May 31, 2019
How to find a business mentor is the main subject of the Join Up Dots episode.
Feel free to either listen to the podcast through the link above, or simply read the content below.
Lets start however with a few things that have been going on behind the scenes of the show this week.
This Week Through Join Up Dots
When we're young, we have an amazing positive outlook about how great life is going to be.
But somewhere along the line we forget to dream and end up settling.
Join Up Dots features amazing people who refuse to give up and chose to go after their dreams.
This is your blueprint for greatness.
So here's your host live from the back of his garden in the UK David Ralph
Yes. Hello. Good morning to you.
Good morning, and welcome to Join Up Dots. How are we?
Oh, I hope we are okay. You know, I can't hear anything in my ears. I'm not even sure if I'm recording at the moment.
I'm just blasting it out.
There we go suddenly, suddenly its burst into my life.
Ok, I can hear myself, I can hear myself. So I know I'm recording and I'm not wasting my time.
So how are you?
How's your week been?
Hopefully, it's been good. Hopefully, you've been rocking and rolling it.
We've been we've been doing a lot of stuff. Behind the Scenes this week, on Join Up Dots.
I've taken on this big body of work. And without going too much into it basically through Join Up Dots, I do a lot of coaching and group coaching people.
Every now and again, something comes up, and I think to myself, that's a great idea for a business. That's brilliant.
And so I started researching a business online. And I bought the domain name.
And I started doing the keyword research and looking at what the target customer is.
And it's a it was a really good business.
I thought to myself, this is what I'm going to do, I'm going to start this, and I spent about a weekend, probably about four days.
I lose track of when the weekend is as Fridays, and Saturdays don't mean anything to me now.
I spent three or four days doing this. And I've got this business platform ready to roll. But just before I started doing it, I hit the Five Year Anniversary of Join Up Dots
The Five Year Anniversary Milestone Slump
Through the show we have joined up many many dots.
As we say, "Please come back again, when you have more dots to join up as I believe that by joining up the dots and connecting our past it's the best way to build our futures."
Iwas talking to a guy who I've been connected with for quite a while called Mark Egan and he's an ex cameraman from the BBC.
I taught him to be a podcaster many years ago, and we've stayed friends.
He was saying to me, "Congratulations on hitting the five year anniversary, you know what, what you're doing moving forward?"
And I had moved into a slump.
I felt there should have been a big fanfare, there should have been something, you know, rewarding at the end of five years, and I didn't have anything.
So I kind of went into this, this depression for about three days of, I don't know where I'm heading.
I can't just keep on doing what I'm doing all the time. Because I'm going to get the same results.
As they say, "if you always do what you've always done, you'll always get the same results."
So I said, "You know what I'm gonna do, I'm just going to sort of leave it behind."
The Big Plan Moving Forward In Join Up Dots
So anyhow, I started doing the sample business.
Then through the process, I thought to myself, "no, I've already got a business, I should be going back and actually making my business is stronger."
Although Join Up Dots is going extremely well, I thought to myself, now what I'm going to do, I'm going to go back, and I'm going to work on all the shows.
I'm going to develop a strategy for it as I'm going to aim for a million listeners a month.
Okay, now there's some podcasts out there that get that. And believe me, I look at the figures. And I think I don't know how you can get those kind of numbers.
Because you're looking at something like 30,000 a day, which is a hell of a lot.
But I've started working on the whole strategy because I realized that five years of work needed to be reviewed again.
I needed to go back and join up my dots to connect my past to build the future.
So that's what I've been doing.
How To Find A Business Mentor
I was talking to another guy and he said "Can you be my business mentor?"
And I went well, you know, it's all very flattering. But you know, I've got a lot on my plate at the moment.
He he instantly started telling me what he wanted from me and sort of pressurising me into helping him.
He was like, it was kind of like going into a bar and going straight up to somebody and saying "Have this drink, eat these crisps, you're coming with me?"
You know, no one's going to do that.
Sso I said to him, "No, it's not for me, really, it's not for me."
This is what this episode is all about
How to find a business mentor,were actually you can build up the right relationship, and it works for you.
It's valuable. You certainly can't steam in on someone and say "I need your help, you know", because it's just not going to work.
So this is my thing, for guys in How to find a business mentor.
How To Find A Business Mentor - Phase One
Right, the number one.
I've broken it down into basically three strategies. There's three phases.
I would say the first phase is know what you really want. Why are you wanting to know how to find a business mentor?
Now you don't want to just go, I just want somebody to push me on.
I want somebody to, you know, show me the errors of my ways because it's too vague.
You've really got to drill down and work out what your goals are, what you're aiming for.
Then start looking at your business strengths and weaknesses.
Now one of the great ways of doing that is doing the Strength Finders 2.0 tests that you can get online.
You answer about 178 questions and it tells you your five key strengths and your weaknesses as well.
To be honest in business more often than not if you know your strengths and work on developing those, and get other people to do the work where you have weaknesses.
Its job done.
So strategy one on how to find a business mentor without making it just desperate is know what you want.
Set your goals and work out what your business strengths and weaknesses are.
How To Find A Business Mentor - Phase Two
Then start looking at your network, that you already have.
That's the second point.
Don't just think Branson, I'm gonna get Branson if he's not bit busy.
If he's too busy, I'm gonna get Ralph that's what I'm gonna do. Ralph he just he sits around in his lucky pants all the time.
He's not doing anything.
Consider your friends. There might be people locally for you. There might be a local businessmen, there might be sort of a local network, evening classes, whatever.
You don't have to steam in on some high powered businessmen, you can just go for somebody who is in your vicinity is in your network already.
They might actually know somebody that could help you.
How To Find A Business Mentor - Phase Three
Okay, so be strategic content.
Of course, you need to do your homework on the people that you come up with.
One of the best ways is the internet, have you heard of it?
You can go on there and you can find good things, bad things, you can find things that you shouldn't let other people know you're looking at.
You can find lots of stuff.
Believe me, if you listen to the early episodes of Join Up DOts ,when I first started doing doing them, I used to spend probably about two hours building the intros.
But now I can find out anything within about four or five web pages.
I know exactly where to go to find those kinds of details that make people nervours.
Stop this, that can't be out there.
So do your homework, go on their LinkedIn platform, look on the internet, try to find their biography, their history, some kind of track record.
You need to work out whether those people of course, have got the strengths and the weaknesses that you might need or may not need.
Okay, so let's summarize how to find a business mentor.
Phase one, figure out what you want, first of all.
Set your goals, your business strengths and your weaknesses, and then consider your own friends.
Do you have a local network?
Can you speak to somebody in your sort of group?
Do they know somebody?
Then once you get a name, do your homework, really find out about them. Know 100% that they're the right person.
How To Find A Business Mentor - Build Value
So now the second stage is to contact them.
Don't just sort of ask for stuff straight away. You know, one of the best ways is praise them.
You know, I get a lot of emails now.
I'm so shallow, I'm so shallow, where they sort of say "David you sexy person, or David you're gorgeous or David this or that".
I'm easily bought, I really am.
But they praise. They say some nice things, so I'm open to start a conversation with them.
Now, what you don't want to do is praise for stuff that you know, it's not true.
Why You Must Be Authentic and Honest
llI give you a story.
A guest who's going to be on my show, probably four months time, probably about August time.
He came to me last night, he said, "David, thanks for having me on the show last week."
And when we recorded it, it was good, it was really good and pleasant to have. He had passion. He had a true story.
But when he pitched through to me, it was "David I've been listening to your show, I love it, I can provide great value."
I got a feeling that he hadn't even listened to an episode, however I went with it anyway.
Whilst I was speaking to him, I was thinking this is obvious, he hasn't.
Now that kind of leaves a bad taste in a lot of podcasters mouths, because the person hasn't really done any research.
They just say "I love your show, but I haven't even listened to it."
So be genuine and be, you know, really honest about your appraisal of their work.
If you like it, tell them why. Tell them how you found it, tell them what you you enjoy about it, praise them.
Then ask them about their business. Okay.
Find out how you can help.
Is there any way that you can help them? Do they struggle with something?
You've got a good network of people, or you're willing to put some work in.
Try to provide value value value to build up a relationship.
Share some information, if they respond back to you. That's very interesting. I found this.
Maybe you would like that.
It's something that I do a lot of with other people.
I find tools and stuff that I think would be very good for podcasting.
So I send it through to people and I just say I saw this, I'm using it, I'm testing it out, maybe you would like it.
You know, I don't do anything more than that.
Then we build up these nice little relationships where they would then say to me, "oh, I was thinking about this, and maybe you'd like to be part of what ever,"
So share information that you think can be useful for these people and could help them with their business. Okay?
Then the last thing.
How To Find A Business Mentor - Final Stage
Even at that stage, don't push or pressurize them.
Don't say right now, yeah, I've done all this for you. I want this from you.
Don't pressurize you know.
Just let it go naturally, just just make them fall in love with you to build up that relationship, okay.
If at this stage, they are still not willing for it, then move on to somebody else.
You know, you've really got to think about value first value first. But don't just go invade, don't just go in, I want your help know exactly what you're looking for.
Know exactly how they can help.
Really pick them up, praise them, do your research on them, and and be genuine and honest.
Don't just say," Oh, I love your work" if you've got no idea about it in any shape, or form.
Its quite easy to really think of how to find a business mentor.
You just start with doing things the right way...thats not hard after all.