Last week I wrote about BNI and wondered if BNI was a good place to meet mavens and connectors. (click here for original post.)

I was reading Dr. Ivan Misner’s book The 29% Solution: 52 Weekly Networking Success Strategies…

And right in the introduction he quotes some of the same research used in Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference.

Ever hear of the 6 degress of seperation?

The reality is there is no such thing.  This was research done in the 70′s and 80′s where people who had no direct connection were asked to get in touch with a specific person in New York City.  This is where the 6 degrees of seperation comes from, because in the test results the average person took 6 connections to connect with the specific person in New York City.

The reality of the test was that in the best test only 29% of people were able to connect with the specific person.  That means 71% of them failed.

Back to my original point.  Dr Ivan Misner in his book is talking about ways you can improve your networking skills.  He talks about ways that you can become one of the 29% who has enough connections and clout that you can “connect” with anyone.  This is a key to becoming a successful network marketer and these are the kind of people I personally am looking for in my business.  I guess that’s one reason why so many successful network marketers I know are members of BNI.  BNI is a social networking group for business professionals.

BNI is founded by Dr. Ivan Misner the man whose book tells us how to become “mavens” and “connectors” like Malcolm Gladwell speaks about.

Having said all that… and knowing that BNI is a great place to network… I’m going to my first BNI meeting tomorrow!

I’ll keep you posted of my results.

- Ben Fitts

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