4 Referral Boosters: How to Increase Your Word-Of-Mouth Referrals - and Get More Clients

2018-03-28

Many businesses count “word-of-mouth” as their most powerful generator of new customers—yet few create a system to harness more referrals.

Here are four tips for getting more and better referrals:

Referral Booster #1 – Ask for them.

“If you build it, they will come” only works in the movies. Outstanding products and customer service are a necessary foundation—but they alone will not generate referrals. The reality is, you must ask for referrals and make sure your team does too.

Referral hack: There’s a sweet spot to timing your referral request, after your client has received your services and begun to experience the difference it’s made, but before too much time has passed. For example, a week or two after a new, no-slip coating installation is a great time to check in for a referral, when your customers have had time to enjoy the improved appearance and feeling of better traction and safety.

Referral Booster #2 – Make it easy for people to refer to you.

You always want to make it as effortless as possible for people to refer business to you. So, support the people recommending your service with tangible tools: as simple as business cards or a branded pen, or a link to a special website page.

Referral hack: If you give and receive referrals by email or social media, give potential referrers specific verbiage to use when introducing you—so they can easily copy/paste the info (and you have more control over how and who they refer your way).

Referral Booster #3 – Offer an incentive.

Whatever the reward is, it should make sense for your customers and niche. If your business provides ongoing maintenance, you could offer a discount or credits for future service as a thank you for referrals.

Don’t be afraid to get creative and have fun with it. Test which offers work best.

Share information on your referral program with your best customers however you normally communicate with them: blog, video, newsletter, email or mailings.

Referral Booster #4 – Define how people can make referrals.

As important as the referral is how it’s made. You can create a referral form, checklist or contact form on your website to capture details so that a referral is more valuable—and your customer is educated on who make the best referrals.

If possible, the warmest referrals are when a customer arranges a face-to-face meeting or introduces the referral in person; the next warmest are when a personal connection is made via phone, email or otherwise. A name and number handed to you is coolest and least useful—really, more a lead than a referral—unless the referral has been “warmed up” by the referrer and expects your call.

Bonus referral booster: Always thank the source of a referral! Recognition goes a long way toward encouraging more of the same.

If you want more referrals, reach out to our team to learn more about becoming one of our certified, recommended contractors. Schedule a call today.