Networking is a form of collaboration. Collaboration can take place in a multitude of situations. You can head off to a business networking group with a stack of business cards in your pocket and meet potential customers and referral sources for your business. You can collaborate with co-workers on completing a project at work. You can even network with your friends and family in a variety of ways.
One option for networking with your friends, family and other people you know is to create a savings or coupon network. Especially in tough economic times, people are always looking to save a buck here and there. If you put your mind to it, you can easily set up a coupon network among the people you know. So, here is how it may work:
Let’s say you and five of your friends all receive the Sunday newspaper. Everyone knows the Sunday newspaper is a goldmine of coupons. Pull out the coupon booklets and clip your coupons as you normally would. Take the booklets of coupons leftover to work the following day and hand them to your first co-worker that is part of the group. They clip the coupons they use and then hand the booklets on to the next person, and so forth and so on.
If you sign-up to receive special offers, such as LL Bean coupons, when you receive a special offer, forward the email coupon or savings offer to your group of friends. If you hear about a special sale a store is having in town or you see one while out shopping, spread the word by calling each member of your coupon networking group or blast out an email to all of them. While you are doing all of the this coupon and savings sharing, so are the other members of your networking group. This spreads the savings around your network.
