Page 241 - Duct Tape Marketing

Duct Tape Marketing

when she was in your shoes. Above all, be creative. Propose something
very specific, and try like heck to propose something that will benefit
your prospective big fish.

Make up your target list of people you would love to have in your
network and devise a plan to make contact. What’s the worst that can
happen?

Online Referral Networks
In recent years, a new breed of networking community has

cropped up that allows online users to network with other business
professionals and potentially find resources and generate referrals. At
the very least, these networks allow members to meet like-minded
professionals. The two biggest business-related social networks are
Ryze and LinkedIn. These sites allow you to build a profile of your
expertise and then network with other members in an effort to expand
your contacts based on the profiles of other members.

Mining Online
John Hollner of Hollner Promotions in Atlanta, Georgia, has dis-

covered that one of the best ways to find potential referral sources
and joint venture (JV) partners online is through advanced Internet
research techniques provided by search engines and other sites. He
uses the “similar pages” link (or Related Searches list) when search-
ing in Google. Once he has identified one customer or JV partner
through this method, it usually leads him to others.

He also researches sites linked to a prospective joint venture part-
ner or customer by using the “link:” command before the domain
name in a Google search (link:www.ducttapemarketing.com). This
shows potential directories where similar people can be found. It can
also list other people interested in what his JV partner offers.

If he is looking for local contacts, he uses his keywords with the
area code or zip code (e.g., “marketing training 64105”) to narrow

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