Why The Referral System Is The Best Time Management Tool You Can Use.

(Or how you can get all the referrals you need in just 15 minutes a week.)

How many times have you heard this old adage, “If you fail to plan, you’re planning to fail?”   But as you know, “knowing and doing are two different things.”  As Yoda in Star wars said, “There is not know, only do.” But still how often do you begin each day or week with a plan?  If you’re like 80% of the people in business, you don’t have one.   I’m going to outline a simple yet effective way you can begin each week with a plan (that will take you less than 15 minutes) and will result in more and better referrals.  After all, how many referrals do you need to become very successful?

In past articles I’ve talked about developing a description of your Ideal and Bread and Butter clients.  So I won’t go over that again because you already know how to do that.  So today I’m going to share with you an exercise you can do in 15 minutes and get results.

First: Make a list of your 10 best, most faithful clients.  These are clients who think you walk on water and wouldn’t leave your to go to one of your competitor’s for love nor money.   (I hope you have several of these, if you don’t that’s another problem.)

Second:  Prioritize the list like this.  As you review the 10 names on the list ask yourself this question.  “If I were in trouble at 2:00am in the morning and needed help who on this list would be the most likely person to come to my rescue?”  You write that name down.  Then who would be the second person to come to your aid?  Write that name in the second place. And so on until you prioritize all 10 names.

Third:  Now call the person on the list you marked as number 1 and schedule a meeting to ask for referrals.  Then move to the second name, etc. until you’ve called all ten and scheduled meetings.

Will you schedule meetings with all of them?  Probably not, since some will be in meetings, some will be out of the office, etc.  But the one’s you do get to will schedule meetings for you to get referrals.  In the next session I’ll tell you what to do when you get to your meeting that will motivate your client to give you several referrals.  Remember the only thing that will keep you from getting more referrals will be your reluctance to act because your clients are more than willing to refer to you.

When you use this method you’ll be amazed at how many referrals you can get in a short time.  When you begin using this technique your “Time Management” will be drastically improve because you won’t have to spend so much time prospecting.  You’ll have much more time for selling, service, family, and hobbies.

Remember, you can either Soar With The Eagles, Or Scratch With The Turkeys!

David

This content was originally published here.