Branding: Tending the Front Door

Dr. Earl R. Smith II
Managing Partner, The Federal Circle
DrSmith@Dr-Smith.com
Dr-Smith.com

As the old saw goes ‘you never get a second chance to make a first impression’. I am often amazed at how much time and polish people spend on their so called ‘elevator speech’ and then how casually they present themselves, their interests and their company during a first encounter. First meetings have at least two components that demand careful attention. The first is the communication of information about you, your interests and your company. The second (mostly nonverbal) is the impression that you make (and leave) with the other person.

Networking Events: People do business with people they know like and trust. The principal purpose of networking is to identify those people who seem to be good candidates for meeting those standards.

Is that how you are approaching the process? Here’s a good test. Go back over the last few months of business cards that you have collected and think about how each of those initial contacts has played out. Figure the amount of time you spent meeting these people and compare it with the results generated. How does it stack up? Are you scoring or just running the bases? Has the investment in time and money paid off or is it all a write-off? What has been the net result?

Branding: Your personal brand is the definition of you in the minds of others. Your company’s branding is the image of your company as understood by outsiders and as represented by you. Both are the sum of judgments, opinions and gossip that results from the coherency, and sometimes downright incoherency, of the image you project.

Branding begins with the first meeting with any person or company. They open a file on you from the moment you come in contact with them. In the early stages of any relationship first impression dominates. Trouble comes when the images that you are projecting do not jibe with the words you are using. You could be losing customers and deals because your first impressions aren’t what they need to be.

Most people make a common mistake in first meetings … they think that the information within their ‘elevator speech’ is the most important part of what is going on. But just a little thought will suggest why that might not be so.
You might be successful, using the attractive bait of a well crafted elevator speech, in kicking off a conversation. But success may quickly be sabotaged by the conflicting messages that make up a first impression. Along with the elevator speech you may be giving signals which directly contradict that carefully crafted message. You may appear insincere, disorganized, untrustworthy, overly casual, unfocused, disengaged, unlikable, disrespectful, sloppy, callous … or any of a number of other negative message carriers.

The effects of first impressions endure (and often prove notoriously difficult to overcome). It is that first impression of who you are … what kind of person you are … that serves as the basis for the other person’s decisions about whether to allow the relationship to develop further. The relevant maxim here is that people do business with people they know, like and trust.

No matter how good and well crafted your message is, if they aren’t getting to know you, think that they probably won’t like you and/or feel that they won’t be able to trust you, the game is over before it begins.

The cruel fact is that most of these negative impressions are generated by a thoughtless approach to the critical ‘get acquainted’ process … that is, they are unnecessary and self-sabotaging. As in other parts of life, it is the unthinking actions that are the ones that get you into real trouble! It is also those unthinking actions that keep you repeating the same mistakes over and over … and having the same results over and over as well.

The Exchange: Let’s consider an ordinary occurrence to make the point … the exchange of business cards and the ritual which normally accompanies it. The business card is used on a daily basis by people to communicate information not only about them but also about their company. This exchange should convey a company’s brand, its purpose and its importance to a potential customer.

Personally, I respond best when the card is offered immediately after a common value proposition is identified and as an important representative of the individual I am talking to … as something that I will take away when we part.

So, how do some people approach this important ritual? I have had people stuff their cards in a spare pocket and pull out one dog-eared representative. The clear message is “Oh hell, it’s not that important, but you might as well have one of these.” Then there are people who keep their cards in their wallets! Out comes a bent, damp first impression. “Goodness”, I think “If this is how you treat your representatives. How are you going to treat me?” If you think that is a bit off base, try it this way; “If you can’t bother to make sure you make a good first impression, how are things likely to go when they get more casual?” Most times these cards never leave the meeting with me.

I get all kinds. The most objectionable for me is the person who, in giving you their card, seems to need to apologize for both the card and themselves. “What’s the point?” Another type seems to want to slip the card to me with a minimum of effort and exposure … a kind of surreptitious delivery. I feel like I am out in the cold somewhere in East Berlin before the wall came down.

Then there are those who seem to make it clear that the card (and themselves, I would gather) are not worth all the attention … that what is going on is not that important and that the card represents something of little consequence. These people don’t seem to see their time as valuable and most likely see my time that same way. I find this insulting. Finally, some people have built a cute trick, inappropriate photo or reference into their card. The branding message becomes the cute trick … which seems of more interest to them anyway … so the next time I need a cute trick …

Next time you are at a networking event, take a break and back against a wall … watch the various approaches to the passing of the cards. Watch when the cards are offered … early on, later or as an afterthought. Pay attention to how the card is delivered and, as importantly, how it is received. Watch the look on the faces of those on both the giving and receiving end. Check for eye contact during the transfer. Is there a connection or just a delivery? Then get in the mix and notice how an individual acts when they give you their card … when you give them yours.

Best result: You meet an individual who you might be able to rely on, establish a commonly valuable basis for meeting again, exchange contact information, address the question of a next meeting and move on.

First Conversation: Two people, who have just met, are trying to independently decide whether there is any basis for further conversations. At this point it is probably not clear which direction the relationship will take. They may find business interests in common or hobbies that form the basis for deciding to meet again. Once this decision has been reached the purpose of the meeting has been achieved.

Most environments in which these conversations take place are not conducive to immediately extending the meeting. In fact, the decision to have a subsequent meeting has been the whole point. I prefer to delay proceeding for an entirely different reason … but more on that in the next section.

For now I would like to focus on those kinds of behaviors during these initial meetings which just drive me nuts. The first I call the gratuitous insult. An example might help. In one initial meeting I was describing what it was that I do. I described my efforts at executive coaching, leadership coaching, management team coaching, mentoring and life coaching. Because, to me, each of these areas requires a different approach I took some pain to distinguish them. The response was quite dramatic. “It’s all life coaching to me. I think your distinctions are silly.” I smiled, gave him back his card and walked away.

A second behavior which I find bizarre I call the gratuitous rant. Again an example might help. I was at a network event were a group of four or five of us had gathered around the subject of using various software to manage contacts, correspondence and leads. The conversation had turned to the best platform and all of us agreed that a well known integrated software package on a PC platform was the way to go. We had started exchanging tips as to how to make the combination really sing when we were joined by an individual who immediately decided that we all needed conversion.

The individual launched into a sermon about how much better Apple computers were than all the rest of their competition. None of us really cared what this person thought but he persisted and then wandered into a strident defense of Apple’s senior management team. By that time the group was looking for an excuse … any excuse … to drop out of the congregation. One by one they drifted off until it was just me and the preacher. After the last member left, I raised my hand and told the ranter that clearly nobody cared what he thought, that he had irritated a whole bunch of people who might have been interesting and useful to him and that he has solidly established his reputation as a bore and a bully. He seemed surprised as I walked away. I needed a drink.

Did you ever find yourself asking this question, “Why are you telling me this?” I have. I will find myself listening to the description of the latest tricks that somebody’s dog has learned, the newest addition that was built on to a house that I will never see or (and this one really gets to me) the tremendous progress that their child has made in school. This is always an indication to me that the person has no idea why they are at the networking event, what the purpose of our conversation is or (probably) what planet they are on. I can help you in this area because, over time and with much experimentation, I have found the correct response. Just raise your hand and look the person in the eye … then ask, “Why are you telling me this?” It works.

Best result: Your initial conversation identifies a commonly valuable basis for the next meeting. You gather enough information to have a fairly solid basis for suspecting that a subsequent meeting will likely be productive. The conversation ends with either a scheduled meeting (best) or an agreement to schedule one.

The Follow-Up: As I mentioned earlier, I like to complete one initial conversation and move on to others. After establishing that there is a good reason for more extended sessions I exchange cards and suggest that we should both see if there are others in the room that we should meet. We should contact each other with the purpose of scheduling a follow on meeting. As a matter of habit, I always send an e-mail the next day suggesting one or two times for the next meeting.

I hold off having a more extensive conversation at that initial meeting for a simple reason. One of the things I’ve noticed over the years is there are a group of individuals who are very good at having apparently successful initial conversations … but that is all there is to them. After having met them, I encounter them again and again at subsequent events going through the same ritual (and sometimes with the same people) that seems to define, more than anything else, who they are.

Over the years I have come to suspect that these people have difficulty building deeper relationships and therefore have become addicted to a constant flow of new ones.

The neat thing about this strategy is that it helps me separate the wheat from the chaff. Once a common value proposition is defined the next step is to test the true value of that proposition. This is important because I have found that better than half of the individuals who agree to follow up do not. Often they have either no intention of or no ability to follow up. I call these people the ‘five minute, one night standers’.

The follow-up becomes important because it gives you information about whether you can trust the individual to remember the value proposition you agreed on and to honor the obligations that they undertook at the end of your first conversation. This is a fairly simple test. You either mean what you say or you don’t. You either understand what you’ve committed to or you don’t. You either take the opportunities identified as important or they’re not. Nothing sorts this out like a follow on meeting.

Best Result: You have a next meeting. At the end of that more extended session you know if the relationship will be worth pursuing.

Summary: Networking events should be seen as an investment of time and money with an expected return of new opportunities. Your performance at these events has a critical impact on the results achieved. The bad news is that you can self-sabotage to the point of making attendance not only nonproductive but negative. The good news is that, with effort and a little coaching, you can drastically improve both performance and results.

© Dr. Earl R. Smith II

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Related Articles:

• Finding Meaning Without Manufacturing Meaning
• Running Your Own Shop
• Decisions, Decisions
• Yes You Can
• Extending Your Reach
• Seeking the Upward Path
• A Cost of Anti-Humanism

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