Nice to meet you...now what?

Last week I gave a keynote to a conference about the uselessness of conferences. After all, why spend your whole day attending break-outs, shaking hands, and collecting business cards if you don't have a follow-up system in place when you get back to your office? It's true of all networking—your traction will only be as good as your follow-through. Use these five steps to improve your system: 

1. As soon as you meet them, make a few notes on the back of their card to capture the most relevant details from your conversation with them.
2. When you get back to your office, enter their business card into Outlook or your CRM of choice. Make sure you tag them according to their profession (or whatever other criteria you use) so they don't simply become vCard number 1284.
3. Connect with them on LinkedIn.
4. Add them to your newsletter mail list, if appropriate.
5. If you feel there's good potential for business, send an email proposing a follow-up lunch so the relationship gains momentum. If it's too soon to set up another lunch, post-date your email so it goes out in a couple of months.

If you have a stack of business cards anywhere on your desk, you probably aren't following up very effectively. So, put the five steps to work, build up your database and your LinkedIn sphere, and turn those handshakes into assets.

Oh, and click HERE if you aren't sure what to do with all those LinkedIn connections.