Whilst smart phones have many features and certainly quite a few benefits they really shine when it comes to networking.
Look at the facets of networking that make it the most effective way to meet people and start building relationships and it is easy to see how the features of smart phones quickly become benefits.
You meet some one at a networking event and agree to exchange information. You can either laboriously type in all their details or, using an iPhone app called BUMP they are exchanged in an instant.
Having left the networking event you want to start the follow up process and an email is so informal so you call up another iPhone app called Voice4Mail and instantly send a personalized voice message thanking them for their time and suggesting they keep in contact.
Now you want to create TOMA (top of mind awareness) – which email will never do – so you log into your SendOutCards account and create a card that arrives in their mailbox 5 days later.
By this stage in their mind you are the number one contact they have made!
Phoning them then to make an appointment as part of your follow up process – you have one don’t you – can be done from almost anywhere.
In between times you have logged into Facebook and commented on a few posts, searched for your new contact in LinkedIN and asked to be connected, logged into Ecademy and written a short blog about a lesson you learnt from the speaker at the networking event – all of which has been pushed to your Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIN accounts in an instant….. and you haven’t even been near the computer in your office!
In fact you are seriously wondering whether you really need to upgrade the computer at all given all the things you can do from your smartphone.
And just as a sideline your networking has become so much more efficient that you really have created TOMA with all these new contacts. Very soon they are turning to you for advice and possibly the use of your services as a client.
Article by Geoff Kirkwood – Professional Networker
