Gas Crisis Last Time VS Now: The Difference!
When IT happened before we didn’t have the Internet. We were lock-stepped into drastically reducing our in person sales prospecting activities due to our reliance on our vehicles. This time, we have a more efficient and widely distributed option thanks to the growth of online business networking communities plus the software at our fingertips to mine and manage their data.
I’m no spring chicken and learning new technologies has required self-discipline and hours of self-study. My bookcase is full of the “Dummy” book series. I’ve invested the time, money and effort to learn how to author eBooks so I don’t have to conduct far away seminars, anymore; auction stuff on eBay; leverage software and some new biz tools to maximize my time away from my gas guzzler. If you read my “Let The Arabs Drink Their Oil” blog post, you know where the line is drawn in my sandbox.
My point is simply this………..now, is the time to become more skilled using today’s and even yesterday’s business tools to change the way we meet new prospects. Last year, after reading The Virtual Handshake authored by David Teten and Scott Allen (2005, AMACOM Books), I signed onto several popular online business networking communities. After kicking the tires at each of them, one became my tool of choice recently to exponentially expand my online business contacts network.
Check it out if you haven’t already done so at www.linkedin.com. The feature which convinced me to upgrade from a free membership to a monthly subscription fee and to get serious leveraging this very powerful business network is the one that permits me to Accept or Decline an Invitation to link to one of their 12 million members.
There are still too many getters who have no intention of sharing relevant, timely referrals. I choose to avoid these people. Having the convenience of quickly scanning another member’s Profile and credentials before accepting an invitation to link places me in control of who I add to my Connections.
The LinkedIn Dashboard works well with my Microsoft Outlook so I can stay on top of my new linking invitations. Another huge time-saver that will really turbo charge your email management activities is at www.xobni.com. Cute, xobni is ‘in box’ spelled backwards. At the About Xobni page it states:
“Xobni is the Outlook plug-in that saves you time finding email conversations, contacts and attachments. After a quick install, you’ll see the new Xobni toolbar appear in Outlook – and suddenly information will become much easier to find. When a new email arrives, the sender’s full communication history appears in the Xobni sidebar, including past conversations, attachments and contact details. Xobni also includes a blazing fast email search tool.”
It’s a free download since this is a beta version so, there may be some bugs to patiently tolerate. That’s OK, the embedded search feature which enables me to Global Search keywords in past, stored e-mail messages is a dream come true. I agree with Bill Gates’ comments about this software tool!
Next week, we will get back to mastering tactical phone-use skills to make sure we book more business by conducting face-time sales calls, not social calls. After all, none of us can make a living making social calls at today’s pump prices!
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