People First Then Profit

LINK: If you have not already listened to my episode "How To Create a Brand People Love" please take a moment to listen to that FIRST.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-005-how-to-create-a-brand-people-love/id1500987210?i=1000472344255

When professionals, business owners and entrepreneurs spend considerable time and energy creating a brand people love it ensures that their Brand Fans journey from knowing about the brand to forming a deep emotional connection to their brand. I define Brand Loyalty as a strong devotion and allegiance to your brand based on the formation of a strong emotional connection that is nurtured and protected over time!

In this episode we discuss the origins of branding from the 19th century and how ranchers used branding irons to establish ownership and identify their cattle. We talk about why branding is so critical when starting and running a business and I share with you three ways you can ensure your audience forms an emotional connection to you and your business so you can create a brand people LOVE!

Increasing the customer service experience begins with better understanding the customer journey so that you can guide them through that process in the hopes you get them to the coveted last step where they form an emotional connection to you and your company.

In this episode I discuss what customer service is and why it is so important. I offer specific benefits of customer service and teach you my five step framework for creating exceptional client experiences. I even share a bonus tip that teaches you what you can do to elevate your brand ahead of all your competition!

Create & follow a business networking framework to increase efficiency and maximize your return after every networking opportunity.

_Transcript_

I know how much effort networking takes. We need to increase your efficiency and maximize your returns. At the end of this video, I'm going to tell you the one biggest mistake professionals, business owners and entrepreneurs make so you don't!

So what type of networking are we talking about anyway? We're talking about traditional networking. Association meetings, open houses, essentially any special event where you have the opportunity to interact with other professionals in your industry. So why should we be networking anyway? In large part, people network to grow business. They also do it for professional development or brand recognition. But the biggest reason why we should all be networking is you're building a resource for anything and everything you may need in the future.

So with all those wonderful benefits, why wouldn't we be networking? The one that I hear the most is time and energy constraints, but also, for some people, the idea of being in a networking environment is intimidating. And lastly, like we've talked about already, if you're not feeling like you're getting a return, why would you dedicate all that time and energy to networking? If some of these pain points sound familiar to you, it means you're not networking to the best of your ability. Let's network smarter not harder.

The best thing you can do in order to increase efficiency and maximize return, is create a networking workflow. Don't show up day of and expect to get great returns, you've got to put the work in upfront. Here's what that looks like. If you're attending an association event, those are usually larger and hosted by bigger organizations. Familiarize yourself with the association! Check out their website, look at their upcoming events and their goals for the year. Familiarize yourself with their board of directors. If the registration list is public, you can look and see maybe there's a professional that's going to be attending you wanted to meet and get to know anyway. And lastly, if you're one of those people where networking environments creates anxiety or is intimidating to you, consider bringing a friend.

Now, if it's an open house, these are usually smaller events hosted by companies or individuals. Consider reaching out after you RSVP. Ask the host if there is something you can do to help ensure that their events is a success. If it's open to the industry, share it on your social media. One of the scariest things we do is host an event in and fear that there's not going to be enough people in attendance. And then lastly, after the event, send them a thank you note, an actual thank you note for inviting you and telling them that you hope their event was a huge success. So let's talk about some networking pitfalls. If you're one of those people that's anxious or intimidated in networking environments and you've brought someone with you, or if you see people that you know there resist the urge to talk to them all night long, it's definitely not the best way to get a return on the networking opportunity. You want to meet new people and when you meet those new people, keep in mind you want to focus on them, ask them questions about their business, how they're doing and how you can support them. Essentially what I'm telling you to do is ditch the elevator pitch it's disingenuous and I just don't think people want to hear them anymore.

So earlier I promised you that I would tell you the one biggest mistake that professionals, business owners and entrepreneurs make when it comes to networking and that is they think that the networking opportunity ends at the end of the event. In truth, the biggest networking opportunity starts when that event is over. At the end of every networking event, I take all the contacts I've just made and I separate them into three categories: lead & referral sources, professional partners and connection opportunities. For the lead and referral sources, I immediately follow up with them and I try to set up another meeting, a one-on-one where we can get to know each other better. For the professional partners, I send them a note and tell them how wonderful it was to meet them and I look forward to working with them soon. For the connection opportunities, and this is a big one, it means that we may not have an opportunity to work together directly, but I hope that I can connect them to somebody that can either provide them a service or be their client. Okay, so there you have it. If you follow this workflow & adhere to this process, you're going to have to put up just a little bit of work upfront in order to maximize your return on every single networking event you attend. Effectively, every person you meet will have a place in your network because you never know when you're going to be able to help someone & when they might be able to help you.

In this episode I share my experience and process for overcoming fear!  Starting and running a business can be scary but fear doesn't have to hold you back or stop you from achieving your goals.  Get inspiration to set BIG GOALS, motivation to TAKE ACTION and application to GET RESULTS!

Don't forget to subscribe to the show!

TRANSCRIPT

Hey everybody, thanks for being here today. In case you don't know me, I'm Don Mamone. I'm a hospitality veteran, I'm an artist, I'm also an entrepreneur. Today we're going to talk about a four letter word. No, no, not that four letter word. Today we're going to talk about fear and more importantly, we're going to talk about how to overcome fear to achieve your goals.

What is fear anyway? Fear at its base level is an emotion. Don't get me wrong, I understand it's a very powerful emotion. It can oftentimes feel paralyzing and something that you can't overcome but I guarantee, fear is something that you can move past so that you can achieve your goals. I want to tell you a story. I'm going to tell you a story about a time in my life where had I not been able to overcome fear, it would have changed the course of my entire future. It's 2007, I'd spent eight long years in hospitality. I say long years because of the hours. It's nights, it's weekends, it's holidays, it's whatever it takes to get the job done. I took a job at the corporate office largely nine to five Monday through Friday, and I suddenly found myself with an abundance of free time. So what did I do?

I picked up my camera. For two glorious years, I was working that job and photographing in my free time and I was loving everything about it right up until my project got canceled, unexpectedly. And here's the circumstance. I could either go back to the life that I knew or I could strike out this bold new path and I can become a photographer. See, what brings about fear are things that we don't expect, things that we can't control and oftentimes things that we can't understand. So I remember that that fear was overwhelming and almost paralyzing. So I sat down with my fiance, she's now my wife, business partner and the mother of my daughter and we made a list. We had a very long list of all the things that I was scared of and that were inducing that fear. As I started to talk to people in my life about it, I found that people were supportive, loving, caring, enthusiastic and those things were wonderful and I've now called those people my cheerleaders. That wasn't really helping me with the list or with the fear.

So it was then that I identified that I needed to find a group of people that had been through what I was about to go through. I call those people our trailblazers. A trailblazer is someone who has been through what you're about to go through. So I was about to start a business. I didn't know how to start a business. I didn't know how to run a business. And so my list spoke to a lot of the things that have to do with that.

So I reached out to people that had started and were currently running successful businesses. And when I sat down with those people and they looked at my list, they were able to say things like, "Don, when I was in that circumstance, I was just as fearful as you are and these are the ways that I was able to achieve that goal. These are the resources I used." And suddenly those things that I was afraid weren't quite as scary and so I could cross them off my list. So as you talk to your trailblazers, they're going to look at your list and they're going to provide you with action and experience. Here's the magic. As you cross those items off the list and it gets shorter and shorter and inevitably disappears, so does the fear. So let's recap. Hold dear the cheerleaders in your life that provides you kindness and love and support, encouragement and enthusiasm. But when you're facing a fear, find the trailblazers, have them help you with your list. Ask them to provide you with actions and experience. And as that list disappears, so does the fear.

Okay, that's it for today. I know you enjoyed this video. I know you did. So make sure you give me a thumbs up. I ask you to please consider the subscribe button because we're going to be sharing lots of future content. And for this video in the content section, I would really love it if you would tell us some stories of ways in which you've overcome fear in your life to achieve your goals. Or if you're stuck in one of those places where that fear is overwhelming, tell us about that and I'll bet you we can crowdsource some answers to make sure that you overcome that fear and you can achieve your goal. All right. Thanks again for being here and have a great day.