Meet the N3 app - an initiative that is to Tinder what LinkedIn is to Facebook.
Edwena Dixon, director of Melbourne-based brokerage Pinpoint Finance, is the brains behind N3 – an initiative that is to Tinder what LinkedIn is to Facebook.
Just as Tinder cultivates personal relationships, the N3 app will allow users to discover and connect with like-minded professionals and form business relationships.
N3 members will be able to check in at professional events or conferences on the app, which will then allow them to see other N3 members in attendance and identify and connect with their most suitable networks.
“N3 is the perfect forum; everyone is there looking for opportunities to work together, refer business or partner up, and they are all the young, energetic, forward-looking, innovative professionals who will shape this industry for the next few decades,” Dixon told Australian Broker. N3 is targeted towards young finance professionals up to 38 years of age, including accountants, finance brokers, financial planners, and insurance brokers.
Dixon, who was the winner of the National Rising Star Award at the MFAA’s 2015 Excellence Awards, says the inspiration behind N3 came from her own difficult experiences establishing professional networks as a new broker. “I recognised early in my broking career that finance broking is an industry dominated by older, established players, and I discovered through my own efforts at networking that this older, established clique can be very hard to break into and make it very hard for ‘newcomers’ or even younger finance professionals who are experienced to establish the business and referral networks they need to survive and thrive.
“There was a risk that some greatly talented professionals were going to leave the industry or not reach their full potential simply due to a lack of opportunity to develop the networks they needed.” On top of that, Dixon says the difficulties of ‘breaking in’ and establishing professional networks is only compounded by how time-poor new-to-industry finance professionals are.
“New-to-industry professionals are often time-poor, as they are scrambling to establish their business and brand, develop internal procedures, market, and still find time to ‘do their job’ for the clients they are able to find. “After all that, many new-to-industry professionals feel they don’t have time to be meeting others purely on the speculation that they might, maybe, at some point in the future, be a valuable partnership,” she said. “In the end, many new-to-industry professionals end up toiling away in isolation, largely giving up on referral relationships and partners.”
But N3 won’t just be about a networking app.Dixon said she would also be organising and running N3 networking events for members. The expected launch date of the app and inaugural event isn’t slated until the fourth quarter of this year, pending sponsorship, but Dixon told Australian Broker that she had already received overwhelmingly positive feedback from her target audience.
“Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, with almost every young professional I’ve spoken to in person saying they would ‘definitely’ want to come along,” she said. “All the people I’ve spoken to instantly understand the value of the app, and the power of mixing the digital, professional, and personal spaces in our N3 events. “There is no doubt that the first N3 event will be fully subscribed, and we are revising our structure to ensure we will be able to accommodate the demand for membership and attendance at N3 events once we launch.”
The membership and pricing structure is still being finalised, but Dixon has revealed that there will be an annual membership, which will provide complete access to the N3 members database to facilitate business networking, both at and away from N3 events, as well as ‘members discounts’ for each event.
Dixon says casual attendance will also be permitted at events, providing the event is not already fully subscribed by members. However, causal attendance will only allow access to the database of attendees at the time of the event, and only for the duration of the event.
This article originally appeared in Australian Broker issue 12.17, written by Julia Corderoy.
Just as Tinder cultivates personal relationships, the N3 app will allow users to discover and connect with like-minded professionals and form business relationships.
N3 members will be able to check in at professional events or conferences on the app, which will then allow them to see other N3 members in attendance and identify and connect with their most suitable networks.
“N3 is the perfect forum; everyone is there looking for opportunities to work together, refer business or partner up, and they are all the young, energetic, forward-looking, innovative professionals who will shape this industry for the next few decades,” Dixon told Australian Broker. N3 is targeted towards young finance professionals up to 38 years of age, including accountants, finance brokers, financial planners, and insurance brokers.
Dixon, who was the winner of the National Rising Star Award at the MFAA’s 2015 Excellence Awards, says the inspiration behind N3 came from her own difficult experiences establishing professional networks as a new broker. “I recognised early in my broking career that finance broking is an industry dominated by older, established players, and I discovered through my own efforts at networking that this older, established clique can be very hard to break into and make it very hard for ‘newcomers’ or even younger finance professionals who are experienced to establish the business and referral networks they need to survive and thrive.
“There was a risk that some greatly talented professionals were going to leave the industry or not reach their full potential simply due to a lack of opportunity to develop the networks they needed.” On top of that, Dixon says the difficulties of ‘breaking in’ and establishing professional networks is only compounded by how time-poor new-to-industry finance professionals are.
“New-to-industry professionals are often time-poor, as they are scrambling to establish their business and brand, develop internal procedures, market, and still find time to ‘do their job’ for the clients they are able to find. “After all that, many new-to-industry professionals feel they don’t have time to be meeting others purely on the speculation that they might, maybe, at some point in the future, be a valuable partnership,” she said. “In the end, many new-to-industry professionals end up toiling away in isolation, largely giving up on referral relationships and partners.”
But N3 won’t just be about a networking app.Dixon said she would also be organising and running N3 networking events for members. The expected launch date of the app and inaugural event isn’t slated until the fourth quarter of this year, pending sponsorship, but Dixon told Australian Broker that she had already received overwhelmingly positive feedback from her target audience.
“Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, with almost every young professional I’ve spoken to in person saying they would ‘definitely’ want to come along,” she said. “All the people I’ve spoken to instantly understand the value of the app, and the power of mixing the digital, professional, and personal spaces in our N3 events. “There is no doubt that the first N3 event will be fully subscribed, and we are revising our structure to ensure we will be able to accommodate the demand for membership and attendance at N3 events once we launch.”
The membership and pricing structure is still being finalised, but Dixon has revealed that there will be an annual membership, which will provide complete access to the N3 members database to facilitate business networking, both at and away from N3 events, as well as ‘members discounts’ for each event.
Dixon says casual attendance will also be permitted at events, providing the event is not already fully subscribed by members. However, causal attendance will only allow access to the database of attendees at the time of the event, and only for the duration of the event.
This article originally appeared in Australian Broker issue 12.17, written by Julia Corderoy.
