Hannah McNamara

"It's a numbers game - right? The more strangers you introduce yourself to, the greater the chances of one of them becoming a client."

When most coaches think of networking, they view it as a fairly intense and active process. They might think about going out to events and working the room, talking to as many people as possible in order to "gain contacts" that might in the future pan out into business opportunities when those contacts become clients.

However, there's an aspect to networking that many coaches are overlooking. Did you ever stop to think about how many people you really know? Go through your personal address book as well as your work contacts book, the contact list on your mobile phone, your instant messenger list, anywhere where you might store the info about people you have frequent contact with. There's probably a lot more people there than you realize!

Go through this list, and try and job your memory to see if it leads you to any other people you know who you might have overlooked. Usually, you know at least a few "friends of friends" who could be added to a list like this. Check out our book on the topic, "Niche Marketing for Coaches" for more tips on realizing just how many people you know.

Once you've got your list, think about the contacts that those people have. The implications truly become staggering when you stop to think about how many people you're already networked with, even if only by just a few degrees of separation.

The idea here isn't to market to your friends of course; that will rarely ever end well. What you want to do instead is to take a look at their contacts and see where they overlap with your own marketing target areas. Ask them for referrals, and you might be surprised how many people they could recommend who would have an interest in your coaching skills.

Moreover, since your friends know these people they're referring directly, they can probably tell you a few things about how to effectively win over and market to those people. Remember, the more information you have, the better off you'll be.

We hope you've realized that there's a whole world of networked contacts right under your nose that you may never have taken notice of before. Now that you have, it's time to take advantage of it! Start expanding your network today!

© Copyright Hannah McNamara

Hannah McNamara is the author of 'Niche Marketing for Coaches'