How much do you prepare for networking events? I don’t mean researching the speakers or deciding which talks to go to. I mean really thinking about why you’re at the event in the first place, what your goals are for this event and how you can have meaningful conversations. If the answer to that first question is not a lot, then this is your networking masterclass.

“One of the biggest problems I see is that people go to networking events in the mindset of selling,” says Mark Rhodes. Besides being the author of How to Talk to Absolutely Anyone, Rhodes is a successful entrepreneur, speaker and mentor. He’s developed a fascination with mindset and has written books about subtle changes that people can make for better outcomes. For example, in networking events…

“The majority of people go into a panic state about networking,” he says. “As human beings, there are a couple of things we really don’t like. One is walking into a room full of people we don’t know and the other one is speaking in public. You may be talking to a group of strangers about your business and what you do and it gets even scarier.”

He gives an example of a conference that has its first session at 10 AM but has a 9 o’clock arrival for breakfast and networking. Lots of people sit in the car thinking, “I hate networking” and enter the venue at 9.50 or 9.55. They then walk into a packed room that is full of people they don’t know and it’s even more difficult to get into a conversation… so this dislike of networking becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Rhodes is qualified to talk about this topic because he was one of these people. “I was very socially anxious and shy,” he says. How shy? He once faked a car accident, breaking its lights to make it seem more realistic, just to get out of a 30-second presentation reading from a sheet of paper to 10 people. Fast forward to today and Rhodes does 90-minute presentations with no slides to rooms of 500-plus people on a regular basis.

One of the ways Rhodes broke his negative mindset around networking was to arrive first. “If they say 9 o’clock,” he says, “get there at 8.40 and see if you can get in. It will probably just be the organisers there, but you can say to them, ‘I work in this particular area, is anyone from my industry coming along?’ But what’s going to happen is the first few people are going to start turning up and start chatting to you. The event will then build around you. You’re then going to have your confidence before the masses get in.”

Preparation for an event, though, should happen even earlier than that. Fuel for easy icebreakers can happen on the way to the venue. “Parking is a nightmare here”, “parking is so easy, I should come here more often” and “the Tube ride is so much easier than I thought” provide easy fodder but the real magic can be visualised in imaginary conversations beforehand.

“If you’re standing around at a networking event and someone comes to talk to you, most likely they are going to ask what do you do. I think preparation is the key to being confident,” says Rhodes.

“Someone once said to me at an event, ‘My name’s Marie and you won’t want to talk to me because I’m in insurance and that’s boring.’ I challenged her to change the way she said that, that’s not misleading, but that can make people curious and interested. I thought about what insurance companies do. When stuff goes wrong, they’re supposed to pay out. So, I said, ‘When people say, what do you do? Say, ‘Well, when things go wrong in life for people, I help put it right’.”

Another way to subtly reframe and intrigue is not to talk about your role and your company but instead adopt an X, Y, Z statement. This is where you say I or we help X (this is the target market) to achieve Y (which is a benefit or an outcome) so that Z (which is what Rhodes refers to as ultimate emotional gain – the benefit beyond the benefit).

He gives an example of what he’d say at a networking event attended by legal professionals: “When people ask what I do, rather than say, ‘Hi, I’m Mark Rhodes. I’m a business coach or I do sales training’ I say, ‘Funnily enough, I help solicitors win more clients and earn more fees.’ Preparation is key. Think about the outcome you want and then plan accordingly. What am I going to say? What am I going to say to make it interesting? What am I going to say to engage people?”

The obvious next focus is body language, but Rhodes looks at this a little differently than most. We do things automatically as humans. If we’re depressed, we sit in similar ways, if we’re excited or confident, we will walk pretty much the same. That means we don’t really need to learn how to do body language, because if our body language is wrong, it means our mindsets are wrong.

“We’ve got to change what we’re thinking and how we’re feeling because that is what’s driving our body language,” he says. “For instance, all week a shy person will think, ‘I don’t want to go to this networking. I’ll probably end up on my own with no one to talk to.’ So as they come in the door, because they think they’re going into a dreadful situation, they will avoid eye contact and stand at the edge of the room.

“People will think they want to be left alone or they’re in deep thought and ignore them. They go out at the end of the night and think, ‘I hate networking events. Everyone was horrible and I’m never going again.’

“A confident person on the other hand will go into a networking event and think, ‘I can’t wait to get to that networking event and meet some new people. I bet there could be a lot of opportunities for me and others there.’ That person is naturally going to walk in with their head up and smile because they’re excited to go there, not dreading it.”

He stresses that it’s not about faking it. One of the ways to achieve this confident state of mind is through visualisation. Much like manifestation, this tool helps you practice a good flowing conversation and feel comfortable so that when you go to do it, you’ve already done it in your mind. For the naysayers, Rhodes points out that there’s one time in life when everyone uses visualisation – when learning to drive.

“For most things in life, human beings make one or two mistakes and they give up,” he says. “And if they make a mistake, and other people see them make a mistake and they embarrass themselves, most people will never do that thing again. However, this isn’t the case when it comes to driving. When 28 cars are queued up at the third change of the traffic lights on the hill, everyone knows that the learner driver at the front is getting it all wrong. But that driver will go back and get in that car week after week.

“I think that the main reason is that they visualised it. It’s a big life moment. They imagine going to work or going out with their friends at the weekend and they feel good about it. That same mentality can apply at a networking event or achieving a business goal.”

So, what should your goal be for a networking event? This will obviously depend on the type of business you run and the sector it is in, but be sure to clearly write down what you want to achieve before walking through the venue door. Do you want to make a connection with a specific person you know is attending the event? Find a new supplier or mentor? Uncover top talent? Build awareness of your brand within a certain demographic? Whatever the reason, ensure it is front of mind well ahead of time.

Rhodes points out that having targets within the overall goal can help you achieve this too. It’s human nature to keep in conversation with people you know or the first few people that you meet. But consciously focusing on not falling into this habit could reap rewards. “Say to yourself, ‘My goal at this event is to talk to at least five people that I’ve not met before. Once I’ve done that, I’m free to talk to all the people I’ve met before and engage with them’,” says Rhodes.

He also recommends open-ended questions such as, “What keeps you busy during the week?” It’s just a different way of asking a question that gives people more width to open up.

Other tips include openly asking people, “Who else here do you know that would be useful for me to talk to?” Don’t feel comfortable going straight up to someone you don’t know? Hang around the tea or coffee station. Keep your notes app open on your phone. Once you’ve spoken to someone, write down their name and job title, along with something memorable from the conversation that you can refer back to in follow-up conversations.

But most importantly, there’s one thing you need to keep front and centre. “Everyone’s there for the same reason,” says Rhodes. “It’s not like it’s some private ceremony going on that you’ve gate-crashed and now you’re going to start to try and start a conversation with someone in an environment where you’re supposed to all stay silent and not talk to each other.

“Everyone’s in the same boat. However, someone said this to me years ago: networking has got the word ‘working’ in it. You have to work at it.”

Mark Rhodes’ book How to Talk to Absolutely Anyone is available now.