I had scheduled to post a different post to start my own domain, but I saw a post by Chris Garrett about the professional Networking. That encouraged me to write this post.

When I think about professional networking, the first thing that comes to my mind is the vicinity of the networking. Is it local, around you? or is it the world wide networking? If you talk about the local networking then obviously the local events - Conferences, seminars, trade fairs, professional association meetings, trade association meetings and club meetings are very effective. You get a chance to talk to prospects face to face and exchange business cards. Make sure you could leave a mark in his/her mind. Explain why you are there and what are your expectations. Listen what your peer tells about him/her. You should be able to quickly (in 20-40 secs) match if your interests intersects somewhere in the Venn Space you create in your mind. Here comes the questions, are you looking for buyer networking or seller networking? or just a networking for friendship. Your Venn space shows if you are with the correct match or not. If you are for just professional friendship, the more intersecting section you see, the more you are likely to go along in future and you may be tempted to offer at coffee or a lunch some day this weekend. The lesser the intersecting section you see, the more you drill down to understand the peer about his/her intention of attending the event. He/she may be the right candidate for your business lead generation. Good Luck!

Global Professional Networking-its again international events. Conferences, Seminars, workshops, Outsourcing fairs, business match making meetings, Roadshows and networking sites. Being visitor is more effective than exhibitor in trade fairs, you get a more time going around and give time for networking. Same Venn space applies for international professional networking as well.

There are more networking sites coming online every day. You get a lot of invitations from many of such online networking sites. LinkedIn is one of the popular networks for professionals. Blogs are now proving itself as the most effective professional networking choice. You link each other, trackbacks, blogrolls and share thoughts through comments. You can actually promote each other professionally. It indirectly introduces more other bloggers and readers to you, you might have never known. This is a very powerful benefit you get from blogging. It creates virtual professional networking relationship. Unfortunately, you can not sit together for a coffee or a lunch so easily and spend hours talking about the blogging…

For the last more than 10 years, I have been working on many Software projects with the people from different countries. World is so small. Most of the times, I have no idea where my clients are from and am surprised when I realize there are four, five, or even ten time zones separating us. Online networking environment has made it possible to bring people so close and work virtual on the same horizontal plain.

For professionals, networking online really opens up the chance to find peers and professional opportunities based on your exact experience, skills and interests.
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