Affiliate By Night

Why Building Relationships is like Printing Money

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what makes people successful and what goes in to making something go viral online and a lot of other stuff (like how an employer chooses between equal candidates) that all sort of relates to one overarching topic: Who do you know?

In my view, it is becoming increasingly important to foster positive business relationships and make contacts with as many people as you possibly can. The more people you are connected to, the more opportunities will present themselves to you and the better positioned you will be to leverage those opportunities when they come your way. I mean this both in terms of building your online business and driving more sales etc. but also for life in general in building a social network and landing jobs, for instance.

A great example of what having strong relationships with people can do for you comes right from my own life. This past year I was in the process of transitioning day jobs and had a particular position that I was really psyched about. Through my previous job I had a couple of contacts already within that organization who I then reached out to expressing my interest in the opening. I asked for additional information on the position and mentioned that I was planning on applying, so would they be willing to put in a good word for me. By fostering a good working relationship with these people, I got myself an interview.

Given the fierce competition for the job (over 1,000 applicants in the 48 hours the posting was open, I was told) I am pretty confident that my connections directly resulted in my getting an interview. Now, I didn’t get this particular job but the point remains that given the myriad of qualified people they had to choose from, having some contacts got my further than most.

The same applies to having a video go viral, or getting a post to the top of Digg or whatever. If you can put it in front of the right people, and have the network established to reach out and ask for a vote or a comment or what have you, it can go a long way. Another example, if you look at the comments for the Affiliate.com T-Shirt contest where I was soliciting votes for (Thanks to all who supported me by the way. I really appreciated it!) it was pretty clear that the two most well supported blogs were this one, and the eventual winner, HeatherinBC.

Now, I don’t know all the criteria that the judges voted on, but I can imagine having a lot of great comments factored into the decision as well. She made a great post, had clearly built great relationships with a lot of people and ended up winning the contest.

Now you might be saying, but I don’t have a huge following yet, or my list isn’t big enough to compete with the heavy hitters in the industry so why bother? Well for one, you can’t win if you don’t try and two, we got a lot of benefits out of participating even if we didn’t win. A free shirt, increased traffic to our blog, promotion of a great cause, exposure to and some nice offers from a new (to us) affiliate network and a lot of fun participating. That right there should give everyone pause to think about how you can take your great content, and just through getting involved, reaching out to others (in a polite fashion) and putting in a little effort can go a long way.

We got a nice additional bonus in the mail today as well. Tom Wozniak from affiliate.com sent a nice note thanking us for the great post and included $100 in Starbucks gift cards as an additional thanks. I was really pleased to get that, it was a great acknowledgment of my efforts in the contest and while it isn’t the grand prize money it’s the start of a nice business relationship. Thanks to the friendly communications I’ve had with Tom and other members of the staff I am more likely to do business with them in the future. Often times it’s the little things that make the biggest difference. Thanks again, Tom! I’ll be well caffienated for the near future.

So remember, as you create your campaigns and read blog posts looking for the next great tool or nugget of advice, think about leaving a comment or sending a thank you recognizing someone for their effort or their contribution. You never know what may come of that initial contact or when you might need to ask that person for a little help down the road.

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