has anyone heard of or had experience of the BNI?

[Phill Fenton]

I’ve been invited a number of times from different customers but didn’t attend. To be honest I don’t like it. Signing up to this means you are obliged to source your requirements from among the membership. I prefer to choose who I source my business requirements from a much wider network. On the downside, I have lost customers that previously bought from me then switched their alliance to the sign business that signed up to this in my area.

[Cheryl Smith]

quote Phill:

obliged to source your requirements from among the membership. .

thanks phil, your point raises a number of interesting questions for me to ask at the next meeting on Friday.
I dont think you are obliged, and how would they know if you used someone else eg another plumber? But when it comes to sign stuff that I actually need for MY business, there is no representitive for anything I need. On the other hand ID KNOW if they turned up in a signwritten van done by someone else.
For me, I think the downside would be any added pressure on me to sell everyone elses businesses in the group (if that is the case) AND pay the fivehundred odd pounds to join and get up at 5.30 every friday morning to bacon and egg fryup (which I dont eat anyway!)

[Martin Pearson]

Cheryl, BNI is like any networking group in that you are there to try and acquire business for yourself and to aid others to acquire more business for themselves. I am not saying it is a bad thing but it isn’t as cheap as they tell you it is by the time you have added up all the traveling not to mention the hours spent there and the getting up in the morning can be quite difficult in the winter when it is dark, wet and cold.
They may not have someone who sells sign supplies but what about everything else like stationary, telephone etc…etc…
A lot depends on the other people in the group as well, if there are a lot of financial type people don’t suppose there will be much work from them personally but they may be able to refer you to a lot of people. You will be expected and pressured into finding work for other businesses which was what made me leave, there were people who I was expected to find work for who I wouldn’t have trusted to do work for me let alone introduce them or recommend them to my customers. I will PM you when I get a bit more time before friday as I was a member for a year and know quite a bit about how it runs. If you have any specific questions you want answered just PM me.

[Martin Cole]

Hi Cheryl

I was a member of my local BNI for just over 2 years. That was a good couple of years ago now. Also a director for a six month period.
While I was there I did re-coop all of my fees in referred jobs to me and found it invaluble for meeting local business people as I was resonably new to the area at the time.

To this day most business people I know and do work for I met through BNI in one way or another.
You also have to stand up and give a 30 second talk about your business every week, which I think is a good thing, it definately buillds your confidence which you carry through to the day to day running of your business dealing with clients etc.

However!
The pressure to refer work to the other people in your chapter is quite intense and people tend to dish out poor referrals which come to nothing just for the sake of giving someone some work.

I think you need to look at the people in the group and see if they are the kind that can refer business to you, it may not be suited to a sign person, as some have a lot of white collar people and not your general trades people.

Overall I found it a good experience and met some great people, however I wouldn’t rejoin as I think it has a shelf life for certain businesses after 2 years I felt it was time to move on.

Big decision as it’s not cheap to join as you said and getting up early is a killer 🙁

Finally if there are a lot of peolpe in the group the better it is for obvious reasons. If there are around 15 members I would avoid it.

Hope this helps a tad 😀

Just read Martin’s post which is all very true.

[Cheryl Smith]

thank you both Martins.
It was really important and helpful to hear your oppinions and experiences. I think the appeal for me was to meet new people as my job can be quite a solitary one, and that I would like to generate more local business, but having said that, I am probably better off spending time talking to customers who I havent spoken to for a while , cold calling or doing a mailing run. I am very busy anyway!!!

[David McDonald]

Hi

I’ve been a member for about 2 months now and I seriously recommend trying it out. There is no obligation to sign up if you want to just take a look.

I was reluctant to go the first time (invited by my bank manager) and was wary about what I would get out of it. On my second visit (still as a visitor and not having signed up) I was given a referral that resulted in business/margin that more than paid for the annual fee plus a lot more on top. Since then I get 1-2 good referrals a week and one looks likely to result in me taking on a huge slice of on-going work which could double my company size of the coming months.

Now I might just have been lucky but I think you get out what you put in with BNI – I actively try to find referrals for the others and in return I’m getting plenty back. I see some people who don’t ever seem to find referrals and funnily enough they don’t seem to get much back.

Yes there are some firm rules on attendance etc. and it costs money to join (BNI is a profit making business) but for me the joining fee and my weekly time at the early meetings is easily a worthwhile investment. Plus running my own business its good to talk to like minded business people.

See what you think

Macky

[David Arch]

I was in the BNI for a few months and I did get a few jobs but I’d say that it is dependent on the chapter you are in, some will send a lot of work, others wont.

I think the reason I didn’t get a lot of referrals is because I didn’t give many, this was because a lot of the business types that were in the chapter either conflicted with other services I offered or were businesses that friends and family owned which I would give to them first.

[Aaron & Chris]

we did 12 months in BNI, as said previously it does depend on who is in your chapter. I personally had issues with our particular chapter, they were as follows.

1. We were a new chapter so it was all taken a bit too seriously the pressure to refer business each week was ever increasing and the negativity towards people who didn’t or couldn’t was over the top.

2. The costs, the initial outlay isn’t cheap and then we had monthly paymets on top for hiring the room.

3. We were an easy option, if no one had a referral that week they would chuck us a bone and have a pointless quote off us, browning points gained for the referral though!

4. Getting up that early when the novelty wears off knowing the referrals have stopped.

5. They say it isn’t a cheque book organisation..well it isn’t free!

We got our money back plus some, but only really did one job per member and very few were external referrals. The second year wouldn’t have been as good.

If you can find a group with a graphic designer, it might be worth your while. We still work for two designers from two different groups!

Some people love it, but it’s not for everyone! Hope this helps.

Aaron

[Brian Little]

Hi Cheryl .I was in BNi for a couple of years in our area .Im now in a different networking group . It all depends who you have there There will always be the people who manage to work with each other well and generate business together .Then there is the other group who turn up late …and are not really interested in helping anyone else but themselves.Ive found that the trades ….sparkys …joiners ..painters are the guys/girls to hang in with .there the people that are generally employed doing up premises shops etc . The people in the financial secter "the suits " insurance ..mortgage brokers ..bankers …will writers..(yep we have one !!) pass trade amongst themsells . What i fined is you always have to bring new blood in.Dont rely on everyone else to do it .From personal experience cheryl it has worked for me

[John Simpson]

everyone above has very valid points as i experienced almost everything stated above.
I did my 12 months but admit work was drying up all around my chapter, members were leaving one by one until we only had 9 in the group. Then my 12 months was up & after thinking it over long & hard i then left, followed by a few others. This chapter seems to be building up again though, but i wouldn’t rejoin again.
I personally do not regret joining & made many friends, even after leaving nearly 2 years ago we still deal with each other & ring each other occasionally just to stay in touch.
To sum this up imo it was worth joining to meet new local business people, which opens other doors, it was financially worth it at 1st, made good business friends with whom we still do business together.

So give it a go, try your best & i don’t think you will regret it.

L J

[Martin Pearson]

Aaron, I don’t think it was because you were a new chapter that you felt it was taken to seriously and there was a lot of pressure to find work for others. This is the nature of BNI and doesn’t change no matter how long the chapter has been running. BNI itself is a business so there is always some sort of pressure to make it bigger and better so other chapters can open making more money for the local franchise holder.

As has already been said above a lot of it depends on the particular chapter you are in and the type of members they have. I was told they vetted potential members to ensure only respectable businesses were allowed to join which may be the case with chapters that are already full and have a waiting list of people to get in but from my experience if the chapter needed members and you had the money then you were in.

There were 3 chapters fairly close to me, one seemed to do very well, one seemed to scrape by and the other one folded. That was another problem I found, because I did work in quite a large area I would have had to have joined all 3 chapters to ensure I kept the signwork in all of those areas so although Phil said he lost work because he didn’t join he may have lost some of that work anyway because it went to a signmaker in another chapter which was close by.

[John Simpson]

very true, Martin.

John

[Cheryl Smith]

Thank you again for all your points.

I had no idea that additional to the joining fee of £400 odd there is annual fee of £100 and from what you guys tell me, I have to pay for the breakfast on top each week AND pay towards the venue hire each week.
This is a new chapter (there are 15 at the mo) and the competitor of mine is in at least two other chapters around the area.

Its funny that I had not heard of the BNI until a couple of weeks ago, I went once. I have since found out a competitor of mine had started doing work for account of mine because they were in the same chapter. Nether the less, I was invited back to redo the work as they were unhappy with the quality which is not bad for me as it restrengthens my relationship with them.

Very swings and round-a-bouts

ooooooooo choices choices……I wont write it off just yet, I will go again next week…will have to take my own healthy breakfast tho!
😀

[John Simpson]

We didn’t have to pay for the venue as well as breakfast, as the Hotel were grateful for the increased sales of fry ups.

Give it a try for 12 months, i think it’s worth it.
one of the ex members phoned me today, wants a new sign doing.

got to be worth trying.

john