4 Part Music Blog

Last night I attended the first meeting of the Wiltshire Business Club which has recently been formed by Phil Hendy of PAH Accounting.   A familiar name in local networking, I first met Phil at 4 Networking in Devizes.

The Wiltshire Business club has been formed to bring together local business in Wiltshire (obviously!).  The first meeting last night was extremely well attended and I met up with some familiar faces and some new businesses.  The format of the evening combines some traditional networking ideas along with some new concepts. I particularly enjoyed the “blind meeting” where everyone was paired up for a ten minute appointment by picking a raffle ticket.  I found myself talking to Helen Silver of the Property Styling Company who used to boss me around when she was in charge of 4 Networking in Bath and I was merely the humble servant that is Operations Assistant.   Since then we have both moved on, Helen is a now an area leader for 4 Networking whilst I have currently let my membership lapse.

Further information on the Wiltshire business club can be found on their website.  I would recommend it to any Wiltshire based business. There is no date set for the next meeting but I will update this as soon as I have been made aware, or indeed someone with more information may well add a comment below!

It occurred to me this morning that networking is rather like Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).  Now let me start by saying I am no expert in SEO but over the years I have picked up a few tips from those who are.  The one common thread it seems from all the SEO experts out there, is there is no overnight fix.  First you need to optimise your website which could be any number of things from fresh content through to page titles, meta tags and a whole host of things that I, the musician, do not pretend to understand.  You then need to start a process of submitting your content to one or more search engines such as google, yahoo, dmoz etc.  However, just because you have done all of this, doesn’t necessarily mean that Mr googlebot will come along and instantly rank your website at the top of the search engines.

SEO

Networking is much the same. You can go to as many different networking organisations as you like such as 4Networking, BNI, Local and National Chambers of Commerce and so forth.  The thing is you can’t just turn up to one meeting and expect to walk away with a full order book.  I’m sure there’s the odd exception but generally this doesnt happen.

The 4N philosophy is centred around “Meet, Like, Know and Trust”.  I think this sums it up perfectly – after all quoting Brad Burton (MD of 4Networking) “people buy people before they buy products.”  Having been involved in 4 Networking for nearly a year now, I am finally getting to the point where people are starting to recognise the values of 4 Part Music and I have had a number of good referrals and indeed I have also given a lot of business to other 4N members.

This brings up another interesting point – always remember its not just about who you can sell to, but also who you can buy from or indeed seek advice from.  For example, I recently got married and used the services of Michael Palmer for my wedding photography who I met through 4 Networking.

So for anyone looking to promote their business, whether its on the internet via SEO or in front of other business owners via networking, so long as you are prepared to put in the effort the rewards will be forthcoming. Just don’t expect instant results.

After much deliberation, and listening to a lot of people at 4 Networking talking about twitter I have finally given in and created myself a twitter account. A lot of people keep telling me that it should be a serious part of the marketing mix for the business as well as a means of social networking.

I’m not yet convinced on the business benefits of twitter, although I do see how the search facility may well be useful. It’s like anything else, it all rather depends how much time and effort you are prepared to put in. What with facebook, this blog and now twitter I wonder how much time I will actually have left to live my “real” life rather than some sort of online life.

I’ve always said I’m openminded about most things so I will persue twitter over the next few months and will report back on here how I find it. If anyone is interested in what I get up to on twitter or facebook then you can find me by going to:

Facebook

Twitter

I have spent the last few months going to really quite a lot of “networking breakfasts” using my passport membership with 4Networking. Through this “networking” I have met a lot of business people and also made a lot of friends.  So therefore I should stand up as most “4Networkers” do and pronounce it the best thing since the invention of the wheel.

To do this, however, you need to define what counts as success.  Part of the 4N ethos is 50% social and 50% business.  This to me seems an excellent idea – people buy people after all.  Certainly on the social front I have made a lot of good friends and some good business aquaintances and via the networking group I found a photographer for my wedding, an accountant for the business, a duplication house to produce our CD’s and 2 customers.   So on balance that’s not too bad then.  Always remember, finding good suppliers is just as good if not better than finding customers!

However, if I take a purely economic viewpoint and add up the cost of membership, the cost of breakfasts and the cost of travelling to the breakfasts then I am probably currently around £500 out of pocket.  With the membership renewal looming this makes for an interesting challenge. My accountant would probably say its not financially viable to renew.   The thing is though, networking is a slow burner. You can’t just turn up and instantly expect everyone to give you business, even if like me your business is fairly unique – I feel sorry for all the accountants, business coaches and solicitors!!  I have always been clear at networking meetings that ultimately I’m not interested in selling to anyone in the room. Only once did I find someone at the breakfast who happened to run a string quartet.  Realistically classical musicians dont do networking meetings!  So therefore I need to know who people know and in order to get that, they need to like and trust me enough to pass on their contacts.  From this comes the whole 4 Networking concept of Meet, Like, Know, Trust which is quite possibly the best thing Brad Burton has ever come up with and definately sums up the way to approach networking.

Will I renew my membership to 4N? Yes I most likely will regardless of whether it makes economic sense because in the world of recordings and music it’s all about who you know.  If I can pick up the odd customer along the way then so much the better, but even if 4N produces no further customers, it will have a value to me personally.

If you want to find out more about 4 Networking then take a look at their website http://www.4networking.biz/

So goes the strapline for 4 Networking which for anyone who isn’t initiated in this is all about business networking. Some would argue its actually all about having breakfast!   I was reflecting on this yesterday whilst attending a networking meeting at Chippenham which due to refurbishment of the usual venue was held in one of the members houses and as an aside raised £140 for charity!    As for the 50% social versus 50% business, this isn’t far off the mark. I probably see the meetings as entirely social and after 9 months of membership count a lot of 4Networking members as friends.

One of the good friends I have made through 4 Networking is Michael Palmer of Ignite Photography – www.ignitephotos.co.uk

No that’s not Mike, but its one of his photos taken at the Chippenham 4Networking breakfast which being in Ellie’s house had the addition of her two cavalier spaniels!

As part of my commitment to 4 Networking I am giving a series of 4 sight talks (an insight not a sales pitch into a specialist subject), and I have taken as my title “Does a Duck’s Quack Echo?”.  The idea originally came about as I was trying to find an amusing take on the world of recordings without actually just preaching to people about what recording companies do!  Of course the danger of an amusing or intriguing title is that the actual content of the presentation has to live up to people’s expectations.

The Duck talk had its second outing at 4N Cribbs Causeway this morning and went reasonably well I think.  I’ve developed the theme slightly this time and focused on the idea of questions which don’t necessarily need to be asked but in asking can lead to a positive result.  The concept behind this is the idea that many businesses once they become successful stop trying to push the boundaries and make changes to their operation. Now of course, this may be no bad thing, lets face it, if you have found a solution that works then some might argue it would be foolish to change it.  My point however is that the world and the business which goes on in it, is always changing. It is therefore important to keep questioning everything.  Just because you have happy customers today doesn’t mean they can’t be even happier tomorrow.

At 4 Part Music, we are always asking ourselves, what can we do to improve the quality of our recordings and therefore the quality of the service we provide to our customers.  There are of course many days where we do not necessarily have an answer to this question – again I am not proposing change simply for the sake of change.  But nevertheless it is important to keep asking the question. That way you can ensure you are always one step ahead of your competition and one step nearer to your next job.  Remember, in business you are only as good as your last job. It therefore always needs to be your best job!

Nutritionalists and other health experts have long been telling us that its important to have a good breakfast.  There are plenty of statistics around which aim to prove this fact and show how we will all be far more awake and be able to concentrate after a bowl of cornflakes or some egg and bacon.  The trouble is many of us don’t have time in the morning to prepare a fry up or make our own bread and all the other things that go with a healthy breakfast.

Falling into this category myself I decided to do something about it so joined 4 Networking, which combines a bit of business with a spot of breakfast. By doing so I was then able to go and have breakfast at one of around 200 locations throughout the UK, four days a week.   What attracted me most, apart from the idea of a cooked breakfast 4 times a week, was the premise that the meetings are 50% social and 50% business.  I admit, I was initially sceptical. Lets face it how many musicians, choir masters or music directors is one likely to meet at such events which to my mind are aimed at accountants, solicitors and independent financial advisors? 

However, I also take the view that nothing ventured nothing gained.  So back in September I signed up for a years membership and along with that took on the post of Operations Assistant at the Bath group – if a job’s worth doing then its worth doing properly.  With its combination of the online forum and the networking breakfasts 4 days a week 4N provides a great chance to interactive with other people from a wide variety of businesses.  After 6 months we have already gained a number of suppliers and this week will be doing a recording which arose as a direct result of a 4N meeting.   It’s certainly not the be all and end all of business promotion but is becoming an important part of the marketing mix and one which I will continue to develop over the forthcoming months.

Over the last few months I have become increasingly aware of “twitter” as the latest “must have” social networking tool.  Looking around the 4 Networking forum it seems everyone is twittering at everyone else and apparently we must all let the world know our every move.  In principle I’m not against this and last year I eventually relented and joined facebook. As a social networking site it seems to me to be about right.  You can interact with your friends, share pictures  and let people know what your doing.

However, to my untrained eye, twitter seems to be a cut down version of facebook and is nothing more than a short message which tells all your friends what you’re doing at any given moment.  Well, that seems entirely reasonable but I just wonder if anyone actually cares what I’m doing.  Currently Jules is writing a post for the blog and in a little while Jules will go and put the kettle on.  Who actually needs to know any of this?

Moreover there appear to be a lot of people who are on every possible social networking site which must mean they spend most of the time just updating their status which surely doesnt leave much time to actually do whatever it is their status says they are doing at the time!  I’m not saying I won’t twitter, I just need to think about it a bit more first!