Using your network to create business development opportunities

Anna Stubbs • July 25, 2024

People buy from people. It’s an obvious observation beloved of salespeople, but it’s also why networking is such a powerful tool for creating business development opportunities.

 

Networking helps build relationships with other professionals, share ideas and learn from each other. By connecting and partnering with the right people, you can create meaningful business relationships – relationships that may lead to new and innovative business opportunities.

Networking as your blueprint for success

 

Building a successful business network is essential. But how do you start developing these relationships with customers, suppliers and other business owners? And how does connecting with your peers help you broaden the scope of your opportunities?

 

Building up your network and connecting with people helps you:

 

  • Find potential customers and expand the reach of your brand – attending trade conferences and industry workshops gets you in front of your target audience. It’s a chance to chat, find out customer pain points and understand your audience.
  • Meet new business partners – networking at the right trade events also helps you meet other business owners in your sector, and in other complimentary industries. It’s an opportunity to forge new partnerships and create co-branded opportunities
  • Get referrals from trusted members of your network – when you have trusted relationships in your network, these people are far more likely to recommend your business to their own network. Word-of-mouth promotion is the best kind, after all.
  • Locate the perfect mentor – we all have something to learn from more experienced members of our network. This is a golden opportunity to seek out a mentor who can give you advice, share their experience and improve your management skills.



By taking the time to nurture your network and build relationships with the right people, you can open up a world of possibilities for your business. As a business adviser working across multiple sectors, we can introduce you to new people, connections and opportunities.

 

If you’re looking for an introduction to a new network, come and talk to us.

The importance of having a business coach

By Anna Stubbs • October 6, 2025
It can be lonely at the top when you're running your own business. As the owner manager, the buck stops with you and that can result in all the pressures of financial management, people management, strategy and business performance ending on your shoulders.  To ease this pressure, it's helpful to have a business coach. A coach can look at your business objectively as an outsider, will act as a professional shoulder to lean on, and can help you to focus on and enhance your business ideas, strategy and longer-term tactics as an owner.

Do you need to improve the cash flow position for your business?

By Anna Stubbs • October 6, 2025
Keeping on top of the financial management of your business can be hard work. It's possible to have a profitable business that is struggling to find the cash flow to pay expenses and fund growth. Likewise, you could have positive cash flow but are not turning a profit, particularly if you are scaling. Turning a profit is at the heart of running any successful company But without an even and predictable flow of cash into the company, you can't cover your overheads, you can't pay your employees and you can't run your day-to-day operations – let alone think about expanding and growing the business. In the end, you need both. But if you’re going to be in control of your financial destiny, it’s important to get your head around the important process of cash flow management.

Can you build a viable one-person business?

By Anna Stubbs • October 6, 2025
A solopreneur running a complete and viable one-person business is no longer a pipedream. Sam Altman, the co-founder of Open AI, was recently quoted as saying that a one-person, billion-dollar business could be possible by 2026-2028, using tools like GPT-5 and the other generative AI tools that allow individuals to create and manage AI agents. The idea that one person, a solo CEO and entrepreneur, could generate that kind of capital on their own, would have seemed crazy less than a decade ago. But with the power of AI and the accessibility of flexible coding tools and AI agents, it’s actually a real possibility. Let’s look at how a one-person business could work, and how the basic business model differs from the traditional tech start-up model that we’ve known for so many decades.