BlackStar is Ecademy’s premium membership. It demands a time and personal commitment to make it work. Not everyone gets that. Some time ago I wrote about BlackStar whatever next >
In just one line of that blog I summed up what happens at BlackStar Boardrooms at the regular monthly meeting. I said:
In London we spend time in small groups focusing on providing peer support for each other on specific issues
Ah, the art of understatement!
What are BlackStar Boardrooms?
BlackStar Boardrooms bring groups of BlackStars together through a structured agenda to provide support, advice and guidance to each other. In the process (and one that has been honed over 5 years) the group digs deep to gain a real understanding of the help that is needed and gets the wheels in motion to provide it. The power of these groups really is extraordinary, but because we hold these sessions at every BlackStar Meeting there is a risk that to those on the inside of the group they are just considered ordinary.
This week in Guildford with our colleagues from NRG we held just such a group. There were non BlackStars there, well I say they were non BlackStars, because since then they have joined.
Why would they do that. Well first of all – If you are seeking help you get the undivided attention of maybe six others for up to an hour. Professional, experienced business people, for an hour, what’s that worth? £600? £1,800? maybe more. There’s often 200 years of business experience at your disposal. Secondly, if you are providing help what do you get? a real understanding of six other business people, how they think, what they really know about. What’s that worth when you need it?
If you can’t attend a physical meeting you can always be there for a phone conference Boardroom and I run one of those monthly. The same happens there, it really is phenomenal. In 2010, there will be meetings in many parts of the UK, not just London. Belgium, Holland, Denmark and other European centres and elsewhere, if there isn’t a meeting near you Ecademy and I support members who want to set them up and run them locally. We anticipate many many more in 2010. As an example, the Chicago meeting this year was remarkably powerful, amazing.
Now, Boardrooms are confidential, unless the participants agree, so I’ll not tell any stories about how it helped others, but I can tell you about my return on the investment I made.
My return on investment.
Another Ecademy member asked me about my ROI and their question set me thinking. I did some sums and was surprised, pleasantly.
My company does a lot of corporate work and much of this was derived through BlackStar last year and mostly delivered using BlackStars as associates. Skilled capable people working under the Abelard Brand delivering great service for our customers. I’ve been able as a result to focus on delivering . I know that it was being at several meetings and particularly BlackStar Boardrooms building relationships that brought that work to me.
The BlackStar Boardrooms allowed me to hone the offer I was making, and get much better at communicating it; in doing so I taught 20 or 30 people directly about me and my business – The 20 or 30 corporate contacts they each new meant that I reached an audience of 400-600 corporate people in the course of each year – Of course business developed from that. My experience is that participating in an individual BlackStar meeting and Boardroom generates tens of thousands of pounds of revenue over the ensuing months. It’s worth me travelling from Bristol (total cost at least £200 with petrol, trains, hotels, food etc) for that. Is it a direct connection? Can I attend and then issue the invoice? – No, of course not, and it takes time to build up. Give it between 18 months and three years, and I’m sorry there are no shortcuts.
Looking at the total costs of attending with a realistic opportunity cost charge for my time and I still show a much greater than 500% Revenue ROI, but it took time, but that number is still growing. In a years time it might well be over 10 fold return on investment. Of course that’s just me, others may have done more or less, but I know that those who put in the time and make the effort get the rewards. That’s just revenue though, Every month I get advice that would cost at least £600 to buy, for a spend of £200, the returns are truly extraordinary.
This year I’m negotiating for some very close collaborations with other BlackStars that will lead to much bigger contracts, with people who I only got to know through putting in the time.
Thomas Power, Chairman of Ecademy, says it takes a year to Know people, a year to become Liked and a Year to become Followed. Business flows after that. Penny Power write about that in Know Me, Like Me, Follow Me, it matches my experience.
Of course you can do transactions in other places, but it’s hard to scale and grow them. I do work through Linkedin too – I’ll probably do the same amount this year as I did 3 years ago. It’s all transactional and none is relationship based, I can’t regularly meet the same people and nothing is organised off line unless I do it. It ends up in the “too hard” bucket, and I enjoy what comes along transactionally. Of course there may be ways to use Linked in that I’m not doing or haven’t found, but when I talk to others who get work there they don’t indicate anything special or different.
It taught me this about my networking, and when people say they can’t get Ecademy or Blackstar to work I ask them:-
- Do you attend meetings regularly or recently where the same group of people are present so you can build deep relationships with them? (Eg. BlackStar Events/Teleconference calls)?
- Do you engage in the forums and places on-line where those people are?, (eg The BlackStar Community Forum)?
- Do you engage in a Boardrooms style intimate business development group? (eg. BlackStar Boardrooms)?
- Do you have regular 121′s?
- Are you using BlackStar/Ecademy/Networking with a business focus or just socialising and hoping?
- Do you expect to get something from BlackStar/Ecademy/Networking or do they expect to give something to BlackStar/Ecademy/Networking?
- How many referrals have you given to others who work in your target market. After all if no one in your target market is giving referrals where are yours going to come from?
- What’s the timeframe for your expected return?
The answers to these questions are always illuminating and point to where strategy is missing or tactically poorly applied.
The ROI only comes when you contribute to the community and attend meetings and build relationships, share knowledge and give referrals. If you do that it’s extraordinary.
I’m always saddened when I see people who could commit to BlackStar and build a great return who don’t because they can’t see the power of it, only to join later and find out about what they missed. The biggest thing they have missed is the time that has passed and that just can’t be given back.
