The getting referrals without asking part 3...final part

I have to warn you, this is a long email. I considered breaking it into two emails, but I didn’t want to do that to you. So, now you have my magnum opus of emails on how to get referrals.

If you’re new here and want to catch up:

On that note, let’s get into it.

One of the first networking events I ever attended when I entered the business world was both very illustrative of what not to do, but also showed me that the competition out there was both ferocious and pretty weak.

I was working at a company called General Electric (GE), which used to be this amazing company, but at least in the years since I’ve worked there, has been a steady decline. Who knows, maybe I was the linchpin that brought about this failure.

This was my first job out of university, and I was excited to be there and not the government, like all of my friends. I didn’t want to work in the government, and I went out of my way to make sure I didn’t (even taking a lot less money to not work there). I’d been there as a student and my mom worked there and I vowed not to work there (the culture is too toxic in my opinion. By the way, this was a very smart decision on my behalf, because I’m just not a government person and I’ve made more money in the private sector than I ever would have made there).

So here I was at this networking event for business owners in Ottawa and I’m excited and little nervous to be there, it being my first one. So, I just did what I normally did, walk up to people and listen to their stories. But, I felt I was missing something, maybe not doing this whole thing right. I even ended up telling people stories about where I went to university, what I took and also the Cheaton Cup (which was this crazy hockey game between two competing residences – Chipman and Eaton the original two all-male residences – but was really the most drunken day I can remember. They even added cough drops to the elixir that they called “drunk-punch”). I then realized, maybe I should haven’t been sharing such a story at my “first” networking event. But, people seemed to get a kick out of the story as they reminisced of their time in university too.

And as I did the slow dance around the room I met this amped and I mean amped (and jacked) sales bro (before this was a thing) who was jackhammering his business card into every Dick and Nancy’s hands in the joint. I met up with him and he told me his name was Nate and proceeded to tell me how great he was and his company and all sorts of things. It was like nothing I’d ever seen. I didn’t get a word in edge-wise which I was fine to just listen. Maybe the conversation was 5 minutes, but it felt like 50.

I was a bit too green at the time to realize it, but that was not how you should behave. I’m not sure what this guy was on or if he had a lot of success. I don’t even remember who he worked for to this day. I just remember him being so obnoxious and self-centered. I thought to myself after that event and the years since, what ever that guy did, don’t be him.

Even at the time I didn’t have a ton of exposure to the sales world, but it seemed that the best people that I knew in that space were nice or at least, they created this aura that they were nice, they cared about others (or at least that was the act). This Nate fellow was the complete opposite, he was out there on display. He was the most transparent person I’d ever met. It was clear he was in it for himself and no one else. But, unlike those other (and more talented) sales folks, Nate didn’t hide it.

I wasn’t able to articulate it into words then, but I can now:

Nate made the conversation about HIM and not YOU.

So, if I can give you any advice for the process I’m teaching you, is do the complete opposite.

The process is about THEM and not YOU.

Which, if you’re new ‘round these parts seems the complete opposite to what you want. You want referrals, so we should talk about how great YOU are. That’s true, but people don’t like that. Plus, people like to talk about themselves, if they can. So, you’re going to give them that opportunity, but in a way they won’t feel bad or self-centered or any of that.

Think about your best friend in the world and you’re sitting down for coffee with them and they ask you:

What are you up to?

You’ll likely take this as a chance to talk about you, your family, your business, your dreams, your goals, your problems or whatever you feel like talking about.

You’re not going to feel bad about talking about yourself, because your best friend (who likely loves you) is asking because they care about you.

That is the type of conversation we are trying to make happen. Except, we are going to be on the other side of the discussion. The one asking the questions and listening. And, if you’re not used to this, it’s going to feel like we are taking care of this person, as we are in some ways. But, we want to give them space to talk about them and we want to listen, because here’s the big problem:

No one listens to them.

Including their spouse, children or business partners. Now, I’m not saying their spouse doesn’t listen to them or their children or their business partners at all. I just mean that in today’s world, everyone is out for themselves. Everyone thinks about their goals, their problems, their opportunities, etc. It is rare to find a person who sits there asking deep and intelligent questions and listens without trying to tell their story. Some people just want others to listen to them. Not provide advice. Not give them their take. Not tell them how that story reminds them of XYZ.

Just listen. And, shut your mouth.

We can do this.

Now, a word of caution. I know that if you’re in sales, you’ve likely heard of various strategies and tactics to build rapport faster to get to referrals faster. I want you to throw that out for the most part. A lot of those “tactics” are based on manipulation of some sort. Now, I’m not saying those strategies don’t have a place, especially in the sales process. But, we aren’t selling anything right now, we are in the cultivating relationships with fragile human beings process. So, don’t do any of that stuff. Not here.

NO tricks. NO manipulation. NO tactics.

Just listening to your fellow human being. But, you will doing more than just listening. Oh yes Chuckles, much more than listening.

You Will Be Looking For Ways To Help

They will say something, and you’ll make a mental note, because you will want to add value in the form of helping them with a problem they are having. Maybe they mention that they are struggling to find good employees for their business. Afterwards you could connect them with one of your contacts that is in HR and could help them hire the right employees. Or, you could provide an article or video that is valuable to a business owner looking to hire and retain employees. Or, maybe you have something else that would add value. The point is that you listened to them talk about a problem they have, you identified it and stated the problem and offered some solutions after the fact.

I want to be clear about this. It isn’t one of your insurance or wealth products. This is information or connections that will add value to them. Save your product discussion for another time.

Anyway you slice this, they’ll be appreciative. Because, you’re probably one of the few people in their lives that actually listens to them.

And another thing. While this process sounds simple to go through, I’m going to tell you, you’re probably going to have to have 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 or even 6 of these face-to-face chats BEFORE your contact ever considers referring you business. Trust takes time to build up. But over time it will build, as a house is built block by block – so will your relationship with them.

What you’re going to do is have what I call a first conversation in which you will provide value (or help them with a connection or resource) AND plant referral seeds (more on this later). It is the combination of listening and providing value and planting referrals seeds that will both build trust and condition them to do the things we want – which in this case is make a referral to us.

But, as I mentioned, we want to do this organically without asking. As they come across people who could be referred to us, we want them to think about us first. And the way we do this is listening to them and providing value (which builds up our trust) and dropping referral seeds (so they know we are taking referrals). Overtime, if you do this consistently, you can condition these contacts to return the favour (of all the listening and providing value we have done) in the form of a referral.

It is the most human and organic process you can imagine. We don’t manipulate. We are our authentic selves. But, as you can imagine, this process takes time to start working, but it works. That’s not to say you can’t get referrals very fast with the system, but some people take more time as you build trust and credibility and of course, they need to come into opportunities to refer you as well.

It is a system. But it works.

One final thing before we delve into it. Our meetings are not emails. They are not text messages. They are not calls. They are good ‘ol face-to-face conversations or Zoom (or MS Teams) calls for those that can’t be in person (or long distances). We want to see the whites of their eyes as we discuss helping them.

In the last section, I talked about creating a masterlist of Clients & COIs to put them on a list. If you haven’t completed that exercise yet, I’d encourage you to take 10 minutes putting the list together of people you think can refer you (focus on low hanging fruit). This can be all clients or all COIs or a mixture. It doesn’t matter. Do what’s right for you.

The second part of the process is once that list is complete, is to schedule some 1-on-1s with the people on that list.

And, let me re-emphasize what we want to do in those conversations: listen to THEM, provide value and drop referral seeds (1 or 2 per conversation maximum). And, like I said, you’ll likely have to have multiple conversations, so you will follow up at pre-set intervals (so you don’t forget about them, as we are creating a process) to stay top-of-mind and continue to look for ways to help them.

When you do that (as you’ll likely be the only one doing this for them, because people are so self-centered, but not you), when a potential referral opportunity comes up, they will think of you first. That is actually the goal of doing all of this work. So, that when an opportunity comes up, you are the go-to and not someone else.

Got it?

To start the process, you’re going to add people to the system each month and then keep adding. Some people will come out (as you don’t think they will refer you or you just don’t like them or whatever reason) and some will start referring you (which go to a new system). But, I need you to understand that the system compounds on itself.

Each month you are going to choose a number of NEW conversations to have. A good number to start with is 5. This would be 5 new conversations with potential referral sources.

Now, just a word of caution if you are choosing your clients, this is not a client conversation, but a REFERRAL conversation. While this might be a little bit confusing for you. This is not about the work you do for a client, but is a meeting to learn more about what is going on in their life. I’m not saying don’t discuss business if it comes up, but your goal is not to discuss business, but to learn more about what is going on in their life.

If you’re mainly going after COIs, this probably isn’t as big of a deal.

But, let’s talk about compounding for a second. So, if you add 5 new conversations each month, this is in addition to the work you are already doing in your business. And, remember, we need to be doing quality follow-ups (which I will talk about how to do those soon, patience!), the numbers can really grow.

Here’s an example of a monthly follow for you:

Month 1: 5 new conversations

Month 2: 5 new conversations plus 5 follow-ups = 10 contacts

Month 3: 5 new conversations plus 10 follow-ups (5 from Month 1 and 5 from Month 2) = 15 contacts

Month 4: 5 new conversations plus 15-follow-ups (5 from Month 1, 5 from Month 2, 5 from Month 3) = 20 contacts

…

Month 12: 5 new conversations plus 55 follow-ups = 60 contacts

You get the point, while 5 new conversations doesn’t seem like a lot. This is NEW people to your system. Eventually, you will have accumulated a lot of people already in the system. And, this is in addition to the work you are already doing, as these are net-new meetings. You can see how this system could potentially overload you and why people don’t do follow-up all that well.

There are a few things that will make this easier. First, quarterly meetings will be acceptable for most of your contacts, which will minimize the monthly follow-ups you'll need to accomplish (to a more manageable 10-15 per month).

And, if you get overwhelmed, you can pause the system of adding new people. But, that does not mean you stop your follow-ups. Once you have someone in the system, you need to keep it up as this processes success comes down to how you cultivate (read: contact multiple times with value) those relationships and this takes time, consistency and drive (along with providing value and dropping referral seeds consistently).

You might be looking at this and thinking, while 5 seems like a good number, I can see how I can get overwhelmed quickly. You can choose a different number, but I’d keep it between 3 and 10 NEW contacts in the system. Anything below 3 will not be enough to get traction, in my opinion, and more than 10 will become unwieldy as the months go on (unless you don’t have any clients or very little client work). But choose a number that works for you and run the system.

And meet whoever fits your mold between clients and COIs. Maybe you want to start with clients to get your feet wet before you move to COIs. That’s fine. Choose a process that works for you. But, whatever you choose, stick with it and be consistent in the process. If you aren’t consistent, this system will not work for you. And, by the way, the reason most people are successful with any system comes down to consistency.

Since this is a system, what you’re going to do for that masterlist you have already created is that each month as you meet 5 new people (or whatever number you choose), you’re going to create a new list. Since you’ll be pulling 5 people each month, you’ll want to create that new list for tracking purposes. You’ll want to document who you met with, when and the value you provided (if you did at all, including connections and resources provided). This will allow you to track this in the future.

You can add this information to your CRM, but I suggest you use a simple tracking tool like Excel to keep a separate documentation to make it easy for you. Sometimes, CRM tools have a lot of things going on and something as important as building your referral pipeline makes sense to have an easy to access and easy to use document that keeps all of this information in a separate place.

Now the next step is going to be super easy for a lot of you. It’s setting up these meetings. For people you know it will be as simple as sending an email, text or a quick phone call to set up a coffee date. But, for others, especially those you haven’t talked to in a while, you may want to take a different approach (which includes people you don’t know that well, but know a bit).

If you are also connecting with people you don’t know, but might know you, remember to use a Champion to make the process go smoother and faster.

So, for those people who may need a bit extra lovin’, I suggest you take this as a two-step process.

Step 1: Send them a handwritten note to their office mentioning that you’d love to connect and that you will be connecting with them via phone or email to arrange a meeting in a few days.

The point of Step 1 is to warm them up and show that you are taking a bit more effort than the average person would take to set these meetings up.

Step 2: Simply book that meeting/coffee/lunch appointment to catch up. Not talk business, catch up.

It’s pretty simple, stuff you do all the time, so I won’t belabour the point here. But if you need the handwritten card, send it. If not, just do your thing.

Let’s flash forward here and rip through the process as I’m sure you’re getting it. I’m going to assume you will not have many problems booking your first 5 conversations. This should be second nature for you.

Now that you’ve booked them, what do you do?

First off, I know you know how to have a conversation. You do this all the time in your job. The only thing that I want you to change is your approach to your business. This isn’t a sales call. You aren’t trying to pivot on how to sell them this or that. They might even be expecting a sales pitch, but it just won’t be coming out of your mouth. Instead, like I’ve mentioned before, this is all about THEM.

Here’s what I want you to be doing:

Pay attention to what they say.

Because, as I’ve mentioned before, this is where you will be focused so that you can provide value and help them out in some way. Maybe they will mention this or that problem and you can connect them with a video or an article or a colleague who can help them out. You are simply trying to find something of value, so they leave that conversation in a positive frame of mind.

I’ve already talked about all of this stuff, but it makes sense to keep reinforcing it so that you don’t forget. You keep the conversation focused on them.

BUT…there is inevitably going to come a time when they start asking you questions (How’s your business going) or wondering about you. Even the most self-centred contact (probably not someone you want to build a relationship with) will ask you questions; it’s only human.

Now, this type of question might cause you to jump into your sales pitch, but I want you to try all your mighty power not to do that. Instead, use this moment to drop a referral seed or two.

Let’s talk about referral seeds now, as I haven’t spent anytime at all talking about it so far. But, this is an essential part of the process.

You are having a conversation and you are keeping that conversation focused on THEM, which is important. And, if you are helping them out and providing value, they start to view you higher on the trust meter. But, the point of all of this is to get referrals. So, we need to connect that value and trust we are building with these conversations (and ongoing ones) to bridge the gap to a referral.

And, this is where the referral seeds come into play.

So, what are they exactly?

Well, they are snippets of a conversation that allow us to talk about referrals in a completely organic way. We aren’t trying to drop them into conversation where they don’t fit. People will recognize this and feel it’s some kind of indirect sales pitch. Which is fine normally, but we are trying to stay focused on them in these conversations. Instead, these dropped conversations fit in perfectly.

Let me give you an example:

“So, how’s business on your end.”

This is a completely normal question that comes up in conversation all the time. And, what’s your normal response.

If you’re like most people, you probably say some version of the following:

“I’m so busy. It’s tough to keep up, but I’m doing fine.” Or whatever your version of this answer is. Even if you aren’t that busy, you aren’t going to tell someone that. Busy is good. Not busy is very, very bad.

So, that’s the normal response.

But in my opinion, this is missed opportunity. No shot on goal, as they say.

Instead, why not view this question as an opportunity to talk about referrals in a completely organic way? Setting the stage to let our contact know that we are getting referrals.

Here’s how this might sound:

“Thanks for asking. I’ve been very fortunate to continue to receive referrals from my amazing clients, people just like you.” Of course, assuming this person is a client.

Or:

“Business is great, I just brought in 4 referrals last month all through referrals from other clients.”

Or you could use cloning language in the process too:

“I love working with great clients just like you.” Setting the stage that maybe they can help find other people like them.

Or you might be talking with a COI from the “How’s Business” question:

“I’m very fortunate to continue to receive referrals from people in my network, from people just like you.” A revision on the client example, but very similar. Essentially setting the stage that OTHER people in your network are referring people to you, which increases your social value and thus makes you more referrable.

“Business is going great, as I just received another referral from an Accountant (or whoever you’re meeting)”. By the way, don’t lie if that’s not true. But, if you did just receive a referral from an Accountant and the person you are talking to is an Accountant, by all means say that. It’s a great line. But only if it’s true.

And here are a few others that you can use in conversation with COIs:

“Don’t you think referrals are the best way to grow your business?”

“How many referrals do you receive on average?”

“Who are your best referrals sources – clients or COIs?”

Now, I want to caution you. You could simply drop plenty of these in conversation, but they’ll be onto it. You could have an entire conversation around referrals, but your contact on the other side will likely realize that you are asking for referrals and may be turned off, which is not our goal at all.

The point isn’t to pepper them with these referrals statements and questions. It’s instead in the course of your discussion about THEM, that it inevitably will come up in conversation and it will be a perfect segway to drop 1 or 2 referral seeds.

I would not try to do more than that. And, I wouldn’t try to fit something that doesn’t fit naturally. Don’t all of a sudden switch the topic of discussion to drop one of these seeds. That will feel unnatural, and they’ll be onto it.

But, naturally most people do ask the “How’s business question”. Or, you might be talking about business development (and getting more sales with a business owner perhaps) and it will be natural to drop the “Aren’t referrals the best” comment. That is a natural part of conversation where those seeds make sense, and it won’t feel like you forced anything.

And, if you do it well. They won’t think second about it or feel you have any ulterior motive. But, you are essentially planting these ideas in their head that you:

Get Referrals All The Time

Again, don’t try to force something that doesn’t fit, but at the same time, if the opportunity arises to drop one of these into conversation. Take the opportunity and take it well my friend.

That’s all there is to it. Have a normal conversation where you look for ways to help them and when the conversations comes around to the perfect place, drop a referral seed or two that fits naturally and organically in the conversation. Simple as that. Got it?

Now, I’m going to assume you are good with all of that. I think it’s pretty simple and straightforward. The next part of the process is all about keeping them warm.

So, let’s say you have your first conversation with them and you organically drop a referral seed or two in conversation. You might be thinking:

“Where are my referrals?”

Well, my young padawan, it doesn’t work that way. Sure, you might get lucky and the next week someone calls you up to send over a referral. But, for most of your contacts, it won’t work that way. You need to provide ongoing relationship support to stay top of mind.

If you remember at the start of this process, I told you that we can create desire, but we can’t control opportunity. Said another way, we can have people that want to refer us business, but if they don’t have anyone to refer to us. We won’t get any referrals.

The other thing is they might really like us, but they don’t yet trust us. Trust usually takes time to build, especially if you haven’t been as active in their life. That is why this process is long-term. But, if you have a long-term attitude, you’ll notice this fits squarely in that camp.

One of the ways we keep the fire hot, so to speak is ongoing touch points to stay top of mind.

My advice to you is to schedule 4-5 follow ups per year per contact. This will allow your system to work properly of adding 5 new people each month and doing a follow up every 2-3 months for those in the system. Now, you can adjust this to your own flavour, but that’s what I’d recommend.

If you’re good with all of that, what kind of follow ups should we be doing?

Now, these are unlikely to be truly ground-breaking to you. They are things you’ve probably done from time to time, but now you are going to make them a process. It means you will do them consistently. If you do not do them consistently, do not expect to get referrals consistently.

Here’s the list:

You could simply schedule another 1-on-1 in 3 months. Let’s say you went to coffee and you both agree that was a great meet-up and you say, “we should do this in another 3 months”. That’s a great idea. You will always get faster relationship building by sharing some food (or coffee or a drink) and seeing the whites of their eyes as they discuss their life. This is a great idea.

You could also introduce or connect them to someone in your network that can help them with a problem or maybe you’ve identified they share similar interests.

If the chance comes up to refer them a client for their own business, that is another great touch point. But, this one is tough to arrange. But, my opinion is that if you want to build a relationship with them, you should also be someone who would refer to them as well. If that’s not the case, why not find someone you like better and would have no problem referring to.

Send them a relevant resource (article, book, video, etc) on something you think they would benefit from, maybe based on your discussions.

Set up a networking lunch, this is where you invite them and another contact to lunch as a meet-and-greet, so that they get to know each other better. This could be someone you think they’d get along with or can help them in their business. If the connection works out, they’ll view you in higher regard as you understand them and who they want to cultivate in their network. If you make networking even easier for them, your value and trust will increase. This is also a great way to leverage your time, as you can have two meetings in one, and both feel it was a good use of their time. Of course, this can backfire if the lunch does go poorly, but use your discretion, and you’ll figure it out.

You could invite them to an event you are attending. This could be an industry event, a charity event, a sporting event, lots to choose from. You invite them as your guests (by the way, you can do this for multiple people, again leveraging your time). In my day job as a wholesaler in the insurance business, we always do this. Get a box at a sporting event or be at an industry event and invite the guests for the networking session and lunch. It is incredibly effective at building relationships faster. In addition, if you can get a drink in their hand and have a conversation, nothing builds a relationship faster, in my opinion, than sharing a drink and talking together.

Send out a holiday card. This is a great example where you can either show off your family or show off your corporate team. They start to feel included in what you are doing and who you’re a part of. Again, this is just another touch point for you to feel connected with these individuals.

Social Media shout-out. Maybe they posted something great, and you share it on your socials, but you could use the following language: “Look at my buddy BLANK as he’s building his business. Go check him out, and you won’t be disappointed.” People love that stuff, but what did it really cost you? Nothing. You are lending your network to their business, and they’ll love it. In addition, you can like, comment and share on their other social media posts.

These are just an example of things you could do throughout the year to keep that relationship warm and keep them thinking about you as you keep building the relationship.

Because remember, what we are trying to do is build a relationship and stay top of mind, so that in the event they meet someone who they could refer to us, they do that.

But, they’ll only do that to US if they think of US first.

We are doing all these meetings, all the touch points and all these connections to have their attention in that moment where someone comes into their lives with a problem where WE can help and they will direct that referral to US and only US.

You want to be INDISPENSIBLE.

But let me tell you a little secret, okay?

You know what will supercharge this whole relationship business:

If you HELP THEM.

If you go out of your way to help them. Or, you provide a contact or resource that really helps them. All of a sudden, your trust and value goes through the roof.

And, then if they get a Christmas card with your family all blazon on there. And, then 3 months later you invite them to the hockey game. And, then you go to a networking lunch with another person who is incredibly valuable to you. And then….

Someone needs the help of a financial advisor, who are they thinking about?

They are thinking about YOU.

And only YOU. Because of all the work you’ve done. Your relationship meter is through the roof. They love you. They need more of you in their life. No one has likely done for them what you have done for them.

And, this is a big AND: You need to keep it up, so long as they keep referring you people.

This is why my buddy Mark who got all those referrals from the Tim Horton’s owner. He kept on being valuable to his network and he found some people that really supercharged him. His referrals came in fast and furious.

This can happen to you. You just need to put in the work. Run the system. Add people. Add value. Drop referral seeds. Stay top of mind.

You will have built a flywheel system that will send an ungodly amount of referrals your way. But, only if you:

Do The Work

Here’s something I heard someone say:

If I can impact how your feel about me. It will impact how you think about me.

That’s powerful. It just shows the value of truly helping people. They’ll want to return the favour, which in our minds, is a referral into our business.

See, those referral seeds you’ll be planting in each engagement will really start to compound when they FEEL differently about you. They start thinking about how they can help you WHEN the opportunity strikes. You will be top of mind and only YOU.

Because no one else will have done the work you’ve done.

That my friend is the process. It seems simple. But you have to keep doing the work. You need to keep showing up and adding value, keep being a helper and while you are doing that, you drop some of those referral seeds where needed. And, as you help them and they feel you help them and the opportunity strikes, you will start to get referrals.

As the referrals do start to come in, I want you to do two things:

1.      I want you to track the referral in Excel. You will want to compile data on who is sending you a referral, the date they referred and the outcome of the referral. This will be helpful as we plan for future quarters and future years. Data is king, and you are making your own data.

2.      I want you to write a handwritten thank you card within 2 business days, regardless if the referral becomes a client. We appreciate all referrals, and we want to thank them with a handwritten card. Some people will add a gift card to this card, and I’d caution you against this. We don’t want to create a transactional relationship; we want to create deep relationships that aren’t money-based. You can give them a gift at a different time. We got the referral because we were uniquely qualified to solve the problem that had presented itself.

You’ll be amazed at how a handwritten card is received by people. You probably know this: handwritten cards are not a lot of fun to write. They take time. But it is precisely this reason that they work because people know that they take time. You have to take precious time out of your day to write a handwritten card, which is why it gets such high value from people receiving it. No one goes out of their way to write handwritten cards anymore, which is, again, why they are so highly valued.

Everyone is trying to optimize their time and use technology to do so. And that has a place in your business, no doubt, but this is the complete opposite. We want to show our referral sources that we value them so much that we took time out of our day to write you this card because “you mean so much to me.”

This is the message we want to get across to them. They are so important that I took the time in my day to do something special for you. And, believe me, this will not go unnoticed.

I have sent handwritten thank you cards to people, and they tell me months later how amazing it was to receive them. There is something to be said about being unoptimized. People appreciate it.

Now, the final thing I want to discuss in our main program is setting your one-year target. Because where are we really without some goals to hit?

Nowhere, in my opinion.

Now, it’s going to be tough for you to set a target if you don’t have any real data (which is why you are filling out the Excel document to capture real hard-core data we can use for the future), so the number we choose is going to be a real guestimate here. But it will give you a number you can work on throughout the year.

You have to ask yourself, what is the number of new referrals I want to get this year? How many can I handle? And, then work backwards.

But if we take all the people we add to the system each year, in our case, that is 60 (5 per month times 12 months). In your case, it may be a bit lower, depending on how many people you want to add to your system.

Now, we are going to have to make some assumptions. Let’s say we did an excellent job in the system. Maybe we turn 50% of those referral sources into sending just 1 referral each year. If we only did a good job, maybe that’s only 30%. And then, if we did just an OK job, that turns 10% into referrals.

To determine if you did an excellent job, did you stay consistent with adding more people to the program? Did you find ways to add value to your meetings? Did you drop referral seeds? Did you invite them to networking events? Did you send out your Christmas cards? Did you send handwritten notes after a referral was made?

Did you do all those things? Or did you do some of those things but not others? Did you get busy with other things?

As you can see, the more consistent you are with seeing the people, providing value (and help) and dropping referral seeds, the more likely you will receive a consistent stream of these referrals.

The point of this exercise is simply to give you a starting point for where you think you’ll be and a goal to work towards. You can adjust your plan if you get slightly fewer referrals than you expected.

Maybe you should exit people from the program who you don’t feel will refer people. Or maybe you should add people of higher value to the system. Or maybe you should change your value offering.

It is to give you feedback and make the necessary changes to hit the referral goal you want to grow your business.

And, one final thing. Once you determine your referral goal, I want you to send it to me. You have my email address, so send it to me, and I’ll be your long-term accountability partner.

Congratulations on making it through the training and the process. Now, I hope this isn’t one of those things that you read and put on a shelf and never implement. It does work. I have had many Advisors use the system and use it well. But it is up to you to make that change. If you do it consistently and adjust where needed, you will find that you will have achieved a level of success that you didn’t think was possible.

Good luck, and keep me posted on your success!

All the best,

Andrew