The Savvy Entrepreneur

In Jeffrey Gitomer’s The Little Black Book of Connections, he says that when using questions to make meaningful connections, you want to get to know just enough about an individual so they’ll want to know more about you.

How can you accomplish this? Make a game plan.

1. Create your A-List. What types of individuals do you want to connect with? The more specific and targeted, the better.
2. Compile your questions. Create a pool of engaging questions you can use when face-to-face with someone from your A-List.

The benefits of having a database of well thought-out questions are:

• you’re always prepared to engage the other person
• it helps you stay focused on your main goal — showing interest in the other person to discover how you can best serve them
• it keeps you on topic — THEM
• you’ll be prepared to bring the conversation back to your audience if you catch yourself talking too much about you
• having a vast list of engaging topics in mind, the conversation will flow naturally
• you create a sense of comfort in your audience, since they don’t have come up with topics of discussion
• you don’t have to wonder whether you are boring your audience to death with your stories, since you are letting the other person speak about themself and their business

I can’t even begin to list all the possible questions you can ask, since it depends entirely on your industry, the services you offer, the type of contact, and your specific marketing goals. As you create your collection of well-crafted questions, remember to keep them in relation to your business and the services you offer. Include questions that surround these points:

• What are their greatest challenges, issues, problems or pains?
• What has been the greatest impact of the above?
• What would they give anything or pay any amount to receive? What is their desired end result?
• What elements are missing for them to achieve this?
• Do they want to overcome these challenges, issues, problems or pains?
• What has and hasn’t worked in the past?
• Are they familiar with all possible solutions?
• What have they lost or gained?
• What are they willing to try and not try?
• How much do they know about the subject?
• What are their greatest obstacles?
• Are they the decision-maker?
• What is the greatest benefit they would achieve by using your services?
• What needs would you fill?
• What’s important to them? What are their values?
• Can they afford you?

As you perfect the skill of using questions to build long-lasting relationships, your pool of questions will narrow down to a few key questions that will immediately tell you if you’re talking to the right person and if you can actually serve them in any valuable way. Remember, your not aiming for the quick-fix, immediate sale; You want to create clients for life and generate repeat business. It’s a longer process, but well worth the effort. Achieve the know-like-trust factor with your network, and you’ll have an endless supply of potential clients and referral partners.
Please let us know how using questions has helped you establish a strong relationship-based network.