Sales Question:
"How Can I Get More Referrals from My Clients?"
Answer:
I’m not a fan of asking my clients the “who do you know?” referral question. If they decide to recommend my services on their own, that’s one thing. But calling them up and putting them on the spot to cough up some names isn’t something I’ve ever felt comfortable with. I don’t like it when it happens to me, so I don’t want to do it to others.
Prospecting Without Pestering
Generating referrals is a form of prospecting. A way to generate leads. The premise is to hopefully generate a higher quality lead. The “who do you know?” question is not only off putting in most cases (IMHO) but also only generates a few names as it is. I believe there are better ways to generate higher quality referral leads without risking your clients not wanting to take your future calls.
One way to do this is by creating a value added webinar on a subject matter that helps your targeted audience solve a problem (Try and keep the webinar to 20-30 minutes max)
Next, email your clients a quick note about the webinar, the problems it solves and who should attend and the link to register and then simply ask them if they wouldn’t mind “forwarding” the email to any of their contacts that they feel could benefit from it.
Do it right (meaning, have the right message – solving the right problem etc) and don’t be surprised if you get 50 to 500 new prospects registering for your webinar.
CAUTION…
- DO NOT SELL YOUR PRODUCT OR SERVICE AT ALL IN THE WEBINAR.
- DO NOT START THE WEBINAR WITH AN INTRODUCTION OF YOUR COMPANY AND WHAT YOU DO.
- DO NOT MAKE A SALES PITCH OF ANY KIND.
Simply get in there, introduce who you are, what problem you are going to solve and who the webinar is for and then get right to it.
Resist the urge to talk about you, your company or why prospects should buy from you. This isn’t a sales pitch. It’s a way to get on a bunch of new prospects radar and get them to view you as a trusted advisor.
If you need to see an example of a model to follow, take a look at this webinar to help inside sales teams get more prospects to return their voicemail calls:
Cold Call Voicemail Scripts, Tips & Strategies Webinar: How to Increase Call Backs by 10% Starting Today!
THE PAYOFF
With one 30-minute webinar and one email to your clients, you’ve generated a host (50-500) of fresh pre-qualified leads (they wouldn’t register for the webinar if they weren’t at least pre-qualified to be considered a suspect) all without picking up the phone and making one “who do you know?” referral call to your prospects.
Just make sure you have an intelligent call strategy after the webinar because if you call them and say something like: “Just calling to follow up with you” you’re going to sound like every other inside sales rep and you will quickly get blown off the phone.
Michael Pedone
CSS: Chief Sales Scientist
SalesBuzz.com - Because Salespeople Don't Want to Be Trained, They Want to Be BETTER!
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