Networking is one of the most important ways to sustain any successful business, but how can you easily build a list of useful contacts in order to make your business a constant success? Although social media is one of the leading communication platforms in the world, unfortunately chances are it won’t cut it for building business contacts. It can be difficult to know just how to build your contact book, especially if you’re starting out, however with these top tips you’ll have a list of useful business contacts in no time!

Figure Out Who is Important

First of all, you’ll want to figure out who it is you already know that you’re wanting to maintain contact with, and how they benefit your business. It could be a co-worker, a mentor, or even a customer. Literally just anybody who’s being there in your life has helped to shape your career and has proved valuable along the way. These can turn out to be some of the most important contacts for your business, especially to begin with, because chances are, they’re reliable and unlikely to let you down. Once you’ve identified who these people are, it’s absolutely critical that you keep regular contact with them in order to make sure you have a friendly surrounding network. You should know them on an almost friend-level basis.

Choose Your Next Tier

After figuring out who your important closer contacts are, you’ll have to figure out who the next tier of business contacts will be for you. This might be a number of between fifty and one hundred contacts. Although it won’t be possible for you to maintain a close level of contact with them as you have with those closest to you, it’s important to keep them in your business loop. It can be something as simple as sending out your monthly newsletter to them, but ensuring that they are in the know about your business and know you’re still interested in them is vitally important to keeping them on your contact list, and you in their good books.

Use Your Website to Network Further Afield

Although it was initially mentioned that social media isn’t the ideal place to do your business networking, the internet is so much more than just that. In fact, nowadays, the internet is one of the most frequently used platforms to communicate and conduct business on, so it just makes sense to have a business website, doesn’t it? A great way to spread your business further and make contact with people far and wide, is by link building online to increase the amount of hits your webpage receives, and therefore the amount of potential contacts that are aware of your business. If this is something that you’re not familiar with, fear not! There is help out there for even the most technology-phobic business folk. Pages such as https://www.rankwarrior.com/link-building/ will not only explain the basics of link building to you, but will explain how to do it effectively to get the best possible results.

Be Interesting

Chances are if you want someone as a business contact, so do the vast majority of other business owners in your field. You’re not going to stand out as someone who they want to conduct business and associate with if you’re just the same as everyone else, so make sure your company stands out and has a certain level of intrigue to keep them interested. Whether that be surprising them with something, or maintaining a steady level of interest because your company is always coming forward with new and original ideas, simply being interesting and innovative can set you apart from the rest of the crowd and rouse interest in even the most judgemental of contacts.

Be Generous

Last but certainly not least, be generous. Remember that when it comes to the people you likely want as your contacts; you need their business a lot more than they need yours. Although this has the potential to change in the long term, when you’re starting out as a new business owner, you’ll want to ensure that you can actually offer something to your contacts, and don’t necessarily expect anything back in return (that’s not to say you won’t get it in time). The trick to keeping contacts, is by keeping them happy. Of course, this doesn’t mean being a walk over and doing whatever it is they ask of you, but remember that if there is something that you’re asking of them, you should be able to offer something in return. Although this isn’t the case in overall life, remember that this is a business transaction and if you think savvy, you’re more likely to succeed.