Get Referrals Without Asking

Speaker 1: we need processes and we need systems and we need workflows in our business to deliver that seamless repeatable client experience and it needs to deliver the work that you do and the relationship touch points that you're trying to build as well hi I'm Melanie bar welcome to the she builted experience with Melanie join me as I talk to women who have successfully built it a career and business that they love we dive into the topic of how they built it and talk about everything from Having the courage to make career leaps to the details of how to lead effectively create successful teams Implement strategies for growth and Infuse Tech Innovation magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy so let's dive in thank you for joining us Stacy you are a three-time entrepreneur and author of The award-winning book generating business referrals without asking tell us about what you do your business and what led you to write your book

Speaker 2: I teach small business owners how to generate referrals naturally and when we say naturally what we mean is not having to feel like you've got to participate in the traditional ways that teaching referrals has been around for decades and decades so when we say naturally we mean without manipulation without incentivizing and without even asking for them we look at the science behind what's happening when referrals are being given and then we develop strategies and tactics that actually protect relationships and work so I've been doing this now for about 10 years we hit 10 years this year and it was a couple of years ago it was like okay it's just time for a book it was always there would be a book eventually now it's a WIS book number two coming out which I've been sitting on for embarrassingly way too long the idea was always how can I get the message out to more people because I'm a contrarian in the space of referrals most people teach that you've got to ask if you want referrals and I'm like absolutely not don't do that so I do a lot lot of the educating somebody called it Tim relased learning they're like they like get it and they're like then they gotta like really get it to understand that it's possible so the book was just a natural Next Step as we're educating the people that we work with my background is in sales and I love sales and I know not everyone does and it's so much building

Speaker 1: relationships was your background in

Speaker 2: sales it was I have a portfolio career so I actually went to college I got a broadcast journalism degree because my expect was and what I had planned on doing was being the next Katy kurick I assumed somebody needed to replace her why couldn't it be me and then I went off to college and got my journalism degree and I was like oh I don't want to do this so it really started me on a portfolio career I do have a background in sales and marketing but every opportunity I was placed in was about okay what can I learn from this

Speaker 1: situation for me it was I do have a background in Human Resources HR Employee Engagement generational diversity I also have a background in sales marketing publishing as well but I could never have predicted the people that I would help how uniquely positioned I would be to be able to help them based on this portfolio career that I have before I started this business everything has centered always around the positions that I've had within those Industries and within my other company has always centered around communication and language and messaging and then relationships so that's always been an ongoing theme and I see how that's a tie in because the more you ask and the more you're told no the more you learn you learn what to do the next time and how to do it better and also how to build those relationships to where someone would want to refer you yeah it's funny because when I talk about referrals people bring all kind of baggage to the conversation and even how they Define referrals and what it means to them and what it looks like and I will find people being like okay stacy says you can't ask for referrals so I'm also not asking for testimonials or reviews and I'm like I didn't say that that's not what I said or they'll be like stacy says you can't ask for referral so that also means I can't ask for the business I'm like you need to know how to sell when you're talking to a prospect you need to know how to take them through your process whatever that looks like to be able to close them into a paying client and you need to also when they think you're amazing right you also need to have a system in place processes in place to not be afraid to say hey you've loved this experience would you give me a testimonial would you do an online review like those are things you should know how to do and those are things you have to ask for what I will always tell you never to do is don't then go ask that client to refer you there are other ways that will actually make the referral their idea versus your idea which is actually what Builds on that relationship and it strengthens their willingness to refer you long term and it's so much better when it's their idea right here's what people don't always realize about referrals if I were to say hey Melanie I know you know a lot of amazing people I'm sure they're all awesome they're all like you and they probably all need to work with me so who do you know that you should be referring to me so I can teach them what I do and the reality is in that moment not only did I make an assumption that people need what I do I'm assuming there's some need I'm manufacturing or artificially creating which doesn't actually exist which is you knowing people who need what I do the other thing I just did is I just gave you work to do like I just gave you like a homework assignment and most people just don't realize that when you asking for referrals that's ultim what you're doing is you're placing it on someone else to come up with people to refer to you and that's not how it works that's not how the science says that it works that's why you get that uncomfortable awkward feeling in the pit of your stomach every time you've been told you've got to ask someone for a referral there's a reason for that it's like your intuition and your gut are saying this is awful this is uncomfortable and I don't want to do it now there will always be unicorns in the world and there will always be people who are like I love to ask people for referrals they're not my people they're not in my tribe but definitely what I'm trying to help people understand is that you can generate referrals and you can get it consistently and you can actually have some control over what your referrals look like but you're going to have to put in the work and you're going to have to know the right strategies and tactics and it all centers around relationships you have a client experience formula that drives referrals

Speaker 2: if someone follows your formula share

Speaker 1: with us how they will gain success we actually teach this is usually for most folks a little bit like what I had no idea there are that many ways to think about referrals in my business but we actually teach 19 different strategies teaching you how to build out a referable client experience so that your client experience plants referral seeds and brings clients to the place where they're more likely to refer you is actually just one of the 19 but it is one of the three biggest strategies that we teach and it's almost like a disclaimer when people are like hey I want to get more referrals I almost make an assumption that you're referable okay let me teach you I'm assuming people want to refer you like you're referable in nature and so with a referable client experience we just make that the reality the formula that we teach is that to be a great client experience to be sticky right to have the wow factor to have people be like oh my gosh working with Melanie was amazing for that emotion to be evoked right because the client experience is all about what your client thinks about and feels about when they're working with you the idea behind that formula though is it's got to be a balance of the work you do which we happen to call work touch points balanced out with the relationship you're trying to build which is the relationship touch points and it's not 5050 right it's usually like relationship touch points are going to be 20 to 30% and the balance of that will be the work touch points that you're doing but people just miss in some cases simple and in some cases you got to think about it opportunity is to really build that relationship with your client to be the person they be like wow I did not expect that after working with Stacy and then also be able to plant referral seeds so there's the potential for them to think about referring you as well and so when you think about the work you do just make sure you've also got that relationship piece mixed in as well that's what helps you be referable the customer experience and the relationship is everything and I think people downplay it because what I tell people is that you have a client experience whether you're intentional about it or not there is an experience your people are feeling things they're going through things what I'm hoping is that it's a referable client experience it's repeatable for every client and it actually works the way you want it to while also not being this overly taxing process or strategies or systems you're trying to put into place within your program you suggest the right way to Define referral how do you define

Speaker 2: referral yes so the way we Define a referral is it's two parts and the first part is you've got to be connected by someone who we call the referral source the person who's going to refer you you've got to be connected by the referral source to the Prospect and that connection typically happens in most Industries over email though I will see it in some Industries like real estate and others where it may happen a little bit more over text threads but it's really going to happen that connection's going to be made from the referral source to the Prospect and they're connecting to you right because you're the solution provider for whatever problem the prospect has which leads us to the second part of the definition which is there's a need identified in the prospect I'm going to use just real estate as this example if I'm living in the house this is my forever home I have no intentions of moving I'm going to be here forever that's the plan right I never need to be referred to a real estate agent because I have zero need and zero desire and so the idea here is what when you receive a referral not only do you need to be connected by the referral source to the prospect so that trust can be transferred but actually that the prospects yeah I'm the prospect raise my hand I'm the one who has a problem and I'm interested in solving that problem which is why I let that referral source connect us which is why I let myself be referred to you personal connection need identified in the prospect it's so interesting because sales and referrals you can think negatively about the words but sales and referrals make a business yes you have a lot of different ways that clients can come into your business or prospects before they become clients can come into

Speaker 2: of those things and you don't need all those those things but you definitely need a couple of ways that you bring clients in the door when I work with a client I just want referrals to be the biggest piece of the pie I want you to have a diversified sales strategy I think that is smart business but I just want referrals to be a locked in loaded strategy you have of how you consistently bring in clients whether they're refer to you or they come through a Facebook ad or they meet you at a networking event they still have to

Speaker 1: go through the buyer journey and the buyer journey is where they're making the decision to say yes or no or not now to working with you that's where that sales proc process is ultimately happening so we need to understand it all and we don't have to be amazing at everything but we have to know our processes we have to know what we say and what we do and what that looks like to be able to grow a business because to your point without paying clients we really don't have a business at all and

Speaker 2: you're so right the referral being the biggest piece of the pie just makes life easier the prequel to generating

Speaker 1: referrals is being referable what do people Overlook about their client experience when it comes to referrals we teach this from a two-part process because I think it makes it easier for our minds to latch on and understand where we may have a gap the first one is

Speaker 2: source it's so interesting because there's things that we know we know our processes relate to our client experiences but we don't always think about it that way especially when we're

Speaker 1: going through the process so it's so great to have these reminders to say hey look we're going through the process the process is for the customer but how does it relate to their experience one of the things I teach my clients to do when they're going through the client experience is map it out you can bullet point it out you can draw it out or you can actually like what I would prefer my clients to do and actually have the journey map the expectation map it's like hey this is what it's going to look like to work with me and I can't tell you how many of my clients have joined my coaching program I had a client that was going through my client experience and he was like he just happened to mention he goes that map I think like a Candy Land board it's kind of how we tell folks to create them he was like that map of what I can expect and where I am in the face he he was like I haven't even learned the first strategy from you and this map alone was worth the cost of admission because this is missing in my business and I'm like oh hang on because there's so much more coming your way that you're going to be like I can't believe I didn't have this in my business and it's pretty simple but I always like to remind folks when you're doing the client experience take a minute to put yourself in your client's shoes just remember what it's like to be a client we all have buyers remorse what are you doing in that new client stage to overcome that buyer's remorse what are you doing even in the buyer's Journey before they become a client to help them understand what it looks like to work with you when you're halfway through the process and the client stops doing what they're supposed to be doing and they're holding up the process how do you have a mechanism in place that allows you to remind them gently and politely this is all your fault this is not my fault but doing it in a way that's they would be like oh because you warned me about this like all those things we just don't think about we just teach it yes you should be thinking about them and you should have systems in place to manage those moments and I'll be honest all these systems are not email-based everything is not automated and everything is not oh I just put you on this 12 drip campaign email and I'm gonna solve all my client experience problems it doesn't work that way so important today to when you've reached the point of okay I've hit my limit to be able to talk to someone I understand Bots to a certain point can fix our problems but at a certain point being able to talk to someone is so important in the client customer experience yeah and it's how you build a relationship the truth is if I felt like all the relationship Outreach within the client experience all the relationship touch points were automated or done by a bot or were done by some type of digital software they lack the impact they're going to have on me that's important for people to pay attention to within their client experience I need something to be automated your clients want some things to be automated but some things

Speaker 2: shouldn't be and it's Discerning which should be and which shouldn't and which needed a little extra step that stuff really matters and people just we're so busy that we don't stop and think about those things until something happens and we have to or we decide this has got to be easier there's got to be a way to make this easier and sometimes that means yeah I need to take a step back go to the 30,000 foot view view your business and let's pay attention to what

Speaker 1: we need to fix you're so right at the end of the day we're still human yes we are hopefully we will always be human thank goodness what do you think is the most important element when scaling a business and growing your teams so that

Speaker 2: is an interesting question for me because I am a solopreneur with the exception that I have an army of contractors and some people would look at this and be like that's exactly what I want and other people would look at my business and be like that is not what I want but I am at a stage in life I refer to myself as a family first on entrepreneur I want to make as much money as possible and help as many people as possible but as long as it fits within the world that I am living in right now with three teenagers who will eventually one is becoming a teenager tomorrow I've got a handful of Summers left with my boys and a few more after that with my daughter for me it's this idea of I want to help people and being a successful entrepreneur that helps a lot of people while working as little as possible and building processes and systems that allow me to do that as long as my clients are getting results and they're getting what they need from me and what they're investing within my company and so I build everything with that in mind and one of those things that I decided early on and this is not for everybody but I prefer long-term relationships with contractors like I have a tech person who's been with me since 2018 I do a check-in you're not firing me I'm not firing you you're not firing me is everything good it's like having somebody in your business that you can have strategy conversations with because they know the insides of your business versus someone who doesn't and so I made the decision to rely on contractors in my business in certain areas and in certain ways because I also know that when you have employees that you're relying on to do things and then they leave or they're not there or something happens all that work typically falls back onto the leader and there's nothing wrong with growing a huge team or a small team or whatever team you want this was just a personal decision I made on my journey and I had to learn some of these things from a business failure to get it right with the next business and so for me it really is it is a small But Mighty team of me and a team of contractors making sure that I have the processes in place to replace a contractor if I ever needed to but it doesn't include employees and right now that works really well for me there's not that many more Summers that I have

Speaker 1: left before I will be an empty nester and that may look totally different I may want an entirely different system in place or type of business in place or what that's going to look like and then I will take that Adventure on at that time so for me it's all about what works for me and lets me sleep well at night knowing that my clients are getting what they need and that my business is doing what it needs to do and it's living up to its promises and I enjoy it I don't want to walk out to my office every day and be like oh gosh I walk out to my office every day and I'm like okay I may only be here for four hours today but I'm excited for those four hours I love

Speaker 2: how you give yourself permission to flow through life in what you need it's the whole point of the Sheil podcast is to highlight women doing what they love and living the life that they choose so I love how you give yourself permission to

Speaker 1: do that so I don't think everyone does they don't and I'll be honest it took a long time and I used to privately give myself permission but then feel awkward when I was trying to explain it to somebody else and it really wasn't until I discovered and like really got into the whole make as much money as possible working as little as possible as long as my clients are getting success then that's okay I'm okay there and as my clients are happy I don't have to prove it to anyone else and then later on I found that family first entrepreneur like label and I was like yep that's me that's what I'm trying to do for right now and it's a stage I'm in a season we never know how long any of our Seasons good or bad are going to last and though I think it's really hard in this world today particularly with social media the way it is to be an active participant of not participating in the comparison society and allowing yourself to be like yeah she is sitting on a yacht with probably a trainer that's helping her look that way and I would love that but I'm also going to go sit at a baseball game for two hours tonight and have the best time of my life what I'm gonna be doing tonight too yeah suns in the playoffs y yes I'll be with you I tell you baseball could they have picked a longer sport

Speaker 2: magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy I asked this question at the end of every she built a podcast episode what is one way that you make sure to find and live your joy this was

Speaker 1: something that I went on a self-discovery journey I don't remember it necessarily being because of Co or anything like that but it really came to head for me in 2021 and I sat down and I tried to figure out when I show up for work or when I show up for my family what is going to make me happy and what is that going to look like and I came down to this formula and it was a little bit like we have three children one of our kids is not biological it's actually our nephew that we have custody of and he has needs that are just different and that I was not equipped to deal with when we took custody of him at seven years old and he's now 15 I know that when I walk into the house I can't be exhausted I can't be tired I can't be Snappy because I'm irritated about what happened in my day and so that formed a lot of how I look at the business that I have and the success and the joy and the things that I'm looking for so I went on a journey like really in 2021 to be like how can I find a model that will allow me not to feel exhausted at the end of the day that's truly the question I was trying to answer how do I find a model that will help me do that and I completely shifted we brought out this brand new like coaching program we launched it at the end of 20 like fourth quarter of 2021 and the model itself allows me to show up and do the things I love and not do the things I don't want to do and for me one of the things that brings me the greatest joy in my business is when I get on a zoom call once a week with the people in my coaching program and I just field questions for an hour what are your questions what do you need to know how can I help you create that language how do I help you overcome that roadblock how do I move that roadblock that obstruction out of the way for you and I just answer questions but I'm not teaching my material live day in and day out and that is all recorded and that shift in my business changed everything about how much I love this business because I love the light bulb moments which happen when I'm having conversation with my clients not necessarily in any other format and so I changed the whole model around it and it was hard and it was painful and I doubted myself and I was like oh my God this is going to fail and it's been the most successful thing that I've done because people actually want their hand held but they don't need it held all the time they just want access to you to know they're doing it right and I'm like I can give you that and I could do it in a container of time and in a space where you feel like as a client you're getting everything you need because I'm there every week unless I'm on vacation or it's a holiday and I'm only feeling like it's an hour week so it is this beautiful blend of the structure the model is ultimately what's made me feel super successful and a big leap that I've made in my business that I'm really proud of and it's got to be great for your clients to have someone they can go to find that help because when you find that person in life that can help you with whatever you're struggling with it feels so good whatever that is it is and I'm pretty convinced that's why we have an 89% renewal rate in the coaching program it was never created that way I was like you're supposed to spend a year with me and then graduate off you go you got what you need and people are like I've got people who are like with me like four or five years and they're like nope not going anywhere love love the accountability love the community love that I can go to you when I have questions and I also do like these one-on-one Milestone calls with clients and there's no limit on them it's like when you need a 30- minute call with me just book it the schedule's only available every 15 days so I'm not like scheduled all the way out I'm like when you need it book it I don't care I can take that I can take that from the car I can take it from my office I can take it from wherever it doesn't matter to me and with my clients it's that ability to be like I've got access to the one person who can solve my problem the quickest I'm not solving anybody's financial problems but that's where I see the real progress made as well and I get to hear about all the successful things that I probably would miss if the program were structured differently

Speaker 2: thank you so much for joining us today Stacy you've given us so much to think about as it relates to referrals and allowing ourselves to flow through life and do the things that we love please tell us how and where we can find you so

Speaker 1: home base is the website Stacy Brown randall.com Stacy is spelled with an e and of course you can find through my full name on most of the social media channels as well LinkedIn and Instagram are my preferred two channels but I am on some other ones as well if you're listening to this podcast maybe you want to add another one I've got road map to referrals is our podcast we're closing it on 300 episodes and then of course with the book there's always a way for you to start learning a little bit more about referrals because you can build a referable business if you will be willing to put in the

Speaker 2: work thank you for joining us today I'm

Speaker 1: I'd love to hear from you reach out to me at hello Sheil it.com on our Sheil it website or at Sheed on social thank you

Speaker 2: to my editor Rich draino who always makes us sound good until next time let nothing stop you from experiencing the life and business that you crave