How to maintain business contacts over time

Whether you’re leaving a company or one of your coworkers or superiors is heading elsewhere to pursue their career, it’s important to stay in touch with one another. Why? Well, cultivating strong business relationships can be a vital element for your career success. You never know when that particular person is going to refer you to a position, give you great business advice or boost your professional life in some way. Check out these ways to maintain and build those business relationships:

Get organized
It’s hard to stay in touch with business colleagues when you don’t have any of their contact information. Create a spreadsheet that includes email addresses, work and cell numbers, company address, positions, etc. Always remember to keep this particular spreadsheet up to date so it’s easy to stay in touch with those that you’ve worked with.

Meet for coffee or lunch
If you feel as though a particular business relationship is very valuable from a personal standpoint, then don’t be afraid to keep in touch with this person. Schedule a time to meet with this person for a quick cup of coffee or lunch. This is a fast way to catch up and this person could potentially be an excellent source for advice, industry intelligence and other important information.

Mail a card
Greeting cards are a great way to keep in touch with your business contacts. An email can often be forgettable because everyone gets lots of those throughout the day. A card, however, is less frequent and shows the recipient that maintaining that relationship is important to you. Whether this person got a promotion, has a birthday or is celebrating a work anniversary, send them a card of congratulations patting them on the back for their hard work.

Have thank you cards, congratulations cards, sympathy cards, etc. on hand so that you’re always prepared to send them out when you need to.

Rely on LinkedIn
Social networking sites like LinkedIn make it easy for you to stay in touch with professionals within your industry. With this platform, you’ll be able to see when new jobs are posted and track the career paths of former coworkers, like when they get a promotion or transfer to a different company. You can send a note of congratulations when you see these accomplishments – that card could potentially spark a conversation that benefits your career.