Five New Year’s Resolutions You Should Keep by Carrie Perrien Smith

Ahhhh … It’s that time of year — that magical season when people make those resolutions that will make their life better. Small business owners are no different. We make them, too, only we break them faster than the weight-loss resolution. Here is a list of resolutions that small businesses should vow to make and keep.

Resolution #1: Network More

As I sat at the first official networking event of the year, I couldn’t believe the number of people who said they resolved to do more networking. They realized that it was important to their business and they were going to start today. My expertise is networking but I was still surprised. They spoke of it as seriously as they would if they were about to try to stop smoking after years of bitter attempts to quit. The networking group had spiked in size similar to the way the fitness center attendance increases in January.

Networking is a great way to develop prospects and market your business. Most powerful of all, though, is the way that networking enables you to build relationships, learn about others through meaningful conversation, and help other businesses by providing nice, warm, gift-wrapped leads. It’s interesting that people who I spoke with on January 2 were people that I had made contact with during the previous October, November, and December. I had top-of-mind awareness because I stayed in the networking game all year.

Read more here: http://www.soarhigher.com/nyresolutions.htm