Yes Kathy, SmartGuy.com is a real good first step for businesses looking to align with one another. After that, they will come together in local face-to-face gatherings (i.e. networking groups, Chambers of Commerce, restaurants and of course, all Biznik gatherings!

Kate,

Thanks for taking the time to respond in such a detailed fashion. Very good points. It seems you have a very good understanding of the subject.

Local networking groups are very effective, but limited. Within a few months, you have met those people and pretty much exhausted the leads you will receive from them.

Adding the SmartGuy tool allows these groups to meet not just those within the group, but everyone they know...and everyone they know... It also allows the groups to mesh with eachother.

This way, even the furniture refinisher or recording engineer you speak of will get referrals since the "net" that you mention is so much broader.

Can you imagine the combination if SmartGuy and Biznik combined efforts? You would have (1) supervised social networking, (2) live meetings, (3) consumer directory (to drive consumers to the businesses), (4) a referal management system that allows professionals view leads send a received, AND (5) an affiliate system that paid businesses to build their own referral networks? In other words this whole system would end up FREE!

Hmmm...

Something for people to think about... Dan you listening? 8)

Very good comments. The purpose of the first article is to dispel those "dreamy-eyed" believers that broad social networking was their ticket to success, and that referrals from quality local professionals should be their goal.

In the next article (as Caelan requested) I will describe the next steps - including turning these quality relationships into valuable alliances. This requires several steps, education on how to properly network with others, practical application, and then face-to-face meeting events where people can interact.

At SmartGuy.com, we are finalizing those stages as well.