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A Big Fat Lie

So you’re attending a meeting and a nice-looking gentleman wearing a navy suit and light brown shoes is up spitting one-liners out like it’s a freestyle rap contest.

One of those one-liners:

“Success is about who you know, not what you know.”

You stop and think about the people you know who are successful today because of connections they’ve had in the past.

You now find yourself slowly nodding your head in agreeance to the gentleman’s statement, “Success is about who you know, not what you know.”

Well, guess what?

That’s a BIG FAT LIE.

big fat lieLet’s re-word it like this:

What do you think about that statement now?

Sure, there may be a few people who got where they are today because of a connection or two. But how often does the lack of knowledge, or experience catch up with them?

Recently, Stu Draper (founder of Stukent) spoke at a conference here at our local university in Rexburg, Idaho. There were just over 2,000 in attendance and he spoke about the importance of earning the trust of your network so that your network can in return, help you.

I’m going to summarize Stu’s presentation and pull a few of the many gems out for you to nibble on.

If you’ve ever been around Stu, you know that he’s a walking example of being an excellent networker.

So how do you earn the trust of your network?

Here are three simple ways:

  • Be skillful
  • Be hard-working
  • Be nice

Stu shares multiple examples of how he has been able to earn the trust of his network and in return how his network has helped him out professionally. Here are just a couple.

A pre-puberty no armpit hair Stu

stu young wrestler

Click to view larger image (Stu on the left)

When Stu started his high school wrestling career he weighed less than 80lbs and was 5 feet 0 inches tall. Needless to say, Stu was small. He was picked on over and over again, until one day he had a brilliant idea to make friends (network) with the biggest guys on the wrestling team. He wasn’t picked on anymore after that.

But that’s not all.

He was paired up to practice with a few of the top wrestlers in the state of Washington. They beat up on him EVERYDAY. To make things even worse, Stu only won 3 matches all year and lost 22.[clear]

Remember this famous quote by Jim Rohn:

Well, for Stu, this paid off. After spending hours and hours of getting beat up by some of the best wrestlers in the state, Stu went on the next year to win the state championship.

Remember to surround yourself with people who will inspire you to become better.

Stu put a twist on the Jim Rohn quote above. It can be hard to make connections with the types of individuals with whom you want to connect. Most of us can’t call up our buddy Warren Buffet and ask for advice.

That’s why Stu says:

“We are the average of the five people we spend the most time with, or aspire to be like, or read about, or watch on TV, or communicate with online.” – Stuart Draper

Technology has made it so easy for us to follow influential people. Literally with the click of a button we can obtain wisdom from influential people.

How GetFoundFirst.com was started

GFF logoShortly after Stu graduated college he was laid off of his job. He kept hearing his brother-in-law talk about the lack of success he was having with the online presence of his dental practice.

Stu told his brother-in-law (Marcus Stones) that he would take the knowledge that he learned in one of his online marketing classes and put it to work. Shortly after, Stones Family Dental had three record-breaking months of new patients and their online presence exploded.

Stu was then able to use Marcus’ testimonial to grow his clientele which later grew into GetFoundFirst.com.

What’s important about this story is that Stu didn’t find success because he was lucky that he had a brother-in-law with a dental practice. In fact, Marcus would have been just that unless Stu hadn’t put in the time to learn the skills needed to be of value to someone within his network.

Remember:

You might be thinking that you’re not a network marketer, and you don’t enter a large room and start handshaking with everyone. And since you don’t naturally do those types of things that there’s no way you can become a great networker or be of value to a network.

Toss that thought down the drain, chief.

Remember that you can build the trust of your network by simply arming yourself with different skills, being a hard worker, and being NICE to others.

My challenge to you

Take the next 30 days and try to master one new skill that you think might benefit someone in your network. Imagine if you did that every month for the entire year?

Influencer tip: A good place to start following people of interest or influence is on Twitter. Simply create a Twitter list that includes all of the influencers you want to follow and eventually connect with. Now all you need to do is open up that Twitter list and you have a feed of what they’re up to, and what they’re talking about and sharing. Be sure to favorite, share, and comment regularly on their updates.

That’s a wrap.

Be sure to catch Stu’s full presentation below. It’s 30 minutes and worth every second.

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