Business Development Through Online Networking

Business networking serves many purposes: general marketing, sales prospecting, recruiting, job-hunting, knowledge exchange, and business development. Of all these, business development is the one that it supports best. Recently, "business networking" has developed some negative connotations for many people, due to its widespread use in the network marketing industry and the proliferation of "lead generation clubs" or "lead exchange clubs" that focus on impersonal lead referrals, rather than on building relationships. The surge in popularity of "social networking" sites on the internet, though, has sparked a renewed interest in meaningful discussion and research on the value and importance of "networking", particularly to mainstream businesses.