Sales Made Easy, take 2

My previous post on the topic of Sales Made Easy discussed turning outside sales into inside sales with little pain or drama.

Now let's turn to creating or expanding your warm market. First, some context.

In Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond relates what happens when two New Guinean highlanders meet in the jungle.

New Guinea has the highest murder rate in the entire world, and for a very good reason: highland men are brought up to kill strangers. The good news is, they are very careful not to kill their relatives. And so the ritual greetings begin.

When two highlanders run into each other, they'll stop and chat - for hours if necessary, asking about each others' lineage in hopes of finding someone in common. "Oh, you're my thirteenth great-cousin fourth removed!" you can almost hear them say with a sigh of relief. "Glad to meet you. Have a nice life!"

We humans seem to have a natural aversion to strangers - though fortunately, most of us aren't as violent about it as New Guinean mountain-folk.

Still, when it comes to sales, we're at a disadvantage when trying to sell to strangers, because those strangers are typically on their guard against us from the word go. That is why it is so important to mine your connections when looking to make inroads into a new territory, community, or company.

Your "warm market" is your friends, family, acquaintances, and their connections as well. I can't tell you how many friends of friends have taken my call because we have some kind of relationship, no matter how tenuous. And likewise, I'll do anything to help a friend because it makes me feel good. I'm sure I'm not alone there.

We're really lucky, luckier than ever before in the history of our species, because of the power of social networking websites such as http://www.twitter.com/, http://www.facebook.com/, and - especially for business - www.LinkedIncom. Want to recommend your job-hunting friend in Buffalo to the CEO of a company in Los Vegas, as I did recently? Let your fingers do the walking - in this case, I was just three people removed from this CEO, and - fantastically - because of the leverage of shared relationships, my friend actually got his interview!

New to social media, but motivated to learn more? Let me introduce you to Tom Williams. Tom is President and Founder of InnoGage (http://blog.innogage.com/). I "met" him only recently via Twitter, and let me tell you - I like his style: insightful, helpful, and connected. Read his company's blog. If you like what you see, maybe you'll give him your business.

...This connection brought to you by the magic of the Web, 2.0-style.

Two more social networking gurus I highly recommend, both good friends:

* Birgit Pauli-Haack, founder of http://www.paulisystems.net/. Her work should speak for itself, though this expert is also a pleasure to speak to directly.

* Pat O'Malley http://www.patrickomalley.com/, who I've blogged about before. I've seen him in action with an audience - he's even better than he'll tell you he is (which in Pat's case is saying a lot!)


*****

By the way: when it comes to networking and referrals, I strongly urge you to steer well clear of gratuitous referrals, as you are encouraged to do in some networking clubs. Keep these rules of thumb clearly in mind as you recommend anyone:

1. Would I hire this person/company for services myself?
2. Will this person/company enhance my reputation or diminish it?

Remember: Your reputation is your most precious possession. Guard it jealously.