In this video I want to talk to you about something that has been blowing my mind lately. I want to tell you why I think it’s so important for you to start networking and getting clients offline because I know a lot of us, especially you introverts out there, are going to feel resistant to that.

I’ve always told people that it can be really powerful to network one on one offline, in person, in the flesh. People are just much more willing to hire someone who the’ve met in person versus someone who they found online.

Now I think there’s a few reasons for this. Number one, being the mere exposure effect, which basically just means that people develop a preference for things that they are more familiar with. No one’s ever more familiar with you than if they meet you one on one.

In my own business this has been happening a lot lately where I have a relationship with someone online or not at all and then I meet the person offline, and the person buys one of my products, services, whatever, within a month of me meeting them. And today I’ve got nine ways that you can start getting clients offline.

Strategy #1 Meetup Groups

Strategy number one is to attend MeetUp groups. This is my go-to strategy for making new friends. Anyway, I’ve lived in a lot of different cities and a few different countries and every time I move I go on MeetUp.com and I look for groups of people I can hang out with. If you are specifically looking for clients, obviously you probably want to attend meetup groups where you believe your potential clients would be hanging out.

Strategy #2 Ask for Connections

Strategy number two is to ask for connections. This is something that I’ve been so shy about doing, but when I do it, I realize that I can start to meet of a lot of, a more curated people because they’re people that have already been filtered by the people who I’ve met.

Strategy #3 Saturate a Market

Strategy number three is to saturate a market. Now, here’s what I mean by this. Instead of going to a whole bunch of random groups and events, try to find groups and events where similar people go. What you want to do, is have multiple touchpoints with multiple different people because the way that human networks work, if you and I have two or three or more mutual friends, you and I are more likely to like each other and to form a relationship.

So instead of knowing a bunch of random people who don’t know each other, try to meet other people’s contacts so that you can then saturate that network and have more friends in common. That brings me to a very similar strategy. Number four, which is to be everywhere.

Strategy #4 Saturate a Market

While you’re in the process of saturating a market, you’re going to have to go out more than you probably would normally, especially when you’re just getting started. I knew when I moved to a new city that I was going to have to go to more events in the beginning than I would end up going to later because once you find contacts it starts to gain momentum and happen more naturally.

But in the beginning you really should make an effort to be everywhere and go out as much as you can. That brings me to strategy number five which is to get your intro together.

Strategy #5 Elevator Pitch

People at events, they’re going to ask you who you are and what you do. And if you show up not having an answer to that question, that’s just silly because you know people are going to ask you that question.

When you’re giving an intro, you really just need to know what are the main details that you want to give someone. Essentially who you are, what you do, who you serve. You don’t want to memorize word by work some very specific elevator pitch. But you do want to know the general idea of what you want to say, so that when you say it, it feels really natural.

Strategy #6 Organize Your Contacts

It’s time to go to strategy number six, which is to organize your contacts. I created for myself, a spreadsheet that I call my little black book, where I’ve been keeping track of all the new contacts that I’ve been making recently because I’ve been meeting a lot of people and I don’t want to forget to keep in touch with those people.

My basic system is just a list of the people I’ve been meeting. And then just in another column how often I would like to get in touch with that person depending on our level of relationship and what I think is appropriate.

Strategy #7 Meet with People

Strategy number seven is another tricky one, which is to meet up with people in different contexts.

So if you always meet somebody at the same type of event, like it’s always at a networking group, the relationship you build with that person is going to stay in a very specific type of one-dimensional way. If you invite that person out to grab coffee or a drink even, it’s going to totally change the dynamic of your relationship.

And the more different contexts you meet someone in, the more depth there is to the relationship you have with the person.

Strategy #8 Volunteer to Help

Strategy number eight is to volunteer to help. Now I realize, especially in my local community, there’s a lot of people already running events and they’re doing a really good job.

But what I know for sure is that it’s a lot of work to put on these events and not everybody is super grateful about it either. So if you want to pitch yourself to volunteer and help them out, how do you think that’s going to help your relationship with the organizer of the event? Probably a lot, right?

If your desire is to establish a genuine connection, then volunteering to help somebody out is a great way of going about that.

Strategy #9 Pitch Yourself to Speak

Now finally, one of my favorite strategies, strategy number nine is to pitch yourself to speak at these events. This is precisely how I got my first speaking gigs.

I started attending local networking events and I actually was asked to speak at a couple of them. And then there was one group that I went to that had a very organized event once a year and they happened to be in the process of accepting speaker applications. I applied.

I developed a relationship with the organizer and some other people who attended the events and I was accepted to speak at the event. If you’ve ever heard the saying that it’s all about who you know, well this is how you get to know more people. People do work with other people who they know, like and trust.

And the fastest way to get someone to know, like and trust you is to connect with them in person. I would love to know in a comment below, make this a discussion. Because I’m sure there’s more ideas and I’m sure you guys have some strategies that have already worked for you.

What is your favorite way to meet people in person when you have an online business? Is there any specific strategy that’s worked for you in the past or just on accident even? I’d love to know in the comments.