Networking by Day and Night

As a follow-up to my first post, I wanted to let everyone know that I finally attended my first meeting of my friend's Leads group recently. I should have known the morning networking meetings are a little more regemented when my friend told me to be there at 7 a.m., sharp! But, I was eager and ready to participate.

I arrived a few minutes early at a breakfast joint in Lisle, as I wanted to get to know some of the people before we sat down to eat. Within seconds of arrving I was quickly self-introduced to an insurance agent from Lombard, a graphics guy from Naperville, an attorney from Woodridge—well, it's sufficient to just say that about a dozen people made my acquaintance by 7:10 a.m.

The meeting went on to be strictly run for just over an hour. Within that hour every person in the group was able to speak about themselves and their business, as well as the opportunity to reccomend business to others in the group.

I thrive on describing my family business to strangers, so I went a little over my alotted 30-second "commercial," but all-in-all I thoroughly enjoyed the structure of the group. It might not be my networking cup of tea on an every week basis, but I certainly will give it another shot.

On the other hand, I also attended a Young Professionals of Lemont (YPOL) meeting that same day, but after work hours. The atmosphere, was, of course, much more relaxed, and involved coctails! This group is something I'm trying to help get off the ground through the Lemont Chamber of Commerce, and it was only the third meeting. But, attendance was good and I saw a lot of new faces I didn't see at the first two events.

While we're still trying to figure out goals and direction for the YPOL, I found my conversations that evening just as engaging as the very established networking group I participated at in the morning. Seeing as we didn't have a strict agenda, conversations took a little longer to get going, but once they did, they didn't stop for nearly 2.5 hours!

And while my morning session brought me contact with more than 12 people in a short period of time, I stuck with one converation between only about 4 of us for my night networking session. Both rewarding in their own right, but which is the best for me...and which is the best for you?

Bottom line is that all business professionals want to use networking as a way to make more money, make new contacts, and enhance their knowledge. I hope both groups can do all three of these things for me.