Your networking tool belt: what every youth leader needs to network effectively

Tool belt item #1: A way to communicate information about you and your ministry

Photo by rahims from Flickr

The most popular way of exchanging contact information is the business card. Business cards are not bulky, easy to pass around, and conveniently short on words.

You can buy business card templates now and print your own. This might be easier than going to your local print shop, like Kinkos/FedEx Office, and it allows you to be more personal than using your church’s business card (In fact, I am in favor of personalized business cards where you can list your social networking URLs).

What should you put on your business card?

I am in the process of creating some new business cards, so I am exploring different options and trying to decide what to put on my card. Here are the things I am considering having on my new cards:

1. Name
2. Photo (a nice, professional one)
3. Church/position
4. Office number (I prefer not to print my cell phone number on my cards, but I often write the number on the back of the card for people I trust with it)
5. My Facebook and Twitter URLs
6. My blog’s URL and tagline
7. A list of skills that I can offer to people. The sentence at the bottom of the card might read, “Need help with web design, video editing, graphic design, or questions about youth ministry in general? Give me a call or shoot me an email!”

These are just some ideas. What do you put on yours?

A social networking profile can work as a business card in the online world. LinkedIn is a great service offering a public professional profile. Facebook and Twitter offer a comparable networking experience.

Additional reading on business cards:

• What should you put on your business cards? – Matt lists some different items that typically go on a business card, then suggests creating a more comprehensive profile that lists more information.
• Should you put your photo on your business card? – This article argues that a photo helps market you as a product. While I disagree with the idea of “selling ourselves,” a photo might help others remember who you are more clearly, especially in youth ministry, where much of our ministry is our interaction with people.
• 10 tips for what to put on your business card – Ten additional suggestions for what to put on your business card.

Tool belt item #2: A way to organize other people’s information

The worst way to organize other people’s contact information is by having a pile of business cards you collected from a convention hidden in your desk. The best way to make this information accessible to you is by putting it in one place.

Web-based contact management system

The good ol’ fashioned Rolodex works great, but I prefer to use an online service called Highrise. I like Highrise because not only can I add contact information, I can also:

• Upload a photo of the person
• Tag the contact with key words such as “youth communicator” or “video guru” for future reference
• Leave notes to remind me of the different conversations or meetings I’ve have with this person

Highrise’s free version works perfectly and allows you to store up to 250 contacts. The pay services offer additional features, including multiple users in case you want to share contact with other people. I will be talking more about how to use Highrise in the future.

Is there anything I am missing? Is there anything that you use to network that works really well? Please leave a comment below.

Coming up next: For the next week, we’re going to take a look at some fundamental networking strategies. First, we will explore different ways to network with local youth leaders in person. Then, we will take a look at how to connect with other youth leaders online.