Episode 5 - The One That Got Away: Why Not Every Conversation Becomes an Opportunity
Hi I'm Keith and welcome to Networking Nuggets. There's always one. If you've been networking for any length of time you'll know exactly what I mean. The one that got away. That person you had a great conversation with, the one where everything just clicked, you found common ground, you had a laugh, you even thought this is definitely going somewhere and then somehow it didn't.
Keith:Maybe you exchanged details. Maybe you said let's catch up next week. Maybe you genuinely meant to follow-up you probably did but then you got busy. They got busy. Life happened and before you knew it that moment was gone.
Keith:And here's the thing it's easy to look back on those moments and think I messed that up. I should have followed up. That could have been something. We've all done it. Hell I know I have multiple times.
Keith:But here's a perspective shift that might help. Not every good conversation needs to turn into something. Some adjusts and always will be just good conversations and that's okay that's fine. Because networking isn't about converting every interaction, turning every person you meet at networking into an opportunity because if it was we'd all been millionaires years ago. It's about building a body of relationships over time and within that some will go somewhere, some will come back later and some well they just never go anywhere at all.
Keith:But as we all have busy lives so you can't follow-up with everyone perfectly. You can't however well you think you can remember every conversation. You can't control all the timing. You can control your own timing you can't control theirs and so sometimes things just drift. But here's the interesting bit people don't always stay gone.
Keith:You might reconnect months or even years later. They might see your content online. They might come back into your world and suddenly that conversation picks up again. I'll do an example when I wrote my autobiography a lifetime of moments' someone saw my post about that and I got in touch to request a copy and I'd not spoken to that person for probably ten years but they remembered me and as soon as they got in touch I remembered them and now I'm actually reviewing the first copy of his book. So you just never know.
Keith:So instead of beating yourself up about the ones that got away focus on building a system going forward. And that system might look like simple follow-up habits, keeping notes, staying visible whether that's LinkedIn, it's website content, it's podcasts, it's a book. You know people would notice that probably that I post a satirical I hope sometimes funny post every day on LinkedIn and on Facebook. Why do I do that? Because it keeps my name in front of people and you know what I look on Facebook groups where I post and a number of the images will be images that are mine and that's really good because anyone who clicks on that then just reads my post finds my name hope they find me interesting hope they get in touch so all counts because that means that even if you don't follow-up perfectly people can still find you.
Keith:Because networking isn't about perfection it's about consistency. There will always be people you forget, conversations that fade, opportunities that don't materialize. That's normal. But what matters is how often you show up, how often you follow-up and how often you stay visible. Because again I can speak from experience here.
Keith:If you have a weekly networking group and you don't go for four weeks people forget about you. In fact they probably forget about you after two. And if that's weekly imagine what that's like monthly. So whatever you do in terms of networking do it consistently because that way there will always be far more ones that didn't get away than ones that did. If you found this week's episode useful make sure you follow or subscribe and if you want more check out Networking Nuggets on LinkedIn it's my weekly newsletter where I share deeper insights every Wednesday.
Keith:Until next time keep connecting. Networking Nuggets is a Think of Something Publishing production.
