Ep 01 - Dan Wallace
"I'll Keep This in Mind": Dan Wallace on the Networking Trap That Kills Most Practices
Key takeaways
Broad networking events don't work because people forget. Dan tracked his yield and it was zero.
Only about 5% of people are genuine connectors who actually make introductions. Stop chasing the 95%.
Instead, have five intentional conversations per day with clients, prospects, or referral sources.
Ask about their challenges first. Only ask for introductions at the end.
Put every name that comes up into your CRM immediately, then review tasks weekly with your team.
Make the ask right after a good session when they've just experienced your work: "My best clients come from my best clients. If you know someone who'd benefit, I'd love to meet them."
Even natural givers forget when life gets busy. Your job is to remind them at the right moment.
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The Idea
"I'll keep this in mind."
That's the magic phrase. Dan heard it for years in Chicago, a great networking city, Midwest-nice, full of people who'd take the meeting and listen politely. He'd walk out having offered three or four introductions for them. They'd walk out with those five words.
"I looked back at that activity and asked, what's my yield been on that time? The answer was nil. I can't keep doing that."
So Dan stopped. No more networking events, no more broad coffees. And he figured out what was actually happening.
"Real, actual spontaneous givers, people genuinely wired to make introductions, is probably closer to five percent of the population."
Not the 25% Adam Grant writes about in Givers and Takers. Dan has had this conversation with Adam Grant directly. The research says 25. Dan's 16 years in the field says five.
These are people who get actual satisfaction from connecting two people they know. You don't need many of them. Dan says five or six. But when one of them introduces you, the dynamic is completely different.
"You start out with the shields down, with a neutral to favorable outlook rather than a defensive and negative one."
No cold email or LinkedIn message gets you there. The prospect arrives already warmed.
So Dan stopped networking broadly and started calling intentionally. Five good conversations a day, not dials, conversations, with a client, a prospect, or a referral source. Each call about them first: what's working, what's hard, anything he could actually help with. Then, at the end: "Right now I'm looking to add three clients. If you know anyone who might benefit, I'd love to be introduced."
The CRM helped. First stage in his pipeline: pre-VTH. Code for "heard about." The moment a name comes up in a conversation, it goes in the system with a task attached. And once a week: a one-hour call with his sales coach, his assistant, and a CRM admin, task review, deal board walkthrough, work order set for the week.
But the move that surprised me most was the simplest one.
His asks in the room.
The Steal
At the end of a good session, any good session, say this:
"My best clients come from my best clients. If you know someone who'd benefit from this kind of work, I'd love to meet them."
That's the script. No arm-twisting, no follow-up ask. A reminder, delivered at the moment they've just had eight hours of the thing, from someone they trust.
Dan's observation: even natural givers need to be reminded. The busy world takes care of the forgetting. You take care of the asking.
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