6 Networking strategies that you can apply immediately
People will tell you to network but no one talks about how to do it. This guide we walk through 6 tips to help expanding your network.
Hi, Ahmed here! each week I share actionable ideas about studying strategies, college life stories, and job search advice for students and fresh graduates.
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Expected reading time: 6 minutes.
Hope you enjoy it.
I don’t know about you but for me, networking with a myth. Something that all the career coaches are talking about and no one talks about how to do it.
It turns out that it’s a real thing and it’s even easier than you might think.
Let’s first cover our basic. Why networking?
Networking could get you:
• Job through referral.
• Information
• Advice.
And much more. but as a student, you don’t have much to offer or to do to network, right?
That’s what I thought too. Surprisingly, because you’re a ‘student’ you have the means to network better than anyone!
The reason is simple.
People love getting out of their way to help students. They see themselves in you.
In this issue, I’ll break down 6 tips that I use to grow my network.
1. LinkedIn Commenting.
This one could be your ‘warm-up’ strategy. It’s your way to get the other person to pay attention and know you.
When you build a relationship, you want to be genuine and a giver.
One way to do so is by engaging with them on LinkedIn.
You want to be the first to comment and engage with him whenever he shared something.
Here’s how it works
You go to their LinkedIn
Follow them
Click on the “Bell” in their profile to “All posts”.
That way when they share or post new content, you’re the first to see it.
Go there and write a valuable comment to provoke them to answer.
As you can see what I did there was simple, I added to the conversation in the right picture I wrote one more trait and started elaborating more and it got high engagement and the author of the post took notice of me.
On the left side, It was the same I agreed and restate what Lasse said and added more to the conversation.
In a nutshell, you want to
Add to the conversation
Be supportive and genuine.
Keep doing so for over a week or two and then you can send a personalized connection that is guaranteed to get accepted because the other person already knows you and is familiar with you.
2. Rock career fairs.
I know.
You probably heard it a million times before but it actually gets results.
One person who is doing it right is Ehab Darwish CEO of iSkala.
He uses LinkedIn to network and managed to even get over 10 meetings in the RiseUp summit alone.
Here’s what he did.
He goes to the event page on LinkedIn.
Click “Attend”
Then Click on all people who are attending the event.
Filtering the list by titles of the persons he targets.
Send them a personalized connection and ask for a meeting.
This strategy has one huge advantage, if the person agreed, you get rid of the fear of rejection when approaching him at the event.
Because you have an excuse he already agreed
It opens the way to build rapport and get the conversation going from the get-go as well.
You can see the video he explains his strategy here and follow him he shares great tips as well!
[Note: The video is in Arabic. So just follow the steps]
3. Ask to interview them.
This one for me is the best and easiest way to network.
When you interview someone, you position them as an expert. It’s hard to find someone who refuses to be recognized that way.
Earlier this year, I interviewed 6 leaders in my industry that I look up to them. I used my LinkedIn and my community to spread their knowledge and experience to students in the industry.
I have even built a rapport with them. Just with a simple project.
And you can do the same.
Interview them in a:
• Podcasts.
• Blog Posts
• LinkedIn Carousels.
The time you invest in the interview will be worth it. You get to help others and expand your network at the same time.
4. Invite them to a webinar.
Again this is so easy and effective at the same time.
I had a webinar at the start of this year in CareersPill it was about Growth Mindset. I reached out to a director-level executive to teach that topic to students.
He happily agreed! I am still in contact with him and reach out to him from time to time. I even asked for his help in the interview series, and he agreed as well.
Why?
Because I was genuine and had a goal to help others.
If you’re still in college, join a student club. They do the same thing every semester.
They find topics that the students need and reach out to potential instructors.
Be that person.
Investing the time to help others will always yield results.
5. Build an email system.
if you’re going to network, you’ve to learn how to cold mail.
Cold emailing is reaching out to someone who you don’t have any prior relationship with before.
You’ve to know how to write a compelling email that not only the other person see but also interests him to respond.
The downside is that it takes time and effort to customize email for each person you want to reach out to.
So I have built a system for it to make it easier to manage and track the emails.
Every email I write, I save it on Notion.
That makes it easier for me to write other emails because I don’t have to start from a blank page especially if the message I want to convey is the same.
Every time I reach out to someone I write 3 emails and use a tool to automate the process.
The reason is simple. You’ll probably contact busy people so they might not see your email for the first time. Even if they open it, they might be busy to respond now.
That’s why you have to follow up with other emails.
A study done by woodpecker they find that follow up brings the highest reply rate — even about 40% higher comparing to the initial email.
So you have to follow up with them. If you set it manually you’ll forget to send it so the best way is to automate it. My favorite tool is Lemlist.
Here’s the sequence that I follow when I reach out to someone.
First email to reach out about the specific goal.
Follow up after 3 days.
Again after 4 days.
After that assume they’re not interested and move on.
6. Accept ’No’
This one I learned the hard way. Before you start reaching out to someone you have to accept “No” as an answer.
That’s part of the game. They are busy and can have a million reasons to not respond.
So don’t take it personally.
When they didn’t respond accept it and move forward.
Networking in a nutshell
To sum up, when you reach out to someone
Be respectful of their time.
Be genuine
Be thankful for the opportunity.
That’s it! Thank you for sticking to the end. 👋
Sincerely,
Ahmed Amin
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