Getting though to people, it’s a snap

I love my little digital camera. It has been just the thing for getting through to people and having them respond.

My camera is a couple of years old, it’s a two megapixel job, which I discovered gives me just enough resolution to read the name tags of people I take pictures of … if I squint.

Traditionally, I have taken a couple of happy snaps at events then posted the images on the website. If there was a caption, it would read something like: “See what you missed out on – lots of happy, important people networking.”

Then came the moment of inspiration. I knew that selling has a strong relationship with the number of times you touch a person. So I thought, wouldn’t it be clever, if not only did I take lots of photos of people chatting at an event, but emailed them the photos. An excuse to touch them again and get them thinking good thoughts about the Churchill Club.

So at my How to Build a Killer Board event I took photos of about 60 people. I couldn’t figure out who about 10 people were (and thus why the pixel resolution is actually important) and 10 were really bad photos, but I emailed out the other 40 with a “Hope you enjoyed the night” note.

Now here’s the interesting thing. Not only did I get a reply from every recipient, but they all added a personal note plus a whole heap of testimonials: “Loved the event”, “Thanks for having me”, “Thought the material was great”, “Keep me on your list”.

Then the bonus, of the 40 people I sent the pictures to, almost every single one has attended other events since. I love my camera.