Business Networking Internation (BNI)

[VaDwayne]

Does anyone have any thoughts and opinions on joining a BNI chapter to help increase the amounts of referrals? I have gone as a visitor and seen that it provides some however I don't know if it is worth the time and money to join one. Any information will be greatly appreciated.

-T

I am a member of a BNI group and it has been very good for me. I would suggest that you visit several groups to see who is the best fit for you. I would also suggest you look for a group that is early morning so you don't waste part of your working hours.

 

[stuy119]

I've been with my current group for 4 years now. I've also been the President of our BNI group, and am an Associate Director in charge of starting up new groups in our area.

It's been said before, but you get out of BNI what you put in. If you attend all the meetings, strive to learn about how to refer your fellow members when the opportunity arises, bring in potential new members as guests, attend the training sessions offered by BNI, and work to ask for what you want*, you'll do well. Year-over-year I receive roughly $25K in new commissions (L&H) from referrals in my group.


* Your weekly 60-second needs to be targeted, ask for someone specific, and give a way to bring you up in conversation. If you don't do it (and spend time coming up with a good one), it's your own damn fault and you're wasting your membership money.

 

[VaDwayne]

I've been with my current group for 4 years now. I've also been the President of our BNI group, and am an Associate Director in charge of starting up new groups in our area.

It's been said before, but you get out of BNI what you put in. If you attend all the meetings, strive to learn about how to refer your fellow members when the opportunity arises, bring in potential new members as guests, attend the training sessions offered by BNI, and work to ask for what you want*, you'll do well. Year-over-year I receive roughly $25K in new commissions (L&H) from referrals in my group.


* Your weekly 60-second needs to be targeted, ask for someone specific, and give a way to bring you up in conversation. If you don't do it (and spend time coming up with a good one), it's your own damn fault and you're wasting your membership money.

I just wrote a new contractor this morning that was referred to me through BNI. Their premium is $13,200 a year, so my cut is $1980 a year and BNI is $365 a year. As long as this business stays on the books, it will pay for my dues, my meals, and my gas, which means from now on everything else is free money. I also like the fact that our group meets at 7:30 a.m., because I wouldn't be doing anything at that time anyway, so it doesn't even cut into my work day and that means I don't have to calculate lost hours into my overall cost.

However, something very funny, or at least I giggled to myself this morning in the meeting. A member who does payroll for businesses stood up for her 1 minute and said, " you can write certain things off of you taxes, Dwayne can even write his cold-calling cost off of his taxes, and I don't know anybody that cold-calls as much as him." And our leader said we nned to get him to working BNI harder and he can forget all of that cold-calling.

I giggled my butt off to myself and thought "you just keep believing that crap, and that is one less person who the person I am speaking to on the phone has spoken to today."

If you don't believe cold-calling works, you are either a fool, lazy, scared, or have enough business on the books you no longer need to, but if you are building a business, it is mandatory....