Beyond Referrals Read online

  This chapter will cover a few best practices that I use, as well as ideas I’ve gleaned from many of my clients over the years.

  CAN E-MAIL INTRODUCTIONS WORK FOR YOU?

  While an in-person introduction is usually the most effective, sometimes your clients and prospects are too busy to make these happen. And, of course, a personal introduction doesn’t fit every business model. More and more small business owners and salespeople are turning to e-mail introductions. Sometimes when talking to my clients about their referrals for me, I ask them if they’ll create an “electronic handshake.”

  Here are the advantages to an e-mail introduction:

  1. People respond more quickly to e-mails these days than voice mails.

  2. Your client will likely have more courage in sending an e-mail than speaking directly to the prospect.

  3. With multiple introductions, e-mails are more convenient for your referral source and therefore more likely to happen.

  4. For business-to-consumer sales, when the prospect responds to your e-mail with an e-mail saying it’s okay to give him or her a call at home, this phone call is legal under the do-not-call regulations.

  5. You can craft a template for an e-mail introduction that you can send to your clients to make it easy for them to send.

  Do e-mail introductions work every time? No. Do they work most of the time? Yes.

  Sample E-mail Introductions

  Do you leave clients to their own thinking and time schedule to make the electronic handshake, or do you take part in the process? Personally, to make sure I get a good introduction that sticks, I want to be involved in the process, and I want to make it as easy as possible for the referral sources so that the introduction actually happens.

  There are two schools of thought about what referral sources should say in the introduction. Should they try to “sell” us to their friends or colleagues? Or should they merely encourage the prospects to take our call? I think both schools of thought are valid. It all depends on the nature of the relationship between the referral source and the prospect.

  Sometimes, the relationship is a close one, and the referral source knows exactly what to say to pique the interest of the prospect. Sometimes the referral source really has no clue whatsoever. In the latter case, usually less is more.

  I’ve found it helpful to have a few templates for e-mail introductions ready to send to referral sources, just in case they’re not sure what to say or just need a nudge to keep the process moving forward. Here are a few sample e-mail introductions you can take and adapt to your business model. These are generic in nature. They will become more effective when tailored to what product or service you offer.

  George, I want to introduce you to Bill Cates. Bill has opened my eyes to what’s possible for me in terms of expanding my business with referrals. I’ve been using his strategies for about a month, and I’m getting more referrals to higher-level prospects. I’ve closed two sales already, and my pipeline is filling with qualified referral prospects. I’ve cc’d him on this e-mail. He’ll be reaching out to you shortly. Take his call.

  George, I want to introduce you to Bill Cates. Bill teaches a referral system that really works. I know that you are in a growth mode—wanting to acquire more new clients in a particular niche. I think you’ll find Bill’s strategies to be totally in sync with your goals. I’ve cc’d him on this e-mail. He’ll be reaching out to you shortly. Take a look at his system. I think you’ll like it.

  George Smith, meet Bill Cates. I’ve been working with Bill for several months, and he’s helped our firm boost sales from referrals. I won’t go into details now. Call me if you like. But whatever you do, take Bill’s call.

  You can see that I’ve written these samples with an informal “voice.” I think your templates should be written this way. When people are introducing you to a friend, family member, or colleague, they are not going to be writing a formal letter. In most cases, this is a quick e-mail to someone they know well. Let your client know that you’ve taken the liberty of crafting a pretty flattering e-mail and that it’s fine for him or her to adjust it in any way that feels comfortable and genuine.

  Quick Tip

  When you e-mail your new referral prospect, put the name of the referral source in the subject line—preferably the first two words: “Mary Smith asked to me contact you.” This will ensure your e-mail gets opened by the prospect.

  ACTION STEP

  Craft a couple of e-mail introduction templates. Have them ready to send to your referral source. As you’re leaving a meeting where you’ve received one or more referrals that the source is willing to e-mail on your behalf, say, “Laura, I’ve put together a few templates for e-mail introductions. When I get back to the office, I’ll shoot them over to you. Use them as you wish. Tweak them to fit your style or scrap them altogether. Please just make sure you cc me so I know the e-mail has gone out and I can follow up appropriately.”

  INTRODUCTORY TEXTS AND TWEETS

  As with e-mail, make it easy for your clients to introduce you through a text or tweet. Take that e-mail you prepared in the last tip and convert it to a suggested text or tweet. As with e-mail, let your referral sources know that the wording is merely a template to get them started. They need to feel free to customize to make it perfectly natural and genuine for them. And suggest that they use an informal tone—just as they would when contacting someone they know well.

  Sample Text Introduction

  Our firm has been working with Bill Cates for almost a year. He has totally changed our referral culture. New client acquisition is up and so are profits. He will be calling you. Take his call! See what he might be able to do for you and your reps.

  At the writing of this book, I text quite a bit. It’s my primary communication tool with my college-aged daughter (can you relate?). But I have not yet gotten comfortable texting prospects or clients. Some industries (like some quarters of financial services) don’t allow reps to text clients. What I do know is that more and more introductions are being made using texts. So be aware of this and be ready for it. When I know a client of mine has texted a prospect, I follow up with an e-mail or phone call (based on what the client has told me will likely work the best).

  Sample Tweet Introduction

  Bill Cates has helped us acquire more clients through referrals. Sales are up. Profits are up. I highly recommend him. http://bit.ly/9v3pSO

  Note: There are many free websites that can take your long website URL and convert it to a much shorter URL to fit into a tweet. In the example above, I used the website https://bitly.com.

  A tweet introduction can be either a mass communication a client advocate makes to all his or her followers or a personal tweet the client sends to just one person.

  ACTION STEP

  Go ahead. What are you waiting for? Craft a few templates and have them ready. You may have to tweak them as you use this strategy and get into conversation with your clients, but if you do some of the groundwork now, you will feel more comfortable bringing the idea of templates up when the time is right.

  ATTEND EVENTS WITH YOUR CLIENTS

  One great way to get in-person introductions is to get your clients to allow you to attend events they frequent. Do they belong to an industry trade association? Are they involved in philanthropic or community service organizations? How about service clubs or clubs that revolve around a hobby (like cars, motorcycles, road biking, or model trains)?

  For example, Brad is a business consultant for the dental industry. He’s a motorcycle enthusiast (Harley-Davidson). At one point he learned that one of his clients was part of a group of dentists who get together on weekends to ride Harleys. He tagged along on one of the rides and hit it off with the group. Now he’s an honorary member of a group that happens to be filled with perfect prospects for his business. Just hanging out with the group has led to several of these dentists becoming clients. (Yes, there are groups of dentists in almost every metropolitan area who ride Harleys togeth
er. In fact, there’s even an organization that combines dental continuing education credits with Harley-Davidson cycle touring. Go figure!)

  Donna is a small business consultant. One of her clients is involved in Habitat for Humanity. Out of love for the cause, she got involved too. Over the course of a year, she’s worked on four weekend projects, building homes for deserving families. During those weekends, she has met a number of small business owners who have hired her for her consulting services. She never tried to sell herself to these folks. She told me, “As we work on projects together, we often work in teams of two or three. We talk a lot and really get to know each other. In some cases I’ve connected directly with small business owners who have hired me, and other times I’ve connected with folks who have referred me to business owners. I don’t work for Habit for Humanity to meet prospects, and I keep a fairly low profile. But business finds me anyway.”

  ACTION STEP

  Look through your client list. Identify the clients that you know are involved in different types of groups—business or personal. Strategize an approach to be able to go with them to one of their group’s events. And don’t overthink this; just start doing it.

  CREATE A SPECIAL WEBSITE LANDING PAGE

  An idea inspired by John Jantsch, author of The Referral Engine, is to create a special landing page on your website for referral prospects. This special landing page could be generic for all referral prospects or specific to each new referral prospect. If you are getting a lot of referrals, it would probably be too time consuming and not cost efficient for you to set up a new page for each prospect. If you are selling a higher-end product or service and your referrals are not as plentiful, having a landing page that says something like “Welcome George Smith! Any friend of Laura’s is friend of mine!” could be quite powerful.

  On this special landing page, you can offer a free report, and you can even host a special video message. I recommend you find a way to provide some immediate value to the visitor. Lead with value and then entice the person to want to hear more from you.

  ACTION STEP

  One simple way to accomplish this is to set up a Word Press website that will allow you or a member of your staff to create this type of welcome page with minimum effort. You can enlist the aid of a graphic artist to create your template. Then once the basic template is created, you can create similar pages in only a few minutes.

  OFFER A FREE WEBINAR FOR REFERRAL PROSPECTS

  Many small business owners are using webinars as a way for their referral sources to make introductions. Your referral sources can tell their friend or colleague about your regular webinars that provide an overview of your products and services. Many of your clients will feel more comfortable with this sort of introduction (meaning they’ll do it!), and many prospects would prefer a slower way to get to know what you offer and how it applies to them.

  I have attended several “introductory webinars” from possible resources for my business and have found them a great way to get the relationship started. I know I’m not going to be asked to commit to anything right away. I can take my time in the decision process.

  These webinars can be one to one—just you and your new prospect, or they can be small-group webinars that you host every time you have a few interested parties. You can have these webinars on your schedule—every week or every other week—for people to attend. Or you can wait for a critical mass of prospects (whatever that number would be for you) to start your next webinar.

  You can also record your basic introductory webinar and post it on your website for prospects to view. There are a couple of weaknesses with these prerecorded webinars, however. First, you aren’t able to answer questions that come up from the attendees. Second, if you don’t really grab their attention from the start and hold their attention throughout, your prospects are more likely to drop off the webinar before you’ve covered everything.

  There are many resources to help you host these webinars. At the time that I’m writing this book, we use GoToWebinar. Many of my clients use Webex and Adobe Connect. Some services allow you to add video—like you on a web cam; some don’t. If you don’t currently have a platform, talk to a few of your colleagues to see what they use. Get a referral!

  8 EVENT MARKETING

  TAP INTO THE POWER OF EVENT MARKETING

  As I mentioned before, one of the highest forms of introduction is an in-person introduction. You can turbocharge that strategy with event marketing. Event marketing removes all the possible pressure that prospects might feel in meeting with you for the first time. At an event—especially a social event—they know they’re not going to be asked to do business with you right away. They get a chance to meet you and see if they like you. Then they’ll be more ready and willing to meet with you in a business setting. Often their thinking is, “My friend George likes and trusts you; I’ll see if I like you first, before we talk business.”

  This chapter will give you the basics of event marketing as well as a few best practices that you can adapt to your world.

  BENEFITS OF EVENT MARKETING

  Why should you even consider event marketing? What are the benefits to you?

  1. Many clients prefer this method of introduction. While many people will play the traditional game of referrals—where they contact their friend or colleague and then you follow through from there—some clients don’t feel comfortable with that. Others, however, are very comfortable inviting people they know to a social or educational event. I think it’s important to have as many referral tools working for you as possible. Ask for a referral straight up and ask your clients to invite people to your events.

  2. You meet prospects in a low-key social atmosphere. This is good for both you and your new prospects. Many people don’t want their first meeting with you to be one where they will have to decide if they want to work with you.

  3. You get better initial connections. Because your events are not “sales events,” but rather opportunities to have fun or learn, attendees are less guarded. They don’t have to play defense to your offense. So you have the opportunity to establish much higher rapport, and even trust, before you ever sit down to talk business.

  4. When you finally do sit down to talk business, you start off at a higher level of trust. This, in turn, usually means that prospects will be more forthcoming with the information you need to see if you can be of service to them. And as you begin to make recommendations, they are usually more open to your ideas.

  5. When your event has a mix of clients and prospects, the prospects see the type of relationship you have with your clients (and vice versa), and they want that for themselves.

  6. When clients who like you and trust you get together with other clients who like you and trust you, what’s the net result? They all come away liking you and trusting you even more. In psychology, this is called “consistency theory.” The beliefs and opinions they held going in get reinforced by the event.

  7. It’s a fun way to do business! As we get into the different types of events you can host to facilitate these introductions, you’ll realize that this is a very enjoyable way to do business. You meet new prospects in a fun environment, and the relationships build with little or no resistance.

  There are five main types of events you can host that can turn into solid introductions with new prospects:

  1. Social events

  2. Philanthropic and community service events

  3. Celebration events

  4. Educational events

  5. Affinity-group events

  INVITING CLIENTS TO BRING GUESTS TO REFERRAL EVENTS

  Imagine being able to host a nice dinner or wine and cheese tasting, where your great clients invite people just like themselves for the purpose of meeting you in an enjoyable setting. Possible? You bet it is. I’ve been teaching small business owners and salespeople how to do this for years. It’s almost always a worthwhile investment of time and dollars.

  Here are a few events I’ve coached p
eople to host:

  1. Nice dinner—a “chef’s table” if you have the budget

  2. Wine and cheese tasting

  3. Chocolate tasting

  4. Cooking class

  5. Sporting event

  6. Golf outing or lesson

  7. Boat outing

  8. Wii or Xbox party

  9. An outing that leverages a hobby, such as fishing, hunting, or skiing

  Here’s how you invite your client to identify friends and colleagues to take to your event:

  George, as you might imagine, many of our clients like to introduce us to people they think should know about our work. We’ve found that one of the best ways to make this happen is through low-key social events. I’m calling to let you know we’re hosting such an event in about six weeks. It’s going to be a wine and cheese tasting. We have an expert coming to walk us through some of the best wines available. We’re making it a pretty small—somewhat exclusive—affair. Consider this a “hold-the-date” call. We’ll be sending you a more formal invitation. Think of who you think might enjoy meeting us at such an event. And this isn’t a sales pitch. We won’t talk any business. It’s just a way to meet people in a low-key, fun environment. We’ll follow up with you in a few weeks to see if you can make it and whom you’d like to bring as a guest. How’s that sound?

  It’s important that you emphasize two things:

  1. This event is for the purpose of introductions. You want to make it crystal clear that this is different from any client appreciation events you may already be hosting.

  2. There will be no sales pitch. If your clients think you’ll be “pitching” their friends and colleagues, they won’t participate.