Hello, and welcome back to Networking Unleashed,
Building Profitable Connections. Welcome back
to the show, folks. I'm your host, Michael Foreman,
and you're listening to the podcast where networking
is more than just awkward handshakes and bad
coffee. It's an art and a talent. But here's
the twist. It's an art and talent you can actually
learn. Yes, even if you're the person hiding
in the corner at every event, pretending to check
emails. Networking isn't just a nice skill to
have. It's a game changer. And when you get good
at it, you'll wonder why you didn't start sooner.
More connections, more opportunities, more profits.
It's like unlocking a cheat code for life. So
whether you're the life of the party or the just
let me stay at home and text type, we've got
something for you. So stick around. Let's turn
those awkward small talk moments into big wins.
Now, I have a guest. Well, I actually have a
pair of guests today. They are a husband -wife
team. They are small business coaches, Sharon
and Hank Ulof. They're authors of eight best
-selling books, whole small business breakthrough
boot camps. several times a year, and have hosted
almost 400 episodes of their podcast, the Marketing
Checklist Viewcast. They focus on marketing,
sales, public speaking, and human resources,
the four areas where most business owners say
they struggle. And this is near and dear to my
heart, because this is what I talk about. Sorry,
excuse me. I go on stages for, and I really like
to talk about. So Sharon, Hank, why don't you
just give us a quick backup of what you do? Our
clients, they call us their easy button. When
they have a challenge, yeah, the best $7 .99
ever spent at Staples. When they have a question
about sales or marketing, or I'm going to a networking
meeting and what do I do? They press the easy
button and we walk them through it in advance
so they know what they're going to. Our background,
our business started like most family businesses
do over Thanksgiving. We were one of those families
that went around the room and talked about how,
what are you thankful for? And I was, it was
my turn. Mom, everything's great. Sharon, me,
married, and I'm passing it on to my sister.
And my mom said, gee, Henry, oh, God, which is
the formal name, how's work? And I got to tell
her how work was going. And her comment was,
what would it take instead of being a manager
for this other company? What would it take to
start your own? And I gave her a very flip answer
that I would need to buy a new fax machine because
it's, you know, because the one I own. had belonged
to the company. Your audience does know what
fact machines are. And she looked at my dad and
said, write him a check. So two weeks later,
the business was started. And fast forward 13
years and ish and Sharon came on board. Yeah.
He had a client that needed his marketing and
sales background, but also needed the HR and
office systems background that I had. So we agreed
to team up and we really haven't looked back
since. So it's good. So you two create a wonderful
synergy between your two backgrounds, which is
great for starting a business. Okay, so I'm going
to move right into my questions. How has networking
influenced your career in marketing, sales, and
public speaking? You know, I'll be real blunt.
Networking built my business. I joined a couple
of different chambers of commerce. I joined a
hard networking group. And it's really, that
was the bedrock of it. Some folks might not know
what a hard networking group is, right? It's
like a BNI or a TIP. I say chamber of commerce
is a soft, right? There could be multiples of
you in there. But a hard networking, there's
one business per category. One. one marketing
firm, one banking, one, it's not one lawyer because
there are different brands of lawyers, different
specialties, but there'll be one for each specialty.
Yeah, I believe that networking is the base of
all businesses because no matter what business
you're in, you have to network. And whether you
do it through Zoom, through your cell phone or
in person, I believe the in -person is the most
important. because you pick up on all the vibe
of the people, the room, and everything else.
But that's neither here nor there. Tell me, what's
your most successful networking strategy for
HR professionals? Watch this, Sharon. It's not
much different for HR than it is for anyone else.
Who's your ideal client, customer, referral partner?
Where are they hanging out? Go hang out. where
they're hanging out so it depends on what you're
right are you looking to network with other hr
professionals are you looking because you're
hiring and you need that next whatever that best
employee is right it depends on what's the goal
of that networking opportunity that's a but that's
pretty standard no matter what right what's the
goal Yeah, that's true. You always have to look
at the end to see where you want to begin, because
when people start to network, they say, OK, look,
I'm in mortgages and where do I go for mortgages?
But you have to look at where your customer really
is networking and you go on from there. That
was very good. Can you share a memorable connection
that significantly impacted your career? Oh.
Easily. There's actually several. I'll give you
one that I share all the time. I was on the board
of the Encino Chamber in Los Angeles, and it
was a mixer. And being on the board, I felt it
was my obligation, or in networking terms, it
was a great excuse to walk up to any new person
that came in and introduce myself, talk about
the chamber. Not by myself, but welcome to the
chamber. Let me get you involved. Who can I introduce
you to? One particular mixer, woman walks in.
Now, demographically, she fell into one of my
target audiences. So, okay, age, you know, got
it. And it turns out, occupationally, in that
demographic that you go to a meeting, I want
to meet this person. There she was. And turns
out we ended up having a hour and a half conversation.
Didn't talk to anyone else at the mixer that
night, but I had been on her boss's TV show because
she was working for Time Warner's table. And
she was his, she ran the office, which in the
promo business, this was like the perfect buyer.
So we became very friendly. We rooted for different
baseball teams. We got past that. Now, let's
fast forward several years. She's been a client
and a friend. But because of her job, she was
in the San Fernando Valley in front of a lot
of audiences, a lot of business audiences. The
mayor of Los Angeles came to the Valley for a
particular event. She was the emcee, et cetera.
And quite often her story, as it turns out, I
was the very first business person she met after
she got her job when she walked into the mixer.
And she will see me in an audience and she will
see that guy right there. Thank you, Law. And
she would edify my company and then talk about
the importance of... being a business community.
But it was that third -party validation that
started being the very first person to be welcoming
a new person into the chamber. At first, there's
a feeling within networking that when you go
to an event or anything such like an event, you
look to give, not receive. Absolutely. So, you
know, if you look to give, then you'll always
get back because what goes around does come around.
But it puts you in such a better place if you
look to give. And so it looks like you hit that
nail right on the head. You probably teach this.
Look, if there's a new person and you say, so
you're here at this meeting, who would you like
to meet? If you can connect them. What's the
first thing they have in common is you. They're
going to talk about you a little bit, but you've
now you've banked some karma points or business
points. Even if you get no business from either
of them, you've done a good thing. And in business,
our businesses are built on continuously doing
good things and being of service. And that's
vital in networking. Yeah, and that's exactly
what I teach to my students and when I go on
stages and everything else, because I say it
in such a way that because I bring everything
down to a chamber event, a chamber of commerce
event. If you see somebody new coming in, you
say, who are you? What do you do? And everything
else. I think, look, that table over there has
a table full of marketers. I think you would.
fit in very well. Let me go over, introduce you.
You go over, introduce, and then you step away,
but you've built yourself up in their eyes. Can
I take that one step further? Sure. All right,
folks, let's say you're going to introduce that
person to one person. What I've done is I've
said, you know what? You two have a conversation
and I'll tell the new person, tell you what,
when you two are done, come find me and I'll
introduce you to somebody else. It's even better.
That's even better. So that's very good. And
I'm going to have to steal that. He's now going
to steal. Yeah. Okay. So the first time, give
me attribution. After that, it's all yours. Okay.
You got it. You got it. Okay. So how do you balance
online and in -person networking in today's digital
age? I think of trying in whatever it is, trying
to find balance. It's a fleeting attempt. It's
not, it doesn't happen. It's not the same as
balance. It's what do you need today, right?
Today you might be out of balance in the in -person,
right? Oh my goodness, we have three events we
have to go to today or we get to go to today,
right? So today we're out of balance because
we're not doing anything online or tomorrow we
might be doing. a webinar and a podcast and something
else. And it's all, Oh, today we get to be online.
We actually can be jeans and a t -shirt or whatever,
right? That day is out of balance in the other
way. Overall, the balance will even out in whatever
way is brings you the fastest path to cash. No,
that's true. That's true. But keeping that in
balance, as you said, is really, it's very important
because you can't have the scale go all one way
or all the other. In today's business, you need
both. And you said it perfectly because one day
you might be doing everything online. And the
second day you might be doing everything in person.
And also you're very fortunate. You have two
people. So you can actually. do both at the same
time. We, this is just our personal, this is
our brand. We tend to do most things together.
Occasionally we do have to be in two places at
once. Yes, we're fortunate there's two of us
we can split, but we do try to do everything
together because that's our brand, right? If
you're going to hire a coach and you only see
me out and we resonate and you're interested
in hiring us, but you haven't met Hank or vice
versa, right? It's hard to make that buying decision
because there's a piece of the puzzle missing.
So we try to do those things together. But yes,
occasionally, especially if it's some, if we're
meeting with folks we've already met before,
if there's two different chamber events, those
people already know us. They know we're a team.
If they're going to make a buying decision, they
already know what they're getting. It's totally
fine. But if we're going someplace new, we're
always going to go together. Yeah. Although if
we spill it up, we almost have to wear a badge.
Sharon is not, yeah. Sharon's doing this or Hank's
not here because he's doing, because that's the
question. Where's Hank? Where's Sharon? That's
good. Because if you go to places predominantly
together, then they're always going to ask where
the other one is. Always. So it's good. So listen,
you've told me how successful you've become,
but I'm sure you've made a plethora of mistakes.
Give me the biggest mistake and how you avoided
it. I would say my biggest mistake is I am an
introvert. Why is that a mistake? I'm a shy introvert,
right? So for me to go out in public to network,
I have to channel my inner Hank. So left on my
own, I would do it online. I'm just really, you
want me to go out there? Like COVID for me was
awesome. We can't go out. Oh, that's just too
bad. So, right. But in the business world, that
is a mistake. So to lean on those initial, I
don't want to, that's the mistake. The learning
process was, well, how badly do you want it?
Right. I want our business to succeed more than
I want to embrace being a shy introvert. So I'm
going to channel my inner Hank and go out there.
I'm not as good as Hank is out there, but I can.
She has her steps. She does wonderful. They always
say the introverts always, or the second half
of the team always say, I'm really not good at
this. I'm not. And you're still saying, wait
a minute. You are very good at this. You are
sensational at this, but you don't realize it.
The secret weapon in our couple. Yeah. Ever since
the pandemic, when people were staying inside.
People now, one other thing that I speak about
is when I go to high schools and colleges, I
speak about how people don't know how to communicate
with one another. They lost the feeling of all
they're doing is Zoom or through texting. They
lost the one -on -one feeling. And as well as
I do, when you meet somebody, you're feeling
the vibe of the person. You're feeling the vibe
of the room. Whether or not you're going to do
business with that person. So can I turn your
podcast around for a second and ask you a question?
Sure. All right. Okay, go ahead. Welcome back.
This is Aaron and Hank. Thank you. Okay. We have
our guest, Michael Foreman. He's an expert at
networking. Michael, you speak to a lot of Gen
X, Gen Y, a younger generation. This is a topic
that's important to me. Have you noticed a difference
in how they network compared to... millennial
and moving toward baby boomers sure it's huge
it's huge because the younger adults as i said
before they never were taught how to communicate
they were just because they don't know about
it so that was that's what my job is when I go
into high school, I have to tell them, look,
you may think everything's on Zoom, or you may
think everything by text, but you must do it
in person. When you go to meet with somebody,
when you go to meet them in a company or corporation,
you're not going to do it through Zoom. And you
have to learn etiquette. You have to learn, be
confident. You have to learn eye contact, handshakes.
You have to learn politeness, respectfulness,
and all of that is gone and they don't know how
to do it. So yes, the answer to your question
is yes, there's a big difference. And that's
one of the reasons why I go out and try to tell
everybody. Awesome. I've noticed when it comes
to things like all of the service groups, chambers,
et cetera, the silent generation did a marvelous
job bringing baby boomers along. And baby boomers,
we did not do as good a job bringing millennials
and teaching them the same thing. So your public
service is important and please continue doing
it. Thank you. I agree wholeheartedly because
I do feel that is a missing link. And I think
that the businesses of today, without that, they're
going to lose out on a lot. So that's why I do
it. But going back to introverts, how can introverts
excel at networking in sales and marketing? Sharon.
In networking, here's my secret sauce. When you
walk into a room of networkers, you're not the
only shy one there. I promise you, you're not.
Look around. There are other people hanging out.
At the wall. Like your high school dances. Okay.
Go introduce yourself to one of those that are
saying, hey, I see you're here by yourself. That's
my inclination too. My name is Sharon. Just be
willing to be first. With our clients, when we
are sending them out to a networking group, they
all know, I'm not going to tell them I'm going
to a networking group because I'm going to get
the assignment. And the assignment is, all right,
is it one, two, or three? And they have to pick
a number. Are you going to meet one, two, or
three brand new people and come back to the coaching
call and give us your book report? Show the card.
Yep. You have to put them on the spot. You have
to make them accountable. For their own good.
That's what I try to do. Yeah, that's what I
try to do with all my coaching students. I make
them accountable. If I'm sitting there just preaching
to them, they're not going to get anything out
of it. If I make them accountable, then they
really will pay attention and do a little bit
more and get their money's worth, so to speak.
What role does public speaking play in effective
networking? Tremendous. Yeah, you can meet one
-on -one, but you could also meet one. To many.
And the other thing I tend to stress a lot is
you're not just looking for your next client
or customer. Like if you're only working on client,
customer, you're missing out the referral partners.
Don't forget about those referral partners. Sometimes
you're not going to meet your next client or
customer. But what you might meet is someone
who has a tribe of people. that also want to
meet you that they could introduce you to. If
you ignore the referral partners because you're
so focused on the next client or customer, you're
missing out. I always say that referrals are
gold. That's golden, right? Because you're not
speaking to that audience, but you're speaking
to the network of that audience. So you're not
speaking to... 50, 100, 200 people. You're speaking
to a thousand people because if you're good enough
and you resonate with them enough, they're going
to say, oh, you know what? I saw this guy speak.
You have to hear him. And so on and so forth.
So yeah, I think it's very important. How do
you maintain and nurture professional relationships
long -term? We have several tools. Okay. You
mentioned our books. We've given away way more
books than we've sold, but that's the tool. We
are huge believers in direct mail. We have an
entire greeting card system that we use that
puts things into their mailbox. We don't believe
in using our email to sell without delivering
knowledge. Our social media is part of it. remembering
little birthdays on social media. There are a
lot of different parts of the puzzle. What did
I miss? It really comes down to follow up. If
you just met someone and then that's it, you're
just leaving it to them, hoping that they're
going to reach out. Hope is not a marketing plan,
right? Yeah, but it's a short one. So follow
up, whether it's greeting cards or social media
or texting or sending an email. Heck, we had
a one -to -one call. We give away 30 -minute
calls, strategy sessions for business owners
that are stuck. We had a call with two women
that they were in entertainment. It doesn't matter,
but they were part of the, in the LA fires that
happened. So we sent an email. It wasn't, hey,
let's continue the conversation about coaching.
It was, hey, we just heard about this. We know
that you're in that area. Are you okay? Like
be a person. Well, that's true. But what you
said was key is the follow -up to your whatever,
right? Now, I personally feel that the follow
-up is almost more important than the actual
meeting of the person themselves. That's right.
And I went to a networking event and I just,
I asked, I was talking with somebody and I said,
hey, how do you follow up with all of the people
that you meet? He goes, I'll send them an email.
And I'll thank them and I'll send them an email
next week and I'll follow up with them again.
And probably the week after that, I said, OK,
thank you very much. And I'm thinking, OK, if
I go up against him, he lost because I have a
secret sauce. It involves writing a handwritten
thank you note, you know, to that person. So
I follow up in such a way. It's about six times
in two weeks. So you think, oh, no, that's an
overkill. No, you'll find that it takes between
eight and 12 touches before a person will respond.
And I can guarantee you that with the way that
I follow up is you go from about a 3 % chance
to about a 70 % chance. And both of you work
corporate America. And if you were told somebody.
That, okay, I have a 70 % chance of my emails,
somebody responding to my email, that's gold,
right? But then you'll know, positive or negative
response, if they respond to you, where to place
them. Either in the no -go file or the follow
-up again file or something else, but you have
what to do with them. So follow -up is the key.
In our greeting card system, we use several different
greeting cards. And we do have them by list.
Clients get a card every month, past clients
get a card. We have prospect, which is a very
broad category. But yeah, and we change the message
to make sure that they understand, look, you
may never, ever need coaching, but here's just
a little positivity for the month. You don't
know who they know. You have that message, that
positivity message. And as long as you are uplifting
and positive and everything, then everybody would
just love to either open it or just say, oh,
that's right. That was Hank and Sharon. And that's
it. Look, we send those, since we're talking
about greeting cards, we send the greeting cards
out to our chamber of commerce. And quite often
it'll be, we'll meet them at a mixer. Oh, you're
the ones that send those cards every month. Yes,
we are. Yes, that's us. We've already met them.
So we've already met them, Michael. Now we're
just continuing the conversation at the mixer.
And it's a lot nicer when it happens that way.
So you don't have that cold, what do you do?
It takes all of that out of the mix. All right.
Can you share tips for turning casual connections
into a profitable business relationship? Sure.
Tell you what, I'm going to use your audience.
All right, audience, careful. You're about to
get sold here. We have several books. One of
them is called The Marketing Checklist, Your
Guide for Overwhelmed and Overthinking Entrepreneurs.
If you would like this book, all you have to
do is send us an email. But wait, would you like
The Marketing Checklist for sale? Here's where
it gets fun. You have to listen to another episode
of Networking Unleashed. and give us like a two
-sentence book report on what you learned from
Michael. A pod report. Yes. If you'd like the
marketing checklist too, listen to another episode
and tell us what Michael taught you. If you want
our human resources book, yep, one more podcast
of Networking Unleashed. Tell us what Michael
taught you, and you can have each of those books.
So what we're doing is we're getting somebody
to get some free stuff. and we're building a
relationship with you because we want them to
listen to more of you, and maybe that you'll
get some coaching out of it because they listen
to more networking unleashed, you might meet
somebody that needs coaching that doesn't do
what you do, and then we refer. So it's not a
fastest path to cash, but it's doing enough things
in your business that spinning all those plates,
they start to come back to you. It's layering.
Yeah. So the thing is, give of yourself. And
if you haven't written a book, all right, some
special report in your industry. I pride myself
on being able to put two people together. And
I am really known for it in my circles. If Michael
doesn't do it, then he knows people who do, and
he'll put them together. And I do that almost
every day. And it's really, it's as much of a
good feeling as... not doing it's just really
a good feeling why wouldn't you do it yeah it's
being a good person it's being a good person
a good neighbor a good whatever isn't that what
mr rogers told us taught us to do oh wait most
of your audience has no idea who mr rogers is
that's right that's right but they probably still
don't even know who cookie monster is it's good
to be nice to people Okay, last question. All
right. How has networking evolved the HR industry
and what trends do you foresee? I'll start with
one. Go ahead. Before we worked together or as
we were starting to work together, Sharon would
hear me talking to clients about marketing. And
she realized real fast that she was doing the
same thing internally. So I used to think that
he was the marketing guy. I didn't know anything
about marketing. I was HR and office management.
What do I know about marketing? Right. But as
he said, I was overhearing the conversations
he was having with his small business client.
Knowing that when I was doing HR, I was only
working with small business. I didn't work with
large companies. It was small business owners.
So the same conversations that he was having
with his clients, I would have in my HR office.
Right. Employees would come to me and say, I
have this great idea, but my coworker or my supervisor
won't listen to me. How do I get them to listen
to me? It's messaging. Or the bosses would come
to me and say, we have this great idea, but we
want the employees to buy in so they feel like
they have some ownership and it actually works.
It's messaging. HR is just internal messaging.
Unless I'm putting an ad out looking for a new
employee, right, then it's external. But again,
most of my career was. small business we didn't
do that much hiring it was a small business so
it's all you saw that i'm gonna use that word
again synergy for what you're doing for both
of you can do together and that's what makes
it work that's what makes your team work because
you are powerful in some areas hank is powerful
in other areas and when you combine that you
make such a good team and it's if Let me ask
you a question. If somebody wants either your
coaching or buy a book or just to see what you're
all about, or even just to talk to you, how would
they go about doing it? Okay. Don't go to Amazon
and buy the book. Reach out to us. We'll give
it to you for free. All right. That's the first
part. Our calendar link is howtogettherefaster
.com. Grab a 30 minutes with us. If you only
want a book. Send us an email. You can track
us down. Our email addresses are on our website,
ulofcreative .com. But if you want some time,
that's how to get there faster is the easiest
way. It'll ask you a couple of questions. So
we're ready for you. And here's our entire sales
pitch. You ready? If you want to talk about coaching,
go to companymarketingplan .com. So that's five
seconds of the 30 minutes. So the other 29 minutes,
53 seconds is yours. That's good. That's good.
And I try to get to the person behind the business.
And if you get to the person, then you really
know what their business is about. And the people
who give you that fake front, I don't want to
deal with. We had a business coach that we were
with him for two years. And I'll say this up
front. Every penny we invested, totally worth
it. We didn't. Because toward the end of the
second year, I said, look, I've got a marketing
question for us how we should do it. And his
answer was, I don't know your clients well enough
to answer that. And I was like, okay, wait a
second. In the first, when a client starts with
us, we start with a two -hour onboarding session.
We know about their clients like that. And during
the course of our contract of a year with somebody,
we really know their business. So it was an oh
my goodness moment. And again, I feel fine about
every penny we invested. It was worth it. But
it also, that last thing taught us to create
the coaching program that we wish we could have
found out in the wild. But we also felt and still
feel like we don't really know him. We know his
persona, but we don't really know him. And we
don't know how to do that. We don't want to learn
how to do that. What you see here with us and
talking to Michael is what you're going to hear
on the phone or in our mastermind. When you meet
Michael in person, you're probably going to get
the exact same thing as you see here. There's
no persona. That's it. I hate. people that put
that front on. And that's why I really don't
do business. It's hard because you know what?
They don't remember what they said a month ago
because it was all fake. If I can just be me,
then I don't have to worry about that. You just
be you. And that's why you're successful. I'm
successful. And it makes the world go around
that much better. So I want Hank, Sharon, I got
to tell you, this was a great podcast. learned
so much because I your background and my background
are so much alike and we're teaching almost the
same things so it was like a breath of fresh
air thank you okay so yeah I have a feeling we
could uh chat for another hour or so and in fact
we might do that folks so y 'all have a great
day Michael's gonna do the ending we're gonna
chat for another hour but you're gonna wish you
had heard it all But make sure you keep listening
to Networking Unleashed because I have a feeling
there's a whole lot more you can learn from Michael.
Thank you, and I'll talk with you soon. Well,
hold on, folks. Don't go anywhere. Let me just
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I believe in wholeheartedly. Revved Up Kids is
on a mission to protect children and teens from
sexual abuse, exploitation, and trafficking.
They provide prevention training programs for
children. teens, and adults. To learn more, go
to revvedupkids .org. That's R -E -V -V -E -D
-U -P -K -I -D -S .org. Well, that's a wrap,
folks. A huge thank you to our special guests
for sharing such incredible insights today. And
of course, a big shout out to you, our amazing
listeners, for tuning in and spending your time
with us. Remember, networking isn't about being
perfect. It's about being present. So take what
you've learned today, get out there and make
some meaningful connections. If you enjoyed this
episode, don't forget to subscribe, leave us
a review and share it with someone who could
use a little networking inspiration. Let's keep
the conversation going. You can find me on Apple,
Spotify, YouTube or my website. Michael A. Foreman,
remember, until next time, keep practicing, keep
connecting, and keep building those relationships.
This is Michael A. Foreman signing off. Take
care and happy networking.