Voray CEO David Olk takes the ‘bland’ out of networking events

Originally published on FierceCEO.com

Networking events are a staple of doing business and David Olk, CEO of Voray, is out to change their often-bland format.

Current network functions are “inefficient, ineffective, stale and repetitive,” Olk told FierceCEO. “When you’re a CEO you’re always being invited to a lot of stuff.”

What Olk wanted to do was “create networking events people wanted to go to. A small dinner with people you want to break bread with.”

One big difference between Voray’s events and traditional ones is their size.

A traditional networking event can be 100 people, standing around, making small talk, but not really connecting. “You’re usually invited because the host wants to sell you something,” Olk said.

What Voray does is “curate” very small gatherings of professionals for dinner, in the range of 15 to 18 people, “that want to attend because it’s very different than any other networking function,” Olk said.

As a result, the event is like a private gathering, not a cocktail party. And guests leave with “more professional growth and new friends in the spaces they operate in,” Olk said. “Voray partners use the platform as a sales acceleration tool by making it easier to build relationships with prospects.”

Using its software, Voray sets up the event by identifying the people who will be invited.

Voray began as an experiment by Olk, who invited 18 friends to his home as a relationship-building exercise and, he said, “We expanded on that.”

The company began operating in January 2016 and is currently hosting events in four cities: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Boston. Voray will begin its networking events in Chicago next month.

For the full article and David’s ‘Fast Five’, read the original article here.