Small businesses that have succeeded in the face of competition from large businesses have done so largely because they have found a way to turn their disadvantages into advantages, and a way to make those drawbacks into something appealing.

• No secretary? “When you call, you get to talk to someone in charge.”
• Only a few customers? “To us, you are a name, not a number.”
• Recycling packing materials to save money? Slap a label on, “This box proudly recycled by…”
• Can’t provide national service? “Looking for a local company that knows your needs?”

Find the advantage in the aspect that can be negatively viewed, and turn it around. Make it into something that a larger company CAN’T do.

People who succeed find a way to do this. Think outside the box, and use the flexibility that a very small business has, to do things differently. For bitty businesses, it is the key to winning against the competition.

She introduced me to her daughter. She said her daughter was studying computer sciences at the University, and loved web design. I asked her, “Are you a geek?” She smiled and admitted it.

There are two kinds of techies:

• Those who are embarrassed about it, or think that they need to apologize for the name “geek”.
• Those who take pride in it, and wear the name of “geek” as a badge of honor.

She was obviously the second type.

People have tried to define what a geek is. They talk about glasses, social ineptness, and a love of pizza. In reality, geeks don’t fit any stereotype, other than this:

They are universally passionate about their area of technical expertise. They speak a language that boggles the mind of regular people. And they can get in and solve a problem that makes other people think they are a genius (we actually like that part!).

The thing I’ve noticed lately is that you can create a geek. At first, the candidate isn’t even aware it is happening. But soon, words like “processor”, “code”, and “compatibility” begin to creep into their vocabulary. It isn’t long after that before they drop their first acronym (HTML, PHP, SEO, CMS, IP, DNS), and at that point, you know that it is only a matter of time before you can hold a conversation with them which will sound mostly like real English, but which will confuse the heck out of any average person!

I happen to like the confident geeks. The ones who fully understand that it isn’t just something they do, it is part of who they are, and they take pride in their ability to comprehend and puzzle out the problems.

It isn’t a closed club. It is populated by people all across the world, of every shape, size, color, age, and lifestyle. If an overweight, middle aged, gray haired mother of eight can be a geek, pretty much anyone can!

It was a small class, hosted by a small organization. The person who was giving the class was in a position in one of the local businesses, and the class was titled in such a way that we thought it would be about general skills within the topic.

It wasn’t. It was about “how to do x, with business y”. It might have been of some use if we had been in a position to utilize the services of y, or if the information presented were more broadly applicable. In the entire 1 hour presentation, I learned exactly 1 thing of value, and it is something which I will likely never use personally. It may someday benefit a client.

The presentation was the equivalent of verbal spam. We came to learn, not to listen to a one hour advertisement.

Presentations, classes, seminars, and conferences are about good information. They aren’t about self-promotion. Ok, we all know we give presentations for promotion, but it is EXACTLY like article marketing. If you advertise outright, you lose your audience. Your presentation must be informational, useful, fun, unique, and contain a good measure of the “ah-ha” factor. You get a moment at the beginning to introduce yourself, just enough to validate your credibility. And you get a moment at the end to hand out something for them to remember you by. That’s IT. The rest is about building a relationship where you are attending to their needs – as in, giving them something they need.

You’ve sat through bad presentations where someone did nothing but promote themselves. Don’t be one of those! Prepare something of value that assumes the listeners WON’T be hiring you. Give them value, and give them the courtesy of choosing for themselves. You’ll catch more interest that way, and people will remember you longer. That means they’ll be more likely to pick up the phone and call YOU when they have a need.

People recognize verbal spam. And they are very sensitive to it. Shove your business at them, and they’ll leave in disgust. Avoid self-promotion, and they’ll come back to you because they respect your knowledge.

I’m not a power pusher. I don’t think I ever will be. My desire not to be made it hard for me to grasp a concept about networking. While it is NOT all in who you know, sometimes, who you know can make a difference to your business.

If you know the person who is on the end of the phone when someone calls an organization and asks who can do what you do, you might get a referral.

If you know the person who leads a particular organization, they may think of you when they need a speaker, or a service.

If you know someone who knows a lot of people who make decisions, they may mention you when the topic changes to something that might benefit you.

Now, the real catch to this is, you never quite KNOW who the “right” people are! You may think that knowing the mayor could help you. But if you are a little guy, the mayor really doesn’t give a rip about you, and it will be a long hard road to make any headway there. On the other hand, if you know the mayor’s secretary, you may actually get further, faster!

One of our students is a pretty ordinary person. Very nice – an easy person to love. Since she has been in our class, we hear her name regularly, and she refers people to us. She is not someone whom anyone would single out as being a person of power. But she knows people, and they respect her because they know she is sincere and good. We’ve met the mayor, and we’ve met many people in positions of power. Some of them remember us, most do not. Someone like our student though, is someone worth knowing for many reasons.

Get to know everyone that you have the chance to network with. You never know which one is going to be someone who helps you in ways you did not anticipate. Don’t USE people – develop good, helpful relationships with them. Our student recommends us in part because while we were teaching her, we went out of our way to help her when things were difficult for her. So it was about kindness and friendship first. The benefit came unexpectedly many months later.

So go… and GET to know…