Referrals

Most salespeople know referrals are powerful. Stats like these aren’t surprising:

• 84% of buyers now kick off their buying process asking for referrals

• 92% of buyers trust referrals from people they know

• The lifetime value of referred customers is on average 16% higher than that of non-referred customers

The problem is that when salespeople ask for referrals, they ask very vague and generic questions like:

❌ “Hey Stacey - is there anyone in your network that could benefit from our product/service?”

Even if they’re big advocates of you, they’ll likely reply with something like:

❌ “There must be someone so let me have a think about that and I’ll come back to you.”

They then ghost you. Not because they don’t believe in what you do, but because you’ve made them do all the work.

So here’s how to do it better:

✅ Look through the LinkedIn 1st connections of the person you’re asking for a referral. Pick specific individuals you think you can help, and write down the reason why they’d be a good fit. Here’s how that would look:

“Stacey, noticed you’re connected to Mike Lopez and worked with him at ABC Corp. Saw he’s hiring account managers, so thought he may be interested in our AM training program. Would you be open to making an intro?”

✅ Give before you get - look up Robert Ciadlini’s rule of reciprocity. He has a lot of data around how people are more likely to help you once you’ve given them something first. Some ideas for giving - share helpful content, provide free leads, send personalised gifts, invite them to events, coffee or dinner

✅ Block off 1 hour of your week to ask for referrals. This may seem super basic but although 91% of customers say they’d give referrals, only 11% of salespeople ask for referrals.

So those are my 3 recommendations.

On the topic of referrals, we have a 10% referral program at Growth Genie. You’ll receive 10% of the first year of the contract of any referrals, and our deals range from $10k to $250k.

Want to learn more about our referral program? Reply to this email for more info.