A Master Networking Session from a Wall Street Salesman

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Mark Evans: I'm Mark Evans, and welcome to Marketing Spark, the podcast that delivers insight from marketers and entrepreneurs in the trenches in twenty five minutes or less. When I started my career, net networking was an important part of career building. Not social networking, but meeting people, connecting, and building relationships. With the rise of the Internet, networking has clearly changed. We use Zoom, SMS, and email to digitally communicate. And when COVID recedes, it's unclear how in person meetings will bounce back. To discover the secrets and importance of great networking, I'm talking with Mark Angelos, a digital marketing strategist and a longtime relationship builder. Welcome to Marketing Spark.

Mark Angelos: Thank you very much, Mark. It's a pleasure to be here.

Mark Evans: Let's start by talking about personal branding and the power of networking. For all the talk about digital technologies, social media, networking as a marketing tool doesn't get much attention. So provide some insight into whether it's still relevant and how people can effectively network in a digital world.

Mark Angelos: Sure. So what people always overlook, Mark, is that networking is the foundational component of social media. Right? The whole point of it is to network. It although it gets transmuted into sales and all that other bit that we know, it is really about people connecting with people. That's not changing. So humans as a social animal, not going away. What's different though is the connectivity piece, a, it occurs in a different manner now, and b, the existence of social media, the rise of these channels, these digital platforms, has transformed networking way more than the Internet itself has. People think of it as a dynamic of just technology. But in the old days, we're all familiar with six degrees of separation. You could get you know, you can meet almost anyone through the sixth iteration. You're now one DM away from the presidency. Right? When that when you can speak directly one to one, it changes the dynamic of everything from sales to marketing and networking. Networking now has to be predicated upon the value delivery component of what I can do for someone else, which is the inverse of the way most people look at it. Right? I I worked for twenty seven years on Wall Street in a relationship management role. And the whole concept there, the reason I lasted as long as I did, if you know how to touch base with someone in an additive manner, and then that's the magic. What what we're all familiar with, especially on LinkedIn, I know you're very active on it, the old you can tell right away when there's the transactional feel when someone reaches out to you. Mhmm. They want something from you, and that that whole thing is not the way forward. You already know this. Everyone out there is aware of it. The new generation of leaders, I mean, from the z's on up, it's this BS detector is on 10. There's no more pushing and pounding and pitching. So networking becomes a game of what can I do for you? So you and I are on this conversation right now. In the back of my head, I'm thinking, what can I do for Mark? And that might not be business. It might just be connections of someone I know, some insights on how you're running your show, what whatever. But it's something that you will benefit from.

Mark Evans: So you and I are contemporaries. And back in the day, and I say that, you know, ten years ago, fifteen years ago, networking was meeting people for lunch, going to networking events, maybe going golfing with them. It was about personal relationships, impersonal relationships where I got a feel for you and your body language and just the way that you operate. And that gave me a sense of whether you should be part of my network. And over time, you know, you work your network, you nurture your network, a lot of physical work to do that. Is that still relevant today? Are we still in person networking still relevant? And how do you cross the chasm from digital to personal? It's a it's a multi phase, multi part question here.

Mark Angelos: I would so we have to get into the definition of personal. Does that mean in person? Because here's why I say this. I've my son is online with four of his best friends that he's never met, three of which are in different countries, and that's been the case throughout the lockdown. So now is that a real relationship? Is that an in person thing? The point is, will they do for each other? Yes. The old days of golfing and dinners and even meeting for a cup of coffee or my world was grabbing a beer after work at the bar with your customer, that's not going on right now. And and we'll come back eventually, but not for a while. That doesn't mean you can't still develop that direct one on one personal relationship. And believe it or not, you kinda have to. Like, this is a digital world now. For one or for good or for ill. The reality is you can and you should, and actually the onus is upon you to do that. I think that what people don't recognize is how to do that. Right? This is now getting into the world, your world, the content world. You, quote, unquote, have a conversation every day, whether it's through the podcast, whether it's what you're posting on LinkedIn. You're very active in communicating your perspective and helpful insights. That helps people develop a relationship. Those of us who didn't grow up in that world have to either learn that skill or and start exercising it or suffer the consequences that if you don't speak in a digital world, you don't exist. So networking really means right now adding to other people's content, putting out content of your own. But, again, it's got to be with that value add approach. You're you're very familiar with it of how can I help these people?

Mark Evans: Yeah. A couple of comments. One is that it's interesting that your son has relationships with people in other countries. My son has these three friends that he's met online. They live thousands of miles away in Western Canada, and he's got this very intimate relationship with them. And in fact, he wants to go visit them this summer for one of them is is having a birthday party. And on one hand, in the old world, you say that's really weird. But in the new world, that's completely acceptable. It's just the way that things are done. One question I did wanna ask you is whether the in person networking is gonna come back. Will we meet for beers? One of the things I ask myself when it comes to coffee meetings is whether that'll happen again. Because when you think about it, a coffee meeting is a two hour endeavor. There's about half an hour to get there. There's the hour that you spend with the person, and you're not even sure if it's gonna work out, and then there's a half hour to get back to your office or even longer. That's a big investment for a first time touch with somebody. I think in some ways, I don't wanna do that anymore. It's it's just too much risk. Right? So the question is, how much will the coffees, the beers, just getting together people come back or whether we're in a new reality now? So the reality is that it is going to come back, right, in some form. However, there's got to

Mark Angelos: be a judicious element now to what you just said to, is it worth my time? And I don't mean this is not in the face of the transactional thing I just mentioned. It is that there's a there's an element in when you get married, you send out your invitations on very expensive paper. Right? Why? Because there's a commitment there that people recognize the high quality and what you spent in the invitation represents something. And that's the same thing when someone invests time to come visit you. My previous jobs back on Wall Street, I was covering customers in Europe. So I was there quite frequently on airplanes, etcetera. What that means is you have to make the decision, is this person potentially worth the effort? And on the inverse of that, the person that will be there for the meeting is thinking Mark is willing to come and make this time in his schedule when he could do this over Zoom call. And so it does add a new dynamic to networking. Right? There's this element of are they worth it? I am worth it depending on whatever side of that table you're on. But, yeah, sure, it'll come back.

Mark Evans: I mean, there's gonna be beers and dinners. Humans are are social creatures. One thing I will say is that the value of meeting somebody obviously makes a difference. It shows there's a sense of commitment. So for example, if I get approached by a prospect about a big marketing project and the fact that I'm willing to meet them in person, a year ago, that was necessary. That was absolutely necessary because if you didn't meet with them, you weren't serious. Today, I think I could probably jump on a Zoom call at their convenience, meet them, learn about what they want, get a feel for whether it's a fit or not, and make a proposal. And I don't even think they expect me to meet with them. I think in my world, that is the new reality.

Mark Angelos: I think you raise a good point there, Mark. But also don't forget that the expectations would change radically with the lockdown. So yes. But going forward, I don't think people will be as insulted by those not making the effort. But that also means on the flip side that those who do make the effort when it's judiciously determined are going to have that much more leverage in that conversation.

Mark Evans: And I think that's gonna be the interesting thing to see how things snap back. I hate the phrase to normal because it's not gonna be normal anymore, but how people flip back to their old behaviors. So whereas before, you and I are doing this virtually if this was a prospecting meeting, but in a month, two months, three months from now, it could be the expectation may be that you're gonna come down and meet me. And if you're really serious about doing business with me, that's the way it's gonna happen.

Mark Angelos: I agree with you. Back to the expectations piece. When we were kids, you they were pen pals. You didn't really have expectations of meeting your pen pal if they were far away in the world, and you hoped to, but it wasn't really on the radar. Now your son absolutely is expecting to one day sit down and meet in person. That's part of the appeal of the relationship. My friend my son's friends, I've asked him, like, where are these guys located? He first few months, he's like, I don't know. Some not in America, though I know because of time zone. Right. Okay. But this is the world. So I think that people will develop those relationships in person becomes the secondary piece, which touches back on the networking mark. The whole concept of social media and digital engagement like this is merely the entree point for an in person relationship. And I think to your point, not everyone's gonna wanna make that second step. That's where you figure out, is this person part of my tribe, quote, unquote. But I do think that this becomes it's a new version of relationship building, but it's still relationship building.

Mark Evans: One of the metrics when it comes to digital networking is connections. The number of followers you have, the number of connections on LinkedIn, and a lot of people equate connections to network. If I have 5,000 connections, I have a huge network. But that can't be the case because it's easy to connect with somebody, but it's different to have a relationship with them. So how do you explain to people that connections are not is not network or or maybe it is? I don't know. Tell me.

Mark Angelos: So there's an old expression, a good friend will help you move. A great friend will help you move the body. This comes down to how what is the depth of the relationship versus the breadth of how many relationships I have. Now if I've got 10,000 connections on LinkedIn and none of them respond to anything I post, is that really a relationship? Obviously, the answer is no. On the other hand, if I only have 400 and each of them are willing to pay me $10,000 for the services I'm offering, that's that's depth. Depth matters. Depth is more important than anything. It always was digital or not. It it's got nothing to do with technology. If you have a connection with someone and they call you up, it's your best friend, and he says, Mark, I need you. It's two in the morning. Can you come? You're gonna go. You you don't ask any questions. I'll be there. Versus some rando who kinda knows you and whatever. My point is the relationship aspect doesn't change. The mediums, they change, but it doesn't the human thing is still there. The power of connection, depth over breadth. I think that people they don't they don't see that because the metrics game that social media has introduced to this younger generation, and and the older ones have fallen for it as well. It is a numbers game. Right? This is the everyone loves data metrics. But this is my argument in the old sales world I came out of. It's you gotta not conflate the tail with the dog. Right? People will do for you and buy from you and and connect with you if they want to. That's it. It's not about how many you already have. I'm probably preaching to the choir here. Well, one of

Mark Evans: the reasons why I think LinkedIn has worked so well for me in the in the last year is that connections are just a starting point. I read a lot of content. I find interesting people. I'll connect with them, but the key to my success has been conversations. And I will reach out to people because I've got a small relationship with them. And I'll say, for example, hey, Mark. I love your content. I love the way that you explained this. Would you be open to a Zoom call? In many cases, in most cases, people say yes. And then you jump on a call with someone, have a thirty minute conversation, and all of sudden, the relationship changes. They go from a connection to a relationship. And some of those are one offs where you talk to them once and that's it. And some of them, you continue to have ongoing conversations, and you may jump on another call with them because you feel like you've got I don't know if it's the right word is friend, but certainly you've got, like, a real connection where there are some people that if I got on an airplane and I was in their town and I and I pinged them on LinkedIn and said, wanna meet for your beer? They would say absolutely because they they know me. Provide some best practices in terms of how to make the leap from connections to conversations because I think that's the magic of of digital networking and networking in general.

Mark Angelos: I'll break it down like this, Mark, and here's here's your actionable steps. Your superpower and the reason you've been so successful on LinkedIn, and I'm talking to you as Mark, is because of these three reasons, and these are applicable to anyone everywhere. Number one, curiosity. Right? You are genuinely curious when you look at someone's content, you chase them down. Most folks don't take the time to really investigate. So curiosity is always the the starting point for anyone's success in anything. Number two, active listening. You illustrate this perfectly. But this is an old sales tactic where people get in there and they don't ask any questions other than to answer than to listen rather. They only want to hear and not and you do this. You're paying attention. You're knowing what the what the stream of questioning should go. You're trying to figure out. Active listening is such a rarity these days. So folks who learn to actively listen, and what that means in practice is, can I repeat back to you what you just said in my words? And you agree. So active listening is number two. And the third piece is empathy. Right? That's what you are also doing here as well. Empathy means understanding it from the other person's perspective. When you're curious, when you're listening to what they're saying, and you start to try to see it their way. This is sales one zero one, relationship building, you can call it networking. It's people connecting is all it is. And those three things are not taught, not formally, and they're not really accentuated at all by the educational system, which is a whole another world. But my point is you have to take the active role in learning these things. We'll call them EQ skills. We'll call them soft skills. They're more important than the technology skills that we all value so highly. And I I may be biased, but I'm coming out of twenty seven years of selling artificial intelligence software. So I I I know what I'm talking about here. The ability to connect with someone is the first step to anything, to selling, to relating, to building a friendship. And that's the thing where you need to take it on yourself. What are the steps I need to do? I need to literally spend the time getting on LinkedIn, and you read people's comments, and you go look at their content, and then you touch base, ask them questions. But you do it in the empathetic fashion. You do it in an honoring value oriented approach, and that's also a skill. That's that's probably skill number four there. Learning how to communicate in a manner that builds people up so that they want to engage in return.

Mark Evans: Let's go back to an earlier comment you said about content and the need to give as opposed to take because there are obviously people on social media that are looking to take. They're looking to sell you something right away even though they don't have a relationship. The good people, the people who are really effective at networking are producing a lot of content. They're leaving many comments. They're engaging with people. And do you think that people forget about the value of content and the value of giving when they're trying to drive networking digitally?

Mark Angelos: Yes. I think it's a great point. Value delivery is the game always in life. Forget about social. Technology allows you to magnify that. But if you're not delivering value at scale, then you're not really worth having in the network, if you will. And this is not giving to get something. This is giving to give because in a sense, the world we live in now with that six degrees of separation becomes one DM thing, we now have people who have to choose to want to do business with you or to engage and connect. And if they don't make that active choice, you're out. Why would they choose to do that? Because you give more than you take. Everyone and everything wants something. Right? In life, you know that anyone you meet is looking for something. And I don't mean sales. I just mean there's something that they're looking to do with their life, some goal. If you can approach everyone in that regard and deliver as much as you can in the area that you think will help them, Even if it's not correct, they'll recognize your intent and intent matters. Intent is a real thing, by the way. Intent is a weapon. If I really go out of my way to try to help Mark Evans, if I'm getting off this call and I think to myself, you know what? Something that dawns on me now and I go back to you with it, something that might help you. You're gonna say this is this is a good guy. That's the game because there's not enough business to go around. There's not there's so many channels. It comes down to who do I want to associate with? Who do I want to give my business to? Who do I want to be able to be there if they need me?

Mark Evans: One of the interesting things about business, and I repeat this on a regular basis, is that people don't buy from companies. People buy from people in many cases. You buy based on the relationship whether you like somebody or you trust them. When I was a reporter, for example, people would tell me things because they liked me and they trusted me and they wanted to have that back and forth relationship. And I think that's one of the reasons why writing a lot of content on LinkedIn makes sense because people believe that they get to know you. They get to know know your thoughts and your ideas and your willingness to help people. And I think that makes a difference is that it's still about trust, and it's still about it's still about whether a likability if whether we like it or not, whether it's digital or in person.

Mark Angelos: I think people don't recognize that what they're selling first and foremost is themselves. Mhmm. So you you as you as an individual, whoever this is, is a product on the web. No different from any company, no different from any widget. And that means your sales front end piece is your communication. Right? It doesn't have to be formal. It could be informal on the phone. It could be in person, but the or it could be formalized in content. But there's a sale that has to happen before you even get to say what you're gonna say. And that's the part where the value orientation. When I was on Wall Street all those years and I jumped a bunch of jobs, and they're they're all big firms you'd know, but it was the same customer base. And the reason it was never difficult for me to switch jobs was because the customer value the customers knew there was value there. They'd be willing to follow me firm to firm. And so that comes down to that in real life. It doesn't matter what you do, Mark, like what career you're in. If you decide that you wanna give up on podcasting and go become a hot air balloonist. If people are behind you, they're in there. They're like, dude, take us on this journey. Let's go. Because they you they're invested in you. You, the person. And so people have to think of themselves as I need a front end on me of communication. It's not I'm not selling anything per se, but you kinda are. Right? The first thing the first impression you're gonna have of me is gonna be content. No matter what, the first thing anyone ever does is check someone out online, period. And that's it. So what's there is what you're putting there.

Mark Evans: It's interesting. There's a lot of talk these days about account based marketing or ABM, and it's the the idea that you would focus on a small number or a limited number of customers, and you would personalize your marketing to them on a regular basis. So that rather than having a shotgun approach to marketing, it's very focused. And in some respects, networking is really ABM. We are focused on a small number of people or a limited number of people that we want to have relationships with because, as you say, you it's a give and take relationship. We're always looking for something. And I think that's ironic because there's such a reliance on technology to make things happen. Relationships are fundamentally where marketing and sales happens.

Mark Angelos: I agree with that because it's all about life is about relationships. I'm formerly relationship manager slash sales. I'm not a marketing guy. I'm in the marketing world now. It's what I do for a living. I can tell you the whole concept of funnels and lead gen and conversion rates, people get hooked on that and think that's the game. When really that's the first step takes you to what really matters, the relationship piece you reference. And that relationship piece is all that matters at that point. If I'm gonna play the game of my 10,000 leads go out and I get 1% conversion and I just have to keep doing this and I never build a relationship, there's no business there. How many times have you bought from a brand new online retailer? You know, Amazon's great. You like them. They do a good job for you. You got a relationship with them. That's the way most people want they nobody wants to switch unless they're unhappy. But it comes down to do I like these people? Do I have a relationship? And firms have relationships. You don't think of it this way, but right now, I got Disney plus. Most of us have Disney plus. You can have seven accounts. I've got my friends and family on my account. No big deal. It's all free. At some point, I know they're gonna convert those folks and start charging them. Now that's manipulative if you think about it, but it's not really because it's Disney and it's a soft magic company and I like that. But Facebook, who's also trying to manipulate me by connections to try to find out who I connect with, That's manipulative and evil. But Facebook, think of as the scary beast, so it's a different the relationship I have with Facebook is different from the relationship I have with Disney. And so people and companies, it's about relationship.

Mark Evans: Let me put you on the spot. Get your predictions for social media in 2021, particularly around LinkedIn, which has had a moment. I mean, the last year to eighteen months has been tremendous LinkedIn. I think they're close to 740,000,000 users. And the other platform of interest these days is obviously Clubhouse. What are your thoughts about both those platforms in 2021? Sure.

Mark Angelos: So I don't do not put me on the spot at all. This is a tried and true formula. LinkedIn is going the way of Facebook. Right? LinkedIn is great. I love LinkedIn. I've been on it as long as you have. It is getting jammed up with content. It's gonna move to a pay to play kind of model where they you want your content to have reach, you're gonna pay for it. And it evolves into the the real value delivery folks will emerge because we just talked about that that metrics game, the SEO optimization and keywords. Like, that's not gonna play in a world that's too crowded. It's gonna become, I want to do business with Mark Evans because I like the guy. You just said it. The same with your journalist background. So as far as LinkedIn is concerned, it's gonna continue to evolve into the real value delivery folks who have real communication skills and are able to attract the crowd because of the value they give to that crowd. I actually I think Gary Vaynerchuk is a great example of that. Mhmm. In the world of Clubhouse, I've done probably two or three of these a week now for a month and a half, two months. And I can tell you, clubhouse is it's someone called it once a cross between a a conference and a and a podcast. Clubhouse is going to get a ton of competition. Right? Twitter is introducing their version of it. It's not just gonna be the the only audio platform. So as the world gets flooded with more clubhouses, and that'll happen, it becomes the feature everyone has, You're gonna start to see the the FOMO disappear. Right? This fear of missing out, which is what's driving a lot of Clubhouse right now. We'll filter away. And then it goes back to the same old game of who brings real value. I know you're on Clubhouse, Mark. There's a lot of snake oil salesman in there right now, especially in, like, the how to build wealth, get rich rooms. Those folks will get flushed, and you're gonna be left with folks who really bring content and contacts and helpful insights, guys like yourself. And that's gonna take probably a year to get to that point if you wanna really put time on that. But I think eventually clubhouse becomes common, and I think it becomes more of a value delivery game. Life is always a value delivery game. Social media was really valuable at one point. Now it's kinda noisy.

Mark Evans: One final question, and I would be remiss because having written three books, I understand that they are labors of love at the at the very most. And if you sell a book beyond your friends and family, you're doing really well. You've got a new book coming out called Content Is The New Sales. What motivated this this activity? Why did you embrace the idea of a book? Because it's a lot of work. And give us a little snapshot of what the book's about.

Mark Angelos: Sure. So I've years ago when I was working on Wall Street, I recognized the value of bringing content to people. Right? And this is before pandemic. This is before lockdown. I used to post weekly articles and videos on LinkedIn and drove a lot of business. And I recognized early on, okay, content's an avenue for selling. But now as we all know in the world we live in, it's essentially the only avenue for selling. And so content is now replacing the in person visit as you referenced earlier. So what does that mean to business? As a businessman and having worked in finance all these years, I can tell you it means that all of a sudden, every salesperson has to become a content producer. Here's the dilemma now, and you'll relate to this, Mark. Salespeople aren't trained in the content channels. In fact, they're penalized for using them. They're not supposed to be on them. The marketing folks use them, they're very adroit with them, they're great. However, the marketing folks don't speak to the customers daily, and so they don't have the customer stories that the salespeople have. Mhmm. So what's gonna emerge in the world of business, in my view, is going to be this merging of sales and marketing. Like, right now as it is, it used to be that marketing did most of the communication on the channels. Sales is gonna start to take over more of that because they have the customer story, because they can recycle into lookalike content what they've already seen, and they'll need the marketing team's help to do that. So I think there's a new version of business emerging. We're gonna call it relationship management, digital account manager. You can term what you like, but it's it doesn't exist yet. Right now in current business today, companies are still thinking of it as marketing's got the channels, sales takes it over from there. It doesn't work like that anymore.

Mark Evans: When does the book come out? And did you self publish or did you get a publisher?

Mark Angelos: It self published. The book will come out in three months. And to be honest with you, I really feel like it's going to lay out how the process of what companies need to do, like what are the action steps you have to take? How do you integrate sales and marketing? What type of content works? The demographics, the psychographics of the channels. I know you're familiar with this, but salespeople aren't. For the most part, b to b sales folks, they're not given the marketing background that they now or suddenly need to have. And by the way, with sales shut down for visits face to face, the c suite's all looking at the marketing folks like, okay. Let's make the revenue happen. And marketing's like, we know how to make the communication happen, but we don't have the customer's information.

Mark Evans: Yeah. When the book comes out, let me know, obviously, LinkedIn, and Sure. I'll do my best to to spread the word. Well, this has been a great conversation. We I haven't talked about networking and the value of relationships in the podcast, so it's a nice change of pace from all the talk about technology. One final question. If people wanna learn more about you and what you do, where are you on the web? Sure. I'm on

Mark Angelos: all my social handles are markangelos n y c, which is where I'm from, and invictus.com with an a is my website. The last thing I'll tell you, Mark, though, about the networking, some action steps for your people to take, a daily practice. Find some way to make a daily practice of leaving content on people's you know, comments on people's content and ideally posting something value added because there's so much garbage out there. Valuable where someone wants to learn about what you do, you give them a couple of tips. Daily practice.

Mark Evans: Awesome. Great way to end the podcast. Thanks for listening to another episode of Marketing Spark. If you enjoyed the conversation, leave a review and subscribe via iTunes, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. For show notes of today's conversation and information about Mark, visit marketingspark.co/blog. If you'd like to learn more about how I help a to b SaaS companies as a fractional CMO, strategic adviser, and coach, send an email to mark marketing spark dot co. I'll talk to you next time.