Are You Referral Ready?

With any professional endeavor, you get out what you are willing to put into it. This is especially true in networking organizations, where people make decisions about who they like and trust based on more than a title or a handshake.

People who seek only to gain visibility often join multiple chambers of commerce, trade groups, and professional or service organizations. The cost of this approach is not only measured in dollars, but in the ‘what’s in it for me?’ mentality that contradicts the founding principles of networking. To join and not show up, or to show up and not participate, is a recipe for wasting your time.

When you join an organization, join a new group that supports your networking goals. Get involved in a committee or project that allows you to build credibility with members over time. If you are honest about your level of involvement, your expectations, and the limitations of your time, the choices become clearer. Rather than settle for networking ACTIVITY, choose the path you think will lead to the RESULTS you want.

Participation in an organization is a way of demonstrating credibility and goodwill, both of which contribute to building trust with other people. Referrals are a byproduct of trusting relationships. Rather than simply JOINING an organization, PARTICIPATING in its cause doubles the benefit while fostering the spirit of service to others.

Referral Ready is a game of strategy, not chance. Part of your strategy is to create the systems that drive referrals to your business from many different sources. The strategy begins with the expectation for referrals.

Providing a great product at a great price is a great start, but it does not by itself constitute a formula to increase referral activity. If you don’t expect to get referrals, chances are you will not do the things necessary to create the conditions that allow referrals to thrive.

How do your expectation for referrals influence the way you communicate and do business with your customers?

In business and in life you don’t always get what you deserve, but you usually get what you expect. Your level of expectation changes the emphasis on referrals in your business model from passive hope to proactive strategy, from a fear-based mentality to abundance, from random luck to predictable outcome, from the exception to the rule.

Your referral sources appreciate opportunities to introduce their products and services to new prospects. These situations don’t present themselves every day, but you can always create them. This proactive approach will demonstrate your commitment to helping them reach an audience they might not have otherwise.

Saying you will work hard to help your referral sources is one thing. Referring them business from time to time is another, and perhaps even enough. But when you showcase their products and services, your referral sources actively participate in the endorsement process and co-create another dimension to the business partnership.

Choose one referral source whose products or services you thoroughly stand behind. Sponsor an event that features this business, like an after-hours social event or product seminar. Coordinate all the arrangements to drive prospective clients and targeted business professionals to the event. Help them display their products and services in a fun and engaging way.

Helping your referral sources succeed is a smart investment strategy, not a passive cliche. A showcase event is an undeniable demonstration of support consistent with the philosophy that ‘actions speak louder than words.’ As the sponsor of the event, you connect with your referral sources in a way that extends and solidifies the value of your business relationship.

Strong referral systems are a ‘get what you ask for’ proposition. The most successful system can be used every time with any client or person in your network. Since customers can be a valuable part of your referral network, it makes sense that you would have a system for helping them share the value they experienced with other people they know, like, and trust. Think of it as creating a road map for success.

Asking for referrals can be uncomfortable, but it is a vital part of any referral generating system. Once you are comfortable with the system, you will have developed a mechanism for removing any doubts or psychological barriers that might keep you from executing it. When it becomes just another part of the way you do business, it becomes just another part of the way you consistently share value with others.

Think of a client who you know is exceptionally pleased with your work. Ask him or her to share what they considered to be the most valuable part of the experience. Ask if they know anyone else who they would like to see get that same kind of valuable experience and if they would feel comfortable making an introduction either in person, in writing, via e-mail, or by phone. To raise the client’s comfort level, demonstrate exactly how you would approach the contact after the introduction.

A process will help you diligently execute results-driven behaviors until they are second nature to you. This approach is successful because it involves customers sharing value with people they know instead of you cold-calling people you don’t. When you give yourself permission to ask for referrals, you give yourself permission to acquire new clients at a much lower cost.

Referrals are not all created equally.  A realtor could be referred to a single home buyer, or that same realtor could be referred to the human resource manager of XYZ company who oversees the relocation of 200 employees each year. That one relationship could lead to multiple referrals and thousands more dollars in business.

Business people spend more time trying to get a referral in the singular sense instead of building relationships with sources that will consistently feed referral business. Networking takes time and energy, so efficiency is always an issue. If your networking activity does not target referral sources, you work twice as hard for half as many referrals.

Use your existing network to gain an introduction to a prominent service provider in a profession that also serves your clients. When you know who and how to target, you are more likely to benefit from your network because your requests become very specific and easy to facilitate.

If you have a choice between a golden egg and a golden goose, go for the goose. A golden goose lays golden eggs all the time. It takes just as much time and energy to build that relationship, but the payoff is much more beneficial to you in the long term. By cultivating golden geese, you create the kind of network that can consistently generate referral business.

You are socializing when you meet new people, but you are networking when you intentionally seek to build mutually beneficial relationships. The difference is strategy.

A network will serve you best when you build it with people you can serve. If you leave networking to chance, you are not taking 100% responsibility for who is and is not in your network. Happy coincidences happen all the time, but strong networks are almost always created by design than by accident.

Find out how other people became successful. Become a student of choices and consequences. Surround yourself with people you intentionally want to be around. Once you realize the power of networking with intent, you can choose to either socialize or strategize. Because it is rooted in giving to others, networking with strategic intent simply enables the law of reciprocity to bring you more of what you want. Otherwise, you get what you get.

We are attracted to people with whom we share common interests. When networking conversations revolve strictly around business, those commonalities are harder to come by. One way to help break those barriers is by getting people to talk about their interests outside of work.

People in networking situations are often in business attire and engage in guarded conversation and are hesitant to reveal personal information to people they don’t know very well. If you can accelerate the process by which people connect, you will find yourself building better relationships faster than those who only speak business or settle for superficial small talk.

What interests do you have that might surprise people? Make you more memorable? What about your friends? The next time you meet someone new, try asking this question:  “What do you like to do when you are not doing what you do?’ Listen for ways to help with resources, contacts, or news/magazine articles.

When people talk about something they are passionate about, they are more engaged and can connect on a stronger and more emotional level. Referral Ready means navigating both the risks and rewards of opening up to people, getting them to feel comfortable doing the same, and actually building relationships based on human qualities that transcend the business arena.

Getting to know your referral sources extends beyond the normal business relationship. If you know they are involved in outside projects that could benefit from your support, offer your help in a way that allows them to achieve their goal and brings value to the relationship.

Nurturing the emotional connection to your referral sources takes time and effort, but without that effort your ability to feed the relationship is limited to the external forces of an unpredictable business cycle. If you don’t know enough about your referral sources to break through those artificial barriers, you lose an opportunity to strengthen the relationship that in turn supports your business.

Would you volunteer to help support a project one of your referral sources was most committed to? If so, clearly define what role and to what degree your assistance might create the most value to the referral source. Building relationships is about finding ways to bond on a human level. For this, there are simply no shortcuts.

Regardless of whether an outside project is related to your expertise, you build credibility and goodwill with the referral source. At the very least, you demonstrate your ability to follow through on your commitments, which extends to the business relationship as well.

You will find St. Louis Cardinals fans around the world and recognize them by the redbird logo on their red and white attire. Harley riders enjoy the same sense of community, no matter where they are from. Only recently have businesses begun to recognize the power of this social phenomenon as an important marketing tool.

Businesses with customer communities build loyalty and support from people who enjoy being associated with your brand. Because these communities are socially driven, they exist formally or informally whether a business recognizes them or not. Ignore them and your business will never benefit from the collective word-of-mouth energy of an impassioned community.

Think about the experience your customers share. Now brainstorm ideas how your company can help define and celebrate its customer community. Try to create an event, club, user group, blog, online bulletin board, e-mail discussion group, newsletter, or web site dedicated to bringing your community people together either online or in person.

Building community allows customers to share experiences and feedback with each other. When the bonding between company and customer shifts from a personal or professional transaction to a social experience, loyalties on both sides are strengthened. An impassioned network of customers will refer your business more loudly and clearly when a social forum to do so is made available.

When you do business with a customer, you begin a relationship with someone whose needs can extend well beyond the scope of what you do. The CPA is in position to recommend a good financial planner. The financial planner is in position to refer a good estate-planning attorney. The estate-planning attorney is in position to refer the excellent lockbox services of a local bank. Your business falls somewhere along a chain that occurs naturally in the purchasing cycle and provides clues for building networking strategy.

If you don’t understand where you fall on the chain, you lose the opportunity to feed the chain and refer other service providers. Referral business requires an awareness of what forces bring customers to your door, and where they go when they leave. Without that knowledge and awareness, customers will find their own way. Rooted in the generosity of helping your clients, building relationships with service providers along the chain is simply good business.

Three major things happen when you build your network this way: 1) you position yourself to better serve your clients; 2) you build a network that you know you can consistently serve; and 3) you take responsibility for building a system to drive referral business to your door. That is a win-win-win solution.