Create Connections: 5 Steps to (Instantly) Connect with Anyone

If you are in sales, then learning how to create connections quickly is the key to creating more selling opportunities.

And when you get good at it, it actually draws other people to you.

Think about it. The last time that you connected with somebody that you thought was a great contact to have, didn’t you tell other people about them?

So you want to make sure you can master the skill of building connections with other people.

5 Key Steps to (Instantly) Create Connections with Anyone

There are five key steps I’m going to walk you through that I found are highly successful with my coaching clients in building instant connections with anyone quickly.

1. Create Connections by Bringing Your Enthusiasm!

First off, there’s one simple step you need to begin with, and that is bring your enthusiasm.

Can you imagine if I started a video by saying in a monotone voice, “Hi, I am Sean Casemore, I think you’re gonna enjoy this video. Please watch it all the way through.”

You wouldn’t watch the video, you’d move to the next video or dislike this video. (I’d immediately defeat my goal, by the way.)

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So you need to make sure you always bring some enthusiasm to every interaction you have with others, because that starts to create some interest and curiosity: “Hey, hold on a second. Who is this person? Maybe here’s somebody I want to connect with.”

2. Prepare for Creating Connections by Reading the Room

The second strategy I want you to use is read the room. Anytime you want to connect with somebody, take a look around you of what’s happening.

So for example, if you go into somebody’s office, maybe it’s a buyer, you’re going in to have a meeting with them for the first time, and you want to build an instant connection, take a look around the office. Are there pictures of their family? Are there trophies that they’ve won? Are there any signs of hobbies?

These allow you to find a reason to connect. For example, oftentimes when I go in and speak to somebody, one of the things I’ll invariably see is a picture of them and their children, if they have children.

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If they do, I say, oh, interesting, you have children. How old are they? They tell me, I share how old my boys are. And then invariably we get into some sort of conversation.

Now, here’s the key. When you read the room, you pick up more than one of those signals. So if they say, “I have kids, we don’t spend a lot of time together”, I might say, “Oh great, I noticed over here you had a trophy. You also do some fishing. I used to fish when I was younger.”

So by reading the room, what you can actually do is understand more about that person’s life and in turn give you things to talk about.

Now, here’s a little tip for you, kind of a bonus tip. If you’re not in the room, maybe you’re trying to make a connection through social media, you can always take a look at their profile to see what they like, what they comment on, because that also gives you an idea of what their interests are, which you can then in turn comment on as well.

3. Create Connections by Mimicking Your Buyer

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This third tip is key to really building a strong connection.

So we’ve got the retention, we’ve identified some things we may have in common that we can start the conversation with. Now we really want to build and solidify that connection.

You want to do this, you want to make sure you mimic your buyer.

Hear me out. You’ve probably heard of mirroring your buyer. You’ve probably heard of, you know, mimicking exactly what the other person does. That’s not my goal. If they stand up, I’m not saying you immediately stand up.

However, what you do want to do is

Notice the behavior and communication style of your buyer, and then somewhat mimic that.

For example, when you’re speaking to somebody who’s a buyer, and ask them a question, they tend to sit back and think for a moment before they respond. It’s okay for you to think for a moment before you respond.
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Meaning, if you jump to your answers when they ask you questions, it can actually hurt the trust that you’re trying to build because the other person in this scenario may assume that while they’re really not thinking through what they’re saying.

So, I want to be observant of the behavior and communication style of the other person of my buyer in the case of sales, and I want to make sure I mimic that to some degree. The goal is not to be a copycat.

• If they take some notes, I might also take some notes.
• If they speak in a certain volume, I’m gonna try and mimic that volume, right?

Why do we do this? Because it’s been shown psychologically that when we have similar behaviors and communication styles to others, they tend to be more accepting of us because they presume we’re very similar to them.

So that’s strategy number three.

4. Create Connections by Letting the Other Person Drive (Ask Open-Ended Questions)

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Now, if you really want to build an instant connection, you need to master this next tip, this is number four.

Make sure you learn how to let the other person drive.

Now I’m not saying drive a car, but drive the conversation.

So here is the trick: This is why it’s kind of part art and part science and a little bit of strategy mixed in because you need to make sure that you’re clear on your goals and objectives for the conversation. Which in our case is to build a connection and to have some next step that we’re gonna talk to them about and meet with them about, right? So that’s our goal. We then are mimicking how they’re behaving and communicating to try and help build that connection.

We also need to make sure we let them drive. And the best way to do that is ask questions:

• Tell me about why you agreed to meet with me today.
• Tell me more about why this certain initiative is important to you.
• Tell me why now is the time to make this investment.

And when you ask these open-ended questions, you sit back and listen.

What you’re doing is you’re getting them to talk more and share more with you, which only serves to help you.

But in essence, you’re letting them drive the conversation. You’re simply asking a few questions. When you do this, what tends to happen is people start to build a connection with you because you’re listening to them.

And what are they thinking? “Wow, this person asks great questions and they’re actually hearing me out. They’re actually listening to what I say.”

Think about it. In any one day, how often do you think people are really listening to you? Probably not that often, but if you were to ask open-ended questions and sit patiently and wait for the answer, you in fact are listening.

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Your buyer will recognize that. And so not only will you learn some intelligence that’s going to help you build the relationship even further, it will also help you create the perception that you hear what they have to say and you want to listen to them, which is true. But that in turn helps build a strong connection.

5. Nurture Connections by Having a Clear Next Step

So you’ve taken all the steps so far. The key now is to make sure that this instant connection that you’ve built is really solidified. That is, it’s something that’s not going to go anywhere.

We’ve probably all met those people where we had a great connection and then we went away. It maybe it was a couple weeks past, we try and reach them again and they’re gone. The key is to make sure that there is a next step in this building of a connection so that we can continue building the connection.

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Let’s be honest, we make an instant connection, but solid connections come after years of work and effort. So this last step to solidify this connection is to make sure that there is a clear next step.

So are you gonna meet with them again? And if so, what is the date? Let’s get it on their calendars. If there’s somebody you’re gonna introduce them to, if so, make the introduction the same day, right?

We want to start to build value so that the other individual sees the value in maintaining a connection with us. And the way we do that is really by ensuring there’s a next step that we are going to deliver on to help them.

So that’s the final strategy I want you to apply to really solidify this connection you’ve built.

Get Your Action Planner & Continue to Create Connections With Others

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If you want to become successful in sales, you need to make sure that you track and manage all of the activities that you’re doing on a daily basis.

The key, however, is how do we best do this in a way that works?

What I found is that by writing down our goals both weekly and daily, it allows us to stay on track. And for that reason, I created what I call the 30-Day Sales Action Planner. This is a way for you to get up off the ground and really launch and accelerate your sales success over the next 30 days.

Click the link and download it in PDF form. You can fill it in as a PDF or you can print it off and write on it. Whatever you prefer to do, it’s complimentary. It’s my gift to you. Download your 30-Day Sales Action Planner and put it to work today.

And I would suggest as a next step, you watch this video here to learn how to continue to build trust and rapport with your connections.

© Shawn Casemore 2023. All Rights Reserved.