Chairman’s Business Networking Blog, Thursday 17th March 2016.
The pre breakfast meeting was buzzing. 22 Members and 4 visitors made for a record turnout at Mary Green Manor.
We welcomed Derek Buckle for the second meeting and he has handed in his application to join. A good start if ever there was one. Carmel Jane a photographer, Dannielle Wilshire of Excel Contracts Limited and Brian Johnston operations Director of National Client Experience Centre made up a healthy group of first time visitors.
After breakfast the meeting started in earnest with the Ed Slot and Nick Cooke holding the floor. His presence was truly biblical. All that was missing was the gnarled staff to bang on the floor to part the waves. He gave us an illustration as how he had managed to obtain a referral from Alan Shaw conjured out of nowhere. No thunder bolts and lightning greeted this announcement but Alan Shaw looked stunned anyway. When he sat down, we were all somewhat reassured by the fact that he would be appearing before us shortly in the 60 second round. Those who at the time were lying prostrate before him just sat up, dusted themselves down and awaited the 60 second round. Such was the force of his presence that the Naughty Corner was stunned into silence for at least a minute.
There was no theme to the 60 second round but somehow yesterday’s Chancellors speech brought forth a variety of references to budget.
Peter Hood told of a bathroom conversion which was well within budget because they used the old tiles which fortunately were white. I think that probably means that they were easy to replace and therefore supplemental and avoided a complete retile. Jill Willis urges us to budget for advertising which apparently should be 10% of turnover if we are to progress and 5% if we are to stand still. Paul Booth declared that there were some good changes in the budget.
Enough of politics; David Plumley has a telephone number of 888442 which he illustrated by getting different members to hold up pieces of paper with the relevant numbers on. Sounds a bit daft, it was a bit daft but actually it worked. Don’t know why I was surprised really…but I was.
Richard Reed is trying to get us all to go to Asia or find people who wish to go there. 5 nights in Hong Kong was only £639.00 per person. The rest rather passed me by, but no doubt we will be regaled with further offers as the week progresses.
Various things were also sent to frighten us. The secret is out, Scott Griffiths is a failed tooth fairy. Kim Redwood-Lee’s office had a threatening telephone call to kill and maim all members of her company and destroy their premises and their pets. The threats were met with a “…thank you for calling” response. Brian Painter really lead the way as far as frightening people was concerned. He started off with a reasonable impression of Marcelle Marceau striking up and lighting a cigarette inhaling and being suitably soothed by it. There then followed a harrowing list of the immediate effects of smoking; narrowing blood vessels, upping the heart rate and increasing blood-pressure. Fatty acids in the blood stream represented the final ingredient. The consequences were even more dire, angina( not the cute kind), coronary disease, stroke and of course cancer. It was enough to make you go out and buy lots of sweet fizzy drinks knowing they would not do you as much harm.
Pride of place both as to the scariest presentation but also the most effective was Dean Caldon who set out clearly exactly the hurdles that landlords will have to jump over if they are to get to the stage where an effective notice to quit can be served upon a tenant at the end of the term of their tenancy. It was Dean who accordingly won the Oscar and as we passed on to the 10 minute presentation Scott confirmed the meetings statistics where 25 referrals and in excess of £39,000.00 worth of business recorded.
Every good meeting deserves a good 10 minute presentation. No different today. Scott Griffiths produced a very clear explanation, with the use of the big screen, as to exactly what he does, how he does it and why he should be used for that purpose.
Numbers and quality caused the meeting to run over a bit but we had an excellent referrals round and it was a very upbeat group that finally dispersed into the sunshine. I am not asking you to do better next week; just as well as this week will do fine.
I am pleased to report that the Tooth Fairy did indeed visit Chateau Griff after all. Yes I had completely forgotten about it but all was saved by last minute action from Mrs G. Phew!
Probably the best meeting we’ve ever had, good turn out, a few visitors and an excellent 10 min presentation. I look forward to next week.
The highlight for me was having a go on Scott’s virtual reality goggles before the meeting. What a tempting little gadget!
Oh & great presentation from Scott!
Made a change from the Beer Goggles.
Congratulations David for handing in the application form, hope all go’s well at committee level. And a big well done to the member that brought him along. Good meeting as always, have a great weekend, although at the moment I’m listening to Dolly Parton on the radio, is that a good or bad start??, lol
I also had the experience with Scott’s virtual glasses, amazing! Wonderful attendance and optimistically the visitors will become members and not fade away.
Excellent meeting certainly the best for a long time – this is not just because of Scotts excellent 10 minutes but the great attendance which creates a buzz in the room, well done to Derek on joining and perhaps he will choose which “corner” to join soon………
Just goes to show how much better our meetings are with a larger attendance!! More members = more buzz, greater positive “feel” overall and (even more importantly) results in more referrals being passed.
Excellent meeting and well done Scott on a very clear description of what Eseyo does.
Another good meeting, great to have 4 guests along! I really like a recurring theme which comes up at the meetings, which is, if you want a job doing properly, you should be prepared to pay for it. Im a big believer that a lot of the time if you try to do things “on the cheap,” you might as well throw that money away and invariably it will cost you more in the longterm!!
Look forward to seeing you all next week,
Steve.
Great meeting everyone
Really enjoyed the presentation Scott nice and clear !
Hoping to see the visitors returning again next week .
Yes indeed. A very good meeting not least of all because of the presence of 4 visitors. Good 60 second deliveries all round and superb 10 minutes from Scott. Ed Slot – ahem! You are too kind Aidan.
Great meeting and as Brian said we need to convert visitors to members. It’s important that we keep up the pressure on inviting visitors because more members means more referrals, more business and more money. I have emailed MGM to request round tables for next week with a small top table so lets see how it works – hopefully more room.
A great buzz to the meeting with so many of us there. I think the presence of visitors, especially a record 4, makes current members try all the harder with their 60 seconds. It was only after I had returned from the meeting that I realised I had seen some VR goggles and assumed they were something to do with the 10 minutes presentation. Scott – maybe you will bring them in again?! Looking forward to today’s meeting!