4 Ways to Increase Your Referability
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- Published on Tuesday, 15 May 2012 21:36
- Written by Jonathan Story
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According to Bill Cates, author of Get More Referrals Now!, the most effective way to attract clients is through referrals. He cites a study comparing sales from prospects discovered through cold-calling to prospects from referrals, with the result that cold call prospects had an 11 percent closing ratio and referral prospects a 40 percent closing ratio. Although these numbers will not necessarily carry over to every business or industry, a referral closing rate that is four times higher than a cold call rate points to the high value of referrals. Following are four approaches toward increasing your referability.
- Exceed your client's expectations. In order to do this, of course, you need to know what those expectations are. One way to do this is simply to make a habit of talking to clients and prospects about what they expect from you. For example, one might ask this early on in a relationship: "Let's pretend it's two years from today, and we've been together for all that time. How will we know if we've been successful? What would your measure be of our success in working together?"
- Put your attitude of service into action. It is one thing to get a client's business the first time, but it is quite a different thing to be able to keep that business year in and year out. Most businesses have a repurchase cycle. For example, people tend to buy a new car every three to five years, and a new computer every two to three years. If you served a person well the first time you sold him an item, and stayed in contact in some simple way, then when you call at an appropriate time in the repurchase cycle, your contact should be well received and even appreciated. Demonstrating your commitment to service includes such steps as: telling the truth; thanking your clients often; showing your appreciation; clarifying fuzzy phrases instead of assuming; knowing your competition; and recording every service transaction.
- Make your clients go "wow".Here are some tried-and-true things you can do:
- Call clients with status reports
- Always "install" your product or service to help your client get comfortable with the product or purchase after sale.
- Be careful how you turn clients over to "customer service". (To the customer, everyone is customer service.)
- Help your clients really know your company. Make sure they know of the other products and services your company provides.
- Find ways to compliment your clients.
- Keep serving your clients after the sale, even in ways that have nothing to do with your specific business.
- Survey your clients over the phone.
- Get your clients to complain. Complaints are not a lot of fun, so why is this important? There are four reasons: first, if they don't complain, then you won't know their problems and get a chance to fix them. Second, if one client is having a problem, chances are that others are having the same problem. As a result, you may need to fix things on a broader scale, such as systems and policies. Third, according to research customers that have problems but do not complain are likely to go to the competition. Finally, clients that are unhappy will usually tell other people about their bad experiences.