Ada Chen Rekhi is head of user growth for Connected, which provides contact management without the work for busy professionals. She can be found on Twitter at @adachen and also writes about productivity and networking at Connected Life. -KF
Let's Lunch is a service which helps busy professionals network with one another. Currently they are only available in San Francisco, Silicon Valley and New York. You tell them when you're available and what type of people you'd like to meet with, and Let's Lunch does the rest.
Signing up for Let's Lunch is painless
The signup process for Let's Lunch was easy as soon as you get accepted. You start by submitting an application to join. While it was a little strange to wait, I'm assuming that they are doing good things by having a human on the other side confirm that my profile is yet another human.
They sent me an email to confirm, and made it very easy for me to set up my account by connecting my LinkedIn profile and typing in my Twitter user name. Then I selected a geographic area that I could have lunch in, and a checked off some interest areas.
All of this took me less than 30 seconds. So far so good, Let's Lunch team.
Taking the dive with scheduling lunch
To really try out Let's Lunch, I decided to take the dive and schedule three lunches for the week.
I set up my calendar for lunch on Monday, Wednesday and Friday in downtown San Francisco for the following week.
This is where the experience really began to deteriorate. On Saturday, they emailed me to tell me there wasn't a lunch partner available on Monday. The lunch alert emails also included the reason and claim, "We could not find a match this time, but try again, our match rate is above 90%".
By Monday, despite the 90% match rate claim, I was batting 0 for 2 on lunches available in my area.
Then on Wednesday... score! I finally had a Friday lunch scheduled!
My Let's Lunch lunch experience
Let's Lunch sends an email to each of the lunch partners and asks them to accept and confirm a time. The first to confirm also gets to choose a location, and optionally send any messages they need to coordinate.
They are pretty good about trying to make sure that each of the potential partners can maintain privacy around their contact information unless they actually want to share it.
I had a very mixed experience, however. The original person that matched cancelled, and I got a last-minute message the day before that my meeting had been switched to a different person named Igor. I showed up to our lunch venue -- a creperie -- and it turned out that the business was no longer open.
Igor and I did manage to meet and enjoy lunch together. We had a great conversation and it turned out that we even knew a few folks in common. I walked out of it having learned something new, and was even able to make some intros for Igor for potential new business.
All in all, despite a few hiccups, Let's Lunch came through.
Conclusion: Let's Lunch has promise
The premise of Let's Lunch solves a real problem by busy professionals meet and connect with each other. It's hard enough to meet and schedule with people whom we do know, but they've made it very easy to schedule meetings and actively meet new people. After all, like Keith Ferazzi says, you should never eat alone.
Their product is still pretty early and could use some work. Despite the density of contacts in San Francisco, I was only able to schedule one lunch out of three. It would have been helpful to get some indication of how I can increase my chances of a match, whether it's by selecting additional interest areas, expanding my geographic location, or simply helping me decide which days and times are most popular.
All in all, however, lunch with Igor was great and it was thanks to Let's Lunch. If you’re in San Francisco or New York, I’d say try it – it’s easy to use and you have to eat anyway.
Here at FG and RMA we're always looking for ways to help the team consistently, proactively expand our networks. So at our last all-hands meeting, I introduced a new exercise to build our company’s social capital – one relationship at a time.
Everyone was asked to come to the meeting with the name of one aspirational contact – someone who could make a critical difference to a current work goal. Each person shared the name of their target, then shared why – what did they hope to learn from the introduction?
The team surprised me with some great names – everyone from key decision makers at potential corporate clients to the Dalai Lama. We all had veto power, if it seemed that the person wasn’t job-relevant or enough of a challenge. For example, one woman said she wanted to get connected to Tony Hsieh of Zappos, but I know him so well already he’s not exactly aspirational – he’s already baked into our network.
Next up, helping each person brainstorm about how to approach their target contact with generosity. Our net result? Within the next few weeks several people are ready to connect with contacts that they thought were way out of reach, and everyone else was further down the path.
There was another win: By the time we had gone around the room in LA, and New York, and even Iowa, we all had a clearer sense of each person’s priorities, which helps guide our generosity toward one another.
So give this a try in your next meeting. Who's your target and why?
Charisma and leadership expert Olivia Fox Cabane created this mission to help get you ready for your next key business meeting.
Researchers at MIT's Media Lab found they could predict the outcome of negotiations, sales calls, and pitches with 87 percent accuracy without listening to a single word of content, just by analyzing people’s body language. In this mission you'll improve your body language to greatly increase your chances of success in any interaction.
Your mission: Prior to your next key meeting, close your eyes and remember, in as much detail as you can, a moment of great triumph. Make the memory as vivid as possible: see, hear, feel the emotions. Now, visualize the meeting you’re about to have, and imagine it going as well as possible. Feel the satisfaction, the excitement, the triumph. When you do this, a remarkable change will sweep over your body language, and you’ll enter the meeting broadcasting positive signals from head to toe. Why? Because our brain can’t distinguish imagination from reality, it will accept as momentarily “real” anything you imagine: this is the power of visualization. Trick yourself!
Pick your key meeting NOW and copy this mission into the agenda so that you don't forget. Report back and let us know: did it work? What changed for you? Have you noticed a new confidence in your communications and the way others react to you?
Here’s a great framework to prepare yourself for a meeting, courtesy of RMA Coach Cindy Cornell’s awesome master class.
As you prep for a meeting, answer the questions below – in writing:
1. What do I want the other person to know? Make sure you’re offering a clear, concise picture, with all the details needed to understand your idea/product/service.
2. What do I want them to believe? What are the benefits? Have you done enough research to know what their problems are, and to deliver your solution in their language?
3. How do I want them to feel?
Invest them emotionally and you’ve won. What stories can you tell that help the person connect to your and your cause on a deeper level?
4. What do I want them to do? Make your ask clear – and make sure it’s something easy to say yes to. No one likes to be rushed, so be prepared to move incrementally toward your goal.
To answer the questions above successfully, you’ll have to DO YOUR HOMEWORK and really put yourself in your target’s shoes – how are you going to walk in there and be uniquely generous? It’s not hard to be persuasive when you know for sure that what you’re offering is truly a win-win.
Remember though, once you get into the room, your job isn’t to orate. It’s to be fully present, pay attention – and be FULLY prepared to adapt, amend, or even toss out all that prep depending on what you learn in real-time.
Mick Jagger sang that you can’t always get what you want. Maybe not, but when it comes to meetings, you certainly want to do everything in your power to get what you need.
Here’s one 4-part play to quickly establish yourself and your agenda in a first meeting. I'm not talking about a casual meet-and-greet; I'm talking about those times when you have one chance and only one chance to make your case. The steps are based on my NEA interview with the “Madame of Moxie,” veteran consultant DeAnne Rosenberg, who learned early in her career that confidence and audacity are often the keys to leaving a meeting with what you need – and what you want.
State the situation as you see it. This sets the stage for their candid response. Before you can speak persuasively—that is, before you speak from a position of passion and personal knowledge—you need to know where you stand.
Communicate your feelings. We downplay the influence of emotions in our day-to-day contacts, especially in the business world. We’re told that vulnerability is a bad thing and we should be wary of revealing our feelings. But as we gain comfort using “I feel” with others, our encounters take on depth and sincerity. Your emotions are a gift of respect and caring to your listeners.
Deliver the bottom line. This is the moment of truth when you state, with utter clarity, what it is you want. If you’re going to put your neck on the line, you’d better know why. The truth is the fastest route to a solution, but be realistic. Made sure your ask is appropriate.
Use an open-ended question. A request that is expressed as a question—one that cannot be answered by a yes or no—is less threatening. How do you feel about this? How can we solve this problem? The issue has been raised, your feelings expressed, your desires articulated. With an open-ended suggestion or question, you invite the other person to work toward a solution with you. It takes pressure out of the interaction.
Entrepeneur/marketing consultant Julie-Woods Moss, who's part of our first Relationship Masters Academy class, recently wrote about client hospitality on her blog, and in doing so articulated what I'd call a couple of solid best practices for good ROI in the arena. Her focus was on big-ticket corporate hospitality, but her advice applies to any entrepreneur or professional ready to invest in strengthening his or her network.
1. Identify shared passions to create a truly memorable experience. She writes, “My former boss at BT is a concert jazz pianist and so when BT got involved with the Montreaux Jazz festival it really paid back to host a small group of clients who shared the CEO’s love of jazz.”
2. Find a way to offer your guests an experience that money can’t buy – and be creative. Julie talks about IBM taking top clients behind the scenes at Wimbledon one year, and also relates the experience a CMO at Formula 1 once gave her: “Knowing my passion for technology - he gave me a behind the scenes tour of the F1 broadcasting pod. It is world class and completely mobile - getting built and rebuilt every two weeks. I could really see how that experience alongside the track event would work with some of the CIOs I know, who are real petrol heads. Nothing wrong with being a petrol head, by the way, I married one."
Julie also shares some creative, low-budget ideas to socialize with clients and colleagues – including naked sauna in Finland. Read it!
What’s the most creative or effective event or offering you’ve given to a client to strengthen the relationship?
My colleague Chris and I met with an executive at a well-known tech company in Seattle the other day. You could call it a “warm” sales call, as I had made contact with the gentleman prior to our face-to-face meeting through mutual friends. When I arrived, I noticed that he seemed nervous about our meeting. Nerves can run high during an initial meeting with someone – especially when an agenda is not set.
I consider the meeting a success, but only because I took very tactical steps to comfort him and build a relationship – not complete a transaction.
Here are some tips to ease a sales call:
Control the location of the meeting – You always want him or her (the buyer) to be as comfortable as possible. Often times that means taking him out of his office to a coffee shop or a restaurant, but sometimes – as was the case in this instance – the target may be nervous, and his office is a place of solace and comfort. In this case, follow his lead.
Do something human with him – When there is uncertainty in a meeting, things can turn uncomfortable quickly. You can cut the tension easily by interacting with the other person in a non-business, very human manner… like making tea or coffee together.
Ask him about his passions – Guide his thinking away from anything transaction-oriented. Find some common ground and discuss (i.e. kids, boating, charity).
Ask for advice - This is optional. If you genuinely have a question he can answer with his insight, it shows vulnerability on your part and puts him in a position of authority and power. He'll feel good about the fact that you're looking to him for his wisdom, and he'll be happy to share. This typically will lead him to a more positive and grounded place.
Offer to help him – Figure out what is most important to him. In this case, the guy had just recently moved to a new job in a new city. What is most important to someone brand new in a company? He’s looking to prove himself. Maybe you can help him do that.
Make sure to discuss “follow-up” items – This is your key to securing a second meeting. It gives you permission to follow-up and schedule more time with the person in the future. If you do nothing else, make sure to discuss follow-up items before you leave the meeting. Then actually FOLLOW-UP!
Hope these tips help – they’ve worked for me time and time again. Do you have tips of your own? Leave them in the comments!
found on Twitter at @adachen and also writes about productivity and networking at Connected Life. -KF
Mick Jagger sang that you can’t always get what you want. Maybe not, but when it comes to meetings, you certainly want to do everything in your power to get what you need.
Entrepeneur/marketing consultant Julie-Woods Moss, who's part of our first 
