Synopsis

Nate Dominguez from BNI Arizona joins Dr. Misner to share 5 things you need to hold a great Visitors Day in your BNI chapter.

* Prepare (or at least pretend like you did). If you’re not able to prepare as well as you’d like, don’t apologize or express disappointment. The visitors won’t know what you meant to do and didn’t.

* Everybody has to do a little heavy lifting. The most successful Visitors Days are the ones where everyone in the chapter contributes. TEAM = Together Everyone Achieves More.

* Arrive early and stay late. The times before and after the meeting are great opportunities to make connections with the visitors. Stick around and answer questions.

* Make 3-5 connections. It’s okay if you don’t meet every visitor, as long as you make good connections with a few. Dig deep and develop the relationship. Visitors can bring you business even when they don’t join your chapter.

* Have fun. BNI members are good at having fun at their regular meetings. Make sure that you also have fun on Visitors Days. It helps to show them what BNI is really like.

Brought to you by the Networking for Success Channel on YouTube.

Complete Transcript of Episode 505 –

Priscilla:

Hello everybody and welcome back to the Official BNI Podcast, brought to you by the Networking for Success Channel on YouTube, featuring Dr. Ivan Miser and many other networking experts. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkeley, California. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and the Chief Visionary Officer of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello, Ivan, how are you?

Ivan:

I am doing fantastic, Priscilla. I am actually in Austin. I am at him this week. I do have a guest. My guest is Nate Dominguez. Nate is in Phoenix, Arizona. Nate has been an Executive Director for a pretty long time now and has been involved in BNI since, well, since he was very, very young. He is the son of Norm Dominguez who was the first Executive Director in Phoenix, Arizona and the first CEO after me for BNI.

Nate has been, what Nate? 10, 15 years in BNI?

Nate:

Next month marks 13.

Ivan:

13. See, I was pretty close. I danced around it. 13 as a Director.

Nate:

As an Executive Director.

Ivan:

As an Executive Director. And how long were you involved in BNI prior to that?

Nate:

I first became an Area Director back when that was a popular position back in 1998 at the ripe old age of 18, but truth be told, I only lasted a year before going away to college.

Ivan:

Okay. You got your degree. Where did you go?

Nate:

I went to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona. The pine trees we do have here in Arizona just a few hours north of Phoenix. I got my degree in Business Marekting. I would have chosen Business Networking had they had such a thing. I thought Business Marketing was close enough and a minor in Communication.

Ivan:

That’s awesome. And as I recall, you never thought that you would go into the family business, per se, but we are really glad you did, Nate. Nate runs a fantastic region of BNI and we are going to be talking about Visitor’s Day today. I think it is a really important topic and Nate has done a lot of Visitors Days and has a very successful region.

There are five really important things that we are going to be talking about today,