Dave Delaney: Oh yes!

John Lee Dumas: Dave's a keynote speaker, author, and founder of networkingfornicepeople.com. He's appeared in USA Today, Entrepreneur, Inc., Fortune, Billboard, and the BBC. His acclaimed book New Business Networking explores online and offline tools, tips, and techniques to grow and nurture your professional network for your business and career.

Dave, take a minute, fill in some gaps from that intro and give us just a little glimpse of your personal life.

Dave Delaney: My personal life – I am born and bred in Toronto, Canada. I moved to Ireland to find myself and my Irish roots and all that good stuff – being a Delaney, and met my wife there. We moved to Nashville, TN and had two kids. We still have them and we live in Nashville, now.

John Lee Dumas: I'm glad to hear you still have your kids, that's really exciting news.

Dave Delaney: Yeah, we kept them. They're pretty cool, so we decided to keep them.

John Lee Dumas: Fire Nation, if you're recognizing Dave's name or his voice – Episode 562 he appeared on EOFire. We're talking over 1200 episodes ago. Dave, welcome back, brother. We're excited to have you. Fire Nation, of course, if you wanna listen to Dave's journey which includes Toronto, to Ireland, to Nashville and other things, definitely check out that episode for sure.

Today, we're gonna be talking about something a little different, we're gonna be talking about networking. If you didn't get by his URL networkingfornicepeople.com, Dave has crafted quite the niche in this area. Break down your area of expertise as it sits today, and then drop one value bomb, something that we probably don't know as entrepreneurs, but that we probably should.

Dave Delaney: Great question! For me personally, my area of focus and expertise is in networking. It's about relationships and community and putting people together and providing value. That all gets into networking nicely, which is what I'm all about. So, that's my area of expertise. As far as a value bomb, I would say to focus on one thing in your career that you're working on – you can do other things, of course, but focus on one core thing and don't try to be all things to all people. I tried – for a long time I tried to do too many things and my head was always spinning and I was never getting anywhere. By focusing on one thing you'll get much closer to that, at least. Or, discover something new along the way.

John Lee Dumas: What I love about that is if you try to resonate with everybody, Fire Nation, you're literally going to resonate with nobody. You need to stand for something. You need to actually put a flag in the ground and says, “Hey, this is what I believe. This is what I'm passionate about. For those of you that are also passionate about this and maybe have some similar ideas, come to my flag. Those that don't, I don't probably want to deal with you anyway.” Really know what you stand for. Really know who you are so you can attract those right people.

Kind of moving in, Dave, to what we're gonna be focusing on today which is networking – why is it more important today, here in 2017, than it has really ever been before?

Dave Delaney: The way social media and online communication has evolved – the future's looking/leaning more toward AI's and then, of course, we all deal with spam-bots and all that stuff.

John Lee Dumas: Yeah, Facebook Messenger bots are already everywhere. It's happening.

Dave Delaney: I've been hit twice, actually. I just reminded people – I didn't fall for it, thankfully, but they seem pretty realistic when you start getting chatted by a friend and you realize, “Wait a minute, this isn't actually my friend.” It's so important. I think that's starting to affect the way social networks work online. Our relationships happen best when it's in person. That doesn't mean to say that you can't have relationships online, but everybody knows that when you have a friend online and then you meet in person, your relationship's way better.

I think nowadays networking is more important than ever because we need to establish those relationships and meet up in person. I think that's just such an important part of this.

John Lee Dumas: Time is everything. It's our most valuable resource, by far. It's literally something that we just can't get back. The last 10 seconds of my life I can't get back. Guess what? I don't want it back because I was hanging out with you, Dave, so that was cool. I made that choice. The fact is we can all manage our time while nurturing our network. How can we do that to the best of our abilities?
Dave Delaney: I use a CRM tool called Contactually, which I really like, which helps me balance relationships as far as email goes. It taps into my email and then I configure what they call “buckets”, but it's like groups. You can put people into different groups to remind you to follow-up with those people at different times. You don't have to do it exactly on time, but they do it in a way to game-ify it, so you get a score and things. It keeps you focused because you can keep tags – you can actually tag people.

If I know a WordPress developer I can tag him “WordPress” or I know an author I can tag her “Author”. That helps me keep track so when somebody in my network says, “Dave, I wanna interview some authors” or “Dave, I wanna meet some WordPress developers,” I can just look in my CRM, find those people really quickly, and then make those introductions. It speeds up time but it also helps me keep focused on following up with people.

John Lee Dumas: I've actually interviewed the founder of Contactually. Great guy and he's always looking just to continue to improve the system. This was years ago that I interviewed him, so I just love hearing years later, people still using Contactually and loving it. I wanna dive into, Dave, is a specific example of how you use Contactually that worked really cool. Or, maybe if you have a better example of a client of yours of something, but give us something real specific. Let's go granular on this.

Dave Delaney: When I send a proposal out to a client – or potential client – I set it to remind me – I have a separate bucket for that in Contactually that reminds me to follow-up within the week. That has saved by butt twice because I forgot and went into Contactually and it reminded me to follow-up with these people. By following up, I was able to close those clients and become new clients. It's paid for itself multiple times. That alone is really worth the investment.

John Lee Dumas: I love that. Fire Nation, a lot of times it's never “no” it's “not right now”. We're getting bombarded with a thousand different things – the messenger bots, the emails, Skype, you name it, we're getting bombarded. Just because I get an email from Dave and then maybe something happens and the mailman shows up and I go down and I've already “read that message” and I've forgotten about it, it doesn't mean that I meant to say no to Dave. Hey, he followed up and here we are talking on EOFire, bringing him on as a repeat guest because he knows how to follow-up and how to network.

How should we seek out events to meet like-minded people? There's a lot of events that are out there – there's virtual, there's in-person – give us a little bit of a roadmap right now that we could maybe follow and use as a guide to really make sure that we're in the right places, doing the right things.

Dave Delaney: One thing that I like to do is – and it sounds pretty basic, but it's word of mouth. Asking colleagues, asking people in your profession or people you work with, ask them what events, what conferences, what trade shows, whatever it may be. Ask them where they're going this year, what's on their radar. That might give you some ideas right away.

Another thing I like to do is go onto websites, just simple services that some of you will probably know – meetup.com, eventbrite.com. Eventbrite – MeetUp's more community focused groups that are taking place locally that you can search for your zip code and find all of those different meet ups. You can look in that and find people that you wanna connect with. Eventbrite, if you search your zip code or your postal code, you can find local events – free and paid – that have tickets associated with them. You can find specific things that are taking place and find those conferences and those events.

There's a website called Lanyrd – that's L-A-N-Y-R-D.com – which is now actually been acquired by Eventbrite. That has more conferences – it's kind of an international conference directory. You can actually search by conferences and find the conferences that appeal to you most. Again, follow-up with your own community and your own network and reach out to those folks, see if they're going to any of these conferences or ask them which conferences they plan to go to. That way, you can have a networking buddy there.

John Lee Dumas: Now we're there at the conferences or these meet ups or small events, whatever they might be. What do we do next? What are some best practices?

Dave Delaney: I like to research who's gonna be there before I go. I just launched an online course all about this, actually, about how to networking before, during, and after a conference or after an event. So, go to the event, but before you go look online and see the speakers that are gonna be there. Look at the sponsors that are gonna be there. Start researching those folks and if there is a connection there, reach out to them directly. Say, "Hey, I would love to grab a coffee while we're at this conference I see you're attending." Let them know why – maybe you have some business to discuss, maybe you just would like to talk about the industry with that person, that's perfectly fine. Do that before you go so you can set up some meetings before you're there.

Then when you're there – you mentioned my book New Business Networking. That book came as a result of me at a conference networking. I went over to my publisher's table, who I'd never before, and she – working the table, they had published some other books of some other authors that I knew. I went over and I was just making small talk and she asked me what my book idea is and that kind of thing. I was like, “No, no, I don't have any ideas.” She said, “Yes you do, what's your book?” I had this idea of writing a book about networking – about networking online and offline. She said, “I love that idea” and we got into it and next thing I know, I had a book proposal and then a book deal from networking.

So, go and talk to the sponsors. Research who's gonna be there beforehand, as well.

John Lee Dumas: Fire Nation, you think that you've gotten value bombs thus far, you ain't seen nothing yet. We're about to drop some more when we get back from thanking our sponsors.

So Dave, we're back. I'm not gonna lie, I think Fire Nation probably knows this, I love acronyms. FOCUS: Follow One Course Until Success. SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Bound. I love acronyms – I think they're cool, I think they make a lot of sense and they help me remember what I should be doing. You've got a pretty cool acronym, how can we use the acronym LISTEN to actively listen to people when we meet?

This is the reality – a lot of times we're there, we meet somebody, they're talking, and now we're just kind of thinking, “Oh, what's that next person I gotta meet? What's that next meeting like?” How do we use the acronym LISTEN to actively listen?

Dave Delaney: So, the LISTEN acronym: L stands for Look interested. You have to be interested. When you go over and introduce yourself and ask them, “What brings you to the conference?” They're gonna start to tell you. Look interested. That means look in their eyes. That means smiling. That means nodding. Look interested.

The I stands for Involve yourself by responding, and that means by giving some cues that you're listening. Say, “Oh really? Wow! Uh-huh, uh-huh” something like that. Even asking follow-up questions like, “And then what happening?” or “How did that make you feel?”

The S stands for Stay on target. The target is the person you're talking to. Let them do the bulk of the talking. Now of course if this feels weird, then back up a bit, that's fine. Try to let them do the bulk of the talking by asking them follow-up questions.

The T stands for Test your understanding. That's a really good one if you're getting some information or receiving information, by repeating it out loud. If you repeat that information out loud, they hear you repeat it, so they're more confident that you're listening. Also, it helps you because you retain the information better because you're repeating it out loud

E is Evaluate the message. Maybe they're confiding in you. Maybe they're telling you something sort of secretive – maybe they're deciding to leave their job or maybe they were just laid off, I don't know. Evaluate the message and treat it as such.

N, finally – LISTEN – N stands for Neutralize the feeling. If they say something like – right now, I'm a big hockey fan and the Nashville Predators are a big team here. If they're gonna badmouth the Preds, it might upset me, but I'm gonna neutralize those feelings. Now, if they say something that's horrible, then that's a good cue for you to say, "I'm sorry, I've gotta run" or "I've gotta go to the bathroom, I'm sorry" something like that. "It was great to meet you" and then meander out of there.

That's the LISTEN acronym.

John Lee Dumas: I can see you just going, “I must have eaten something horrible this morning. I have to go to the bathroom.” What can they say to that? Nothing, really.

Dave Delaney: Right. I do training – I do corporate training and I speak a lot about networking and I point this out. I always tell people in the audience, when I point out this acronym, I say, “Okay, you can say “I've gotta go the the bathroom” but then anybody who actually legitimately has to go to the bathroom now, it's gonna be really awkward.” Let them know, “No, no, no! It's not you, I swear, it's me!”

John Lee Dumas: LISTEN, Fire Nation – L: Look interested, make eye contact; I: Involve yourself by responding like, “uh-huh, yeah! I totally get it”; Stay on target, that's the S; the T is Test your understanding, like “Let me get this straight, are you saying X, Y, and Z?”; and then of course Evaluate the message; and then if you need to, Neutralize that feeling, don't let your personal feelings get involved here.

Now, Dave, one thing I kind of want to move into is ice breakers. Yeah, it's one thing to actually have a conversation with somebody – we maybe even should have potentially talked about this first. The reality is, how do you even start that conversation? What are some ideas for ice breakers when we meet people in person to kind of get that flow going in a natural state?

Dave Delaney: That's a great question, too. There's an author Kio Stark who wrote a book called When Strangers Meet and she talked about triangulation. The idea of triangulation is to find a shared interest or something – even in a room, or perhaps it was another presentation. If you're at the conference in the hallway you could start talking to somebody and say, “Gosh, it's really cold in here” because you both feel that the air conditioning's way too cold. Or, “What did you think of that speaker? Was she on point? What's your opinion about that?” You have a common point of interest.

The triangulation is your – like a triangle – it's you, the person you wanna talk to, and then that point, that common thing that you can discuss. When you're at a conference, too, understand – I always emphasize that the idea with a name tag, a badge, anything attached to a lanyard – that is your invitation to go and introduce yourself. Nobody knows to a conference or a networking event or something and wants to be alone. If you see somebody standing by themselves and they have a name badge, they're there. They're attending the same thing you are. That's your cue to go over and introduce yourself and say, "Hey, how's it going Jim Bob" or whatever their name is. Look at their name tag and then ask them what they thought of the last session and what brings them to the conference.

Use that triangulation point, that really helps.

John Lee Dumas: I love the triangulation point, I think that's a great idea. To Jim Bob it can be like, “Hey dude, what's it like having two first names? That's pretty interesting.” Boom. Ice is broken.

Dave Delaney: There you go. There you go.

John Lee Dumas: Dave, let's kind of wrap this up with you giving us a parting piece of guidance. Give us this parting piece of guidance and share what you're most fired up about today along with that parting piece of guidance. Then we'll say goodbye.

Dave Delaney: Okay, for the parting piece of advice I would say to avoid procrastination through education, which is something – a kick that I've been on lately and blogging about, as well. The idea with this is it's not to stop educating yourself because you can always learn, you're listening to this, you're listening to this amazing podcast, so you're learning. That's great! But, what's really important is that we do stuff with what we learn. If you need to spend time working on regurgitating the content you learn.

For example, if I listen to a podcast and there's a great interview or something like that, I'll actually write out the best points from that podcast and then, if you're a blogger, I'll write a blog post about that interview and I will definitely link to the podcast host and the guest's website. I'll include the points that I took from that interview. What that does is it helps me remember – like writing a book report in school. Instead of burning through a bunch of books or a bunch of podcasts or audio books, you're actually taking the time to regurgitate that information. By writing it out and listening to it again, it helps you really keep track of – it helps you remember that information like I mentioned before.

Write out a blog post sharing that information with – and then you're sharing that information with your own community and you're also sharing some love to the author and to the host and so on.

So, avoid procrastination through education. Instead, spend some time consuming – consume the media, but then spend some time creating and sharing what you've learned. I think that will help you get better at the thing that you're trying to do in your own life.

John Lee Dumas: Where, Dave, can we best connect with you?

Dave Delaney: You can find me at networkingfornicepeople.com.

John Lee Dumas: Networkingfornicepeople.com. And Fire Nation, you are the average of the five people that you spend the most time with and you've been hanging out with D.D. and J.L.D. today, so keep up the heat. Head over to EOFire.com, just type “dave” in the search bar, the show notes page will pop up with everything that we've been talking about today as well as Episode 562, where Dave shares his journey. Just go for a little back to back marathon here, listen to a little D.D. back in the day and a little D.D. now and see what's happened in the past 1200 episodes. Of course, head directly over to networkingfornicepeople.com.

Dave, thank you for sharing your journey with Fire Nation today. For that, we salute you, and we'll catch you on the flip-side

[End of Audio]

Duration: 19 minutes
Dave Delaney: Oh yes!

John Lee Dumas: Dave's a keynote speaker, author, and founder of networkingfornicepeople.com. He's appeared in USA Today, Entrepreneur, Inc., Fortune, Billboard, and the BBC. His acclaimed book New Business Networking explores online and offline tools, tips, and techniques to grow and nurture your professional network for your business and career.

Dave, take a minute, fill in some gaps from that intro and give us just a little glimpse of your personal life.

Dave Delaney: My personal life – I am born and bred in Toronto, Canada. I moved to Ireland to find myself and my Irish roots and all that good stuff – being a Delaney, and met my wife there. We moved to Nashville, TN and had two kids. We still have them and we live in Nashville, now.

John Lee Dumas: I'm glad to hear you still have your kids, that's really exciting news.

Dave Delaney: Yeah, we kept them. They're pretty cool, so we decided to keep them.

John Lee Dumas: Fire Nation, if you're recognizing Dave's name or his voice – Episode 562 he appeared on EOFire. We're talking over 1200 episodes ago. Dave, welcome back, brother. We're excited to have you. Fire Nation, of course, if you wanna listen to Dave's journey which includes Toronto, to Ireland, to Nashville and other things, definitely check out that episode for sure.

Today, we're gonna be talking about something a little different, we're gonna be talking about networking. If you didn't get by his URL networkingfornicepeople.com, Dave has crafted quite the niche in this area. Break down your area of expertise as it sits today, and then drop one value bomb, something that we probably don't know as entrepreneurs, but that we probably should.

Dave Delaney: Great question! For me personally, my area of focus and expertise is in networking. It's about relationships and community and putting people together and providing value. That all gets into networking nicely, which is what I'm all about. So, that's my area of expertise. As far as a value bomb, I would say to focus on one thing in your career that you're working on – you can do other things, of course, but focus on one core thing and don't try to be all things to all people. I tried – for a long time I tried to do too many things and my head was always spinning and I was never getting anywhere. By focusing on one thing you'll get much closer to that, at least. Or, discover something new along the way.

John Lee Dumas: What I love about that is if you try to resonate with everybody, Fire Nation, you're literally going to resonate with nobody. You need to stand for something. You need to actually put a flag in the ground and says, “Hey, this is what I believe. This is what I'm passionate about. For those of you that are also passionate about this and maybe have some similar ideas, come to my flag. Those that don't, I don't probably want to deal with you anyway.” Really know what you stand for. Really know who you are so you can attract those right people.

Kind of moving in, Dave, to what we're gonna be focusing on today which is networking – why is it more important today, here in 2017, than it has really ever been before?

Dave Delaney: The way social media and online communication has evolved – the future's looking/leaning more toward AI's and then, of course, we all deal with spam-bots and all that stuff.

John Lee Dumas: Yeah, Facebook Messenger bots are already everywhere. It's happening.

Dave Delaney: I've been hit twice, actually. I just reminded people – I didn't fall for it, thankfully, but they seem pretty realistic when you start getting chatted by a friend and you realize, “Wait a minute, this isn't actually my friend.” It's so important. I think that's starting to affect the way social networks work online. Our relationships happen best when it's in person. That doesn't mean to say that you can't have relationships online, but everybody knows that when you have a friend online and then you meet in person, your relationship's way better.

I think nowadays networking is more important than ever because we need to establish those relationships and meet up in person. I think that's just such an important part of this.

John Lee Dumas: Time is everything. It's our most valuable resource, by far. It's literally something that we just can't get back. The last 10 seconds of my life I can't get back. Guess what? I don't want it back because I was hanging out with you, Dave, so that was cool. I made that choice. The fact is we can all manage our time while nurturing our network. How can we do that to the best of our abilities?
Dave Delaney: I use a CRM tool called Contactually, which I really like, which helps me balance relationships as far as email goes. It taps into my email and then I configure what they call “buckets”, but it's like groups. You can put people into different groups to remind you to follow-up with those people at different times. You don't have to do it exactly on time, but they do it in a way to game-ify it, so you get a score and things. It keeps you focused because you can keep tags – you can actually tag people.

If I know a WordPress developer I can tag him “WordPress” or I know an author I can tag her “Author”. That helps me keep track so when somebody in my network says, “Dave, I wanna interview some authors” or “Dave, I wanna meet some WordPress developers,” I can just look in my CRM, find those people really quickly, and then make those introductions. It speeds up time but it also helps me keep focused on following up with people.

John Lee Dumas: I've actually interviewed the founder of Contactually. Great guy and he's always looking just to continue to improve the system. This was years ago that I interviewed him, so I just love hearing years later, people still using Contactually and loving it. I wanna dive into, Dave, is a specific example of how you use Contactually that worked really cool. Or, maybe if you have a better example of a client of yours of something, but give us something real specific. Let's go granular on this.

Dave Delaney: When I send a proposal out to a client – or potential client – I set it to remind me – I have a separate bucket for that in Contactually that reminds me to follow-up within the week. That has saved by butt twice because I forgot and went into Contactually and it reminded me to follow-up with these people. By following up, I was able to close those clients and become new clients. It's paid for itself multiple times. That alone is really worth the investment.

John Lee Dumas: I love that. Fire Nation, a lot of times it's never “no” it's “not right now”. We're getting bombarded with a thousand different things – the messenger bots, the emails, Skype, you name it, we're getting bombarded. Just because I get an email from Dave and then maybe something happens and the mailman shows up and I go down and I've already “read that message” and I've forgotten about it, it doesn't mean that I meant to say no to Dave. Hey, he followed up and here we are talking on EOFire, bringing him on as a repeat guest because he knows how to follow-up and how to network.

How should we seek out events to meet like-minded people? There's a lot of events that are out there – there's virtual, there's in-person – give us a little bit of a roadmap right now that we could maybe follow and use as a guide to really make sure that we're in the right places, doing the right things.

Dave Delaney: One thing that I like to do is – and it sounds pretty basic, but it's word of mouth. Asking colleagues, asking people in your profession or people you work with, ask them what events, what conferences, what trade shows, whatever it may be. Ask them where they're going this year, what's on their radar. That might give you some ideas right away.

Another thing I like to do is go onto websites, just simple services that some of you will probably know – meetup.com, eventbrite.com. Eventbrite – MeetUp's more community focused groups that are taking place locally that you can search for your zip code and find all of those different meet ups. You can look in that and find people that you wanna connect with. Eventbrite, if you search your zip code or your postal code, you can find local events – free and paid – that have tickets associated with them. You can find specific things that are taking place and find those conferences and those events.

There's a website called Lanyrd – that's L-A-N-Y-R-D.com – which is now actually been acquired by Eventbrite. That has more conferences – it's kind of an international conference directory. You can actually search by conferences and find the conferences that appeal to you most. Again, follow-up with your own community and your own network and reach out to those folks, see if they're going to any of these conferences or ask them which conferences they plan to go to. That way, you can have a networking buddy there.

John Lee Dumas: Now we're there at the conferences or these meet ups or small events, whatever they might be. What do we do next? What are some best practices?

Dave Delaney: I like to research who's gonna be there before I go. I just launched an online course all about this, actually, about how to networking before, during, and after a conference or after an event. So, go to the event, but before you go look online and see the speakers that are gonna be there. Look at the sponsors that are gonna be there. Start researching those folks and if there is a connection there, reach out to them directly. Say, "Hey, I would love to grab a coffee while we're at this conference I see you're attending." Let them know why – maybe you have some business to discuss, maybe you just would like to talk about the industry with that person, that's perfectly fine. Do that before you go so you can set up some meetings before you're there.

Then when you're there – you mentioned my book New Business Networking. That book came as a result of me at a conference networking. I went over to my publisher's table, who I'd never before, and she – working the table, they had published some other books of some other authors that I knew. I went over and I was just making small talk and she asked me what my book idea is and that kind of thing. I was like, “No, no, I don't have any ideas.” She said, “Yes you do, what's your book?” I had this idea of writing a book about networking – about networking online and offline. She said, “I love that idea” and we got into it and next thing I know, I had a book proposal and then a book deal from networking.

So, go and talk to the sponsors. Research who's gonna be there beforehand, as well.

John Lee Dumas: Fire Nation, you think that you've gotten value bombs thus far, you ain't seen nothing yet. We're about to drop some more when we get back from thanking our sponsors.

So Dave, we're back. I'm not gonna lie, I think Fire Nation probably knows this, I love acronyms. FOCUS: Follow One Course Until Success. SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Bound. I love acronyms – I think they're cool, I think they make a lot of sense and they help me remember what I should be doing. You've got a pretty cool acronym, how can we use the acronym LISTEN to actively listen to people when we meet?

This is the reality – a lot of times we're there, we meet somebody, they're talking, and now we're just kind of thinking, “Oh, what's that next person I gotta meet? What's that next meeting like?” How do we use the acronym LISTEN to actively listen?

Dave Delaney: So, the LISTEN acronym: L stands for Look interested. You have to be interested. When you go over and introduce yourself and ask them, “What brings you to the conference?” They're gonna start to tell you. Look interested. That means look in their eyes. That means smiling. That means nodding. Look interested.

The I stands for Involve yourself by responding, and that means by giving some cues that you're listening. Say, “Oh really? Wow! Uh-huh, uh-huh” something like that. Even asking follow-up questions like, “And then what happening?” or “How did that make you feel?”

The S stands for Stay on target. The target is the person you're talking to. Let them do the bulk of the talking. Now of course if this feels weird, then back up a bit, that's fine. Try to let them do the bulk of the talking by asking them follow-up questions.

The T stands for Test your understanding. That's a really good one if you're getting some information or receiving information, by repeating it out loud. If you repeat that information out loud, they hear you repeat it, so they're more confident that you're listening. Also, it helps you because you retain the information better because you're repeating it out loud

E is Evaluate the message. Maybe they're confiding in you. Maybe they're telling you something sort of secretive – maybe they're deciding to leave their job or maybe they were just laid off, I don't know. Evaluate the message and treat it as such.

N, finally – LISTEN – N stands for Neutralize the feeling. If they say something like – right now, I'm a big hockey fan and the Nashville Predators are a big team here. If they're gonna badmouth the Preds, it might upset me, but I'm gonna neutralize those feelings. Now, if they say something that's horrible, then that's a good cue for you to say, "I'm sorry, I've gotta run" or "I've gotta go to the bathroom, I'm sorry" something like that. "It was great to meet you" and then meander out of there.

That's the LISTEN acronym.

John Lee Dumas: I can see you just going, “I must have eaten something horrible this morning. I have to go to the bathroom.” What can they say to that? Nothing, really.

Dave Delaney: Right. I do training – I do corporate training and I speak a lot about networking and I point this out. I always tell people in the audience, when I point out this acronym, I say, “Okay, you can say “I've gotta go the the bathroom” but then anybody who actually legitimately has to go to the bathroom now, it's gonna be really awkward.” Let them know, “No, no, no! It's not you, I swear, it's me!”

John Lee Dumas: LISTEN, Fire Nation – L: Look interested, make eye contact; I: Involve yourself by responding like, “uh-huh, yeah! I totally get it”; Stay on target, that's the S; the T is Test your understanding, like “Let me get this straight, are you saying X, Y, and Z?”; and then of course Evaluate the message; and then if you need to, Neutralize that feeling, don't let your personal feelings get involved here.

Now, Dave, one thing I kind of want to move into is ice breakers. Yeah, it's one thing to actually have a conversation with somebody – we maybe even should have potentially talked about this first. The reality is, how do you even start that conversation? What are some ideas for ice breakers when we meet people in person to kind of get that flow going in a natural state?

Dave Delaney: That's a great question, too. There's an author Kio Stark who wrote a book called When Strangers Meet and she talked about triangulation. The idea of triangulation is to find a shared interest or something – even in a room, or perhaps it was another presentation. If you're at the conference in the hallway you could start talking to somebody and say, “Gosh, it's really cold in here” because you both feel that the air conditioning's way too cold. Or, “What did you think of that speaker? Was she on point? What's your opinion about that?” You have a common point of interest.

The triangulation is your – like a triangle – it's you, the person you wanna talk to, and then that point, that common thing that you can discuss. When you're at a conference, too, understand – I always emphasize that the idea with a name tag, a badge, anything attached to a lanyard – that is your invitation to go and introduce yourself. Nobody knows to a conference or a networking event or something and wants to be alone. If you see somebody standing by themselves and they have a name badge, they're there. They're attending the same thing you are. That's your cue to go over and introduce yourself and say, "Hey, how's it going Jim Bob" or whatever their name is. Look at their name tag and then ask them what they thought of the last session and what brings them to the conference.

Use that triangulation point, that really helps.

John Lee Dumas: I love the triangulation point, I think that's a great idea. To Jim Bob it can be like, “Hey dude, what's it like having two first names? That's pretty interesting.” Boom. Ice is broken.

Dave Delaney: There you go. There you go.

John Lee Dumas: Dave, let's kind of wrap this up with you giving us a parting piece of guidance. Give us this parting piece of guidance and share what you're most fired up about today along with that parting piece of guidance. Then we'll say goodbye.

Dave Delaney: Okay, for the parting piece of advice I would say to avoid procrastination through education, which is something – a kick that I've been on lately and blogging about, as well. The idea with this is it's not to stop educating yourself because you can always learn, you're listening to this, you're listening to this amazing podcast, so you're learning. That's great! But, what's really important is that we do stuff with what we learn. If you need to spend time working on regurgitating the content you learn.

For example, if I listen to a podcast and there's a great interview or something like that, I'll actually write out the best points from that podcast and then, if you're a blogger, I'll write a blog post about that interview and I will definitely link to the podcast host and the guest's website. I'll include the points that I took from that interview. What that does is it helps me remember – like writing a book report in school. Instead of burning through a bunch of books or a bunch of podcasts or audio books, you're actually taking the time to regurgitate that information. By writing it out and listening to it again, it helps you really keep track of – it helps you remember that information like I mentioned before.

Write out a blog post sharing that information with – and then you're sharing that information with your own community and you're also sharing some love to the author and to the host and so on.

So, avoid procrastination through education. Instead, spend some time consuming – consume the media, but then spend some time creating and sharing what you've learned. I think that will help you get better at the thing that you're trying to do in your own life.

John Lee Dumas: Where, Dave, can we best connect with you?

Dave Delaney: You can find me at networkingfornicepeople.com.

John Lee Dumas: Networkingfornicepeople.com. And Fire Nation, you are the average of the five people that you spend the most time with and you've been hanging out with D.D. and J.L.D. today, so keep up the heat. Head over to EOFire.com, just type “dave” in the search bar, the show notes page will pop up with everything that we've been talking about today as well as Episode 562, where Dave shares his journey. Just go for a little back to back marathon here, listen to a little D.D. back in the day and a little D.D. now and see what's happened in the past 1200 episodes. Of course, head directly over to networkingfornicepeople.com.

Dave, thank you for sharing your journey with Fire Nation today. For that, we salute you, and we'll catch you on the flip-side