Networking is more than just exchanging business cards or adding new contacts on LinkedIn; it’s about creating meaningful connections that with honest intentions for mutual growth and professional opportunities. As someone who has navigated the vibrant business landscape of Orlando for years, I’ve learned insights and strategies that have not only helped me overcome the initial jitters of networking but also build lasting relationships in the professional community including many that I still have to this day. Here’s how you can do the same.
Embrace the Power of Connection
Orlando has a dynamic business environment is that is full of opportunities for professionals that are eager to expand their network. The key is to approach networking with a mindset of building connections rather than mere transactions. Add in the intention of seeking 1 or 2 people in the room that you may be able to provide help or insight to, and you’ll really leave a lasting impression. Remember, the most fruitful relationships are built on genuine interest and mutual respect.
Finding Your Circle
One of the most effective strategies I use is to look for groups of people at networking events and approach them with subtlety. Wait for a moment when someone makes eye contact or gives a nod, it’s usually a signal that it’s okay to join the conversation. This non-intrusive approach respects the existing dynamic and gently opens the door for you to be welcomed. Once you’re part of the circle, engage in the conversation with intent. Ask thoughtful questions and listen actively. Repeat back parts of what someone says to demonstrate that you’re not just hearing but truly listening. This not only helps in making the conversation more engaging but also in remembering the key points about each person, which can be invaluable when following up.
The Art of the Soft Sell
A common misstep in networking is leading with a sales pitch. Don’t be that person! This approach can feel transactional and off-putting. Instead, focus on building a rapport without any immediate expectation of getting something in return. The goal is to foster a connection that could naturally lead to business opportunities in the future.
Overcoming Nervousness
It’s natural to feel nervous when stepping into a room full of strangers, especially when the pressure to make meaningful connections is high. When you get nervous, remind yourself that most everyone in the same place right now are also just as nervous. Some things you can do to help with that is to prepare an Elevator Pitch. Having a concise and compelling way to introduce yourself can boost your confidence and make a strong first impression. It’s not something you’re going to come up with overnight, and although the process can be tough, trust it because you’ll instantly see when you deliver it right and it’ll feel amazing!
Set Realistic goals for yourself. Instead of aiming to meet everyone in the room, set a goal to have meaningful conversations with maybe five or six people. Try out different types of events like Toastmasters, Speed Networking, Lunch & Learns, and After Hours Socials. The variety will get you exposed to various types of people in settings that you may find you’re most comfortable at and the connection opportunities to be of the better quality.
Timely Follow-Ups
This is probably the most crucial tip of all that I have to give, which is to make time first thing the next morning and send an intentional direct email. Part of my workflow is to send a warm email and include a memorable part of the event that the person I’m emailing and I shared so that I help to jog their memory and also show that I honestly remember them. Then I add them to my mailing list. Depending on how well the interaction went I will search for them on Linked In and if they’re active enough, I’ll ask to connect with them and use a personal short message with the connection request.
Networking in Orlando’s bustling business environment can be incredibly rewarding if approached with the right strategies. One of my mottos is “You’re only one connection away from your biggest deal”. It’s true though because as I think about some of the colleagues I have; I can name a few that have access to a private jet, own multiple properties, own large organizations, and manage multiple businesses. The key thing is knowing how to leverage those relationships and contacts with a mutual gain. If you’re starting out, focus on genuine connections, listening actively, and following up effectively, you can turn brief encounters into lasting professional relationships. Oh and remember, networking is a skill that improves with practice, so don’t be discouraged by initial setbacks. With each event, you’ll grow more comfortable and get much better at navigating the art of professional networking.
As a small business owner, your focus can be pulled in so many directions when it comes to improving and sustaining your customer base and experience. When it comes to the efficacy of your website, attracting traffic, converting visitors into customers and a laundry list of other necessities, you’ll want to start with or keep your focus on what’s important. One essential aspect of website development that you may not be paying enough attention to is search engine optimization (SEO). Meaning, you need to make sure that your website has basic SEO metadata and is configured properly.
SEO metadata refers to the information that appears in the HTML code of your website and provides search engines (like Google and Bing) with information about the content of your site. Here are some essential SEO metadata that every small business website should have:
Title Tags: These tags appear in the browser tab and provide a brief description of the page’s content. They should be concise and accurately reflect the content on the page.
Meta Descriptions: These are brief summaries of the page’s content that appear in search engine results. They should be compelling and accurately represent what visitors can expect to find on the page.
Header Tags: These tags organize the content on your page into different sections, making it easier for search engines to understand the hierarchy of information.
Alt Tags: These tags describe the images on your website and provide valuable information to search engines that can’t “see” images.
So, why is it important to have these basic SEO metadata configured on your website?
Improving visibility in search engine results: If your website has accurate and descriptive metadata, search engines will be more likely to show it to people who are searching for relevant keywords.
Increasing click-through rates: When your website appears in search engine results, the metadata can influence whether someone clicks on your link. If your metadata is compelling and accurately represents your content, people are more likely to click through to your website.
Enhancing user experience: By using header tags and providing alt tags for images, you are making your website more organized and easier to navigate for both visitors and search engines.
Beating the competition: If your competitors are not optimizing their metadata, you can gain an advantage by doing so. You can appear higher in search engine results, attract more clicks, and ultimately win more customers.
As a small business owner, you must ensure that your organization’s website has the basic SEO Metadata configured. If you use WordPress as the platform for your website, you’re already in great position and may have several key elements available for simple configuration and input. We get questions all the time about what can be done to increase website traffic and improving search engine results, and these are some relatively easy things you can take quick action on or do yourself. You’ll improve the visibility in search engine results, increase click-through rates, enhance user experience, and be more competitive. There’s a whole lot more to do in SEO, and while it may seem overwhelming at first, implementing these details and descriptions is an easy and effective way to get started.
Check out our FREE slide deck on SEO Data & Strategy. You’ll even be able to download a PDF copy for free.
I recently sat down with a long time friend of mine, Schellie Fanfan, LMHC, MS, EdS, CRE, and spoke about the challenges, emotions, and ebbs and flows of running a business. Let me tell you that she brought to light so many things that I’ve thought about or experienced but never really put into perspective with regards to mental health.
As a creative, there’s so many feelings and thoughts that circle our minds on a regular basis. Some things pertaining to business, some to personal, but still there and not always having time to fully process. The realization was that all of these things and more were affecting my mental health. Coincidentally I thought back to green room conversations at past conferences I attended with other creatives having similar conversations and sharing how we each individually “deal” with day to day happenings and what not. What I didn’t fully realize until I talked with Schellie was how being a highly functioning person, the effects to my mental health that would ensue.
Now this wasn’t a formal session, we were actually on set recording some promotional videos for her new website and platform. I saw an opportunity to ask her about what she notices when counseling business owners and entrepreneurs. This short snippet isn’t enough at all, but does give insight on the different ways that our mental health can be affected in our day to day without much notice from us at all.
I would highly recommend that after watching this if you have any questions to reach out to Schellie directly. She has years of service and even more in studies, degrees, and has more acronyms that I’ve ever seen.
I met Vel at a networking event years ago here in Orlando. We instantly befriended and shared similar business and entrepreneurial stories to almost no end. Her history in working within Florida State government in the capital and working closely with elected officials to local community leaders was inspiring. I’ve always said that it’s not always about what you know, but who you know, and Vel is well-connected! In this brief 3 Question Interview you’ll get an idea of who she is and what Vasaj Communications has to offer in the way of small business marketing and public relations.
1: How do you define public relations different from what the initial naïve perception people may have of this type of service?
On this amazing journey as a public relations professional, I enjoy specializing in the art of transformation and helping businesses grow! The ever-expanding world of public relations largely impacts public opinion, financial performance, and business success. My personal definition of public relations serves at the critical core of my life’s work. I believe it’s the experience, leadership and collaborative approach that is required to be a catalyst for business growth, visibility, and longevity. The public relations approach may be unique to every business and individual, but its intrinsic value is unwavering in being an integral component of influence on industry.
2: With a $500 monthly budget for marketing, what would you suggest a small business owner do with that to increase their brand awareness?
A consultation with the potential client would be required to expertly recommend the most effective manner for building brand awareness. However, there are a couple of measures the business owner should consider before being able to establish a practical and effective approach to setting a marketing budget. First, the business owner needs to identify short and long-term objectives, consider the target market, and know and understand the needs of this audience, as much as possible. Having insight into the demographics (the statistical data of a population, especially those showing average age, income, education, etc.) and psychographics (the measure of the customers’ attitudes and interests) will help guide the campaign’s marketing vehicle and contribute to being able to adequately establish a budget. Secondly, the business owner must realize that as the depth and extent of business goals will vary from business to business, so will the range of professional experience, industry knowledge, and retainer fees vary for branding experts. Just as you would visit more than one car dealer if in the market for a new car, I suggest speaking to more than one marketing professional to find one that is a comfortable fit.
3: What’s the most challenging aspect of your job that most of your clients wouldn’t know from the outside looking in?
That’s a thoughtful question, Jean. I thoroughly enjoy supporting clients of different backgrounds and needs with media and government relations, press communications, author campaigns, messaging, social media management, event coordination, webinar creation, and a host of other branding mechanisms. However, what may not be glaringly obvious is that there is no cookie cutter approach to optimizing one’s brand, and even within the same industry, branding objectives differ. As a public relations professional, I believe it’s important to spend time getting to know the unique personality, business acumen, and mindset of each client, particularly if I’m going to write their talking points, digital messaging, or serve as a company spokesperson. I completely customize services to best fit the client’s overall need. To learn more about Vasaj Communications and our scope of services, visit www.vasajcommunications.com. I can be emailed directly at info@vasajcommunications.com.
This weekend was the WordCamp that almost wasn’t. Due to a recent storm Hurricane Matthew that brushed all along the east coast of Florida that not only caused moderate damage to coastal property but cancelled many events and conferences that only happen once a year here. So a special shout-out goes to Lisa Melegari and the rest of WordPress Orlando Team for being nimble and dedicated to get this conference rescheduled with a pretty quick turnaround and still keep the same venue, sponsors, and amenities.
Some quick highlights of the weekend for us first that our own resident Social Media Marketing Strategist Nicole Perpillant did a talk on Facebook Integrations. This was a great talk for small businesses and entrepreneurs looking to use social media ads in spaces like Facebook and Instagram and ways to hone in on your target market and audience.
This year’s theme was on Lego’s and it was awesome. Probably brought out the kid in all of us. Thankfully there weren’t too many toys out for give-a-ways because I know most of us would have been building and playing instead of networking and learning. Both days were filled with speakers, talks, and panels anywhere from How to install WordPress, to Security best practices, Child Themes, and PHP Functionality. You can see the full schedule along with the speaker talks and information at this link.
While I will be posting the photos we took while on site for the weekend soon, know that it was a pleasure to talk and meet with so many new people. One of the things that is the same with each different WordCamp that we attend is the chance of meeting people who actually aren’t from your local area.
One of the biggest take-aways for me will actually be better explained in a coming blog post about your website being “Software”. There was a Panel Discussion and this was mentioned by one of the speakers Karena Kreger when she referenced WordPress as a software and it really resonated with me because while I know that it is, I don’t treat it like that. Let me explain; to me WordPress is a CMS (Content Management System) and kind of ecosystem. Being that it’s a hub that has extensions of functionality driven by other pieces to make a website work in a way intended by a developer for the end-user experience. Ok before I lose you, let me explain. See in the tech-bubble that most of us designers and developers live in, we understand how to WordPress lives in the sense of what makes it work, the vulnerabilities that it can be susceptible to, and how fragile it can be to core editing. But our clients and customers and users don’t know or understand all of that. In my mind I created a metaphor to best explain this; if you were to explain to a client of whom you are developing or created a WordPress website for, you’d have to tell them it is like having Windows 10 and that in order to keep it working well – there will need to be periodic updates. And along with those updates there will also need to be safety and security measures (and additional software) in place to keep “your software” working well. If ignored you can start to notice decreased performance among many other things.
Some of the best speakers like Josh Pollack, Scott Mann, Jeff Noel, and Elizabeth Pampalone (to name just a few) did great with metaphors. They were able to take what they’ve experienced and word it in a way that we could consume and reflect on. Like any good conference you should never walk away without your head filled with ideas, have some solutions to problems you’ve been dealing with, or a sense of empowerment that you too can be a hero like these presenters.
I look forward to reading other blog posts of other people’s experience with WordCamp Orlando in the coming days and weeks. And I’ll also see about accepting the challenge to attend WordCamp US in Philadelphia PA on December 2nd.
![Mental Health Awareness in High Functioning People [Featuring Ask Schellie]](https://jpdesigntheory.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/AskSchellie-FINAL-3.jpg)
