What do you typically do when an existing customer sends a referral your way? If you\u2019re like a lot of business owners, you get excited and fire off an email to the referral hoping they\u2019ll soon become your next customer. If you\u2019re thinking, \u201cYep, that sounds about right,\u201d you could be missing the whole point of referral business.<\/p>\n
According to our business coaches, a lot of businesses mishandle the most effective and least expensive business generators they have at their disposal. Contrary to popular belief, referrals are not about getting leads to drum up new business. If that has been your mindset, you\u2019ve probably been taking a step backward in terms of growing your business.<\/p>\n
You\u2019d probably love to dramatically increase your positive word-of-mouth and referrals, but before you do that, you have to change the way you view referrals. What is a referral really? It\u2019s a golden opportunity for you to show genuine appreciation to your existing customers. Once you shift your way of thinking, two things will happen: 1) your current customers will become happier, and 2) you will get more new ones.<\/p>\n
This model is not just for B2C businesses, it\u2019s for B2B ones as well. Our coaches teach business owners to approach referrals not just as new leads, but as a validation that they\u2019re doing something right, that their customer is seeing value in their product or service.<\/p>\n
The next time you get a new referral, our advice is to pause and take the time to thank your customer rather than push them aside, and hurriedly shoot an email or call the lead. \u201cBut what if the customer\u2019s referral doesn\u2019t pan out? What if they never turn into a customer?\u201d<\/p>\n
You shouldn\u2019t wait to see what happens before you thank your customer for the referral. Why? Because, it\u2019s not just about turning a referral into new business, what matters is your current customer has gone out of their way to refer you, and when you recognize and celebrate that, it will lead to happier existing customers and more referrals down the road, some of which will turn into new customers.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s advice from our coaches on how to earn more referrals.<\/p>\n
If you want customers to refer business, provide amazing value and make them happy. That\u2019s actually more important than asking for referrals because if they\u2019re happy, they\u2019ll naturally rave about you and they\u2019ll refer people, often without you having to ask.<\/p>\n
You don\u2019t have to be salesy or pushy to ask for referrals. Instead, you can casually say, \u201cHey, if you know anybody who would like our product or service, send them our way!\u201d When you truly believe in your product or service, it\u2019s easy to tell your existing customers with confidence that you can also help their friends or family.<\/p>\n
When a customer does send a friend or family member over to you, instead of thinking, \u201cThis will be great for my business!\u201d think, \u201cGreat! I will be able to help my customer\u2019s friend.\u201d And look for those positive moments that your customers have with you. That\u2019s when they\u2019re the most receptive to you asking them for referrals.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a big deal for people to refer customers. When they make a referral, they\u2019re putting themselves on the line; they don\u2019t expect their friend to come back saying, \u201cOh, I had an awful experience. Why did you send me to them?\u201d<\/p>\n
They don\u2019t want you to give them a quick \u201cthanks\u201d as you send your salespeople to pounce all over their referral. They want to hear that you genuinely took the time to listen to the referral\u2019s needs, and explore whether your product or service is right for them. And if they do become a customer, they want to be confident that you\u2019ll deliver exceptional service.<\/p>\n
Remember, referrals are much more than sales leads, they are your customers’ way of showing you a big vote of confidence. It\u2019s the ultimate validation, demonstrating that you are providing value\u00a0<\/em>to your existing customers. When a referral comes in, your whole team should pause for a moment and realize that it\u2019s a big accomplishment.<\/p>\n Every time a current customer gives you a referral, you should shower them with gratitude, whether it\u2019s through an email, a phone call, a hand-written note, a gift basket, a box of candy, or tickets to a game or concert \u2013 believe us, your customers will love it and they\u2019ll say that they\u2019ve never been shown so much appreciation before.<\/p>\n Customer referrals can be extremely powerful tools for business growth, yet they can be the least expensive way to generate new business. To learn other ways to grow your business from a business coach, contact AdviCoach today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What do you typically do when an existing customer sends a referral your way? If you\u2019re like a lot of business owners, you get excited and fire off an email to the referral hoping they\u2019ll soon become your next customer. If you\u2019re thinking, \u201cYep, that sounds about right,\u201d you could be missing the whole point…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":539,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,10,11,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-growth","category-marketing","category-sales","category-success"],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/06\/0408.AdviCoach-June2.jpg","featured_image_src_square":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/06\/0408.AdviCoach-June2.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"tforehand","author_link":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/author\/va\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}