610: Building Relationships with Influencers, w/ John Corcoran (best of)

For today's best of episode, we've got an actionable doozy with John Corcoran.  As I'm at an event in Monterey, I'm reminded of how important relationship-building is in life.  This is a GREAT episode to sharpen your relationship chops. If you've been around the planet for a while, you know that relationships are the true key to business success as a solopreneur. Learning how to cultivate and grow solid relationships with the thought leaders of your industry is the fast track to business (and personal) success. Here to explain how to do so is former Clinton White House Staffer John Corcoran. He is a master of cultivating these relationships, and on episode 362 of The Solopreneur Hour, he shares the tricks and tools of the trade. Get ready because this is one of those episodes that will set your Evernote on fire! More About John Corcoran If you missed John's previous visit you'll definitely want to listen to it here. We delve into his back story including his days working in the White House on Bill Clinton's staff, why he started his own law firm helping entrepreneurs and small business owners. Because we covered his background previously we can get into the nitty gritty on this show, something I love to do for you. On today's episode John shares why he does so many webinars (he did over 100 this year!), how NOT to approach someone to be your JV partner and several specific tactics he recommends for building relationships with influencers in any industry. On This Episode You'll Also Hear: What are the 3 main topics John does webinars on? How to become more charismatic: can anyone do it? What are CRMs and why should you know? Why doesn't he bring his phone out at events? How to fully leverage an event, even when you don't get to connect with everyone there. And much, much more! One of the many reasons John loves doing webinars is the connections it creates with people around the world. Live events are incredible for this, but not everyone can make it to every conference, trade show or mastermind. And when they can't webinars are a great alternative. And I'm not kidding when I say John loves doing them, he did over 100 in 2015! In about 18 months he grew his email list to nearly 30,000 doing webinars. And he did so spending less than $1,000 on Facebook ads. Instead of ads he does JVs, joint ventures. He approaches people he's already created relationships with (that's a BIG key) and asks if he could do a webinar for their audience. The people he asks have large audiences and email lists, and they are much warmer than Facebook traffic so his attendance rates are high and people are receptive to his offers. The key to this equation is building that relationship with the potential JV partner well in advance of making the ask, and that's something John does extraordinarily well. Naturally we touched on this topic today too: how to build those relationships in a real and genuine way. One of his suggestions is writing handwritten notes and sending them in the mail. You can drop them a line and let them know you're thinking of them. If you see something in a magazine or newspaper tear it out and send it to them. Or if you find yourself thinking of writing notes but never actually doing it send a text or an email. It's better to do what comes quickest and most naturally to you rather than not communicating at all! You can also send them a personal video just to say hi or make a quick video with someone you want to introduce them to. This works really well if you are at an event - the two of you can shoot a short video saying hi and sharing contact info live from the event and then email it to the person you're introducing the new connection to. John also gives recommendations on using Contactually (or any other customer relationship management tool, CRM) to get the most bang for your buck, and how to tactfully turn someone down if they aren't a fit for your audience.