Organised by Realken International Ltd, in partnership with Networking4professionals, the events objectives are:

• Recognize the efforts of all the participants of the Invest in Africa Build Africa Expos. The event will recognize the achievements and contribution, of all sponsors, exhibitors and other stakeholders of the real estate industry and financial markets, towards attracting the Diaspora and other foreign investors to invest in Kenya.

• Officially launch Invest in Africa Build Africa Expo 2009 campaign in Kenya;

• Provide a forum for past exhibitors and investors to share their experiences with interested stakeholders All the major players in real estate, finance and investment, especially those who have been and wish to tap on the Diaspora community will be represented.

This event will form an excellent platform upon which all attendees – sellers and buyers – will not only reflect on the past success and failures but also create a platform upon which to determine the modalities to adopt to ensure that the current barriers, failures and flaws have been addressed and existing opportunities identified and exploited for the betterment of all players.

Get the information you need

The top echelon in the government, real estate agents and developers, bankers, shares and stocks dealers, ICT players among others will be represented. The feedback received on the past events will be reviewed and issues raised by individuals, groups and corporate investors in Kenya and in the Diaspora in the course of events, exhibitions and marketing drives held earlier will be addressed.

As with most networking events, your prospect of maximising information and contacts acquisition depends on your networking skills. To constantly make strong and fruitful connections you need to following up, keeping in touch, determine and making contact with spheres of influence, and form win–win strategic alliances and groups. Networking websites, such as Networking4professionals provides a platform upon which you can do all these by connecting to members and forming groups, posting questions and making follow-up on specific issues on one-one basis or as a group. Reading and posting questions, articles, reviews, comments and participating in online surveys will greatly enhance your networks.

Building networks takes time, effort and sincerity. Attending such an event will give you an initial contact but your active follow-up, contribution and treating your networks and the people within them with respect and integrity will enable them to reciprocate by remembering who you are and providing you with the support you need. It is worth noting these networking rules:

• The law of abundance: There are plenty of opportunities for everyone – plenty of ideas, clients, customers, jobs and so on.

• The law of reciprocity: What you give out comes back tenfold. If you give out help, you get back help; give out love, you get back love; give out information, you get back information. Although your giving is instant and in the short term, the receiving may not necessarily be short term or from the same person but it sure shall come back sometime.

• The law of giving without expectation: It pays to give without an expectation of receiving something, but because you want to help them achieve their goal.

Making heart-to-heart connections with people when talking, by being totally focused on the talking to you, regardless of whether you think they could be a prospect, client, new friend or just someone to add to their network pays enormously. Every person you connect with forms part of your networking jigsaw, and every stranger have potential to become an important connection within your network.

Developing strong clusters of networks across a broad cross-section of interests, age groups, demographics and cultures often wield enormous influence. In such an event, which will be attended by numerous people with spheres of influence, forms a groundwork upon which you can thrive in that a positive word about you from one of these key players carries a lot of weight and influence. Your products, services and requirements will be passed on to prospective customers of service providers by those you network with.

This event will give you target networking with specialised professionals in their spheres of operation. You will be able to collect information and materials from various attendees – buyers and sellers – that will be vital for enhancing your business, investment or even career opportunities. This will be enhanced by effective and efficient follow ups and keeping in touch with your preferred networks. Remember that if you do not value your networks you will not have them for long and you will often not succeed in your goals.

Strategic alliances

The purpose of networking, for most of us, is to form strategic alliances and beneficial relationships. Your ability to know what you require, who is who in the sector you are interested in and the major players and trends help you in selecting prospective partners. You need to decide how much you are prepared invest in terms of time and money based on what the other party is offering. It is vital that the other party is equally committed. They are hard to get and master and like many of the important relationships in our lives, they take time to yield results. None-the-less, they are a great and highly productive way of spreading your influence to a much wider network. It is not what you know, but who knows what you know.

Happy networking!

FRANK

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