn. And they're like, I'm not even in the same I don't, like this isn't relevant to me. The other thing I love about that Phelan is that in psychology, the more that people talk about themselves, the more they like you.

[00:22:28] Yeah. So this is why I say [00:22:30] in networking, let the other person always go first. Be curious. It goes back to Stephen Covey's habits, Seek first to understand before you seek to be understood. And that idea of getting curious about people, you're right. There's so rare that we have opportunities to get in front of our potential target market or our prospects and actually ask the questions like to do primary market research and to say Hey, what is going on in your industry?

[00:22:59] [00:23:00] What are you excited about? What is your challenge? And that's super valuable. So go home and write the notes, because if you're anything like me, you'll hear a whole bunch of stuff and then you'll get home and you'll be like, yeah, that was so great. And the next thing you're like, Oh, what did they say?

[00:23:14] Yeah. So write notes, no habits for sure. Yeah. And it's also, I'd say as well about like mindset as well for you as well, to make sure you have the right mindset when you're coming into a situation. Because like you said at the start, not to get yourself discouraged because you thought, [00:23:30] Oh, I'm just going to come in here, sell a whole bunch and I'm going to make a bandit.

[00:23:34] And it's if you look at it, if you have the right mindset, then you're not going to feel disappointed. Cause you're like I went in this to do market research and I got a bunch of market research and then I also have some prospects. And you just get a little bit of insight. Those little bits of insight are the things that make the difference, which is why.

[00:23:54] Going back and looking at your data is so important. I work with a lot of creatives and a lot [00:24:00] of freelancers, and it seems to be that a lot of them, they just want to like, they just want to go forward. They don't want to go back and look at their archives and come up with a portfolio. They don't want to go back and look at the data.

[00:24:10] They just want to do the next thing. And I think, one of the things that we've, Hopefully shared with our listeners is that yes, the networking is important, but it's what you do after the networking, that's going to make the biggest difference is how you track that networking it's how how much you engage with people [00:24:30] and continue to invite them to what's appropriate for them based on the actions they've taken.

[00:24:36] Yeah, exactly. It's going to be some level of like qualification and quantification. Like you don't want to be overly on one side or the other like in the in quantifying It's only meant to help you figure out oh this like actually figure out the hard numbers about the interactions with the sorry, we're getting a call, I know all these kinds of things. We've got a Facebook user who's just commented that us journalists [00:25:00] absolutely prioritize our portfolios. Yeah, for sure. And I think that there is an opportunity, when you look at prioritizing your portfolio, sometimes some creatives, their portfolio can speak for them.

[00:25:13] Or sometimes depending on where you are in your marketing journey, a portfolio can actually work for you. Oh, Hey Glenna. But sometimes you need words to go with that portfolio, especially if you're wanting to drive people [00:25:30] to that portfolio and you want to invite people to see that portfolio, that's going to take the words.

[00:25:35] And a lot of times those words, can be scraped from the conversations you have in networking if you're going in with that attitude of curiosity. Yeah, as well as you can also tailor your portfolio to those, whatever the conference may be. So you may have somewhere, not all your work is appropriate, but you may have a couple of pieces that are going to really resonate with this type of person because you've known that in the [00:26:00] past.

[00:26:00] That would be a good thing to bring when you're talking to those people. So again, that specific landing page so that you have a specific portfolio that people at that conference would be interested in in seeing for sure. Yeah, exactly. And so I think that, yeah, just being more strategic about Hey, this type of conference or even like maybe there's an event inside of the conference itself that, Oh, I want to hit up I don't know, doing copywriting for SAS companies.

[00:26:26] And that you. Dude, I'm done a good job in the past. That's a really good place to [00:26:30] show up and just be like, Hey, I've got a part it's a way for you to get in front of those people in a hyper targeted event. And so I, it's interesting cause you're like, Hey, I got a portfolio.

[00:26:40] I think that having the portfolio or having that landing page is like your ace in your back pocket. You have it there. Hey, someone asks for it or needs it, but we don't want to be the, here's my portfolio and here's my portfolio. And like the spray and pray maybe you, yeah, I think it goes back to that, like being curious about them, right?

[00:26:59] [00:27:00] Because like you may show up and have a portfolio, but if you just talk to them and oh yeah, it totally makes sense. I've seen that with other people in your industry, you're being interested in them. That's going to get them because everyone is going to feel like they're being sold to.

[00:27:12] So the less you could make them. feel like that. And the more like you just learn and like research people, right? Because that's always a way to figure out where people are and whether you're right for them or they're right for you. That's the easiest way. It's like just learn a bunch more about people at these events.

[00:27:29] And as [00:27:30] long as you're being genuine, then yeah, I think that most people are pretty good about being open like that. So basically bottom line, we're saying like, just get curious And yeah, I love that. I started, okay. Mic drop, take it away. We're finished. And that is great timing because we have just reached the 30 minute mark.

[00:27:50] Yeah. And once again, my name is Phelan at Seymour digital media and I'm Aura McKay at business of creativity. Perfect. And if you have any other [00:28:00] questions, please leave them in the comments for cyberpunk marketing mixer. And we will be happy to answer them and we'll definitely post I think I have a UTM parameter builder and that I think, um, that I'm going to have a link to because it's super useful for you guys anywhere to just build a UTM parameter Yeah, and the code giver link as well.

[00:28:19] Okay, awesome. All right. Awesome. Bye for now. Bye for now.