Importance of Developing a Network

Wow… what a start to 2009. Two of my sites went down due to database errors, and nobody is around to help… right?

To most people doing business online seems like a isolated position, but, for the most part, that couldn’t be further away from the truth. In fact, many of the top online businessmen are there because they developed a solid network.

Back to my database errors. I was in the process of updating all my sites to wordpress 2.7, but instead I copied over one wrong config file and suddenly everything went crazy. Sites were down here and there. Being the holiday time, professional support was obviously hard to come by.

Luckily, I have developed a network of other online peers who were able to bail me out of my situation. Once the site went down, I sent an email to all of them. Within 15 minutes, I had people who were more than willing to help me out.

Again, many people often compare computers to anti-social. We work online so we could avoid human interaction; however, while it may be email or telephone, this is still interaction. Without a strong network, being successful at anyting you do online would be quite a hill to climb.

Besides tech support, networks can help you market stuff, bounce ideas off each other, and even create new partnerships you may have not done one your own.

How to Build a Network

The way I started my network was by contacting other people running blogs or businesses within my own niche. The Wild Investor was my first site and it was a finance site, so I found other people in the same market and simple emailed them. The more we email each other, the better relationship that will be built.

Bottom Line: Whether you want to believe it or not, you don’t know everything. I may be good at picking stocks, but I might not know everything about working with databases and building sites. With a strong network, you don’t have to know everything. Your peers are there to help you.