The Official BNI Podcast

This is a rebroadcast of Episode 186. Synopsis Welcome back to Tom Fleming, who joins Dr. Misner to tell us how you can run a BNI meeting with up to 70 members. Open Networking usually takes place 20-30 minutes before the meeting. Chapter Ed...

Synopsis BNI Connect has the ability to give all BNI members the access to other BNI members who want to do business exclusively with other BNI members wherever they are. But this will only work if members complete their BNI Connect profiles. On a ...

Synopsis BNI has just reached 150,000 members. The 150,000th member is Sumeet Pareek of  Bangalore Northwest's BNI Ultimate Chapter. If you look at the slide below, you'll see that BNI's rate of growth has increased dramatically since 1996. Neither the advent of the World Wide Web nor the recession has done anything to slow this growth. There are now BNI chapters in more than 50 countries around the world. 99% of meetings are conducted in the country's official language; occasionally there are meetings of English-speaking expats, as in the UAE. There are cultural as well as language differences between countries, so ask about local customs before visiting a chapter. The key to making the groups work in any country is following the system, having accountability, and having fun. Brought to you by Networking Now. Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 316 - Priscilla: Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you and where are you? Ivan: Hi Priscilla. This week, I am in San Diego for a meeting of the Transformational Leadership Council. That is an organization I belong to. It was started by Jack Canfield. I always get some great material and ideas there at each of the meetings that I bring into BNI. So I am looking forward to getting lots of new stuff that members will see in my presentations. Priscilla: Oh great. I hope we get to hear about it. Ivan: Absolutely. Priscilla: So what is this title that you have come up with- 150,000 and Growing? Ivan: Well, we just hit, last month, the 150,000 member mark in the organization. It was pretty exciting and now that we have BNIConnect and most of the world is on BNIConnect, we are able to track that number and we're able to figure out who the 150,000th member was. It happens to be a member by the name of Sumeet Pareek in India. He is officially our 150,000th member, an online marketing expert. He is a member of the Bangalore Northwest BNI Ultimate chapter. I sent him a message last month thanking him and congratulating him for being our 150,000th member and for helping the BNI organization achieve this really significant milestone. Sameet responded really enthusiastically and was glad to know that we now have 150,000. He is real proud. They recently launched the BNI Ultimate chapter in India. I have had a chance to visit members in India and, wow, incredible there. They have the highest number of average members per chapter in the world. India has the number one spot for the average number of members per chapter. They average throughout the country about 41 members per chapter. Priscilla: That's great. Ivan: That's huge. It's exciting to see the organization grow to that size group. I have included a slide here in this podcast that members can look at. It is the BNI worldwide membership by year through 2012, where we hit about 145,000 members. So this is through last year. It is interesting. If you are listening to this podcast, pull up the slide. Take a look at the growth of the organization in the first 11 years, from 1985 – 1986. We opened up chapters with about 5000 members, a total of 5000 members. But in the next 11 years, from 1996 – 1997, we went from 5000 members to over 100,000 members. Priscilla: Wow, that is a huge jump. Ivan: A huge, huge jump. In less than six years now, we have grown to 150,000 members. I always think it is funny when I am doing the media- it's usually a newspaper reporter that doesn't have to go out and drum up business who says, “Is this networking thing a fad?” Well, no. It is not a fad. Clearly it is growing,

Synopsis This week, Brennan Scanlon, Chapter Director Consultant of the Commonwealth Chapter of BNI joins Dr. Misner to talk about the topic "Don't Promise, Just Deliver." When it comes to making referrals to their fellow BNI members, about 10% of members over-promise and under-deliver. As the Texans say, "All hat, no cattle." These don't follow through on their promises; they leave their referral partners hanging. In most cases, they make the promises because they want to help, but they destroy their own credibility by not following through. Most BNI members take the approach "under-promise, over-deliver." They say "I think I might be able to do this for you" and keep their referral partners informed of their progress along the way. They don't make promises they can't keep. The third way to do give referrals, and the one Brennan recommends, is "Don't promise, just deliver." These people don't talk about what they can do, they just do it. They take notes at every meeting about what kind of referrals everyone is looking for and go out and find those people. Then they surprise their fellow BNI members with great referrals. The key to this approach is attentive listening and good note-taking. Brought to you by Networking Now. Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 315 - Priscilla: Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you doing today and where are you? Ivan: I am doing great, Priscilla. I am out of town again. It seems like I am out of town more than I am in town. This week, I am meeting with the Executive Management Team, which is the top management of BNI from all around the world, and the Executive Council, which is actually a group of people from around the world that represents the top seven countries or so of BNI. Priscilla: Wow. That sounds like fun. Ivan: It is fun, and it's interesting getting all these people together from around the world to help manage the program. Today I have a guest. His name is Brennan Scanlon. Brennan is the Co-Executive Director for BNI for the greater Cincinnati and northern Kentucky area. His area boasts 1100 members and 48 individual chapters as of now. Brennan has been ranked in the top 10% of directors nationally three times, the rankings a result of reviews submitted by BNI members, which is always the best way to get ranked high, with what members have to say. He has also served on BNI's Founders Circle and the Franchise Advisory Board. He was nominated by his peers and approved by me for both of those. Brennan is a columnist for the Cincinnati Business Courier and was named in the 2012 Class of 40 under 40 which identifies greater Cincinnati's next generation of business leaders. Talking about that, you are a young man. I am going to embarrass you publicly here and share a story. You said it was okay before we went on air to do so. We first met about 15 years ago. I understand that you were about 19 years old and we met. You were driving me either to the airport or from the airport. You were a young man, but I was really impressed with your knowledge of BNI and your commitment. You weren't really involved in BNI much except for one little thing that you were doing, which you are welcome to share. I remember saying to your dad afterwards, “You've got a great kid there. He would be great in BNI someday.” I was really impressed when we met and am still impressed today. I don't want to take time away from your material, but do you want to say what you were doing back then? Brennan: I would. First of all, I appreciate you having me on today. When Dad said that Ivan Misner was coming to town,

This is a rebroadcast of Episode 59. Synopsis Dr. Misner continues his discussion of BNI traditions this week. Testimonials This is one of the earliest traditions of BNI. It came about when a member wasn't getting a business, tried offering an init...

This is a rebroadcast of Episode 58. Synopsis Dr. Misner has just returned from BNI's global conference in Malaysia to tell us about BNI's traditions. In this episode, we hear about the first half of the chapter; the second half comes in Episode 59. ...

Synopsis Everyone wants to be successful in or at something in their life. Success is determined largely by hard work, but also by good choices. Everyone feels like they deserve better at some point. Get over it. The most successful people plan their work and work their plan. They put serious effort into making good choices and carrying them through. If being successful were easy, everyone would be successful. Dr. Misner describes the secret to his "luck" this way: "First, I went to college for 10 years. During that time I started my own business and I worked really, really long hours for almost 3 decades. Along the way I mortgaged my house a couple of times, and I wrote 17 books. You, too, can have this kind of luck--all you have to do is apply this kind of effort." If you're willing to do that, and you can rebound from disappointment, you can achieve success. Brought to you by Networking Now. Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 312 - Priscilla: Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you and where are you? Ivan: Hi Priscilla. I am really excited to say that this week, I am in the Caribbean on Necker Island with Richard Branson and a number of other business people. I was invited there for a meeting of a group of business professionals. It's the second time that I have been there. If you are at all interested, go to my blog, businessnetworking.com and look back in 2007 and you will see my last visit to Necker, where I first met Richard and I talked about the “butterfly effect” of networking. That is where I came up with the whole concept, visiting the last time on Necker Island. Since I am here with Branson, who is, by the way an amazing guy-- he is very, very successful and a constant networker--I thought today's topic, talking about success, would be great for today because there aren't too many people more successful than Branson. I think everyone wants some degree of success. Everyone may have their own, personal definition of success, but I have never met anyone who didn't want to be successful in or at something important in their life. This is a good thing because I think everyone is entitled to pursue success, but success itself is not an entitlement. Success is largely determined by someone's hard work, but it is equally their choices. I know a lot of people who work really hard but they make really bad choices. It's amazing how many of them think they deserve to be more successful because they feel that they have worked so hard. Conversely, I don't know very many people, if any, who are successful and who have made good choices but didn't work hard. Those people who tend to make good choices also tend to work very hard. Working hard is only the first part of success. Making good choices is the second part. It truly takes both consistently to achieve success at whatever you do, I believe. I knew someone who was constantly lamenting about her bad luck. Her personal life was in a shamble. She was almost 30 and hadn't completed college. She wasn't happy about the various jobs that she had over the years, and as a result, she constantly had money problems. She often blamed situations or other people for her predicaments that she was in. However, the glaringly obvious truth to me was that although she works very hard, she continually made horrible choices. She made really bad choices. One day, she complained about money and the next day she would buy something totally extravagant and completely unnecessary. The next week she would complain about not being able to get a good job. Well, showing up to work late for personal reasons,

Synopsis Though most of the people who listen to this podcast don't resist networking, it's important to understand why others might resist it, in spite of the fact that other forms of marketing and advertising can be cost-prohibitive. Dr. Misner aske...

This is a rebroadcast of Episode 83. Synopsis Dr. Misner recorded this episode from the International Directors’ Conference for BNI in Long Beach, California. It’s almost like being at a UN meeting: at least 39 countries are represented. All BNI members are welcome to attend. Here are some questions you can ask when you’re meeting someone for the first time. Remember not to do this as an interrogation. Your goal is to get people to open up. What do you do? How does that work? Who’s in your target market? What do you like most about what you do? What’s new in your industry? What sets you apart from your competition? Why did you start your business? Where is your business located? What’s your most popular product or service? How do you generate most of your business? What’s a good referral for you? What’s the biggest challenge for you in your business? Suggested reading: Bob Burg’s Endless Referrals. Brought to you by Networking Now. Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 083 - Priscilla: Hello everyone, and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the Net for networking downloadables. I’m Priscilla Rice, and I’m coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California , and I am joined on the phone today by the founder and the chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello, Ivan. Ivan: Hi. Priscilla: How are you? Ivan: I’m doing great. Priscilla: Where are you? Ivan: Well, this week I’m at the international conference for BNI in Long Beach, California. It’s a pretty exciting week. We’re recording this with me in Long Beach. The conference generally has up to 700 directors and members, and it’s almost like going to a United Nations meeting. So, if you’re a BNI member and you ever see us talk about the international conference coming up, it’s usually in November of every year, and it’s generally in Southern California. You are welcome to attend. BNI members are welcome to attend the conference every year. It’s like going to a UN meeting because we have flags of all the countries. We’re expecting at least 39 countries to be represented. Priscilla: Wow. Ivan: Of course, all these cultures and all of these different accents and languages, it’s really an amazing experience with keynote speakers and many, many presentations. The conference tends to be really inexpensive. The Members Day is generally well under $50 to participate. Priscilla: Oh. Ivan: So if you’re hearing this podcast, look every November on the BNI.com Web site and you’ll see – actually, you should look in October for it on the BNI.com Web site and plan on coming to our international conference. This is going to be a great one this year. Priscilla: Oh, it sounds great. All right, great. Well, what are you going to share with us today? Ivan: Well, I’m going to talk about what kinds of questions you can ask if you meet somebody at a networking meeting. Our last podcast, we talked about developing a magnetic personality, and I talked about Scott Ginsberg and common points of interest, CPI, and conversation starters and things to talk about. We talked about it in general terms, but I didn’t actually give any questions that you can ask. And so, with this podcast, what I want to do is give about 10 or 12 different questions that you can ask when you are meeting somebody for the first time to get them to talk about their business. Priscilla: Great. Ivan: Now, I talk about this in the book that we released this year, The 29% Solution, so some of this is in there, and I invite people to go and look at it in here. But here they are, and you have to remember, you don’t want to do this as an interrogation. I’ve seen BNI members where they’ve taken the questions I’ve given them and they’ve written them down on a card.

Synopsis This week Dr. Misner is interviewing Hussein Hallak, Director Consultant from the Dubai BNI chapter in the United Arab Emirates Region and author of the BNI Ultimate Success Roadmap. For top-performing members, BNI is a way of life, a journey that needs a map. Here is the roadmap to success in BNI. Grow your team. Give dream referrals. Ask for dream referrals. Great follow-up. You can never do these things too much. If you are wondering what to do next, check back with this list. A dream referral is one of those clients who will provide you with enough business for a year. Ask for that client, and find out who that client is for your fellow BNI members. Be specific and encourage your fellow BNI members to be specific. Read the complete BNI Ultimate Success Roadmap by clicking on the image below. Brought to you by Networking Now. Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 309 - Priscilla: Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio, which is in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you and where are you? Ivan: Hi Priscilla. This week, I am in Dubai. It is my first visit to the United Arab Emirates, and I am excited to be interviewing a member, a Regional Director Consultant from Dubai, Hussein Hallak. As I said, he is a Regional Director Consultant in the Middle East and he really focuses on helping members unlock their networking presentation and communication abilities. Hussein, I love your deepest desire on your bio- to help a billion (not a million) people by finding the simple keys they hold to unlock their potential. That is powerful, Hussein. I would love to- I am happy if I can help a million people, so I am impressed. Hussein is the cofounder and group CEO of Eight Ventures, a group of companies that help with strategic content marketing and today I have asked Hussein to be on the podcast since he is from the United Arab Emirates, since he is from Dubai. I have asked him to be my guest this week. We are going to talk about the ultimate success road map for BNI. Hussein, thank you. Welcome to the podcast. Hussein: Thank you Ivan, and welcome to Dubai. Ivan: I am really excited to be in Dubai. As I said it is my first visit to the city and the United Arab Emirates. It really is an amazing place. One of the things that you say with the ultimate success road map is that BNI is not something that you do. It is a journey that you embark on. Tell me what you mean by that. Hussein: What I mean by that, Ivan, is there are things that we do in BNI, but for me, BNI has always been a way of life. It's not a set of things that you do and once you have done them, it's over. Once you enter BNI, the relationships you build, the people you meet, the things you follow that become imbedded in you and the way you go through life from the givers gain philosophy. It becomes part of you. It's not something that you take off. It's not like something that I did it and now I have stopped doing it. At least that is for me and I have noticed for the top performing members, that is how it has become. Ivan: I heard someone say once, and I love this expression, BNI is not only a great way to get business, it's an even better way to do business. I think that is kind of what you are saying there, that it is the journey and it is the philosophy of givers gain. Hussein: Exactly. That is it. Ivan: So, you need a map for the journey, and what you have in mind for the BNI Success Roadmap is easy but profound. Tell me about what you have in mind for what it takes for someone to be successful. What is the road map to success? Hussein: It is about four things, and these four things are true, whatever you do.

Synopsis The one secret to success in BNI is that there is no one secret. There are at least three--plus one. The three are Embrace quality Grow your team Seek engagement The illustrations below show the advantage to growing your team. (Click for larger image.)     And the one is sharing stories. Sharing stories is the way that you embrace quality, grow your team, and get people engaged. A story is a fact wrapped in an emotion that compels people to take action that transforms them in some way. If you don't have any stories of your own yet, go to BNISuccessNet. Share your own stories here in the comments. Brought to you by Networking Now. Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 308 - Priscilla: Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio, which is in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you doing? Ivan: I am doing great, Priscilla. Today, I am going to talk about what I believe is the formula for transforming chapters into really great groups. As I travel around the world, BNI members will oftentimes ask me what is the one secret to success in BNI? So would you like to hear the one secret? Priscilla: I know the one secret. Ivan: You probably heard me or a good friend of yours say it because I know Mike who we both know says this as well. The one secret to success in BNI is that there is no one secret. In order for members to be successful in BNI, there are a number of things that members have to do in order for a chapter to really do well. I believe there are at least three plus one, and I will explain why the list I have plus one. Three plus one. That is where the title comes from. 3+1=member success. The three are embrace quality, grow your team and seek engagement. Those are three. Then there is plus one. First is embrace quality. Quality is first on the list for a reason. The process begins by being very selective about who you bring into your chapter. You want quality business professionals with positive, supportive attitudes. You also want people who are good at what they do. Networking is dependent on the quality of the relationships that you actually develop as a group. If your network is a mile wide and an inch deep, you won't be getting the referrals that you expect. Therefore, it is important to build deep relationships with your referral partners if you want to generate more referrals. In order to ensure quality participation, there has to be accountability in the group. You have to have accountability. I talked about this in last week's podcast. Without accountability and some structure, you can have a coffee clatch and that is not why people generally join the organization. If you expect the best from your members, you are going to get it. If you expect less than the best from your fellow members, you are going to get it. So why accept mediocrity when excellence is an option? Accountability in a group helps you achieve excellence, and you want quality people who are willing to commit. That is one. Two, grow your team. Years ago, I learned that there is a dramatic correlation between the size of a group and the number of referrals that are generated by that group. Groups that are under 20 tend not to generate nearly as many referrals proportionately as groups that are over 20. The math actually proves it. I just figured this out recently. We have been doing this over 30 years and just figured this out recently. In this podcast, there will be a couple of graphs for you to take a look at and you can see visually what it is that I am talking about there. In the first graph, it is 16 people, and you see 16 people have 256 connections. In the second graph,

Synopsis Dr. Misner has used the expression "Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast" a number of times, but he's never gone into detail about how. Today's podcast focuses on the importance of culture in business success. Here are some important factors in a healthy organizational culture: Tradition Mission Engagement Recognition Education A great strategy keeps people in the game, but a great culture helps an organization win. Brought to you by Networking Now. Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 307 - Priscilla: Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio, which is in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you? Ivan: I am doing great this week, Priscilla. Thank you very much. Priscilla: What are you going to share with us? Ivan: You know, I have talked a lot in a number of podcasts that culture eats strategy for breakfast and used tuhat expression a number of times. I have never really gotten into the detail of talking about how. How does culture eat strategy for breakfast. So that is what today's podcast is going to be about. I think this is particularly important. Not only for BNI businesses and where they live or their BNI chapter is. I think a lot of business schools talk about strategy and it tends to be their primary focus. Culture is really a lot less understood. Culture involves a variety of contributing factors including a blend of attitudes, beliefs, missions, philosophy- any momentum to help create and sustain a successful brand or organization. Culture really affects how people within an organization interact. This is true not only for the macro approach of an organization but for the micro approach- the individual chapter of BNI as well as BNI as a worldwide organization. I think culture is key for an organization's longterm success. It's the most important thing in an organization. It applies at all levels, from the top all the way down. There are a number of factors that I believe go into building a healthy organizational culture. That is what I want to talk about. I want to talk about what those are. It starts with tradition. Tradition is what made the company what it is. They tell the world who they are as an organization by the tradition that they celebrate. One way for an organization to maintain the organizational culture and egos is to introduce and celebrate a variety of traditions. I think Disney, in particular, has been a master of this concept by training all new employees on the traditions of the organization. A strong tradition applied to an organization is one of the best ways to maintain a healthy organizational culture. That is why when I train every Director and Director Consultant in BNI, we spend several hours just on BNI's traditions. It is part of the core training that we do as an organization. If you take a look at the book, Givers Gain, one of the chapters of the book, Chapter 10, the BNI story, is about BNI's traditions. It is really inculcated into the organization. It's one of the things that nobody talks about in business school. The second is mission. A burning mission can really give laser focus to an organization. The mission statement needs to be short and memorable. It needs to be sort of a rallying cry for people throughout the organization. One of the things I have learned running a business for almost 30 years is ignorance on fire is better than knowledge on ice. Getting employees and people in the organization excited is critical for the organizational success in literally any company. The third is engagement to create amazing culture in an organization. Engagement. Collaboration encourages engagement.

Synopsis Nielsen recently did a survey of how much people trusted different forms of advertising (see illustration below). Only four entries scored 50% or above: branded websites, editorial content, consumer opinions (such as reviews and ratings), and...

This is a rebroadcast of Episode 64. Synopsis This episode is based on a blog post Dr. Misner wrote. Successful networking isn’t about what you know, it’s about what you do. Ignorance on fire is better than knowledge on ice. The only thing more powerful is knowledge on fire. Networking is a skill that looks simple but takes constant effort to apply. Success is the uncommon application of common knowledge. The assignment for everyone listening to this podcast is to think of one idea that you’ve read or heard over the past year that you wanted to apply to life but never got around to doing—and do it in the next seven days. Then come back and post a comment about what it was and what you did. Brought to you by Networking Now. Podcast intro recorded by Tony Wolfe. Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 305 - Priscilla Rice: Hello everyone. Welcome back to the Official BNI Podcast brought to you by networkingnow.com, the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I'm Priscilla Rice and I'm coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkley, California. I'm joined on the phone today by the Founder and the Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan, how are you doing? Ivan Misner: I'm doing great, Priscilla. I've been traveling all over the world for BNI this year and I'm actually in town for a couple of weeks. It's great to do the podcast. Priscilla: Well we're glad to have you. Tell us a little bit about what this topic is. Ivan: The topic is based on a blog that I did called, Networking Is Simple But Not Easy. It's really true. Networking is very simple, just not very easy. If it were easy, everyone would do it and they would do it really well. But they don't. They absolutely don't. This podcast is not a podcast about the step by step processes that you need to employ to network effectively. Instead it's a podcast about getting the listeners to stop and think about all the articles, the books, the blogs, the podcasts that they've read or listened to and aren't doing. This is a podcast to get them to stop and think about what they should be doing, rather than what they know or what they should know. I do a lot of presentations around the world talking about how to apply networking to your everyday life and sometimes I have someone come up and say to me, "I've heard people talk about some of those things before." Well you know what? Hearing it for a year versus doing it for a year are completely different things. Success is about the doing not just the knowing. In fact I believe that ignorance on fire is better than knowledge on ice. I love that phrase. I don't know i f you've ever heard it before. Ignorance on fire is better that knowledge on ice. This is said by somebody with ten years of college. I absolutely believe that if somebody's on fire and they've got a great idea and they're ready to run with it, that that's more powerful than all the knowledge in the world. The only thing more powerful is knowledge on fire. There's so many ways in life, there's so many things in life that look simple but are in fact, not easy. If you understand how to do it in your own fire about it, you can make it work and work well for you. Here's an example of what I'm talking about and I'll give you two or three examples. Cooking is one of those examples for me. It always looks so simple. My wife can go into the kitchen and put a gourmet meal together in about 30-40 minutes. Then I go into the kitchen and I burn water. Small repairs around the house, these things look so so simple. Then I pick up a hammer, and well, it's just not pretty. That's when I'm reminded that I'm missing the handyman gene. It skips a generation in my family. My dad can fix anything. He's incredibly capable with a tool box and I'm not. This is absolutely true, I'm not making any of this up. When I was seventeen years old, he brought me into the garage and said to me, "Son,

Synopsis To be a good referral partner, you need to learn something about the person that you're referring. If you know some of the following points about a person's business, you can make a much better referral. It often takes at least a year to build up the kind of relationship that leads to really high-quality referrals. A deep referral relationship requires a surprising level of personal knowledge and connection. It takes time and effort to build this kind of relationship. What is the person's background and experience?  What is their philosophy of customer service? Do you understand at least 3 major products or services from that person's business? Do you know the names of their family members? Have you asked them how you can help them grow their business? Have you asked them for ideas about how to grow your business? Do you know at least a handful of their goals for the next year and beyond? Could you call them at 10:00 PM if you really needed something? Would you feel awkward asking them for help with either a personal or business challenge? Do you enjoy spending time with the person? See Dr. Misner's article "Who's in Your Room." Do you have regular appointments with the person outside of BNI meetings? Is this person top of mind for you? Can you have open, honest talks about how you can help each other further? How deep are your current referral relationships? What will you do to deepen your relationships with your fellow BNI members? Let us know in the comments. Brought to you by Networking Now. Podcast intro recorded by Tony Wolfe. Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 304 - Priscilla: Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio, which is in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you doing? Ivan: I am doing great, Priscilla. I think we may have mentioned this in a previous podcast, but I had one of the members say, “Ivan, you are in Berkeley, California.” No, no, no. That is where Priscilla is. She in in Berkeley. I am in southern California. Priscilla is in northern California. BNI headquarters is actually in Upland, right on the border of LA county. To be honest with you, I think Berkeley is a lot nicer than Upland is, but we are in Upland and we do this by phone with Priscilla in the studio in Berkeley. Priscilla: That's right. Ivan: So today's topic is really about building deep referral relationships. What I wanted to talk about is that oftentimes, people have kind of surface level referral relationships. In BNI, I think members of BNI tend to go a little bit deeper. That is really what I want to talk about. I want to talk about knowing more than just enough about the minimum amount about a referral source's business in order to get by. I think a lot of people don't actually know a lot about the person that they may be referring and they tend to say vague things like, “They are nice,” “They are good at what they do,” “You'll like them,” “They are a good person.” If you really want to be a good referral partner, you need to learn some things about the person that you are referring. A few weeks ago, we talked about the importance of one-to-ones. We had the story about Van Gogh. In these one-to-ones, and of course, in the 60 second presentation, you can learn a lot about members. I am going to give you some things to be looking for. If you want to go deep in your relationships with BNI members, these are the kinds of things- you don't have to do them all, but the more of them that you do, the more likely you are to help build a deep referral relationship with your fellow BNI members. So if you know some of the following points about a member,