If you’re networking with strangers, you’re wasting your time. A consultant friend of mine recently complained, “I’m doing 2-3 networking events a week – and I’m worn out.” When I asked why she felt networking was important, she replied, “One of my marketing goals is to do at least 1 networking event a week.” (I pointed out that she just admitted to doing 2-3 a week – and perhaps doing 1 a week is smart and doing triple that goal is causing some of the fatigue.) But there’s much more to the great American business myth of networking.

The ability to connect with people is essential to success in any business. Professional networking events present opportunities to interact with others on a personal level and to develop profitable relationships. These occasions are critical for anyone who wants to grow a business or promote a career.

Many people are simply not comfortable walking into a room full of strangers and striking up conversations. Here are five common stumbling blocks that you may face and tips to help you overcome them.

Once you have made the all important decision to use social networking platforms as part of your online marketing strategy for your internet marketing business. However first of all you must plan your strategy in great detail quite simply because when you do anything new you have to understand the rules of the game which in otherwords means you must understand your new internet marketing platform in order to produce an effective result when engaging with the others on the social networking platform. When the marketing platform is different your style needs to be different from your other marketing styles.