The Beauty of Flywheel Networking

The networking model that has the world's top business professionals capitalizing on the dual benefits of The Network and The Flywheel Effects.

Over the last year or two, I noticed a new networking model that has emerged with the world’s top professionals.

It involves the breakthroughs that come from combining the unstoppable momentum of growing your network with the massive value and impenetrable barriers that are created in the process.

For the lack of a better phrase, I coined this as “flywheel networking”.

So, what exactly is flywheel networking?

It’s the combination of two business phenomena that have changed the world.

The Flywheel Effect

The Flywheel effect is a concept developed in the book Good to Great by Jim Collins:

No matter how dramatic the end result, good-to-great transformations never happen in one fell swoop. In building a great company or social sector enterprise, there is no single defining action, no grand program, no one killer innovation, no solitary lucky break, no miracle moment. Rather, the process resembles relentlessly pushing a giant, heavy flywheel, turn upon turn, building momentum until a point of breakthrough, and beyond.

In simplest terms, the flywheel effect is a metaphor used in business to describe how baby steps can build momentum over time to help a professional grow.

The flywheel effect happens when your small wins build on each other over time and eventually gain so much momentum that growth almost seems to happen by itself, much like the momentum created by a flywheel on a rowing machine.

Types of Flywheels:

1. Content Flywheel - a system where every piece of content you create feeds into the growth and momentum of the next piece of content.
2. Flywheel Marketing - an inbound marketing strategy that places customers at the center of your marketing efforts. It works to attract new prospects and turn current customers into brand advocates.
3. Flywheel Networking - a new type of networking system that combines the benefits of the flywheel effect and the network effect to create the “prefect storm” for building your network.

The common denominators for building a flywheel system are momentum and time.

Examples of The Flywheel Effect:

• Amazon- Developed the virtuous cycle, finding lower prices leads to more customer visits, leading to more sales, which leads to better returns on fixed costs, which allows for further lowering of prices.
• Uber - More drivers caused less wait time and cheaper fares, which caused more riders to join and more rides to be taken, which stimulated more drivers.
• Tesla - Focused on technological advances that led to great products, as well as an extremely strong brand that’s driving change towards a more sustainable future. This resulted in a massive amount of positive word of mouth which lead to more sales, lower costs (advertising, etc.) and more innovation.

The Network Effect

The network effect is a business principle that highlights the idea that when more people use a product or service, its value increases.

The especially true on digital platforms.

Examples of The Network Effect:

• Social Media - Facebook, Twitter
• Recruiting - LinkedIn, Indeed
• Food-Delivery - Grubhub, DoorDash

Network effects are typically positive feedback systems, resulting in users deriving more and more value as more users join the same network.

Introducing The Flywheel Network

The Flywheel Effect + The Network Effect = The Flywheel Network

Hopefully, you had seen the “endless loop” that is in both of the models above.

By combining 1.) your persistence with positive networking activities (connecting strangers, educating followers, helping customers, etc.) with 2.) your patience to see your flywheel gain momentum (attract, engage, and delight people), you will be creating a very special and valuable asset - a flywheel network.

Over time, you will build a flywheel network that should serve and profit you throughout of your career.

Examples of Flywheel Networking:

• Justin Welsh , a solopreneur who is generating over $3 million in sales on social networking platforms like Twitter and LinkedIn, embraced the concept of flywheel networking by building a large network and implementing a digital flywheel:

• Gary Vaynerchuk , who is a serial entrepreneur and serves as the Chairman of VaynerX, the CEO of VaynerMedia, leverages several platforms to create a flywheel across his different networks.

• Austin Belcak , a professional networker who has 1.3 million LinkedIn followers, has successfully implemented flywheel networking as seen here:

What do these three power “Flywheel Networkers” have in common?

They fall within the Three Circles of the Hedgehog Concept, another term Jim Collins covered in his book which emphasizes an understanding of what you can be the best at in the world.

Finding your place in the shaded area is life changing.

Are you ready to become a flywheel networker?

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