Business Plan School

Mingling and making small talk--for some people mingling at parties can be very stressful. How do I start a conversation with a stranger? How do I avoid getting trapped in a conversation that's going nowhere? Learn how to work a room with confidence.

Think Positive

There are lots of potential positive outcomes from a social or office party. You could meet your new best friend or the love of your life! You could make a fabulous business connection that will benefit your career! You could forget about the stresses in your life for one evening and have a lot of fun! The first step to make any of those or other desirable outcomes happen is to think positive.

Adjust your Body Language


Enter the party with a smile. You won't need to worry about approaching strangers-they will approach you! Uncross your arms. Crossed arms combined with a worried or bored expression will guarantee that no one approaches you. But a beaming smile and sparkling eyes will draw people to you.

Small Talk

For some people, the idea of having to make small talk is abhorrent. Generally, the brighter a person is, the less interested they are in small talk. Why? Because intelligent, accomplished people are accustomed to making big talk and small talk seems like useless chatter. Small talk is not about facts or words. It's about putting people at their ease. These opening lines are the comforting efforts we make as we enter into a conversation to gauge our listener's mood and interest. But what should you say after hello? Almost anything as long as the intention is to empathize with the listener. The goal isn't to impress your listener from the minute you open your mouth with your vast intelligence and wit. This is a holiday party not speed dating! Any banal (but positive) observation or question will serve as an opening. You could mention the venue, the food, the décor, the organization, the host/hostess, the guest of honour, or your listener. For example, you could open with a very generic comment such as,

"I can't believe how beautiful/dark/crowded/etc/it is in here."
"The hostess has prepared a fabulous spread, don't you agree?"
"Isn't this [type of food you are eating] delicious?"
"I'm so glad I skipped lunch. The buffet table looks amazing!"
Then follow with a more specific question such as,
"How do you know the host/hostess?"
"Are you a member of this group/political party/organization?"
"How could I get involved with this group?"

Follow up your listener's answer by sharing how you know the organizers of the party.

The Listener's Mood
Your listener's body language and their answers to your opening volley will tell you a lot about how best to proceed. As any good salesperson knows, matching the client's mood is crucial. A reflective, composed listener will likely not respond well to a back-slapping speaker-at least, not at first. If you're an outgoing storyteller, you'll need to gradually work up to the point where your listener will be ready to hear you tell your great stories.

Listen Actively

Active listening is like cheerleading. Your body language tells the speaker that you're interested and enthusiastic about what's being said and encourages the speaker. An active listener nods in agreement, maintains eye contact, smiles in response, inserts a "yes" or "uh-huh" appropriately, and asks relevant questions.

The Secret to Exiting a Conversation Graciously

If your goal is to mingle, then you want to spend no more than 10 minutes with each person at the party. However, some people are such easy, fabulous conversationalists that you may find yourself tempted to spend the entire evening with that one person. But eventually all good things must come to an end.

Sometimes it happens that you get cornered. You're innocently nibbling a canapé and enjoying the ambiance when someone fixes you with an unblinking stare and the onslaught begins. You feel stuck and your mind races to find some plausible excuse for why you need to walk away. Why is exiting a conversation so hard for some people? It's difficult because we don't want to hurt other people's feelings. We want people to like us. We're programmed to be polite.

You can exit any conversation graciously. It's easy. With these nine words, you can politely and confidently walk away with no fear of reprisal. Simply, smile, make eye contact, extend your hand and say, "It was a pleasure to meet you. Excuse me." It's that easy. The trick is all in the delivery. If you smile, make eye contact, extend a hand and articulate those nine words with sincerity, no one will be able to accuse you of being anything less than gracious and polite.

Storytellers and Standup Comics

How would you describe the ideal party? For me, the ideal party is entertaining. That means that I'm smiling all the way home at a funny story, some witty comments, a quick comeback, or someone's humour or comical impressions. Some people are natural storytellers and standup comics. They seem to tell one great story after another effortlessly. But the truth is that these people have likely told these same stories over and over at other parties. In effect, they've practiced telling their stories. All that practice has made them experts. As a result, they're able to launch into new stories-stories about things that just happened to them yesterday-because they're confident and the rhythms and patterns of telling a good story are second nature to them.

When preparing for a job interview don't forget to include important interview questions in your career guide. These questions should be divided into two groups; questions you should ask and questions the interviewer could ask you. Though there is no set formula for questions interviewers will ask, there are basic ones you can prepare to answer. The questions you should ask depend heavily on your knowledge of the position, the company and what you want or need in terms of fulfillment and compensation.

It is also suggested to be tactful with the order in which you ask your questions. Don't let the first words out of your mouth be, How much are you guys gonna pay me? Be professional and courteous. Let your initial questions reflect interest in the position and company. Here are questions to consider adding to your career guide when preparing for an interview.

Questions to consider asking during a job interview:
• How did this position become available?
• What accomplishments would you like to see within this role?
• What were the major strengths and weaknesses of the last person who held this job?
• What would you consider to be the most important aspects of this job?
• Could you describe a typical day or week in this position? What are the expectations for this position?
• How many people are in the department for this position? How many people are on the team for this position?
• How long has this position been open? What is your time frame for filling his position?
• What are some examples of the achievements of others who have been in this position?
• What do you see in my personality, work history or skill set that qualify me for this position?
• Are there growth opportunities involved with this role?
• What are the next steps in the interview process?
• When can I expect to hear back from you?

Questions you may be asked during a job interview:
• Tell me about yourself.
• Why do you want to work for this company? Why do you want to work in this position?
• What contributions can you bring to our company?
• Why should we hire you instead of another candidate with similar qualifications?
• What are you strengths and your weaknesses?
• What are your short term and long term professional goals?
• How long do you see yourself working for this company?
• Where do you see yourself in five (or ten) years from now?
• What do you look for in a job, i.e., responsibilities, hours, co-workers, managers etc.?
• What do (did) you like the most and the least about your current (last) position?
• Why are you leaving (did you leave) your present (last) job?
• What is your compensation requirement as far as salary and benefits are concerned?
• Describe a situation where you had to work under pressure to solve a problem and what was the result?

Don't blow your chances during an interview and miss out on a good opportunity because you can't answer or ask questions properly. Our career guide offers additional interview etiquette to help in your job search.

Is your team's budget running short? Do you need to address different expenses so that you can keep on doing what you love to do? Then, it's time that you look into carrying out a team fundraising campaign. By doing a fundraising campaign, you can get the necessary funds that you need to buy new sports equipment, sports uniforms, and other things that you might need.

Now, doing a team fundraising campaign may sound like a really simple task but this can be pretty complicated if you don't get the steps right. When you do a fundraising campaign, you have to a good sense of direction so that you can effectively reach your goals and objectives at the end of your campaign. Instead being aimless, you need to have a solid plan in your mind and you need to stick to that plan. Aside from this, you also need to be aware of the different things that need to be taken into consideration when one is setting up a fundraising campaign. We'll be looking at exactly what those factors are in this article.

The first that you must consider when you're planning on raising funds is the percentage of sales that you will most likely be able to receive through your fundraiser. This type of information is vital and you should put it into writing. Stick this into your head when you're going through different prospective fundraising ideas. This is one of the criteria that you have to strongly look into when you're choosing a good fundraiser idea to carry out and you need to base such criterion on the specific amount of money that you need to raise so that you can get the things that you need. When you consider this factor, you need to determine the exact amount of profit that you'll be able to generate from each sale that you're going to made from that certain product or service.

Next, you have to make sure that the products that you're going to offer are worth it. The profit that you'll be able to generate from each sale that you make or the average profit margin that a product can offer would be rendered useless if it's not going to be saleable. This means that you have to look into how popular the product is and if it can be considered as something that's of great interest to people. Even if a product promises to give you $50 worth of profit from each sale, that thing won't matter if you won't even be able to produce a single purchase. An ideal product to choose would be those that are considered as needs by people. Perfect examples of these would be food products of which cookie dough would be one of the most popular ones. When you choose a product to sell, you shouldn't only consider the product itself as well as the time of the year as to when you're going to sell it. For instance, if you're going to have your fundraising campaign during the Christmas season, then it would be wise for you to choose products that are highly saleable during this time of the year.

You know how when you're eating in a restaurant and you don't like the food, and the waiter asks you "How is everything?"

What do you say? "Oh, everything is fine, thanks."

Your customers are doing the same to you - they're not telling you what they don't like about you to your face. But with the rise of social media, they're going home and sharing their negative (and positive) experiences with their online connections.

What if you could overhear what your customers were saying about you?

How could that improve your business? What would it highlight that you're overlooking? How much power would that give you?

Yes, this is possible. It's called social media monitoring. Simply put, social media monitoring is using technology tools to identify what people are saying about your company online.

Social Media Monitoring Tools & Resources

Here are a few free and simple ways to do this:

1. Twitter Search

Enter keywords relevant to your business in the Twitter search form, particularly your company name.

2. Google Alerts

Enter your relevant keywords at google.com/alerts. Google will email you any time in encounters those keywords online, based on your preferences. (You need a Google account to set this up.)

3. RSS Feeds

Set up a Google Reader (or other RSS reader), then set up RSS feeds from social media sites as generated by searches. A specific RSS feed is generated for every search.

4. Facebook Page

Set up a Facebook Page for your business, then simply check the wall daily for comments.

5. Free Monitoring Platforms

There are a number of free social media monitoring platforms to take advantage of, such as Addictomatic, Socialmention, and Tweetdeck. There are also tons of companies who offer social media monitoring services, such as Spiral16, Radian6, and Trackur, but I wouldn't recommend these for most small businesses; it's simply unnecessary.

Your Customers are in Charge

Knowing what your customers say about you is vital. It tells you what you're doing wrong and right and how to improve.

As my business partner and I write in our book:

"Not only has power itself changed, but also who controls it has shifted. In the past, it was business that wielded power to achieve its ends. Now, the power lies with customers.
"It is customers who dictate the creation and disposition of information. It is customers who determine not only what things get produced, but also how they get produced (note the rise in social-oriented and environmentally-friendly businesses).

"Customers are firmly planted on the new throne; businesses are their servants. Those that understand and adapt will survive and thrive. Those who don't will disappear, leaving only a memory."

Consider reaching out to your clients more often. You don't want the only time a customer hears from you to be when you want to sell them something or when they have a problem.

We have learned how to strategically leverage our existing client base in order to increase customer retention, provide opportunities to up-sell, and get referrals for new business. We call it our Customer Touch program, and it's essentially a formal schedule of contacts with our clients.

There are a few considerations that need to be made when designing a Customer Touch program:

• When and how often will you contact the customer?
• What will you discuss, and how will it be presented?
• Who on your team should be responsible for making contact?
• How will you contact your customers?

Read on to find out how you can design a program that fits your business' needs.

When and how often will you contact the customer?

Ask yourself the following questions about your customers in order to decide how often they should be contacted:

• How heavily does the client use your services?
• How often does this client experience changes that are likely to impact the service you provide?
• How organized and proactive will they be about notifying you of changes? You may want to reach out to your least proactive clients more frequently in order to ensure that your team has what it needs to execute.
• Has the client recently had changes in key personnel who may decide to change their vendor if they have no relationship? You should be proactive in engaging with new decision makers.
• Based on these questions, our clients are contacted monthly, bimonthly, or quarterly.
• What will you discuss, and how will it be presented?
• What are you trying to accomplish with each client? Focus on one or two key objectives and know in advance what questions you are going to ask. SUITE 1000 has a standard questionnaire that we go through with each of our clients. The results are stored in a CRM software package to ensure quality and consistency, and also to allow anyone to access the customer's feedback.

We ask questions that allow us to know about internal changes that might impact the services we provide, gauge customer satisfaction, collect ideas for new services, identify opportunities to up-sell, and get referrals. Remember to focus on one or two of these points, and not to overwhelm the customer. It takes time to build a relationship.

Who on your team will be responsible for making the contact?

I put my Customer Service Manager in charge because I wanted a "softer" approach that encouraged honest feedback. I did not want the contacts to be perceived as merely a sales call. The Customer Service Manager assigns herself and two other supervisors to a schedule, and they stick to it, month after month. This is not often a strong suit in salespeople.

How will you contact your customers?

Find out how your customers prefer to be contacted. Many of our customers prefer to have a phone call, but some who are frequently in the field or traveling prefer to correspond via e-mail. We also send a biannual Customer Satisfaction Survey via e-mail, fax or mail. If you are trying to get the point across that you care about customer satisfaction, you do what suits the client.

Results

SUITE 1000, a national telephone answering service, has successfully used our Customer Touch program to significantly increase sales and eliminate customer turnover. How are you engaging your customers?