ASA 68 | Networking Formula

 

In any industry, building your network is a crucial step and foundation for success. Alex Mandossian shares the F.I.T. Networking Formula that has been proven to be effective through experience. He breaks the formula into three steps and explains each one in detail while giving true stories as examples of how you can make it work. He goes into the comparison of being a farmer versus being a hunter and how it relates to network building. Alex emphasizes the importance of consistency in getting those of higher status than you into your environment.

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F.I.T. Networking Formula

This show is devoted to coaches, consultants and other service professionals who want to get more premium clients but don’t enjoy the selling process. Is that you? We believe that seeding through storytelling is the new selling and no matter what you believe, I hope you agree that nothing happens in your business until something is sold. It doesn’t matter what business you’re in. If you hate to sell, then this show is for you.

After you read a few episodes, you’ll find out that selling can be fun as long as you know what to say, when to say it, and how to say it. If that’s what you’ve been looking for, then you’re in the right place because this show teaches you how to sell by obliterating objections that typically can lead to personal rejection. If that sounds interesting to you, then all you need to do is lean forward and read carefully.

Although ethical influence is central to our discussions, you and I will also explore other fascinating and important topics such as getting more exposure like our topic on this episode which is the F.I.T Networking Formula. Attracting joint venture partners, getting an Amazon bestseller, how to do podcast SEO strategies, getting higher-end clients, creating irresistible offers and designing curriculum, productivity habits, storytelling formulas, and even ninja marketing tips to name a few.

In this episode, you’re going to learn three key insights, which I believe are critical to making you a highly-skilled, ethical influencer. Number one, you’ll discover what the F.I.T. Networking Formula is and why it works so well.

Number two, you’ll learn why growing relationship capital is a lot like farming and not hunting. You want to have a farming mindset, not the hunting one. Finally, number three, you’ll learn the F of F.I.T. Formula can take up to 90 days to take root. In fact, of the three parts of the formula, the F will take the longest time to take root. Sometimes 90 days or longer and sometimes less.

This episode could have a significant impact on how you can win the hearts of others with total and absolute certainty. If English is your second language, over 50% of our readers are from outside of North America, I want you to read this episode not once, not twice but three times because nothing empowers your fluency of learning a new language than the art and science of ethical influence.

[bctt tweet=”In building your network, follow people who have a higher status than you do.” username=”AlexMandossian”]

I have a student who’s now one of our mentors, Brian. A quick tip of the hat goes to him. He lives in Taiwan and he listens to each episode about 4 to 5 times. English is not his primary language, Mandarin is. As a result, he’s gone through our Guerrilla Business Online program through another mentor who studied under me.

His name is Jack Wong. He lives in Singapore, originally from Hong Kong. These two have learned new languages by studying sales and, in Brian’s case, studying this show as a public service no less than 4 to 5 times per episode. Thank you, Brian, and I hope you continue to tune in.

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A True Story

The story I’m about to share is true. The gentleman who I’m talking about, his name is Phil. He lives in a small city, which is south of São Paulo. It’s known colloquially as Floripa and it’s in Brazil. His primary language is Portuguese. He lives with his family, girlfriend, brother, and mother. They come from humble means.

His father no longer is living but did leave some money so that the family could expand and learn the business. He paid me $100,000, which is a lot for anybody to mentor him and coach him. He is not only an artist, musician, and songwriter. He’s a novelist. Phil’s first novel is coming out.

As an artist, a singer, a songwriter and as a solo musician, he’s quite good at making videos and putting them up on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. He wants to get his first novel to be a bestseller and hopefully, it’ll be the first of many. One of the things that Phil asked me was how to get more exposure, how to get connected and network in with other novelists.

I’m not in the arena of a novelist. I teach people how to write a nonfiction book, that’s the business I’m in. We have Amazon bestselling offers that we write the book and do a virtual book tour for someone. Most people don’t think of themselves as writers, but I think anyone is an author because the author is short for authority.

Certainly, Phil is an authority about this novel that he rewrote at least half a dozen times. He had a group that would read different chapters. He has different pages for each of the characters. Novels are very difficult because you have to build these characters.

He asked me, “How do I get more exposure?” I introduced him to the F.I.T. Formula, and this is what I want to introduce you to. One of the courses that I co-taught with a former partner, Steve Olsher, is called Push Button Influence. Anyone who goes through my Guerrilla Business Online course gets Push Button Influence as one of the training. There’re seven modules there and I talk about the F.I.T. Formula.

The F.I.T. Formula

The F in F.I.T. is Follow. I is Invite. The T is Tell. The first part of F will take somewhere between 30 and 90 days, sometimes even longer. It’s taken me a year in some cases. What does follow mean? Follow means you are going to follow people who have a higher status than you do.

ASA 68 | Networking Formula

Networking Formula: Growing relationship capital is more like farming instead of hunting. You’re not going for the kill; you’re planting seeds and you’re going to see which one takes root.

 

What does invite mean? Invite means when they notice you, then you invite them for an interview since you know a lot about them. What does tell mean? You tell the world so that they show up. Invite and tell could take a day, but the following could take 90 days before you’re noticed. You’re coming out of nowhere and they’re seeing your face. This is on the social media of their preference.

It could be Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter or YouTube. You follow them for 90 days and you don’t always post something but you post something that edifies and brings more value to what they’re posting. They notice you like, “Who is this? I keep seeing this person’s face up and they’re adding value to my community.”

What I asked Phil to do was to network with those who have higher status than he does. Who are those people? Those are novelists. I asked him to follow JK Rowling of the Harry Potter series, Stephen King, James Patterson, etc. These are very well-known novelists. One is English and the other two are American.

Stephen King noticed Phil and they started a dialogue. It didn’t take very long. It took less than 30 days. He’s doing the same with James Patterson, who used to be in the world of advertising like I am, but he turned into a novelist. A very prolific writer. JK Rowling, her first book was the Harry Potter series that then turned into movies and she became a billionaire.

If you follow their work, they being these novelists because that’s the industry and niche that Phil is in, what happens is if you’re adding relevance and you’re adding value through commenting and posting, you’re not showing off your intelligence. You’re edifying them. You build them to expand them to who they are and make them bigger than they are by being noticed. After that, you’ll get noticed when your face keeps popping up, such as Stephen King. F.I.T means follow, invite and tell.

The reason why you follow them for a while is that they’re not going to notice you. They’re not waiting for you to show up. If you pick three people, on your desktop or whatever you use, I recommend you use a laptop because it’s a little easier to type than on the keypad of your phone, but the direct links of their social media. Them being the people with higher status, you want to follow them every single day and see what they say.

Farming Over Hunting

They won’t always post. Sometimes it’s not even them who’s posting, but whoever is posting for them will notice you if you keep showing up consistently. This is why growing relationship capital is more like farming instead of hunting. You’re not going for the kill. You’re not a hunter going to kill an animal and serve your family like in the old days. What you’re doing is you’re planting seeds and you’re going to see which one takes root. That’s called the farming mindset.

Hunting is instant. Farming takes time. It takes a season and a season is three months. That’s 90 days. The reason the F of the F.I.T. Formula can take up to 90 days is that it’s you getting noticed, that’s the key. Once you’re noticed and once you’re asked the question, then when you feel comfortable, you invite them for an interview. That’s the I.

You might say, “What interview?” Any interview. Think about why would you interview them, where would you interview them and on what channel. Hopefully, the channel or the social media of their preference.

[bctt tweet=”You’re not interesting to them unless you are first interested in them.” username=”AlexMandossian”]

Once they say yes if they say yes, then you tell everyone so they show up. That’s only going to build you up. A lot of people will show up because of them and they’ll invite people to come and you’ll be interviewing them. Interview strategies are a completely different topic, but I think you’ll agree with my friend that F.I.T. and you wanting to tell the world is a very simple way to network with others.

It’s also a great way to get to be noticed with people who aren’t so famous. Let’s take a coach. If you’re a coach, find three other coaches who have a higher status than you do. Who you would love to have their business. If you don’t know any, you’re not networked. It’s time to get networked in.

You don’t have to physically meet them. Social media allows you to have that level of connection. If you’re a coach, find three coaches. Make sure they have higher income, more wealth and a higher level of status than you do. You’ll want to engage in their posts and whatever it is they’re teaching with the F.I.T. Networking Formula.

Follow that daily, at least five times a week. Whenever they post something, when it’s something of interest, number one, you’re learning about what’s interesting to them. You’re not interesting in them unless you are first interested in them.

You can’t be interesting until you’re first interested. That’s by engaging. You follow three of them and let’s say one of them notices you after about 60 to 90 days. It can get pretty lonely if you keep posting and you’re not getting noticed, but you’re learning something along the way. If you follow three people, the whole thing takes about fifteen minutes total, five minutes each.

It’s not a huge commitment and it’s certainly a good commitment to have for your primetime as you’re boosting your relationship capital. If you’re a coach or a consultant, find three others who are posting on social media who have higher status, more wealth, more money and more social following than you do and then you follow them.

If you’re noticed, you invite them to an interview. If they say yes, you tell the world. It’d be great. That’s number one. What if you’re a financial advisor? I know a lot of financial advisors in my tribe. A lot of people from Strategic Coach have come and studied with me and I’ve consulted them for my $30,000 program called Clear Path Coaching, CPC.

Find three financial advisors and follow them for 90 days every day. If you want to take a Sabbath, we call it a BS day, Business Sabbath, do it six days a week but engage in them. Enroll other people to join the social conversation. Be like an ambassador. Don’t go in with the mindset of a guest. Act as a host would. If you think about that mindset, it’s a whole different mindset, not just the farming versus hunting mindset.

If you go in as a guest, then you’re going to feel unwelcome to a certain degree. At least I know I do. If you go in thinking as if you’re a host and you don’t take on and assume too much entitlement, but you’re there because you feel comfortable, then you’re going to be treated that way. After that, you invite them for an interview, then you tell the world.

How about a chiropractor or a dentist? I happen to know a dentist who’s a dear friend of mine. He’s Armenian descent just like me. He was born in Armenia when it was the Soviet Union. His name is Dr. Jack. A tip of the hat goes to him. He’s renewed with me not once, not twice, but now a third time because we are going to work on a book. He gets coached by another good friend Sean Stephenson who’s a great bestselling author and a great coach.

He came up with the title to Dr. Jack’s book. I think that the book title is Extraction, but it’s about an extraction. We don’t know what the subtitle is, but we have a few that we’re working on. You want to extract yourself out of your dental practice or chiropractic practice, and most people can’t. They can’t sell their practice for very much money because once they leave it, then they lose their patients.

ASA 68 | Networking Formula

Networking Formula: No matter what trade you’re in, there’s always three experts that have more status than you do.

 

If you’re a chiropractor or a dentist and you’re wanting to learn how to build your practice, then how about you follow three other lecturers who are in your area of expertise. If you’re a podiatrist, you can follow them. Generally, they’re lecturers. They show up to association meetings.

That’s a great way to climb the social capital ladder because you’re growing your relationship capital through the farming mindset. You’re pampering this relationship. You’re not pimping into it like hunting. The pimping is sell and sell. The pampering is farm and farm. You’re not going to hunt and go for the kill because many times you’ll end up killing the relationship.

If you plant seeds and you see which ones germinate, that’s called farming, then you’ll be shocked at what takes root. The principle of consistency, which is one of Cialdini’s six that we’ve talked about that in previous episodes, the persuasion principle of consistency. You want to do that consistently over time.

That’s why daily is best. If they don’t post daily, then you post when they post, but at least check in daily. It doesn’t take any more than five minutes to do that or post. You’ll learn a lot. You’ll get a new friend and you may get some other friends in their community, whoever they are in your area of expertise.

You could be a coach, consultant, financial advisor, chiropractor or dentist. No matter what trade you’re in, there’s always three experts that have more status than you do. You wouldn’t mind owning their businesses and you get to know them through the F.I.T. Networking Formula.

What I’ve noticed is people genuinely, authentically don’t follow up consistently to get to know someone. They think it’s going to happen immediately. Don’t digitally stalk them but show up and you’ll learn something. Because you’re interested in them, they will find you interesting.

Alexism: Grow Deep Roots

The Alexism for this episode is this, “It’s better to grow deep roots than to pluck ripe fruits. Grow your business like a bamboo tree which is deep and wide, not like a eucalyptus tree, which is shallow and narrow.” If you know something about the eucalyptus tree, it grows very tall very fast, but the roots are shallow. When there’s a strong wind, the eucalyptus trees come toppling down and that’s not good because they block the streets. They’re very tall trees.

It’s probably a trick that the Aussies played on us Americans. I used to live in Pasadena when I was in grammar school. I used to get bused to school and I love the Santa Ana winds, which are the heavy winds that are down there. The eucalyptus trees would come down the middle of the street and the bus couldn’t get through the streets and the school would be out for a day. I love the Aussies because of that.

Not so with bamboo. Bamboo takes a long time to grow. You don’t even see it growing because most of it is growing underground. It doesn’t mean it’s not growing, but you can’t see it and then it shoots up. That’s why they call it bamboo shoots. Up to seven inches a week in some cases. It has this deep root system.

My good friend Jack Canfield has bamboo in his backyard and it takes over the backyard unless you have the special netting. Be like bamboo, not eucalyptus. It’s better to grow deep roots than the pluck ripe fruits. What’s interesting is many people go for the lowest hanging fruit when you should be focusing on the deepest root.

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That does it for this episode and I want to review the three things that we’ve learned together. Hopefully, you’re relearning this because I don’t think I taught you anything new. You learn what the F.I.T. Networking Formula is and why it works so well. F stands for following. I stand for invite and T stands for tell.

Follow at least 90 days until you get noticed. What if you don’t get noticed? You followed and you got to learn something. Hopefully, you learned a few things along the way. Number two, I talked about why growing relationship capital is the farming mindset, not the hunting mindset. It’s about pampering, not pimping your wares or knowledge.

Third, the F in F.I.T. is going to take the longest time, the I and T, invite and tell, that could be just a moment. It could be a day, an hour or ten minutes once you’re noticed. You decide whether you want to invite them to interview them. I love interviews because then they can invite their herd as Dan Kennedy calls it or their tribe as I like to call it.

[bctt tweet=”Grow your business like a bamboo tree, which is deep and wide. Not like a eucalyptus tree, which is shallow and narrow.” username=”AlexMandossian”]

You’ll get a lot of followers you know from them, then you’ll raise your status through association. The F in the F.I.T. Formula, I’m going to warn you, will take the longest time and 90 days is not that long, to get to know someone who’s taken a lifetime to build their relationship capital. Those are the three things you learned.

Remember, these insights will only work for you if you work them. Make sure you execute what you’ve learned in this episode because they have no value to you unless you execute. Your future will be bigger. It’ll look brighter and most importantly, you’ll create it on your terms. I hope you do apply what you’ve learned. That’s exciting to think about and it’s even more exciting to do.

Speaking of reviews, if you’ve already given me a review, then I want you to write down your biggest takeaway or you’re a-ha moment from this episode on an index card and save it so you can go back and revisit it and review what you learned. Hopefully, you have a stack of index cards from all the episodes.

If you haven’t given me a review, then I want you to go to AllSellingAside.com/iTunes, and that will redirect you to iTunes. Inside of the review section, it’ll ask you for review and I don’t want a review of the podcast itself, because usually those are watered down and boring. I want an a-ha moment. What’s something thing that you found to be a distinction or a big takeaway from this episode or perhaps another episode and is worthy of your devotion. Write that down because that’s a lot more interesting.

iTunes will ask you for a rating after you’re done with the review. I hope I’ve earned five stars from you. I get a lot of those and I don’t take them for granted. If you subscribe, then every week, you’ll get a little notification that the new episode is waiting for you and it’s 25 years of my knowledge and my know-how. All the mistakes I’ve avoided, in 25 minutes or less.

Please review and then subscribe if you haven’t already done so. It’ll take three minutes out of your day, but what you declare could provide you and others reading it a valuable lesson. It’s AllSellingAside.com/iTunes. If you don’t have an iPhone and you have another type of smartphone other than an iPhone, then you can go to Stitcher which is AllSellingAside.com/Stitcher and get it there. We’re also on Google Play.

One final gift before I let you go, and that’s in honor of this episode, and that’s the physical copy of my Amazon bestselling book, Alexisms. The reason that particular marketing funnel is so interesting to go through, is because when I show $8 on the page that’s going to cover the shipping and handling costs the book itself, it’s free.

I ended up getting an average of $38. How do I do that? It’s a funnel. It’s the marketing funnel. That funnel was taught to me by a former student of mine, who’s now a teacher of mine, and runs ClickFunnels. You may have heard of him, Russell Brunson. He taught me that funnel.

ASA 68 | Networking Formula

Networking Formula: Many people go for the lowest hanging fruit when you should be focusing on the deepest root.

 

That funnel has a video tutorial attached to it. The voice is my online business manager. You’ll go step by step on how the funnel works. You’ll get a PDF of it, and you also get to experience it and get other goodies along the way.

Go to MarketingOnline.com/book. You’ll experience the funnel, you get a free physical copy of the book, and you can buy it as a gift for someone else or yourself. Do that. That’s going to do it for this episode. I hope our paths cross again in the next episode because this show is dedicated to making you an ethical influencer, and bringing more certainty in your life and professional and personal life.

Do whatever it takes to join me next episode, my friend because the topic is one of my favorite of all time it’s called The CONTRAST Effect. That was taught to me by my good friend and colleague, Dr. Robert Cialdini, who I met years ago and he has a bestselling book. He has many books. You’ll find the topic fascinating.

What’s the contrast effect? Why Does it work so well? How can you utilize it in business and personal life? I encourage you to join me for episode 69. I encourage you to invite a friend, a colleague or a study buddy because it’s a lot more fun learning with others because this topic is for anyone who hates to sell.

If you love to sell, it’s even more fun. There’re plenty of people who hate to sell because they’re anticipating rejection, and it’s no longer necessary when you read the episodes. I can’t wait to connect with you then. The topic will be The CONTRAST Effect. It’s going to be super fun. Bring your study buddy. I can’t wait for our paths to cross then. All good wishes.

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