Why Summer 2026 Is the Best Season to Stop Hiding Behind Your Screen and Start Connecting for Real
Summer is the best prospecting season of the year. Here's how to stop wasting it.
Summer is almost here in California, and I’m reminded every single year why I moved here in 1986 and never left. The weather breaks open. People come outside. The energy shifts. And every May, I find myself thinking about something most entrepreneurs completely miss during this season, the fact that summer is the greatest prospecting season of the year, and almost nobody takes advantage of it.
Barbecues. Neighborhood block parties. Gym memberships. Pool parties. Travel. People are out. They’re relaxed. Their guard is down. And yet most business owners and network marketers spend their summers doing what they do the other eleven months of the year, posting content into the void and wondering why nothing is converting.
I want to talk to you today about something I’ve been teaching for over 25 years: prospecting with purpose. Connecting with purpose. Not the social media version. The real version, where you look someone in the eyes, ask the right question, and change both your lives.
The Problem Nobody Wants to Admit
Here’s the pain point I see over and over again, and I’m going to say it plainly: most people are terrified to talk to strangers.
They’ll spend four hours crafting a caption. They’ll spend $500 on ads. They’ll post the same video seven different ways. But ask them to walk across the street to a neighbor’s party and introduce themselves? Suddenly there’s a story. I don’t want to seem weird. I don’t want to intrude. What if they think I’m selling something?
That is your ego in fight-or-flight. That is your signal-to-noise ratio dropping into a low vibration. And it is costing you relationships, income, and the life you say you want.
I’ve been to enough of these parties myself. Just this past weekend, my neighbors had people out in the front yard on a Saturday. I walked across the street. Within minutes, a woman asked me if I was from Kansas City, because something about me told her I was connected. Turns out she knew the Morabi family. I’ve eaten at Jasper’s, their five-star restaurant on Ward Parkway. That one conversation opened up a whole new thread of relationship.
That doesn’t happen if I stay inside.
The Real Skill Nobody Is Teaching
In 2026, everybody wants to talk about funnels, AI-generated leads, and content strategy. And some of that matters. But none of it replaces what I call the three fundamentals of connection:
1. Fact-finding. Asking smart, sequential questions. Learning who someone is before you pitch anything.
2. Rapport building. Finding emotional commonalities, the teams they follow, the beliefs they hold, the places they’ve been. This is where the bond starts.
3. Small talk. The lost art. The ability to hold a warm, light, curious conversation that makes someone feel seen.
These are not old-school skills. They are communication skills. And they work on social media and in person. The difference is that when you do them in person, at a summer cookout, in an airport lounge, at the gym, the results are compressed. What takes months online can happen in twenty minutes face to face.
I know this firsthand. One of the best people I ever recruited into my business, someone who became a half-million-dollar income earner in her second year, came from a conversation at Quail Lakes Athletic Club in Stockton, California. She was selling gym memberships. I saw her name tag, used her name, asked how long she’d worked there, asked a few more questions, and then asked if she kept her options open for additional streams of income.
She asked me if it was network marketing. I said yes. Then she told me about her challenges with the industry, and I redirected the conversation. She listened to a 20-minute audio. I closed her after. And the rest is history.
That was the three-foot rule in action. She was three feet in front of me.
What’s Actually Blocking You
Here’s the deeper truth that most business coaching won’t touch: your inability to connect isn’t a skills problem. It’s a trauma response.
If you have abandonment issues, rejection wounds, panic patterns, or old trauma bonds, your body will go into protection mode the moment you consider approaching a stranger. Your nervous system reads “cold conversation” the same way it reads “danger.” And so you freeze, overthink, or avoid it entirely.
As you begin to let go of those patterns , as you separate your feelings from the events that shaped them, something remarkable happens. Your energy changes. The people you attract change. You stop needing approval from the conversation before you even start it.
You become, as I like to say, as cool as the other side of the pillow.
The conversation flows. You’re not in your head rehearsing. You’re not running worst-case scenarios. You’re just present, curious, and connecting.
That is a skill you can develop. And summer, when the world slows down and opens up, is the perfect season to practice it.
The Solution: Connect First, Build Second
Here’s the practical framework I’ve used for over four decades in California, New Jersey, New York, and everywhere in between:
Stop leading with the opportunity. Start leading with genuine curiosity.
When you walk into a room, a summer party, a restaurant, an airport gate, your job is not to find prospects. Your job is to find people. Ask questions. Listen not just to what they say, but to what they mean. Hear the emotion underneath the words.
I’ve connected with restaurant owners and Maître D’s all across the country because I took the time to learn their names and tip generously and come back. I’ve had the same pilots and flight attendants recognize me on United because I treat them like people, not service providers.
Great connectors are mavens. They’re the people who know people across bloodlines, industries, and zip codes. They understand six degrees of separation, that almost anyone you want to reach is two or three introductions away, if you’re skilled enough to navigate those connections.
A maven is a connector, a closer, and a finisher. That’s the person you want to be. And it starts with one conversation this summer with someone you haven’t met yet.
Your Summer Challenge
This season, I’m challenging you to do something uncomfortable at least three times a week:
Talk to someone you don’t know.
Not online. In person. The waiter. The person next to you at the farmers market. The woman selling memberships at your gym. Ask their name. Ask one good question. Listen.
And if the opportunity shows up, if they’re open, if there’s alignment, ask if they keep their options open.
You’ll be amazed what happens when your body is relaxed, your ego is quiet, and your purpose is simply to connect.
That’s where business is born. That’s where friendships are forged. And that’s where the life you actually want starts to take shape.
Summer 2026. The world is outside. Go meet it.
Jeffery Combs is the host of Golden Mastermind Seminars Radio and has been coaching entrepreneurs, network marketers, and sales professionals for over 40 years. He offers free 20-minute coaching sessions for those serious about taking their life to the next level.