Referral follow-up is so important, I decided to post on it twice! Last time, we talked about the practical aspects of keeping up with the follow-up tasks for each referral you get. Now let's focus on the details. What's entailed in actually making contact with your new prospective client?
Following up with a prospect you've received by referral is not vastly different from any other prospecting call, but there are obviously a couple of distinctions. (Ideally you won't have to make a call at all, because you'll have gotten an actual introduction to the referral… but things don't always work out that way.)
First, your contact is naturally warmer, and that is, of course, a positive. Prospects are far more likely to listen to you when they know you were referred by a trusted source. But don't fall into the trap of assuming that just because a prospect was referred, he or she will be delighted to hear from you. Referrals are great, but they're far from a sure thing.
Second, if you've followed the steps outlined in the Automatic Referrals report, you should have the benefit of knowing quite a bit about your referred prospect before you call. This information can be quite useful when you first make contact.
The key to success at this point, whether you're meeting the referral for lunch with your referral source or simply following up on your own by phone, is doing some basic planning before you make contact.
Here are five call planning questions (free registration required) recommended by professional services consultants Mike Schultz and John Doerr:
- What is the referral's current situation?
- What are my goals for this prospect?
- What is my desired next outcome?
- What are my relative strengths?
- What are my relative vulnerabilities?
There's lots more to successful follow-up (putting prospects at ease, for example, and saying "thank you" to your referral sources). But get your call planning process ironed out and you'll be off to a good start.
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