This is a follow-up to last week’s episode about asking for testimonials. There are three keys to using written testimonials successfully.

1. Ask for written testimonials at every opportunity—but not too soon!
2. Guide the content of your testimonials. The easier you make it for your client, the more likely you are to get what you need.
3. Update your testimonials. Review your file or binder (or website) every two to three years at least. Discard anything from a company that’s no longer in business. Feel free to ask ongoing clients to update their testimonials if it’s appropriate.

Brought to you by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 111 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan. How are you?

Ivan:
I’m doing great, Priscilla. Thank you.

Priscilla:
Great. So what are you going to share with us today?

Ivan:
Well, today I’m going to talk about three keys to using testimonials, which is follow-up to last week’s podcast on Asking for Written Testimonials. And the question really is: How to you use those testimonials when you have them? So that’s what I want to talk about today.

We know what a powerful tool testimonials can be when it comes to building credibility and generating new business. I talk about that in last week’s podcast, but it’s also very important to know how to successfully use testimonials and how to ask for them. And there are three keys to successfully using written testimonials that I would like to talk about today.

One is that you ask for testimonials at every opportunity. Whenever you have the chance, I think it’s really important to ask for those testimonials.

Second is to guide the content of your testimonials. Don’t necessarily write them, but guide the content, help to coach and guide the direction that the testimonials go.

And three is to update your testimonials.

So at what point in the sales cycle should you ask clients or your fellow members of BNI or other contacts for testimonials? This is kind of a tricky question, but in general, ask for no testimonial before it’s time. You want to make sure that you are at credibility with somebody before you’re asking for an endorsement or a testimonial. Now, this is probably before or after the completion of a sale or a project, but depending on the type of client that you have, your product, or service, it’s after you’ve established a good relationship that you’re going to want to ask for that endorsement or for that testimonial.

So let’s say, for argument’s sake, that that’s one month before a finishing major with some client or after the completion of the project. You want to call your client to ask how things are going before it’s over. If the client tells you that they’re really happy with the results and that their business is better because of the products or services, that’s the point that your testimonial detector should be pinging loudly; it’s the right time to make your pitch; it’s the right time to start to talk to the client about the endorsement. It would be good to say to them, “It would be a great thing for other people to know about what I do. Would you be willing, when I’m completed with the project, to do an endorsement or testimonial on your company letterhead by the end of the project?” If they’re happy, they’re going to absolutely say yes, they’d be more than glad to do that.

The next step is to then coach the client in writing the testimonial that fits your needs. Ask him or her to tell why they chose you to do the work and how they benefited from your products or services, how you solved the problem for them, what other people should know about your business, what are most people concerned about using a business like yours. Ask them to address those issues. Don’t be afraid to offer suggestions. That’s really important. Don’t be afraid to offer suggestions. It will make it easier for them to write an appropriate testimonial, and the results will be more valuable for you. Sometimes people feel uncomfortable laying the ground work and doing a portion of the testimonial, but I’m here to tell you that for people, it’s really easier if you can give them some suggestions or show them some previous endorsements that have been done or give them some verbiage to use.

For example, I’m asked to do dozens and dozens and dozens of book endorsements every year. I mean, literally, I think last year was like 30 or 40 book endorsements and forwards that I was asked to write. It’s so much easier when somebody comes to me and says, “Here’s my book; here’s my material. Here is a sample endorsement or two or three.” And they’ll give me two or three to pick from, and they’ll say – these are the people that are really doing it right – “Here are two or three; these are covering some topics or some comments other endorsements I have are kind of missing. So if you feel comfortable with two or three of those, would you use them as is or put them in your own words or come up with something on your own.” So they’re basically saying to me, “Look, you don’t have to use my words, but here’s something to start you off with.”

Do you have any idea how helpful that is for somebody who’s very busy?

Priscilla:
Yeah.

Ivan:
And they’re going to pick and I pick and endorsement of phraseology that fits my style, that fits something I would say, and then I adjust it or change it or I may rewrite it completely or rewrite it in part. It gives me a starting point.

And so there’s nothing wrong with coaching and guiding the endorsement. Just ask the person to be honest and tell them that if none of these work, come up with something else that they feel more comfortable with. There’s nothing wrong with that at all.

Priscilla:
Do you think it’s embarrassing for the person that’s presenting it to write something about themselves and then hand it to you? Do you think that’s awkward?

Ivan:
Yeah. Yeah, it is, especially if you’ve not done it much. It feels uncomfortable; it feels like it could be self-serving, and so that’s why you want to have a lot of escape clauses in what you say to them.

Priscilla:
I see, yeah.

Ivan:“If you don’t like this or this doesn’t fit exactly how you feel, please, please feel free to write something completely different or write what you feel comfortable with.” There’s nothing wrong with that. But the bottom like is you want the endorsement, you want the testimonial, and people are very, very, very busy; especially successful people. And so the easier you can make it for them, the more likely they’re going to give you what you need. You have to remember, this is for you, not for your client. You’re asking for your client to do something for you. And they’re generally more than willing, but they may be busy, so the easier you can make it for them, the better.

Priscilla:
Yeah.

Ivan:
Now, here’s the last part of the process, and that is to update your endorsements and testimonials. You want to review your testimonial file or binder at least every two to three years, at least, to identify testimonials that are no longer valid or credible, out of date. Specifically, you want to discard refile a testimonial that’s from a company that’s no longer in business. That’s important.

Priscilla:
It’s so funny.

Ivan:
You have a big company and maybe they were well known and you got an endorsement, but they’re out of business now, that doesn’t necessarily make you look good. An endorsement from the vice president of Enron isn’t going to help you at all.

Priscilla:
Exactly.

Ivan:
So it’s not what you want.

For those of our listeners who are from other countries, Enron was a big company that went out of business a couple of years ago.

Priscilla:
It might hurt you.

Ivan:
Yeah, exactly. So you want to pull those out.

Was it written by somebody who has left the company? That may or may not be as big of a deal. Just because they left the company doesn’t mean you pull it out of your file. It may still be completely valid, but it’s certainly one you want to think about.

Does it represent a product or service that you no longer offer? Well, you certainly don’t want that to be an endorsement letter if it’s something you don’t do anymore.

Is the endorsement dated in some way? Does it talk about something that was only relevant at one point, the situation or the experience? Does it need to be updated with new statistics from the customer? Now, that’s important. What if this is a customer that you’ve been working with over time and you’ve got more current data, and you want to get that updated? That’s really easy. You go back to the customer, you say, “Here’s the endorsement you did earlier. Would you mind just plugging in these numbers instead of that? And would you sign off on it?” And generally speaking, they’d be more than glad to do that. So these are things that you want to remember.

So just to review, you want to ask for testimonials at every opportunity; you want to guide the content of your testimonials; and you want to update your testimonials over time.

One more thing.

Priscilla:
What’s that?

Ivan:
Remember the law of reciprocity; it works here, too. If want to motivate someone to write you a testimonial, write one for him or her first. Offer to do an endorsement for them whenever you’re doing business with somebody who’s also doing business with you. And I think that these are recommendations that are really powerful and valuable for BNI members all around the world.

Priscilla:
That’s great, Ivan. I just want to mention that our BNI group is going to talk about the possibility of writing testimonials for each other inside of the meeting instead of a presentation, and we’re going to talk about it at our leadership meeting this week. And I’ll let you know how that goes.

Ivan:
Yeah, that’s a great idea, and those kinds of discussions, I think, can be really valuable for a chapter. It’s very focused on the vision of the organization and the purpose of the organization, which is to support one another. And I think it’s a great idea to spend ten minutes at a meeting talking about how do we do good written testimonials.

By the way, I’ve seen many chapters that literally have a chapter testimonial binder where members have endorsed other members and the work that the other members have done. And they have that for visitors who come to visit the group, and I think that’s a great idea.

Priscilla:
Yeah, that’s a great idea. I hadn’t thought of that.

Okay, well, I think we might be out of time.

Ivan:
Yes, thanks, Priscilla. Great interview today.

Priscilla:
Well, thank you, Dr. Misner.

I think that’s it for this week. I just want to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thanks so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and I hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

Phenomenal reviews can convince you to go to an out-of-the-way restaurant. Written testimonials can do the same thing for your business. Consumers trust testimonials from other people more than they do your own marketing materials.

BNI members can use written testimonials in several ways.

• Place written testimonials on your website.
• If your business attracts walk-in clients, display your written testimonials in a binder in your reception area. If you’re a salesperson, take a binder with testimonials with you when you call on prospects.
• Include testimonials and endorsements with your business proposals. Match the testimonial to the service you’re providing or the industry your prospect is in.

Using testimonials builds your credibility. Start by getting members of your BNI chapter to write testimonials for you. One place people can write testimonials for you is on Yelp.com.

Brought to you by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 110 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from the beautiful Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan. How are you, and where are you?

Ivan:
Well, I’m in your neck of the woods this week, Priscilla. I’m in the Bay Area for a big conference. I’m doing the key note presentation at a Referral Institute conference this week up in San Francisco Bay area.

Priscilla:
Well, welcome. I’m so glad you’re here.

Ivan:
This week I’m going to be talking about Asking for Written Testimonials. Endorsements and testimonials are very important in word-of-mouth. I was thinking about this last weekend when my wife and I were on a trip. And we wanted to go out to a really nice restaurant, but we weren’t really sure what was there. We weren’t familiar with the town we were in, and Beth perused the local magazine for restaurant reviews, and I logged on to the Internet to search for some top rated restaurants in the area. And we settled on a steak house that was more than a little bit out of the way and not real easy to get to. People might say, “Why? Why would you do that?” Well, it’s because the restaurant had phenomenal reviews both online and in the local magazine, and that was really enough to convince us that we should go there and try it out.

It’s like that, I think, in business. Before people come to you for a particular product or service, they often want the comfort of knowing what others have said about you. Testimonials carry a level of credibility because they come from someone who has direct experience with your product or your service. Consumers generally place more trust in a testimonial from another person than in the business’ own marketing message. That’s very true. They’re a little less likely to believe the marketing or sales than they would that testimonial or endorsement. They believe that the average person is unbiased, particularly if we’re talking to a friend.

And that’s why I think BNI works so well. It’s about people who know people, and they’re referring someone to someone they already know. So there’s a little bit of a relationship there. The person has nothing to gain from providing that endorsement.

Priscilla:
Right.

Ivan:
And the business really stands nothing to gain or lose, although, frankly, you do have something to lose if you give a bad endorsement or bad testimonial. You lose a little bit of your reputation. So people that trust others will take that endorsement, and I think that’s what so powerful about BNI.

So I wanted to talk about what you could do as a BNI member, and I think that written testimonials can be used in many ways to enhance your credibility, set you above your competition, and be used very effectively in BNI. And I have three suggestions.

One is, place endorsements or testimonials on your business Web site. Some Web sites have them strategically sprinkled throughout so there’s at least one testimonial on each page. Others have a dedicated page where a browser can view several endorsements or testimonials at once. That’s the first one, place some on your Web site.

Second is, if your business attracts a lot of walk-in clients, it’s helpful to display your written testimonials. Have them in a plastic sheath protector in a three-ring binder. Label them “What Our Customers Are Saying About Us,” or “Client Testimonials.” Keep the binder on a table in your reception area where customers can browse through it while they’re waiting for your services.

Priscilla:
That’s a good idea.

Ivan:
If you’re a sales person, you should have a binder that you take with you that has this content and information in it. It’s a good way to connect with your prospects and enhance your relationship with your current client.

The third thing is to use or include testimonials and endorsements with your business proposals. So if you have a proposal for business that you give out, a bid of any kind, include a handful of endorsements in a section of the bid or proposal, preferably one that’s specifically aimed at that individual. If you’re gathering many endorsements or testimonials and you can find some that somehow connect with this prospect, maybe it’s a similar industry or there was an endorsement or testimonial that addressed a similar issue, like quality of the product or customer service, and you do an endorsement, maybe that particular prospect is really concerned about your ability to deliver and provide good customer service, so you do some endorsements that apply to how good your customer service was. Make them specific to the prospect. That’s really, really powerful.

So if you make a standard practice to ask clients and contacts for testimonials, you’ll build your credibility and your business. What better place is there than BNI. Start, if you haven’t already, by getting members of BNI to do some of the endorsements for you, and use those in your proposals as you continue your business.

Priscilla:
We’ve done that quite a bit in our chapter. Are you familiar with the Web site by the name of Yelp.com?

Ivan:
Yes, I am. I am familiar with them. One of the senior executives just happened to contact me recently, and we will be getting sort of the beginning phases of relationship with Yelp in recommending Yelp. They are in most major cities in the United States. They have not gone international yet, but they are in most major cities. Yeah, I am familiar with them. Good program.

Priscilla:
Yeah, and that’s a perfect way to get testimonials up on your business and have them affect how many people contact you.

Ivan:
Well, I’m impressed with Yelp.com, and we may be doing some things with them as time goes on, and they certainly want to go international. We may be able to assist them with that. It’s ironic that you bring that up, because I literally just had a phone call with one of their executives just within the last few weeks.

Priscilla:
That’s great. Well, that’s wonderful. Do you have anything else you’d like to share before we end this podcast?

Ivan:
No, just to reiterate the three points that I gave. Place your endorsements on your Web site; have a binder; and use those endorsements in any proposals you give. You do those three things, start with BNI members and have it grow from there, and it’s a great way to help your prospects know about all the other people and what they think about your products and services. And that’s, I think, very important.

Thanks, Priscilla.

Priscilla:
Oh, you’re so welcome. Thank you, Dr. Misner.

I would just like to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thanks so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

Dr. Misner wants to talk about the article he contributed to the recently published e-book The Way Out! Steer Clear of the Recession and Drive Toward Success and Prosperity. (If you download the e-book, please leave a comment here about what you’ve read and what you liked about it.)

Dr. Misner’s article is on page 49; it’s called “Networking Mixers: Break the Ice, Build Your Contacts, and Grow Your Business.” Next time you’re at a mixer, take a look at the way people stand.

If people are standing in closed groups, face to face, they’re not inviting you to join them. You can ignore them until they’re finished with their conversation.

But if people are standing at an angle to each other, with space between them, there’s an opening for someone to come into that group. Those are the people you can go up and talk to.

Also, look for the people who are wearing badges, especially if the badge mentions what business they’re in. That makes it easier to strike up a conversation.

Download the e-book and leave a comment here on the blog.

Brought to you by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 109 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan. How are you?

Ivan:
I’m doing great, Priscilla. Thank you very much.

Priscilla:
What do you have to share with us?

Ivan:
Well, I want to talk about a book that I just a contributing author to. It’s called The Way Out. It’s about how to steer clear of the recession. The subtitle is Your “GPS Guided Path to Success.” And I was a contributing author along with some other fairly well known business professionals, Bill Bartmann, Brian Tracy, Jim Cathcart, and myself along with about half a dozen other business professionals. And I did an article that I just wanted to talk a little bit about on this podcast. And for all the listeners on the podcast, we will be providing a link where you can download this e-book, and the price is great. Do you know what it is?

Priscilla:
Is it free?

Ivan:
It’s free, yeah! The price is free for this e-book. Actually, I shouldn’t have said free; there is one small for this. The price to download the book is I want you, if you download the book, to just leave a quote or a comment, any comment, about an article that you read in this e-book that you liked and what you liked about it. That’s the cost to download it. So it’s all on the honor system. That’s the cost to download it. Download the e-book for free here on this podcast, and read over some of the articles. Mine’s one of them. And I’d love for you to leave a comment. If you’re listening to this podcast, leave a comment under the Comment section here on the podcast about an article that you liked in this book.

It’s a book that just came out, and I did an article that was a little bit different. It’s a joint article. It’s a combination of a couple of pieces that I had written in the past. One is a piece that I talked about here on BNI Podcast about a year or so ago. It’s Episode 32 and Episode 33, and that’s the Ten Commandments of Networking a Mixer. I did those quite a few episodes ago, Episode 32 and Episode 33. And so, we’re talking about things like having the networking tools with you at all times, setting goals, acting like a host not a guest, giving a referral whenever possible, spent ten minutes or less with each person you meet. These are part of the Ten Commandments of Networking a Mixer.

That’s part of this article, but there’s another part that I’ve never really talked about in any of my podcasts, and that’s what I want to talk about for the next few minutes.

Priscilla:
What’s that?

Ivan:
When you download the book, I’m on page 49 of the e-book. I’m on page 49, and the title is Networking Mixers: Break the Ice, Build Your Contacts, and Grow Your Business. The first part of the book is something that I’ve not written about much, I haven’t talked about it at all, and that’s how to read a room when you walk in to network, how to look at it, and where do you start? Because many times when business people attend those ever popular networking mixers, they have a difficult time reading the crowd and knowing when and where to get started.

So what I did was I put together some material, and there’s actually some diagram, so if you download the book, you can have diagrams to look at while I’m talking here. And these diagrams allow you to assess the room to start the process. For example, imagine that you were on a balcony looking down on a large crowd of people. And you look at this crowd and it’s a mishmash of people and you really don’t even know where to start.

So with that in mind, what I want you to do is the next time you go to a mixer, take a look at how people stand, physically grouped together. You’ll find that people stand with their bodies clearly indicating whether or not they’re open to having someone approach them and join in or not. Literally, you want to look for open groups versus closes groups.

So take a look at the diagrams that are in this article, and you’ll see that there are some diagrams of people that are, what I would call, a closed group. Imagine two people standing face to face with one another, standing parallel with their shoulders squared off in a way that they’re looking face to face with each other. That would be a closed two. It’s kind of hard to walk up and start a conversation.

You’ve been at mixers, Priscilla, two people talking like that, it’s hard to walk up and start talking to them, right?

Priscilla:
Right.

Ivan:
But imagine instead of a closed two, where people are standing face to face with each other, that one or the other is standing slightly askew; they’re standing a little bit open. That an open two. Almost like if you were looking down from a balcony, they would be, from the top down, it would be sort of like a V. So a third person could walk in and start speaking fairly easily. That’s an open two.

So when you look at a room, look for open groups. A closed three would be three people who are standing. Looking down, they’d be standing like a triangle, shoulder to shoulder. Right? And there’s no opening. An open three would be like a U, where there’s an open spot that people can come in.

So being able to read a crowd, any size crowd, and gauge when to come into a group of two or three or four or five, ten people is really an acquired skill, and it’s something that you can look at a room very quickly and get a sense as to what groups are open and what groups are closed.

Now, I described this once. I was in Switzerland for a big conference, and I had a chance to do an interview with a CNN reporter. And I was describing this to him. He was, “Yeah, kind of makes sense. I’m not quite sure I get it.” And then, it was really funny because later after the interview, and this is what he actually broadcast, he was in a balcony looking down on a room and the light bulb came on. And he stood there, and he goes , “Oh, my gosh. I see it! There’s an open two; there’s an open three; there’s an open group.”

So if I were down there mixing, I would be looking for groups like that where I could come in and make that first introduction. And that’s the start of the process.

And so my article merges the Ten Commandments with How to Visualize a Room for a Mixer. So you start with looking for the open twos, threes, and fours. And then you start to apply the Ten Commandments.

And this is the article that I wrote that is available here on BNI Podcast for free. Anyone can download it, read it. The only cost is I’d love for you leave a comment and tell me what you either liked about one of the articles that you read or my piece in particular; either is fine with me.

Priscilla:
I want to ask one question.

Ivan:
Sure.

Priscilla:
It seems to me that if you see some people and they’re talking, maybe they would be a closed two or whatever, but if you approach them and you speak to them that they may just then open up. Isn’t that true? Or would you not approach somebody who seems – you would not want to interrupt them, is what you’re thinking?

Ivan:
What I’m talking about is really literally a physically open group. If you have three people standing shoulder to shoulder in basically a triangle, it’s hard to break into that.

Priscilla:
Yeah.

Ivan:
So what I’m talking about is physically three people standing together more in a U shape where there’s an open spot so that you can kind of saddle right in and start that conversation that you’re suggesting. But what happens is people go into a mixer and they’re overwhelmed because there’s hundreds of people and they don’t even know where to begin. So with this technique, I can immediately eliminate 50 percent of the room.

Priscilla:
I see.

Ivan:
Whereas you can focus on the other 50 percent of open groups where there’s a spot where you can walk into. Now the question is: What do you say? And that’s really the other half of the article, which I talked about in Episode 32 and 33 in an earlier podcast.

Does that make sense?

Priscilla:
Yeah. Okay, that makes sense.

Ivan:
Of course, when you strike up that conversation, one of the things that you want to look for are people who are wearing badges. If somebody is wearing a badge and they have their name on it, particularly their profession or their company, I can start a conversation with anybody on the planet if I just know what business they’re in. Because if I know what business you’re in, I can strike up a conversation about that business. “Oh, I know a number of people in the mortgage business. I think things are pretty tight right now. How are things going for you in your area?” You can start up a conversation like that fairly easily if you just know what business they’re in.

Let’s say it’s the name of the company and you have no idea what that company does, that’s how you open up the discussion. “I have not heard of that company before. Tell me a little bit about what you do.”

Priscilla:
That’s great. I always just make it over to the food, and then I have lots to talk about!

Ivan:
I try to get the food out of the way, then go meet people.

Priscilla:
That’s great, Dr. Misner. I think that might be as much time as we have for this podcast.

Ivan:
Great. I just want to remind people they can download the book here, and please leave a comment.

Priscilla:
Well, thank you very much.

I want to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thanks so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

This week, Dr. Misner wants to talk about the Fast Track program put together by Mark Taylor, Executive Director for the Houston East and South East Texas Area in conjunction with Del Fuego publishing. The program is based around the BNI Networking Secrets CDs that Del Fuego produced for Dr. Misner.

Everyone in the chapter buys the CDs and uses them like the required text for a college course. This ensures that everyone understands the fundamentals and works together. The result is 300% chapter growth.

Part of the program involves a live training session led by Ivan Misner on webcam.

If you’d like to see your chapter do the Fast Track Program, Dr. Misner will be happy to join you by webcam. To get started e-mail bnifastrack [at] delfuego [dot] com. (Just substitute the appropriate symbols for the words in brackets so it looks like a normal e-mail address. It’s written that way to prevent spammers from assaulting them with junk.)

Brought to you by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 108 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan, how are you, and where are you?

Ivan:
Hi, Priscilla. Doing great, and I’m really excited. I’m in Southern California, this week, and I’ll be headed to a local high school to give a scholarship, a leadership scholarship. It’ll be the tenth annual scholarship that BNI has given to this high school, and we have, as of this podcast, the BNI Foundation has given almost $800,000 in mini grants and scholarships to organizations all around the world, in many countries around the world. This is our tenth year with this particular one, and I’m headed out there right after this interview today.

Priscilla:
That’s great, really great.

Ivan:
Thanks. We’re really pleased. For any member that wants to know more about the BNI Foundation, go to BNIFoundation.org, BNIFoundation.org.

But that’s not what I’m here to talk about today. Today I want to talk about quantum chapter growth and the program that was put together by Mark Taylor. Mark has been in the Houston area for 32 years. He’s been involved with BNI since 2001. He’s been an Executive Director with BNI since 2006, and he is the Executive Director for the Houston East and South East Texas area. He’s been doing a joint program with Del Fuego Publishing, and Del Fuego Publishing did a CD called BNI Networking Secrets. And he and the Del Fuego ladies had put together an incredible program that has made a huge difference with some of the chapters, and that’s what I wanted to talk about today.

And I wanted to welcome Mark Taylor as my guest. Mark.

Mark:
Thank you, Dr. Misner. Great to be here.

Ivan:
Well, it’s good to have you on board. Let me throw the first question at you.

What have you done to help your BNI chapters grow? What was the secret, in your mind, of taking some of the members, the growth of these chapters that were in this program, the BNI Networking Secrets Program, which, I think, you’re calling with the Del Fuego ladies, the Fast Track program. Is that correct?

Mark:
That is correct.

Ivan:
You took a few chapters and they had 25 percent growth in members. And here’s the part that blew me away. They have tripled their referrals. They have had as much, and in some cases more than, 300 percent growth in referrals. Is that true?

Mark:
That is exactly true, and it’s happened in more than one chapter. We’re noticing in every chapter who’s adopted the chapter wide practice of buying these CDs and listening to them, we’ve noticed that in every single chapter. It’s amazing.

Ivan:
So tell me, why do you think it’s worked. To me, it’s all about a team and knowing how to work it together. Would you agree?

Mark:
Yes. In fact, the reason it’s worked is because it is, as you say on the CDs, it’s all about the fundamentals, and I’m a little embarrassed to say that I came to realize that many of our chapter members were not fundamentally sound.

So I listened to the CD, and I knew that that was the answer if we had everybody purchase their own set and listen to their set, their own reference copy, if you will, then that was the fastest, simplest way to get everybody on the same page. And you, Ivan, you and Tom Fleming we doing the training for me, 24/7.

Ivan:
In one of the stories in the CD that really resonated for the Fundamentals was the wind sprints story. Is that right?

Mark:
Exactly, exactly. We got a lot of testimonials afterward and asked our members, “Why? Why was this meaningful to you? What did you gain from this?” Wind sprints was the overwhelming answer, the popular answer. They really related to that story.

Ivan:
So once they had the CD, what do you think was the secret in getting them to all play the same game as one team? Just listening to the CD?

Mark:
No, that was the start. It was the first step, but then once they listened to the CDs, I’m happy to tell you that most of the work is done there. They then began to understand. When the information was dug up from the CD and in their head, they began to have an appreciation for how this BNI thing really works. So it really was that simple. You and the Del Fuego ladies and Tom Fleming go the ball to the one yard line; we simply just decided for everybody to participate in that way, and we were delighted with the results.

Ivan:
I’ve taught colleges for many years as an adjunct faculty, and of course, whenever you teach a class, you have required texts. And if all of the students aren’t reading the text, you can’t have a dialogue, you can’t talk about the things. And so it was really brought to my attention by one of the members; this is just like having the required texts for a class, everybody has to be on the same page, be listening to the same material, dialoguing about the same material. And by everyone having the same verbiage and the same ideas and the same vision of the values of the organization that it’s much easier to accomplish what needs to be accomplished in the chapter if everybody’s on the same page, and that really resonated with me, everybody using the same curriculum basically.

Mark:
Exactly. And it’s one of those things where if you polled people, they tend to say, “Oh, yeah, yeah. We know the fundamentals,” just as you and your teammates did to your coach back when you were in high school. The fact is, we found that they simply were not well grounded in the fundamentals, but these CDs took care of that problem for us.

Ivan:
Here’s some of the fundamentals. And I’ve got to give my kudos to Del Fuego Publishing, because they really drew out of me and Tom Fleming some of the core fundamentals that I think are successful for a BNI chapters. Some of the things that we talked about on the CD were:

Setting Expectations
Why is BNI Important to Building Your Business?
What Can You Expect in Your First Year?
The Fundamentals, where I talked about the football story and the wind sprints.

Because our 60 second presentations are all about – just like those wind sprints, nobody likes doing them, but they’re core to being successful in a BNI chapter.

There was one thing in particular. You said “the fundamentals” when we talked about this, but there was another technique that you said was really important, from the members’ perspective, in achieving success.

Mark:
Oh, yeah, yeah. In fact, whether they were brand new members or they were our seasoned veterans, the VCP principle, Visibility, Credibility, and Profitability, that was what you call a BFO, blinding flash of the obvious. It was a real difference maker in our chapters. They went back and they did what you instructed them to do, they made a list of the people in the chapters and categorized them accordingly and began to see results from that point on.

Ivan:
And, of course, one of the things we did as a result of this, you asked would I be willing to do a webcam for your chapters if you had a handful of chapters that all listened to the CD, all basically did the homework, would I be willing to do a webcam. And I did, and we had a tremendous response. You had over 80 percent of all of your members who went through the program attend the event where I did the webcam, about a five, ten minute presentation and 20 minutes of Q&A. What was the result of that? They loved that event, did they not?

Mark:
Absolutely. In fact, that’s one of the challenges we had for them. We said, “Okay, our objective is for 100 percent of the chapter to have bought their own set of CDs and listened to them. And we’re going to track that, we’re going to track the numbers and so forth, but we are going to track that, and when we attain that, we’re going to contact you and see if you’d be willing to do a live webcam.” And that made a big difference to them.

Ivan:
And that’s the reason that I did this podcast with you today, because I’d like to make this offer to all BNI members all around the world. If you’re a BNI member and you’d like to see your chapters in your area do the Fast Track program, I’m willing to do the same thing for chapters all around the world. Get two or three chapters together who all commit to the Fast Track program, and I will do a live webcam with members all around the world, a special event.

In order to participate, we’re going to have a link for the BNI Networking Secrets CD that was published by the Del Fuego Publishing Company, and I’ll also include an e-mail where you can connect with one of the Del Fuego publishers, and they’ll work with your local director, like Mark, to see if we could do an event where I do a live webcam just like I did there in Houston.

Because your results were so impressive, I would just love to see that work all around the world, and that’s the reason why I invited you to be on this podcast today.

Mark:
I want to thank you, and really, the credit goes to you and Tom and Del Fuego because you made us look like heroes. We simply took the program that you had already prepared and implemented it, and thank you, Dr. Misner, for training our people for us.

Ivan:
Well, thank you, Mark. I appreciate you coming on. And I invite the listeners to this podcast, if you would like for me to do a live webcam, just connect with Flynn or Sara. I’ll have their e-mail address on this podcast. You can connect with them and ask what it takes to do a webcam. And all I ask is that you listen to the CD that was published by del Fuego Publishing so that we’re all on the same page and we’re teaching off the same content, and I’ll do a live webcam for the Fast Track program for BNI members anywhere in the world.

And I want to thank you, Mark, for working with del Fuego for putting this concept together. Tremendous results and kudos to your chapters; 300 percent increase in referrals; what a great job.

Mark:
Thank you. My pleasure.

Ivan:
Thank you very much.

I’ll turn it back over to you, Priscilla.

Priscilla:
Well, I think that’s it for this week, and thank you so much, Mark, and thank you, Dr. Misner.

This podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thanks so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

Dr. Misner shares three networking faux pas that he’s run into over the years.

1. Not responding quickly to referral partners. Don’t put off returning phone calls to your referral partners even if you’re not sure they have a referral for you.
2. Confusing networking with direct selling. Networking isn’t about collecting business cards and then sending them sales pitches or making cold calls.
3. Abusing the relationship. The worst example Dr. Misner is aware of is someone who disguised a sales pitch as a 50th birthday party.

Read Dr. Misner’s complete article on Entrepreneur.com.

What kind of networking faux pas have you encountered? (No names, please!)

Brought to you by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 107 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from the beautiful Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan, how are you, and where are you?

Ivan:
Well, I’m at BNI headquarters this week. Most directors may know this, but members may not know that we bring directors from all over world here to BNI headquarters several times a year and we do directors training. It’s three days of training, about 24 hours, and so I’m helping to conduct the directors training this week here at BNI.

Priscilla:
Well, that sounds great. So are you planning to share with us?

Ivan:
Well, I want to talk about networking faux pas. Three faux pas that I’ve come across in my years of involvement with BNI and with other networking organizations, as some of these are from other types of networking organizations, but three faux pas that jump out at me as big problems. I thought what I might do is share these, and then I’d love to have the listeners share at the end where they can post their comments some faux pas they’ve run into, but don’t name names. Don’t put people’s names up there. But share some of the faux pas that you’ve run into, either somebody doing something at a BNI meeting that probably wasn’t the best way to network or some other organizations where you’ve seen people do things that weren’t necessarily the best examples of networking.

Remember, this isn’t just to tell on somebody. What we want to show are what are good and bad examples. I talk a lot about good examples, but I want to model some things to stay away from, and that’s what I want to do here with Networking Faux Pas.

Priscilla:
Okay, great. Well, tell us the first one.

Ivan:
Well, the first one is really an ideal example of what to steer away from, particularly in BNI, and that is not responding quickly to referral partners. Now, this one really troubles me. I can’t imagine getting a call from a networking partner or a referral partner and not responding immediately. But unfortunately, this seems to happen with some regularity.

Not long ago someone I know had a referral to give a gentleman in his group, and he called the associate and left a message at his office. As soon as he knew the referral was viable, he called immediately. And a day went by without a return call, so he picked up the phone and called again and said it was really important to connect. He still didn’t hear from the guy.

He was finally able to speak to his networking associate at the next meeting. He asked him why he didn’t return his call, and the associate said, “Oh, well, if I knew you had a referral for me, I would have called you back immediately.”

Priscilla:
Yeah, right.

Ivan:
He couldn’t believe that. So he still gave him the referral at the meeting, but to no one’s surprise, the person referred ended up working with another vendor because no one got back to him in a timely manner.

Treating each of your networking partners as one of your best clients is critical. You’ve got to return phone calls from them immediately, as it speaks to your credibility and reliability as a professional. There are countless examples of people receiving referrals from networking groups and then contacting the referral a few days later and not doing it quick enough. The old phrase, if you snooze, you lose, is apropos here.

If the referral knows you have her name and number on Monday, boy, you better call them that day or the next day. And if one of your referral partners calls you and they don’t say why, you still need to call them back because these are your referral partners. Big faux pas.

Priscilla:
Right. That makes sense.

Ivan:
Here’s number two. Confusing networking with direct selling. Confusing networking with direct selling.

One of my company’s directors struck up a conversation with a woman business owner at a networking function. I may have mentioned this in a podcast in the past. When the business owner asked our director what she did, she said she helps owners build their business through networking and referrals, and the business owner smiled and said, “Well, I’m really good at networking. I’ve been doing it for a long time.”

And our director asked her, “So what’s your secret? What makes you so good?”

She stood straight; she said, “Well, a friend and I, we enter the room together.” These are like business mixers, like a Chamber mixer. “We enter the room together. We imagine drawing a line down the middle. She takes the left side; I take the right side. We agree to meet at a certain time at the end of the event and see who collected the most cards. And the loser has to buy the other one lunch.”

Well, the director said, “So what do you do with all those cards?”

And again, very proudly, she said, “Oh, I enter them into my distribution list and I begin to send them information about my services. If I have all their information, they’re all good prospects, right? They’re all good prospects.”

Well, no! They’re not good prospects. This is a classic example of an entrepreneur not understanding networking isn’t about simply gathering contact information and following up on it later. That’s nothing more than glorified cold calling. It just gives me the chills. I used to teach cold calling techniques to business people, and I did it long enough to know that I didn’t ever want to do it again. I’ve devoted my entire professional career to teaching the business community that there’s a better way to build long term business. And this is not a good example of it; this is not much better than cold calling.

Priscilla:
Right.

Ivan:
So here’s networking faux pas number three, and this is the most amazing of them all. And that is, abusing the relationship. Abusing the relationship. There are many ways I’ve seen networking partners abuse relationships, but the next story is one of the most glaring. As a matter of fact, I wrote about this story a few years ago at Entrepreneur.com, and when the editors read it, she actually wrote me back and said, “Is this a true story? This couldn’t be true.”

I told her, “I’m afraid it was.”

So here’s the story. A woman I know is invited to attend a 50th birthday party of an associate who used to belong to our networking group. So they once had a good, long term working relationship, and out of respect, she decided to attend. When she got to the birthday party, she got to the door, she looked through the window, and she noticed that people were arranged in a semi-circle listening to a presenter in front of an easel board. And when she stepped in, it was obvious that the party-goers were actually being recruited for a business opportunity.

And as resentful as the woman felt, she and the other mutual friends there found it difficult to remove themselves from the “birthday party” in spite of the fact that the only refreshment – and this is what is really amazing, the only refreshment being served was the company’s diet shake.

Priscilla:
Oh, wow!

Ivan:
So here’s the bottom line. Never mislead your networking partners. For that matter, never mislead anyone, but trust is everything when you’re talking about relationship networking. Inviting people to a birthday party that turns out to be a business opportunity pitch isn’t being honest with people with whom you want to build a trusting relationship.

All these faux pas directly relate to good people skills. So the prevailing theme of all three is to treat your referral partners and your potential referrals with professionalism and care. Use networking opportunities to meet people and begin the process of developing a genuine relationship, and treat your referral partner like you would a top client.

Most importantly, always network in a way that builds credibility and trust. Be candid in telling your referral partners what you need and what you’re asking of them. And do these things, and you’ll avoid some serious mistakes in your networking.

Now, just one last thing before we wrap up is I would love for the members listening to this story to share your networking faux pas, something that maybe has happened to you or you’ve seen happen. Again, don’t name names, and this isn’t just a place to complain. What we want is to learn from this. Here’s something you saw that you didn’t think was real strong and here’s why. And maybe even here’s what might have been better.

But this is your opportunity. I’d love to see some really positive negative. I’d like to see some strong examples of what not to do in networking environments.

Priscilla:
Well, great. I bet you you’re going to get a slew a faux pas.

Ivan:
Well, I’m looking forward to seeing them. I’d love to write some more. I’ll tell you what, if there’s some good ones, I might add to my networking faux pas article with Entrepreneur.com.

Priscilla:
Yeah, I think when you’re learning to network, you can actually make quite a few mistakes. So it’s kind of an art.

Ivan:
It is. You know what? You bring up a good point. We all go into this as newbies, as neophytes, and I’ve certainly made many mistakes in the past. I probably, in my early days of networking, didn’t respond to people as quickly as I should, and I might have confused networking with direct selling, but not for very long. I got that pretty quickly.

But we all learn as we go, and so by taking a look at what other people think are bad examples of networking, it helps teach us what not to do. Knowing what not to do is sometimes as important as knowing what to do.

Priscilla:
Right. Well, that a beautiful summary. Thank you so much for sharing this with us, and I look forward to hearing what all the new faux pas might be as they come forward.

Thanks so much, Dr. Misner.

I just want to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thanks so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

Dr. Misner wants to ask listeners “What’s your BNI story?” His own favorite story is that he met his wife through BNI; that was the best referral he ever got. So today he’s sharing some stories from other BNI members. You can read more of them in BNI SuccessNet.

• Tim Seitz says that BNI took his business from the verge of collapse to new heights of success in seven months.
• Patty Chakales reports that 51% of her new business in Q1 2009 came from BNI referrals.
• Paul Williams prevented layoffs at his company by infusing his office with the BNI mentality and refusing to participate in the recession.
• Carl Frazier credits $6000/month of his income to BNI referrals.
• Carolin Bennett is a second-generation BNI member; her mother was on the original BNI Board of Advisors.
• Javier Unzueta has increased his income 723% as a result of joining BNI.
• David Lewis got a $4.9 million referral.
• Ian Holligan from Barbados says his 3 years in BNI have improved his leadership and public speaking skills.
• Richard Swan wrote a BNI Song. Watch it on YouTube!

What’s your BNI story? How has BNI helped you? Post your comments here and share your story.

Brought to you by Networking Now.
Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 106 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from the beautiful Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan, how are you, and where are you?

Ivan:
Hi, Priscilla. I’m doing great. And, shhh, I can’t tell anybody where I am.

Priscilla:
Why is that?

Ivan:
Well, it’s actually that I’m on an anniversary trip with my wife, and so it’s just kind of pulled away just to do this podcast. My wife and I got married 20 years ago yesterday, and we’re taking a little getaway, and we don’t want to tell anybody where we are because we don’t want to have to break up our anniversary trip. We are out there right now in one of your regions. Somebody listening to this, we’re in your region. But we just did a little getaway; I almost never do this, and that’s what we’re doing this time. I married my beautiful bride 20 years ago yesterday. I know I’ve told many members this before, but she was a member of BNI. It was the best referral I ever got, and we’re still married 20 years and going strong. So I’m in one of your regions right now.

Priscilla:
That’s great. Well, congratulations to both of you.

Ivan:
Thanks.

Priscilla:
So what are you going to share with us today?

Ivan:
Well, I thought I have certainly an interesting story with having met my wife in BNI, and I thought it would be a good topic today to basically ask members, “What’s your story? What’s your BNI story? What is that you have gotten out of BNI? How has BNI helped you in some way, either personally or professionally?” And I say that because this is a people business; it’s a people organization. It’s all about people helping people to increase each other’s business through referrals.

Interestingly enough, we found that there are many other benefits that have cropped up along the way, some that I just didn’t expect. And what I thought I would do in this podcast is to talk a little bit about people’s stories, because many members have been sending me their stories. We’ve published some of these in SuccessNet, and I think that they’re really powerful. So I just wanted to share some of them today with BNI members because I think it’s good to see some of the kinds of benefits that other members have gotten.

Priscilla:
Great. Okay.

Ivan:
Tim Seitz from Bay Ridge “Morning Money Makers” chapter said that seven months ago he was afraid he had to close down his business during these recessionary times, things were difficult. He said, “Today my business has been doing so well that I’ve been putting sales people in other BNI chapters,” yet, seven months ago he was afraid he was going to have to close. Here’s a member who has not only survived these difficult times, but has thrived during these difficult times.

We have a couple of other members who said something that was almost identical. They both said words to the effect that, the expression that I’ve used for a while now, “I refuse to participate in a recession.” Both of them said words to the effect that, “I refuse to participate in a recession is not just a slogan.” It’s not just a slogan to them.

Patty Chakales from North Carolina said it’s a way of life for them as a member. She said, “I’m one of the owners of Brank Insurance Agency in North Carolina, and the economy is affecting a lot of people.” But she said she’s using her BNI resources to keep that from happening to her. She’s attending training, serving on a leadership team, doing one-to-ones every week. And in the first quarter of 2009, 51 percent of her business came from BNI referrals, 51 percent of new business came from her new referrals. That was just amazing to me.

Priscilla:
Yeah, that’s fantastic.

Ivan:
One of the most incredible stories I’ve heard recently was Paul Williams. Paul is with the Achievers Chapter in the United Kingdom, and Paul said, “About four weeks ago I was informed that there’d be layoffs in my company, and the thought of any of my team members being laid off was just devastating. So I decided I would do whatever it took to ensure that that didn’t happen.”

So he wanted to infuse some of what he called the BNI mentality into his team, and he talked about my articles on refusing to participate in the recession. They, as a team, resolved to look for changes that could be made within the business for the long term benefit of that organization, not just to get through the recession, but to really do well. And on a large white board, he wrote in the North-West Office of his company, “We refuse to participate in the economic downturn.” And every one of those employees signed their names on the white board, and then they sent an e-mail out to members and staff all across the company offering them the opportunity to join them in their stance in refusing to participate.

He said the reaction was unbelievable. Within just one week, the financial situation had turned around enough so that no layoffs were made in the organization, and the staff actively looked for increased business opportunities and had their best week since November of 2008. So the North-West Office of this company generated more business than any other four-week period over the last two years, and he said in his closing comments to me, “If it were not for BNI’s mentality, one of my team members would now be out of a job. And for that, to me, this is worth the membership alone.”

Priscilla:
Oh, that’s a great story.

Ivan:
These are just incredible stories, and I get these every week from members. And I think if you, as a member, are listening to these – and I’ve got some more. If you, as a member, are listening to these, take a look at SuccessNet because in SuccessNet there’s always a My BNI Story, and there’s some great stories in there about how people have benefited from the organization.

Carl Frazier from Hawaii said, “I love BNI. Someone offered me $100,000 for my seat. I would not sell it.” He said, “I can track back $6,000 a month in income I’m making from my membership in the organization.

You know, it’s really amazing is that these stories are now coming from second generation members of BNI. Second generation members. I’ve seen people who were children when BNI started. One is little Carolin Bennett. I have a photograph of Carolin Bennett. When I first met her, she was, I think, 11 years old, and there’s a photograph I have of her in a tree at the house that I used to go to for Board of Advisors meetings when she was a little girl. And we’d have Board of Advisors meetings at her mother’s house, Raoul Bennett, in Glendale, California. And that was back in 1986.

Today little Carolin Bennett is now a BNI member and in an acupuncturist in a chapter in Southern California. She used to kind of sit in on the side of the these original Board of Advisors meetings that her mother helped to get started back in 1986 when I was running them, and more than 20 years later she’s a member of a BNI chapter today.

Priscilla:
Wow, that’s great.

Ivan:
And so I’m seeing more and more of these kind of second generation members, people whose parents were involved, and now they’re involved.

There are new people like Javier Unzueta. Javier is with Speedy Signs & Engraving. And Javier, if I mispronounced your name, I’m so sorry. You can call me Misner from now on if you want!

I’ve met Javier, and he’s a sign company. Great guy, and he told me personally, I asked him to write this down, he sent it to me. He said, “My gross income has increased 723 percent because of BNI. Thank you, Javier; it’s great having you in the organization.

One of the biggest success stories that I heard this year was from David Lewis in the BNI High Flyer Chapter in Dubai, and he said that he had been a member for quite a few months. I don’t recall exactly how many months, but I think it was as much as nine months he had been a member. And he hadn’t gotten any referrals, and he was a little concerned because he hadn’t gotten a referral. And one of the very first referrals he got turned into a $4.9 million referral.

Priscilla:
Wow.

Ivan:
It was the biggest referral that the company had ever gotten, turned into business. He said, “I think this is a 480,000 percent return on my membership!” He said, “I’m not exactly sure if I did the math right.”

I said, “That’s okay. It’s close enough, David.”

480,000 percent return. I think David’s story is a great one because he said, “I was in for nine months. I didn’t get any referrals. None.” But when he finally got one, it was huge. Some businesses take longer to get, but when they get them, it’s incredible.

And it’s not all just about the business. Ian Holligan from Bridgetown, Barbados, said that his three years in BNI has given him great leadership skills and improved his public speaking, which is really incredible because he told me a story in something he sent to us in SuccessNet that he had to speak at his father’s funeral, and there was a time where he could never stand up and speak in public. And he said from his years of experience in speaking in BNI he was able to stand up and give the eulogy at his father’s funeral, and he said, “My dad would be proud. My dad would be proud of me and what I was able to do.”

And so there’s so many things, so many stories that members have about how this program has helped them, not only increase business, which was my intention when I started BNI, but things they’ve benefited from that are just incredibly powerful.

Here’s one that you’ve got to listen to. Go to YouTube and listen to The BNI Song by Richard Swan. We’ll make sure and put a link in this podcast. The BNI Song. You want to see how BNI has impacted somebody, you’ve got to watch this six minute song. Richard did it to the tune of American Pie, and he changed the lyrics; very powerful.

I know we’re running out of time. Let me just give you a couple more. Lou Brockman said he was a sales and leasing consultant. “BNI has changed my life both professionally and personally.” He’s gotten over a million dollars in referrals.

Here’s a letter I got from someone who wasn’t a member but affected their life, little ten-year-old Liam. Liam is in elementary school, and the BNI Foundation contributed to musical instruments for their music class. And I got a handwritten note that said, “Thank you, BNI Misner Foundation,” and I love this. There’s a little drawing of Liam with a guitar rocking away, and he says, “Your company rocks for helping our school.”

Priscilla:
That’s great.

Ivan:
We are changing the way the world does business, and we’re changing people’s lives. And nothing is more an example of that than Calvin Cheng, who, when I was in Hawaii, told me a story. He came up to me and he said, “I have my adopted children today because of BNI.”

Priscilla:
How’s that?

Ivan:
And I said, “Wow, how can that be? How did that happen?”

And he said, “I went to Kazakhstan to adopt my children, and you have to speak in front of a judge. I was petrified to speak in the past, but I was able to stand up, and it takes six weeks go get an adoption through in Kazakhstan, but,” he said, “my first time I was able to stand up and speak to the judge and tell him what I do and tell him how important it was to get the children as soon as possible because one of the children has a heart condition.” He said, “I spoke so convincingly and so well that the judge approved the adoption right there on the spot, and I was able to get my children.” And he sent me a photograph of he and his two children and his wife. And he says, “I have my adopted children today because of the skills that I learned in BNI.”

Priscilla:
Wow, that’s a beautiful story.

Ivan:
Well, I know we’re way over time, so I just want to wrap up and say BNI truly is changing the way the world does business. We’re helping people in so many ways, so my last comment would be: How has BNI helped you? What’s your BNI story? What have you gained from the organization either in terms of business or personal skills? I would love for you to put your comments up on this podcast and share your BNI story with the rest of the BNI members.

Thanks, Priscilla.

Priscilla:
Thank you, Ivan, that was a wonderful podcast.

Well, that’s it for this week, so I just want to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thanks so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

Until recently, Dr. Misner assumed that if he made an appointment with someone, he was going to be there, but there seems to be an emerging trend requiring people to confirm the appointment closer to the actual day. People have been saying “When I didn’t hear from you, I assumed it was off.”

Dr. Misner wants to state for the record that if you make an appointment with him, it’s firm, unless you hear otherwise. And he believes that should go for any BNI member: if you make an appointment, people should be able to count on you to show up.

BNI members who treat the BNI meeting like an appointment with prospects and business associates are much more likely to be successful. You don’t want to miss an appointment with your best referral partners. The chapters that understand this are the strongest.

Brought to you by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 105 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from the beautiful Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan, and how are you?

Ivan:
I’m doing great, Priscilla. And I still want to know, did I miss the memo?

Priscilla:
I think you might have, but what does that mean to our listeners?

Ivan:
Well, there seems to be a new trend in keeping appointments that I was completely unaware of until recently. You see, I’ve always operated under the assumption that when I set an appointment with someone for a meeting, a breakfast, a lunch, or some kind of face-to-face engagement that it’s presumed that I’m going to be there unless I notify them otherwise.

Priscilla:
Yeah.

Ivan:
However, it’s recently come to my attention that I’m apparently no longer safe in assuming that that’s the case. Just last week I received this frantic call from a friend of mine who had confirmed a lunch meeting with me a few weeks earlier. And he called because he seemed uncertain if we were still on for lunch. I thought it was really interesting because he was about 90 minutes away by car, and he hadn’t left yet, and the lunch was in 30 minutes. So I was a little frustrated by that.

More and more I’m experiencing scenarios that are really similar to this, and there seems to be this emerging trend now. I’m beginning to see that if you schedule an appointment and don’t hear from the other party again before the scheduled date and time, this means that the appointment has been magically and mysteriously cancelled by the appointment fairies. Now, I’m not alone in this either, because my wife, Beth, had the same experience last week with a group of ladies that she was planning a brunch for. One of the women said, “When I didn’t hear from you over the weekend, I presumed it was off.”

Priscilla:
Yeah.

Ivan:
She was told that my one of the five ladies who didn’t show up.

I just want to know, when did this start happening? Did I miss the memo? Maybe it’s tied to the reminder call system that most of my doctors are using now where the front desk has the task of calling clients a day or two before their appointment to remind them that the doctor is expecting them at such-and-such time.

Now, my wife, Beth, told me that spas and beauty salons are now doing the same thing, but I really can’t vouch for that from personal experience. How about it, Priscilla, do they do that? Do the spas and beauty salons do that?

Priscilla:
Definitely. Especially the beauty salons; that’s what I can vouch for. Yeah, they do; they have to.

Ivan:
Well, if the doctors didn’t have the front desk call me to remind, or if the spas didn’t call you for you appointment and we went ahead and presumed that the appointment was cancelled because they didn’t call, I wonder if they would waive the no-show fee for not showing up. What do you think?

Priscilla:
No, I don’t think they would.

Ivan:
Probably not. So I’m just kind of stating for the record that if you set an appointment with me, it’s firm unless you hear otherwise, and I think that’s the way it should be for any business person. We’re all part of a networking organization, and we have to have a commitment to our fellow BNI members and to other business professionals that if we set up an appointment, we going to be there. Unfortunately, there seems to be some new trend coming on that when it comes to an appointment protocol and I’m just asking, “Can someone please send me the memo, because I must have missed the last one on this one.”

Priscilla:
You know, Ivan, I think it’s because we’re on such an overload, to be honest with you, that people are completely overscheduled and inundated with information, and it’s their way of handling things. That’s what I think, but it’s very rude, so I’m with you on that.

Ivan:
It is. And all joking aside, I am seeing it start to happen more and more, and I think it’s almost a self-sustaining kind of problem. Because it’s happened more and more, people are starting to call just to confirm that everything is still one, and so there’s this sense of, well, this person didn’t call, so it must not be on, which is just crazy to me.

And I think that this is really relevant in BNI, don’t you? Isn’t a BNI meeting a little bit like an appointment?

Priscilla:
It is like an appointment, and it’s one that you’ve made a commitment to for the whole year other than a few absences.

Ivan:
Yeah, I know that this is sort of a side issue from the main discussion, but I think it’s an important one. BNI members who treat the BNI meetings like an appointment with prospects and fellow business associates are much more likely to be successful in this program, because these are appointments. These are appointments with your best referral partners, and you don’t want to miss an appointment with your best referral partners. It’s very important. I think that the chapters who have this sense of accountability where the members understand that this is an appointment and you need to treat it like a good appointment should be treated, and you don’t want to just not show up and have a poor attendance at the – I think that those people tend to be stronger business professionals and more successful, and they certainly are going to build better relationships because of their regular participation in the local chapters.

Priscilla:
Yeah, I agree. So we all need to be there. I agree with you.

Ivan:
Well, I’m not going to send a memo, so this podcast is going to have to do the trick. So everybody, if you set an appointment, be there, and treat your BNI meetings like an appointment.

Thanks, Priscilla.

Priscilla:
Okay, great, Dr. Misner. Thank you so much.

Well, that’s it for this week. I just want to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thanks so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

Dr. Misner developed this technique for getting referrals in the earliest days of BNI. He realized that he needed to be the “go-to” guy whenever anyone needed a referral—to anyone. He started sending the following letter to his clients three or four times a year:

“Dear _____,

I really believe in the process of referrals, so part of the service I provide is to be sure to refer my clients and associates to other qualified businesspeople in the community.

Attached is a list of areas in which I know very credible, ethical and outstanding professionals.  If you’re looking for a professional in a specific area I’ve listed, please feel free to contact me.  I will be glad to put you in touch with the people I know who provide these services.

Sincerely,

Dr. Ivan Misner

He didn’t include direct contact information for the professionals, because he wanted to make sure people came to him first. It worked like a charm, and people really appreciate the service.

Read Dr. Misner’s article on Entrepreneur.com.

Brought to you by Networking Now.
Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 104 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from the beautiful Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan. How are you?

Ivan:
I’m doing great, Priscilla. I’m going to be talking about a topic today that really helped me a great deal in my business many years ago.

Priscilla:
Okay, what would that be?

Ivan:
Well, we titled this, when I first wrote about it, Entrepreneur.com titled it The Networking Trick to Increase Business. When I first saw that, I was like it’s not really so much a trick. But when you think about it, it is certainly a technique that really helped me a great deal, and that’s what I’m going to be talking about in my podcast today.

One of the most important networking questions, and certainly one of the common networking questions I get asked is, “How do I generate referrals for other people? Because I understand that if I want to get referrals, I have to help other people. So how do I generate those referrals for other people?”

Well, this is the same question that I asked myself in the early ‘80s when I was just starting my consulting business before I started BNI. I came up with a technique that had a huge impact on my ability to provide quality referrals to others, which, of course, led to me getting referrals. I first did this before I started BNI, and then when I started BNI, this technique became even easier for me to employ, and I’ll explain it in a minute.

I realized that I needed to be the person who people came to if they needed a referral for anything, for any kind of business. I wanted to be the gatekeeper of referrals, sort of the “go to” guy. So what I did is I composed a letter that I sent out to my client list several times a year. Today you could send out a quick e-mail to your database, but you should be able to send it out – I would recommend that you send out a hard copy at least once a year as well so that you stand out from everybody else who’s doing all the e-mailings.

So here’s a sample of the letter. “Dear ‘Blank,’ I really believe in the process of referrals, so part of the service I provide is to be sure to refer my clients and associates to other qualified business people in the community. Attached is a list of areas in which I know very credible, ethical, and outstanding professionals. If you’re looking for a professional in a specific area I’ve listed, please feel free to contact me. I’ll be glad to put you in touch with the people I know who provide these services. Sincerely, Dr. Ivan Misner”

Now, you’ll notice, Priscilla, I said, “Attached is a list,” but I didn’t actually – in a list of areas or a list of professions, but I didn’t actually include any names or numbers of the people so that they could contact them directly. You know why?

Priscilla:
So they’ll have to call you.

Ivan:
Yeah. I didn’t want them to contact people directly. I wanted them to contact me because I was concerned that some of the people that I would send this to might just contact the person directly and bypass me, and I wanted to be the “go to” person. I wanted to make the connection. And they may or may not have ever said how they heard of the person, or the individual may not have asked, how did you hear of the person. So you’ve got to notice when you read this letter that I just listed professions; I didn’t list names and numbers. I wanted my clients to contact me so I could put the referral and the contact together so that I could build business relationships by being the “go to” guy.

What began to happen was that others would ask someone on my client list. “Who do you know who does X, Y, Z?” If they didn’t know anyone, then they would send that person to me. They would refer people to me because I got to be known as somebody who knew a lot of people. And I did that because I was trying to build my referral list, my ability as a networking person. And this is before I really had a lot of BNI chapters, before I even had five or ten BNI chapters by the time I was really in the middle of this. And I just learned that if you are the person who is the gatekeeper, if you are the person who is putting people in touch with people, more and more people are going to come to you, and if they need you, they’re going to ask you about your services.

See, the importance of becoming a gatekeeper is huge for anyone who is seeking to grow a business through word of mouth or through work of mouth marketing. It’s a strategy that gets people not only to contact you for a referral but also to open up a dialog with people about what your business is all about and how you can help them. This, in turn, leads to more business with existing clients and new business with prospects.

I think it’s a great technique, and I’ll tell you a real quick story that happened in the middle of this process for me. I would put people on who I met and had a conversation with. I wouldn’t just send this stuff cold to people, but if I met them, if they were my clients, if they were my friends, if they were on the list. But if somebody didn’t respond or if I ended up not doing business with them and there was no ongoing contact, I would drop them off the list. And I was sending this out about three or four times a year, and by the fourth or fifth time I sent it, I started dropping some names off the list, because I didn’t want to just send mail to people. Remember, this was before e-mail.

Priscilla:
Yeah.

Ivan:
So it was expensive to send this out. It cost me some money to print everything and put stamps on everything and mail it all. It cost a little money, and I didn’t want to just keep sending letters to people who weren’t interested, so I dropped some names off the list. It was really funny, because two months later I got a phone call from some guy who I’d met at a meeting many months earlier, and I put him on the list. After we didn’t have any contact with each other for a while, I dropped him off the list. He called me up, and he said, “Hey, do you still send that letter out every now and then, because I haven’t gotten one for a few months?”

And I said, “Yeah, as a matter of fact, I did, but I didn’t want to bother you anymore because I hadn’t heard anything from you, so I took you off the list.”

He said, “No, no. Send me the current list, because I need somebody who does some graphic design work, and if you’ve got a person that you’d recommend, I could really use that referral.”

And so I learned a lesson. Don’t drop people off the list unless they opt out, unless they want to be out of the list. And so I started asking people if they wanted to be dropped off the list, just contact me or drop me a note back. And I kept people on.

I’ve got to tell you, that was the way I built my personal network, and it was one of the things that helped lead me to build BNI was because of building my own personal network.

Priscilla:
Yeah, and it just heightens your reputation among your friends, because since I’ve been in BNI for about five years now, people know me as somebody who’s really connected in the community and that I would have a resource for almost anything. And they do that, they come to me and they ask me, do I know somebody who can take care of their house or whatever it is that they need. And it’s really a great service that you can provide. It makes you feel very good.

Ivan:
It does. And you are helping a lot of people, and you can expedite the process of being considered the “go to” person, the gatekeeper by doing a technique like this, because you’re now formalizing the fact that you’ve got a lot of contacts and that you would love to share those contacts with anybody who needs those. And people appreciate it, and it’s one of those touch points where you’re not asking anybody for anything, you’re not asking them to buy something, you’re not asking them to read something about your product. You’re simply letting them know that you can help them if they have a need, whatever their need is, that you’d be glad to help them. That’s the epitome of Giver’s Gain. It’s a perfect example of how can I help you and you’re not asking for anything in return. That’s the way to build a powerful personal network.

Priscilla:
Yeah, it sounds like a great idea.

Ivan:
I’d love to see BNI members all over the world start to use this technique with their clients and customers, because I think you’ll find that it’s a very effective technique.

Well, thanks, Priscilla.

Priscilla:
Okay, great. Well, thank you, Dr. Misner.

I think that’s it for this week, and I want to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thank you so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.

A newspaper reporter in Stockholm put Dr. Misner on the spot about online networking, insisting that it would replace face-to-face networking. So Dr. Misner turned the tables on the reporter and asked “So why did you drive all the way out here to do this interview in person?”

Some things are better in person. Networking is one of them. Online networking is a powerful tool, but it shouldn’t be the only one we use. To build a strong personal network, you should use both online and and in-person networking. Dr. Misner is active on many online networks, but nothing beats that face-to-face process.

Even the younger people coming into business realize that face-to-face connections are important. In-person networking is not going to disappear—at least not until we can be present by holographic projection. BNI and the service it provides are here to stay.

Brought to you by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 103 -

Priscilla:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables.

I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from the beautiful Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California, and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Hello, Ivan. How are you?

Ivan:
I’m doing great, Priscilla. Thank you.

Priscilla:
Where are you today?

Ivan:
Well, I just got back from a number of trips, one of which was the U.S. conference in Milwaukee, which was great, a lot of members, a lot of directors. And before that I was in France and Stockholm, which I mentioned on a couple of previous podcasts. And I want to talk about one of my experiences in Stockholm today.

Priscilla:
Oh, great. I’m anxious to hear about it.

Ivan:
Well, first of all, give a shout out to a BNI member in Stockholm who I met who said he listens to the podcast. He downloads them to his PDA device, and he listens to the podcasts as he drives around each week, and he sits and listens to the various podcasts. I hope he enjoys this one because it’s actually an experience from my visit in Europe.

I was doing a presentation in Europe, and a newspaper reporter with a major publication arranged to do a interview with me. And upon his arrival, he really started putting me on the spot about online networking. Most of what I do, when I do interviews, it not really controversial stuff. It’s how do you build your business through word of mouth. But he was really kind of confrontational, and he told me that online networking is basically going to replace the face-to-face process. He was becoming very militant in expressing his point of view and really didn’t see the value of networking face to face like we do in BNI. He was basically, for all intents and purposes, telling me that traditional networking is going the way of the buggy whip. I was a little surprised, and I was annoyed at first that this reporter was being so confrontational about networking.

And then I asked him a question. I said, “Why are you here to do this interview?”

He looked at me, and he was like, “What do you mean?”

I said, “Well, why did you drive all the way” – because he had to drive a long way to get to the stadium to meet with me. I said, “Why did you drive all the way through traffic?” It was late in the day, and it was during rush hour, and there was a lot of traffic. I said, “Why did you drive all the way in person just to do this interview when we could have done it by phone?”

He looked at me, and he said, “Well, interviews are always better face to face.”

And I said, “Exactly. I rest my case!” Networking is much the same. It beats communicating online or over the phone because nothing can ever fully replace an in-person conversation.

And the reporter kind of sheepishly relented and said, “Yeah, yeah, okay. I get it. That makes sense. Some things are better in person.”

And the truth is some things are better in person. Networking is one of them. This doesn’t mean that online networking isn’t valuable; far from it. Online networking is a powerful tool in our arsenal of networking strategies, however, it shouldn’t be the only tool we use because sometimes it’s simply not the best. For me, the bottom line regarding face-to-face networking versus online networking is that I don’t think it should be an either/or scenario. I think it should be a both/and if you want to build a strong personal network. So I’m a real believer in online networking and I’m active on Facebook, on Twitter, on LinkedIn, on Xing, on Ecademy. Ecademy is one of my favorite online networks, very active there. I think it’s a great way to have touch points with people, to connect with people over and over again, and to stay in touch with them.

But the truth is, there is nothing that beats that face-to-face process. Meeting somebody individually and having a chance to talk to them always works better in networking. It works better in almost everything we do. It works better in networking. It works better in interview with a newspaper reporter. It works better on radio shows. Whenever I’m in town, people would rather do the radio show with me coming in to the station to do that show rather than over the telephone because there’s an interaction that can take place face to face that just can’t take place over the phone or over the Internet.

Priscilla:
I think it’s the human condition, because we get so many cues from the face and the expressions. And we’re actually looking at the face more than we’re listening to the words, I think.

Ivan:
Yeah, I think it’s absolutely an important aspect of the process, and I’ve had a lot of people say to me that Gen X and the Millennial – the young people that are coming into BNI, and I’ve talked about this in a previous podcast, by 2010 there will, for the first time, be a non-Baby Boomer organization. So we are integrating technology into our system. I announced BNI Connect will be coming up later this year, which is an online network that will support the BNI membership. And I’ll be talking more about that in some future podcasts.

So I’m a real believer in online networking, but I also believe that what we do in BNI is very important, and that even though there is this real connectedness with younger people coming into business, they realize that a lot of business is still done face to face. And so the Gen X population and the Millennial Gen Y population, people in their 20s, the kinds of skill sets that we provide in BNI in that face-to-face networking is not going to become the buggy whip industry. It’s not going to disappear, not in my lifetime, anyway. Until the time comes when we can have fact-to-face meetings with a holographic image, like the Jedi knights of Star Wars – do you remember in one of those last Star Wars episodes, they literally had all these Jedi knights in a circle, and some of them were really sitting at the chairs, and some of them were sitting at a holographic image, and you were talking to these holograms? Do you remember that?

Priscilla:
Yeah, absolutely.

Ivan:
Well, until that happens, I think it’s still a good idea to network in person whenever possible. We’re not going to have that any time soon.

By the way, when the world advances to that point where we can do the Star Wars networking thing, I have dibs on being OB1 Kenobi. Do you remember the Alec Guinness version, right, the older guy with the gray hair? I mean, come on, that only makes sense. You have to admit, you see the resemblence, right?

Priscilla:
Yeah, absolutely!

Ivan:
Slap a smile on his face, and we’re practically brothers, right?

Priscilla:
Yep, looks just like you.

Ivan:
So when that happens, I want dibs on being OB1 Kenobi. Until then, I believe that face-to-face networking is a powerful medium, and I think that BNI will continue to provide that service. And as long as we begin to integrate some technologies into our existing system, which I’ll be talking about in future podcasts, I think we’re here to stay and continue to be the world’s leading networking organization.

Priscilla:
That’s great. Well, thank you, Dr. Misner. I think we’ve come to the end of this podcast. Is there anything else you’d like to add, or is that it for this week?

Ivan:
Well, I think I would just repeat the fact that it’s not an either/or; it’s a both/and. Really successful business people understand that you need to have the online technologies and online networking, but you also need to continue to do the face-to-face networking, and BNI is a great way to do that. Eventually, both, but certainly for now, face to face is our strength.

Priscilla:
Okay, great. Well, thank you so much.

I would just like to remind the listeners that this podcast has been brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. Thank you so much for listening. This is Priscilla Rice, and we hope you’ll join us next week for another exciting episode of The Official BNI Podcast.