I’ve been discussing networking for a couple of weeks now, so here’s a list of dos and don’ts to summarize what I’ve learned through this journey:

• Don’t give up!
• Do have confidence in yourself!
• Don’t wait for opportunities to come to you! Do go out and make your own opportunities!
• Don’t be afraid!
• Do make eye contact!
• Do plan what you’re going to say ahead of time!
• Don’t go into every situation with an agenda!
• Do collect business cards! Don’t just let them sit in a drawer! Do follow up with those contacts!
• Do start conversations! Do ask people about themselves!
• Don’t wait for networking opportunities to come to you. Do get out there—find new people to network with—a great source is http://www.meetup.com to find groups meeting in your area!
• Do ask for advice!
• Don’t retreat to a corner!
• Do watch others as they network. Pick up pointers of other dos and don’ts through observation!
• Don’t assume when someone doesn’t respond to you or doesn’t let you have that seat that you’re being rejected. Don’t get discouraged.
• Do refresh yourself with time alone or time with your supporting group of friends/family.
• Don’t put off networking. Building your network of contacts now will lead to more success in the future.
• Don’t talk someone’s ear off. Do know when to shut-up.
• Don’t stalk the person you’re trying to network with. Do know when to walk away.
• Do learn how to write good letters and e-mails.
• Do practice speaking to business contacts on the phone.
• Do treat everyone you come in contact with as you would like to be treated if you were in his or her shoes.

Yes, this is closely related to Communication, but it deserves some time and consideration of its own. If you’re like me, you tend to procrastinate about things like correspondence and networking follow-ups until you’d be embarrassed to send the note because it’s been so many weeks or even months since the original meeting.

When you network and you get those contacts and/or business cards, do not underestimate the importance of prompt follow-up. If you’ve ever been on a job search, you know how important it is to make sure you get your thank you letter out in the mail no later than the day after your interview, if not the same day. You want to make sure the person who interviewed you sees how efficient and on-top of things you are. It is the same way with networking.

Have you interviewed someone for research purposes? As soon as you finish the interview (hang up the phone, finish reading the e-mail, or get home from the location), write a note thanking the person for their time and the information. Then, once your book is published, if it is someone who did a considerable amount of work to help you, sending them a signed copy of your book (with an appropriate thank you above your signature) would be a wonderful token of gratitude.

Have you spoken at length with an author, editor, or agent at a book signing or conference? Show the same promptness. If it’s at a conference, take your stationery and postage stamps with you and mail it from the hotel so that the note is there when they get home/back to the office. If you’re that efficient, you certainly can meet deadlines, right?

If you have done any kind of networking and you say you’re going to contact that person about getting together for lunch or about the possibility of future projects, DO IT. Send that e-mail or make that phone call. Oh, and if you’re an introvert who isn’t comfortable initiating phone calls, calling someone’s office after hours and leaving a voicemail message, while not preferable, is at least a contact. Practice initiating phone calls, even if you have to write down what you want to say to make sure you don’t stumble and mumble (and you can always pray they’ll be away from their desk and you’ll get voicemail anyway!).

Another thought or two on building name recognition, based on some discussions in a couple of writing groups I’m in . . .

Try to avoid controversial topics when it comes to blogging or commenting on blogs, writing letters to the editor of publications, or posting to e-mail loops or forums. I know we all have strong feelings about topics, and if it is a topic on which you are passionate and must have your say, then do so, but just remember, the internet is forever and every editor and agent out there has access to the internet and knows how to do a google search. They want to publish authors who are going to reach the broadest audience possible and might be leery of publishing authors who have a tendency to speak out often on hot-button topics or respond to others in an abrasive or attacking manner that may offend potential readers.

Remember, every person you come into contact with is a potential reader. What kind of opinion do you want them to have of you when they see your name in print?

This is one of the reasons why I do not blog about politics or religion, and I rarely if ever leave comments on blogs or forums that are polarized emotional boiling pots. It’s not that I don’t have strong feelings, it’s just that I don’t want my opinions coloring the way potential readers, editors, or agents may view me as a writer of fiction. This is also true of expressing your opinion of topics on e-mail loops or forums. You are eventually going to want to use every contact avenue you have as a place to market your book. You don’t want to have to battle negative word-of-mouth when trying to build readership and recruit influencers.

On a blog about writing, it may seem odd that I would list communication as a stumbling block. But it’s the way in which we communicate that may prove to be our own undoing.

I’ve already written at length about learning how to “chat-up” the person you’re networking with. My only addition to that would be to recommend you do a Google search for ACTIVE LISTENING SKILLS and read up on how to become a better listener—from facial expressions and body language to eye contact.

Before moving on with other forms of communication, I would like to make a couple of comments on EYE CONTACT. When in a face-to-face conversation with someone, if you do not make eye contact, it not only betrays your nervousness, but it also gives the impression that you have something to hide or that you are not being honest. Eye contact creates a sense that you are confident—in yourself and in your writing. It’s definitely hard to do (you may have to learn how to do it by looking at the rim of someone’s glasses, or at their eyelashes or something like that (but don’t make them feel like you’re examining them!). Again, practice, practice, practice.

WRITTEN COMMUNICATION in Networking
When did the art of the hand-written thank you note disappear? Okay, I’ll admit, I’m terrible at remembering to write thank you notes or birthday cards. But to become a more effective networker, I’m trying to do these things more often to make them habits and to build my network just a bit stronger.

The first thing you need to do when it comes to becoming a more effective networker is find a way to get organized. Are you good at keeping up with a journal or a hand-written address book? Then invest in a good day planner complete with calendar, address book, notes pages, and sleeves for keeping business cards you collect. Are you better at keeping up with information electronically (like me)? If you don’t already know, learn how to use the software on your computer to keep up with your contacts and all of their vital information. The Contacts portion of Microsoft Outlook has multiple fields for information such as spouse/children’s names, hobbies, birthday, and other vital statistics in addition to the contact info.

That said, no I don’t recommend sending birthday cards to editors and agents, unless you have actually signed a contract to work with them. With published authors, if it is someone you have established an acquaintanceship with, then yes, birthday cards would be appropriate.

THANK YOU NOTES
If you have the opportunity to meet with an editor or agent at a conference for a pitch session and they ask you to submit, then include a line in the query letter thanking them for their time. If you are not asked to submit, you can still send them a thank you note, but be sure to keep it brief and professional. Be sure to show off your listening skills by mentioning specific topics/subjects/suggestions that were discussed in the meeting. For example:

Dear Mr/Ms Editor:
Thank you for meeting with me at the 2006 ACFW conference in Dallas, TX, to discuss my manuscript, _____________. I appreciate your time and the insights you gave me, and will put your suggestions about creating more emotional conflict into practice as I move forward with my writing.
Sincerely,
My Name

If you have the opportunity to meet with a published author and speak with him or her at some length, a thank you note is very appropriate:

Dear Mr./Ms. Author:
Thank you so much for taking the time out of your busy day to meet with me last Thursday evening after your book signing. I enjoyed learning more about your writing process and have already started researching XXX for my manuscript (or whatever you spoke with the author about—to jog his/her memory about your conversation). I wish you all success and blessings with your writing career.
Sincerely,
My Name

Hand writing this note (and if you have atrocious handwriting, you may consider seeing if someone you know who has nice handwriting is willing to write it out for you) is preferable. It shows that you have made an effort. So, invest in some nice writing stationery. You can get some at any card store, or even at office supply chains such as Office Depot or Staples (or you can order online at their sites, but I’m a hands-on girl—I want to see it before I buy it). Remember, this is a piece of business correspondence. I recommend against “thank you” greeting cards with preprinted messages, as you are trying to show off the strength of your writing in any way possible. And cutsey is definitely a no-no. No cartoon characters. If you do not already have your own letterhead, you can create it yourself on your word processor, but still handwrite the note. If you are not using letterhead, write your contact information below your signature.

If the only contact information you have for the person is an e-mail address, it is okay to send a thank you note through e-mail. But write as above, with the “Dear so-and-so” salutation and the “Sincerely, My name” closing, followed by your snail-mail and e-mail contact information (and website address if you have one).

Things to keep in mind when writing follow-up notes:

• Proofread for grammar and spelling. Remember—best foot forward. You’re trying to be taken seriously as a professional writer.
• Reiterate the important part of the conversation to bring the encounter top of mind for the addressee.
• Keep it PROFESSIONAL. No matter how laid-back your conversation was with this contact, this is still business correspondence. Do not use slang or shorthand abbreviations, and do not tell your life story.

Keeping it professional and showing your grasp of business etiquette (even if you’ve never worked in a business environment) is of vital importance when networking through correspondence. As a copy editor at a small publishing house, one of my tasks is reading submissions of poetry and short prose for our seasonal collections. I process about 100-150 submissions about once a month, and one of the issues I run into most often is people who cannot write an appropriate business letter. Keep it brief and keep it on point: this is business, not personal.

MAINTAINING CONTACT
So you’ve met with that editor and she did not ask for you to submit your manuscript. You’ve sent the thank you note and now it’s a few months down the road. You want to keep your name fresh in the editor’s mind, but you haven’t finished revising your manuscript to fit what the editor told you she’s looking for. What to do? Try sending an e-mail, once again thanking her for meeting with you to discuss your manuscript (mention by name) and then ask if she will recommend a few books her house has published in the genre/line you’re targeting so that you can study them to get a better idea of how to revise your manuscript.

Read trade publications such as Publishers Weekly (subscribe to the PW Daily newsletters), your writing association’s monthly/quarterly magazine or newsletter, and industry magazines such as Writer’s Digest and The Writer. When you see something about a networking contact—such as a promotion or move to a new agency/publishing house, a new book contract, a book tour announcement, a great review (not the bad ones), or an article published, clip it (or print it if it’s online) then write a brief congratulatory note to the person and send it along with the clip.

Then, the next time you see that contact, be sure to walk up to them and re-introduce yourself. And don’t be surprised if they remember you!

A high percentage of writers are introverts and our natural instinct is to just sit at home and write. But while some authors can parlay that into book sales without ever leaving their comfort zone, in this modern age of branding and name-marketing, selling our books is much harder to do without networking and marketing ourselves. You have to learn how to talk to people!

Whether introverted or extroverted, there are going to be some stumbling blocks you’ll need to get over and etiquette you’ll need to learn. From my experience, networking takes years to learn, so don’t expect to become an expert overnight. Practice, practice, practice!

Stumbling Block #1: FEAR. Networking boils down to putting ourselves into a place of vulnerability with a high likelihood of rejection. Fun, huh? In doing some research for a new character I’m developing, I have discovered that I have mild social anxiety disorder. Not enough to keep me from functioning now, but now that I know what it is, I understand why I had so many problems connecting socially as a child/teen/young adult. It was FEAR. Fear of rejection, so I wouldn’t put myself in a position to be rejected. Fear of not doing something perfectly, therefore not trying in the first place. Fear of being judged by onlookers—always feeling like people are watching/judging me. Sound familiar? As I have grown more comfortable with myself as an adult, these fears are still there, but I don’t let them rule my life. I know of what I am capable (such as not ending a sentence with a preposition). By forcing myself to get out there and meet people (kinda had to when I moved to Nashville in 1996 where I knew no one and had no job), forcing myself to talk to strangers, and forcing myself out of my comfort zone by attending large national conferences, I began to gain confidence in myself as an intelligent woman who could carry on conversations with a variety of people on an endless number of subjects. I watched people around me I admired—especially my former boss Mary Ella Hazelwood, who is an expert at networking—and mimicked the techniques I saw until they became second nature to me.

FEAR OF STRANGERS. I am still extremely uncomfortable around strangers. The parties I like to go to are those where I know everyone who will be in attendance—usually about 10–15 tops!—where I know the music won’t be too loud and I won’t have to force myself to speak to people I don’t know. But one thing I have learned to do when in these kinds of stranger-ful situations is to ask questions. Every person is most eloquent when speaking about something near and dear to his/her heart. Therefore, I’ve learned to pick up on verbal cues—a mentioned hobby, a place lived, a book read, a school attended, a sport loved—and ask the stranger about that particular topic.

Almost every person in the world has something unique and interesting about them. Good networkers can find that and get them to start talking about it. But, don’t just “interview” them. Be sure—when APPROPRIATE—to interject information about yourself. Learn how to share anecdotes about your own life in a fun and interesting way. Also, learn how to read your audience. Are you a married-mom-of-four in a room full of mostly single people? They probably aren’t going to want to hear stories about your kids. But they may want to hear about how you found that fabulous necklace you’re wearing at a great little antique store down in the Warehouse District in Chattanooga. (“Oh, you’ve been to Chattanooga, too? What’s your favorite part?”) College professor in a room full of blue-collar workers? Try talking about the old barn you helped your grandfather refurbish when you were a kid.

FEAR OF BEING OUT-TALKED. Some of the most tiring and annoying people in the world are those who don’t know what is appropriate and what isn’t when it comes to interjecting the personal stories. Don’t be the kind of person who always has to one-up any story anyone else tells. (“You think that’s something? Well, MY experience is . . .”) If someone is speaking about a sick relative, you don’t have to talk about your sicker relative. You don’t have to have a “matching” story for every story the others around you tell. And by all means, DON’T be the kind of person who has to follow the other person’s story with one illustrating how your experience was better, worse, more exciting, more terrifying, etc. Sometimes, the better way to network is to let the person you’re speaking to have the limelight, feel special, be the center of attention. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: it is not all about you!

FEAR OF REJECTION. Admit it—we all carry around at least a little fear of being rejected, some of us just carry it much closer to the surface than others. We’re afraid people aren’t going to like us. We want validation of ourselves as interesting, important beings on this journey called Life. We don’t want to blend into the walls, but we don’t want to risk getting hurt, either. I was the kid who always wanted to be part of the “popular group”—no, make that ANY group—but because I was somewhat socially inept, I made an easy target for those kids who did have social skills, amongst which is the skill of ostracizing others. I usually had one or two other “outcast” kids that I played with, but pretty much stayed a loner. I remember in Junior High (what a wonderful time of emotions and raging hormones puberty is!) crying because I felt like the few other girls in my class at a small private school didn’t like me and were pushing me out of their circle because I’d decided to play volleyball instead of going out for cheerleading. It didn’t matter that all the girls on the volleyball team liked me. What mattered is that these other couple of girls didn’t seem to like me anymore and were rejecting me.

My high school was so large that while I did make a few close friends, I pretty much just kept to myself, went to classes, and then went home, where I immersed myself into fictitious worlds surrounded by characters I knew well whom I knew would never reject me. As far as the relationship scene went, I quickly learned the rejection of never being asked out. So I made friends with lots of guys and even though I did get my heart broken by falling in love with one of them in college, I never had to go through that most awful of rejections, a break-up.

After going through a severe depression where I became almost completely isolated, I entered my 20s starting to crave social interaction. I sought out other 20-something singles through church. Because they liked to go out country dancing, I learned to have fun doing it, too. But I started to know myself better. I started to understand my fear of rejection, the fear that people wouldn’t like me. Living with my parents after dropping out of college not only changed our relationship for the better (much better), but it taught me how to relate with other adults in a loving relationship that, while it wouldn’t always be perfect, would never be cut off just because I did or said something stupid. I learned that I didn’t always have to go out and do what all of my friends wanted to do. If it wasn’t an activity I was interested in, I didn’t go. And you know what—I didn’t lose friends over it. I learned I had marketable job skills that led me through a succession of several jobs. And I learned that I was a good teacher and had a knack for leadership. God surrounded me with people who built up my confidence before He moved me to Nashville where I would have to put myself forward if I ever expected to meet anyone, to have a job, or have a life. In the past ten years, the most important thing I have learned about rejection is that nearly everyone surrounding me feels the same way.

Here are a few exercises for overcoming the fear of rejection:

• Seek out someone else and NOT-reject him or her. Find the person sitting in the corner alone or standing slightly apart from the crowd. No, they aren’t always going to want to talk to you, but more likely than not, you will at least brighten someone else’s day, if not make an important networking contact.
• Learn how to walk up to a group and join it. This is easiest to practice at conferences/large gatherings where most people don’t know each other well. One of the hardest things for me at my first writing conference in 2001 (Blue Ridge Christian Writers’ Conference) was walking into the cafeteria and not going off to a table by myself, but walking up to one with a few open chairs and asking if I could join those already seated there. Sometimes, they are saving the seat(s) for someone else. They’re not rejecting me, they’re just NOT-rejecting someone else. And there are other tables with other interesting people sitting at them where I can be NOT-rejected. One of the most important things I do when walking up to and joining a “group in progress” is to just listen. I listen to the conversation already going around. For the most part in the beginning, I keep my comments to myself—partly from fear of their rejecting what I have to say, but also out of basic politeness. I’ve just “forced entry” into the group. I don’t want to follow that up with “forcing entry” into the conversation as well.
• Learn how to converse on a variety of topics. Watch the evening news. Review the bestseller lists. Check the headlines and article blurbs on the home page of your local newspaper, the USA Today, CNN, or other national news sites, or listen to the news on NPR when getting ready in the mornings or driving home in the afternoons. NPR does about 10 minutes of headline news on the hour every hour. Try not to introduce controversial topics such as politics or religious subjects unless you know your audience very well. Strive for neutral topics of general interest. Remember, not everyone likes sports or watches the most popular TV shows. For writers talking to other writers, starting a conversation is as simple as saying, “So, what do you write? Tell me about your work in progress.”
• Practice, practice, practice. This is going to sound really weird and simplistic for all the extroverts out there, but just bear with me. Practice overcoming the fear of rejection first by making eye contact and smiling at people. Now, depending on what area of the country you live in, you will get varying results with this. When I lived in Washington DC, making eye contact with others was hard, simply because of the nature of the Big City. However, whenever I did make eye contact with someone and they returned my smile, I felt like I’d met a kindred spirit. (Ah, so glad to be living in the south again!) Once you’re comfortable making eye contact and smiling at passers-by, try saying a simple “Hello.” (Try to avoid the question, “How are you?” because if you don’t want a genuine answer, you shouldn’t ask the question. I actually get annoyed by people who use that question as a greeting because I know they don’t really want to know “how” I am any more than I want to know “how” they are.) Next step is to actually strike up conversations with people—in line at the store, at the gym, at your kids’ games/practices/events, at the airport, etc. Start attending events you wouldn’t normally attend with increasingly larger groups of people present. Practice walking up and joining groups of people and learning how and when to enter the conversation.

In one of her comments, Carol mentioned that one of the things she is doing is participating in a blog where she is gaining name recognition, but that she isn’t sure that it is networking.

Building name recognition is a major part of both networking AND marketing! Because the three work hand-in-hand. This is why we write blogs, why we participate in local writers groups (aside from the fellowship, knowledge, and support of other writers), why we volunteer to help out with contests and “group management” type tasks with our writing groups, and why we walk up and introduce ourselves to published authors, editors, or agents. We want name recognition.

I have joked that I am one of the best known unpublished authors in CBA publishing circles. This has been helped along by several things, some of my doing, others because I have done that networking and stories have gotten around. I mentioned earlier about my working with several of the editors from the largest CBA publishing houses last year during the Noble Theme (now “Genesis”) contest with ACFW.

But something I haven’t mentioned on this blog is another area of name recognition—not necessarily writing related, but still name recognition. At the first ACFW (then ACRW) national conference in 2002, I got to know Brandilyn Collins, one of the preeminent CBA authors, and just a fun person to be around. It just so happened on our last night there, as a bunch of us were hanging out in the “pub” at the hotel, another patron decided he wanted to have a bit of fun and walked over to our table and kissed someone on the cheek—ME! It was fun and funny and we joked that I would go down in the lore of the stories that are told about conferences.

What I didn’t know is that for a couple of years after this, Brandilyn was still telling this story about me. When she came to Nashville with the Zondervan book signing tour a couple of years later, almost as soon as I walked into the bookstore, I was practically mugged by this tall man I’d never seen before in my life who wrapped me in a huge bear-hug and kissed me on the cheek. Well, he turned out to be James Scott Bell who’d been told the “kissing bandit” story at lunch by Brandilyn, who knew I would be there.

Now, I have not seen nor talked to Jim Bell since that day (and it’s been almost two years ago), but I have a feeling that were I to see him again and remind him of that incident, he would instantly remember me. Not because he knows anything about my writing, but because of the name recognition that comes from a unique memory.

Networking builds name recognition and name recognition translates into marketing because a recognized name is a brand. Think about it. John Grisham. Tom Clancy. J.K. Rowling. Amazon.com has a feature on their website where you can sign up for announcements when your favorite authors have upcoming releases so you can preorder their books. At one point in time all of these authors were pre-pubs trying to break into print. Now people buy books simply because their name is on the cover as the author. Granted, their name recognition has come through selling millions of books, but for those of us trying to break into an over-saturated publishing market, building a “following” by networking ahead of time, getting our names out there, marketing ourselves pre-publication is vitally important when it comes to first convincing a publisher if they buy our novel it will sell, and then parlaying that into sales and royalties after the book hits the streets. (Can you tell I’ve been working on a marketing plan for a proposal submission?) And not only will you have built-in readers eager for your book to come out, but you will have influencers—published authors willing to put their “seal of approval” on your book with a quote about what a wonderful author you are and how fabulous your story is.

So how do we go about “branding” ourselves with name recognition? Post your comments with your techniques and I’ll expound on it a little more in another entry.