Have you ever gone to see a live band you knew nothing about because of some flyer that said ” Best music you will ever hear!” or some such claim? How about when a friend tells you the exact same thing about the same band? Will you consider checking them out now? Quite likely (depending on the friend’s taste in such things, of course!). Why?

You already know the answer. Its because you trust the source is passing on information they think will benefit you, not just because they want to sell you something.  That’s why word of mouth is so valuable. And why networking can be such a goldmine. ‘Can be” being the key phrase.

Networking gives you an amazing reach, helping you get in contact with large portions of your market that would be difficult to contact otherwise. But unless people recommend you or you are seen as a like-able and trusted source, all your networking efforts are not going to get you anywhere.

For example, no one likes spammers. But they infiltrate every networking site on the web. However, it literally takes millions of messages for them to hit upon one newbie that isn’t going to think they are a scam AND wants what they’re selling. But for a business that wants to build a reputation and a loyal market, that is not going to work.

So the first rule of cultivating yourself as a trusted source (and getting those who trust you to spread the word) is “Don’t overwhelm and annoy your market”. No 20 tweets an hour or emails every day. You will get ignored with this approach. Your complete disregard for people’s time will only result in people dropping off your email  and twitter followers lists. It’s a waste of time.

The second rule is simply “Build trust by being real.” so you can be considered a reliable messenger and others will become messengers for you. Building trust takes work but it’s not hard work.

• Reach out personally to people. Personal contact is so rare that most people will decided to check your business out just because of that, regardless of your message or product.
• Be helpful. There is not better way to build trust or gain fans than to offer truly useful assistance.
• Be comical and lighthearted. It doesn’t matter how serious your business is, life is funny and people like to laugh. Laugh at yourself, make quips about your product, and laugh at other people’s funnies. If you can laugh, especially at yourself, people will trust you.
• Interact with people. Pass on recommendations from people in your network and when posting information, make it useful so people want to come to you for information. Answer every message and email  you get. If you just can’t do it personally, pay someone to do it for you–it is that important. Ignoring people is the best way to turn off a potential customer or client and start bad word of mouth.

Yes, all this can be very time consuming, at least initially. I used to spend half or more of my time just chasing work but now, I rarely have to, with work coming to me through repeat business from loyal clients and great word of mouth. I spent a lot of time initially building trust and rapport through my networks and existing clients and now, it’s more just maintenance.

So go ahead, just be real. Be human. Be the kind of person you’d trust to steer you to businesses you want to deal with.