Getting Referral Business - A Proven System
July 20, 2008
Referrals are an amazing and effective way to grow your business and add to your income. The trouble is that most of the tips and articles give you bad advice on how to get referrals. Here, I’m revealing to you my tested way of when and how to secure more referral business.
The normal advice given is to prove your worth, make sure the customer is happy and then ask for a referral. While it’s sounds good, this is a really just a great way to eventually wonder why you get so few referrals. You understand if you’ve ever tried it.
The first meeting is the best time in the relationship to let people know how you work. To build your business with referrals, you advise people right away that referrals are how you do business. Here’s why:
You have a center in your brain called the reticular activated system (RAS). This system is the attention center of the brain. It also functions to automatically filter out all of the various noises and distractions in life that are not important right now, so that you can focus on areas that are important.
The part of your brain responsible for this is the reticular activated system (RAS). Researchers call it the attention center of the brain. It has many tasks but one of them is choosing what to pay conscious awareness to.
Letting your customer’s RAS work to build your business:
Some people advocate that the time to bring up referrals is after a product or service has been delivered and the customer is happy with the outcome. However, if you do it this way, your customers RAS will not automatically work with you. Your customer has gotten their result and their mind is on to the next thing - you are automatically forgotten.
Referral System Example
Example of a Referral Request
“Mr. Smith, if we do business, there will be a time when you will be thrilled with what we provide. We won’t take on a new client unless we know we can provide what they need. A single client fee is not worth the potential loss in reputation from taking an assignment where we are not confident of success.
Our business grows by word of mouth. So, we don’t stop until we achieve success together.
So, if we do business together, there will be a time when you are thrilled with who we are and what we do. We actively set it up that way.
Of course, if you refer me that’s a positive thing and it will only happen if you are thrilled with my services.
So It’s really important to my business to do a good job. I’m relying on impressing you enough that you are happy to be an ally and do some promotion of my business. I don’t give rewards or trips for business referrals. I make sure that my prices have no hidden charges and that they offer a great value.
I only expect that you will refer a friend if it makes sense that they will benefit as much as you have.
I make sure that you get a ton of value so that you want to send friends and associates to get the same results.
I only have one request: If we work together, may I periodically check with you to see if you are thrilled yet?”
When you prime the pump like this, your customer’s RAS gets a chance to start looking for ideal candidates for your service, while you are important to your customer. Doing it this way, your referrals will be much more effective.
You will end up getting and keeping more customers at a profit.
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