Taking your networking efforts to the next level requires shift to NetBeing

Handing out your business card at monthly Chamber of Commerce meetings no longer qualifies as networking. Today’s business leaders know that real, profit-generating networking requires more. More strategy, more connectedness, and more trust.

New Year, New Relationships, New Opportunities

With the new year comes that feeling of a fresh start. A chance to start with a clean slate and make something happen. What will you make happen for yourself this year? How will networking play a role for you?

Strong Business Relationships Are Critical

You may already understand that relationships play an important role in keeping profitable customers, attracting talented employees, and advancing your own career. But are you doing anything to strengthen those relationships?

'Yours Truly,' the E-Variants
Useful to know for follow-up emails

Chad Troutwine, an entrepreneur in Malibu, Calif., was negotiating a commercial lease earlier this year for a building he owns in the Midwest. Though talks began well, they soon grew rocky. The telltale sign that things had truly devolved? The sign-offs on the e-mail exchanges with his prospective tenant.

The Skill that Separates

"I wasn’t bowled over by his intelligence, or his piercing questions, or his anecdotes. What impressed me was that when he asked a question, he waited for the answer. He not only listened, he made me feel like I was the only person in the room.”

Are You Visible?
If you don’t regularly exhibit some evidence of your existence people will quickly wonder whether or not you’re still around.

3 Invaluable Sales Lessons from an Unlikely Source
Who'd have thought Seventeen magazine would be so useful to the networking set? Targeted at selling, but useful advice for networking too.

Interview with Jefferey Anderson of FSB Associates
Interview all about networking from the Business Networking Advice blog

Networking Quotient Quiz
This free quiz is designed to help you learn about your social networking skills for business and how your skills compare with those of your peers in several demographics.

• How to be Interesting
• List of International Faux Pas -- should be useful for networking with different cultures (link to China section)

• Job Networking: Getting Started
• Professional Online Networking: Act Globally or Locally?
• The Art of Schmoozing

• Using Email as a Prospecting and Networking Tactic
• Why Aren't You Talking to Me?
• How to Increase Your People Power
• Effectively Leverage Your Business Network
• Networking for the Right Reasons

• Clarify

• Relationship Development is Just So Important
• 15 Second Pitch
• Reach Out and Network
• 5 Tips to Increase Your Likeability
• 51 Thoughts on Networking
• The "Do Nots" of Networking - useful for jobseekers

• Online Networking or Offline Networking?