MOO “Networking For People Who Hate Networking” Tip #1: Small Talk

hey there hero it’s David H Lawrence the
17th and you may know this about me but
I am a huge fan of a certain brand of
business cards they’re called moo cards
and I’ve got a link to take you to their
site below this video but I use moo cards
there’s my vo Heroes card I don’t know
if you can see that is that okay and
I’ve used MOO cards for probably ten
years I would think at this point every
single business I have I use MU cards
they’re tiny little cards and they they
spark conversation all on themselves
because they’re smaller than normal I
have some normal-sized business cards as
well for situations where it would cause
more of a puzzled look on somebody’s
face but for the most part the people
that I run with they they like it they
think it’s great and mu is just like me
in that they have this habit of
publishing tips and tricks and
strategies and tactics that help their
clients the people that buy business
cards from them and postcards and
stickers I use those too
I’m gonna be honest with you I’ve spent
a lot of money with MU over the years
they send out these these little notes
they create blog posts and so on that
help business people do better business
and they created a blog post that was so
chock-full of golden nuggets Thank You
Kristine Oller for the phrase golden
nuggets but it was so chock-full of
golden nuggets
that I wanted to share some of them with
you over the next few videos and the
first one today you know this is this is
for networking for people who hate
networking or networking for people who
are shy or making contacts for people
that just don’t know how to go about
doing making contacts right and today’s
is about small talk people will tell you
when you go to a networking event or a
meet-up or a party or
a meeting a committee meeting or
something where you’re in the midst of
people that you could make contacts with
and tell them you’re a performer and
tell them that you can do voice work you
never quite get to that because you kind
of hang back you don’t like it you’re
shy or you’re you know you just don’t
know what to do you don’t know do with
your hands or your words or and one of
those things that people often will say
to me that was the very first point they
made in this article was I hate small
talk right I don’t like talking about
the weather I don’t like talking about
what people are wearing I don’t like
talking about politics I try to stay
away from that as much as possible you
know I just don’t I just don’t
understand why I have to make small talk
why can’t I just come out and start
talking with people and it’s it’s
reasonable for you to feel that way when
we meet people for the first time
there’s always that moment of
trepidation I enjoy that challenge but
there are lots of people I know in my
client base and my students and in my my
peer groups that just they just don’t
like it they don’t do it well and I love
what they said to do about it first of
all they said two people meeting each
other can be awkward but walking up and
just hanging out and listening to what
people say will do two things number one
it will give you examples of what they
do when they’re making small talk maybe
or maybe they’re deeply engrossed in a
conversation and they will give you
information or knowledge or tips or
strategies or tactics that you didn’t
know before just by listening but there
was a really great tip in what they had
to say and that was go meta with it and
what I mean by going meta M ETA is just
simply call attention to the problem by
saying something along the lines of gee
you know I I really hate small talk just
say it just say I really hate small talk
or I’m not great at small talk isn’t
this all very awkward because you know
people have to like come up with small
talk just give it a boy give it a name
give it words make it
a kid vocal and then you’d be surprised
how many people will say to you yeah I
know right
and then that just naturally leads to
conversation somebody will say what do
you do or I don’t mean what do you do
for a living but I mean what do you do
when you have to make small talk you
know I basically hang out on the wall
and then you get to be yourself you know
you get to show the the kind of person
you are the character that you are just
by giving it a name and I think that’s
one of the things that we forget about
networking with people in general and
this is in-person networking not social
networking although with social
networking you can do the same thing but
there’s a very good chance that they
feel similar to what you do or if they
don’t they want to help people want to
help immediately I love helping people
when they say that to me I’m like oh
well tell me a little bit about yourself
don’t let’s just dispense with the small
talk tell me about you so I think it’s a
really easy thing to do if you can just
gather up the gumption to say what it is
that’s bothering you and that is you
know I’m not very good at this small
talk stuff just say it I hope that helps
I really do any other tips you have when
you can’t do small talk when you don’t
know what you should say or what you
should talk about how about what you
shouldn’t talk about hmm let me know in
the comments below I’d love to find out
what you have to say about all this if
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appreciate it I’m David H Lawrence the
17th I thank you so much for watching
and I will talk to you tomorrow .