When I attend a multi-day conference my bill can quickly get to $2,500 or more when I take into account admission tickets, airfare, transportation, accommodation, food and entertainment.

For me one of the most important benefits that I'm looking for when I'm attending a conference is the opportunity to network with other "serious minded" people. Let's face it, the kind of people that "self qualify" themselves and make the investment to show up at these affairs are definitely the kind of people with whom I want to do business. They're the leaders... the influences... the opinion formers!

Have you ever found yourself in the situation where you meet dozens of people at an event, collect lots of business cards, only to have them gather dust on your desk when you get back home? At best I only follow up with a few of the people I meet as these events. Perhaps you've had the same experience?

Well, I've found a clever solution to this problem. The reason why my speech is called "When You Break Bread You Are Family" is because I have discovered when you share a meal with someone you have the unique opportunity to make a deep and meaningful connection with them. The chances of making these connections is increased exponentially when you use an "Unforgettable Feast" as your model. I'm going to share with you my story of my first unforgettable feast in the hope that it inspires you to host your own.

This is my story...

As I was walking out at the lunch break I was approached by a guy who asked me a question that stopped me dead in my tracks. He asked "Are you a great speaker?" Of course, I said "Yes, absolutely!". His response was "Great! How would you like to join us for an Unforgettable Feast?". My curiosity was fully piqued at this point. I wanted to find out what was going on so I said "Count me in!".

A few moments later I was sitting at a table with 7 other people. The person who invited me, with a big grin on his face, said "Welcome to your Unforgettable Feast!" and proceeded to explain to us that we were participating in an advanced form of networking. He explained that when we meet someone in the hallway and exchange business cards we're merely acquaintances, but when we break bread with a small group of people we become family.

There are 5 parts to an Unforgettable Feast. They are:

1. What You Are Grateful For? (1 minute)
2. Your Transformation Story (4 minutes)
3. Your #1 Take Away For The Event (1 minute)
4. The Cheese Ceremony (1 minute)
5. What Makes You Unforgettable? (30 seconds)

The way this works is that each person at the table gets a turn to share.

Clint Arthur, our feast leader, explained that if you try to use your time to promote your business the Unforgettable Feast will not work as well for you. He went first to give us an idea of what we should say. We each had a turn to answer question #1. Then #2, and so on, until we had all answered all 5 questions.

Here's how I answered the first two questions at the Experts Industry Association conference:

I held up my name badge for everyone to see and said "Hi my name is Brad Codd from InfoQuick.com. Today I am grateful that I had enough faith to fly in from Southern California to attend this event even although I had very little information about what the benefit would be." From the number of chuckles I got it was apparent that several other attendees were in the same boat as me. As it turned out this conference is head and shoulders better than any event I've ever attended... and I've attended many and have gotten incredible value.

When it was my turn for the next question I held up my badge again and said "Hi my name is Brad Codd from InfoQuick.com. My transformation story is that I used to be a extremely well paid computer programmer/consultant. For the first 7 years of my career I doubled my salary every year. Then for the next 15 years I earned more than I did the year before. I had it all... the overseas vacations (sometimes twice in the same year), the fancy sports cars, the fancy house. I had a great life."

"Then one day I woke up and all the work was gone! When the work went off shore to India at half the price I could still demonstrate value and had no problem winning contracts. But, when the Russian programmers came into the market at 10% of what I was charging everything changed. The harsh reality was that 10 Ukrainian PhD's out perform one Brad... no matter how I sliced or diced it. I was bidding on $25 an hour contracts and not winning them. It was scary!"

"Through a couple of entrepreneurial misadventures things went from bad to worse and over the next few years I lost everything: my investment properties, my savings, my credit score, my family home and racked up debts of over $400,000. This was a really dark time in my life. For the next four years I was in a terrible depression. All I did was eat, sleep and watch television."

"Luckily for me the one thing I didn't lose was my wife. She came to me one day with some free tickets to a personal development event put on by Chris Howard (a Tony Robbins type motivational speaker/coach). Chris woke me up! Over the next few years I got my confidence back and found some mentors that helped me to get into the business that I'm in today."

"Because I have had to change careers and re-invent myself I find that, quite by accident, I'm in the unique position of being able to help others. Especially in these turbulent times. I'm no longer a computer programmer. Now I'm a marketer and am very passionate about what I do. I now help hundreds of thousands of people improve their lives and they spend millions of dollars every year with my company."

This intimate sharing of transformation stories is the secret sauce that makes the people you meet at an Unforgettable Feast... well, unforgettable!

I met some truly remarkable people at the Unforgettable Feasts that I attended. You can rest assured that there are going to be many more feasts in my future.

If you'd like to become an Unforgettable Feasts Facilitator... I've posted a series of free tutorial videos, created by Clint Arthur (Thank you Clint!), on my blog in the article Clint Arthur & Dylan Stewart's Unforgettable Feasts Video Tutorials. These videos walk you through step-by-step showing you everything you need to know for hosting your own Unforgettable Feasts.

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