I recently read a pretty frightening statistic that ⅔ of all salespeople miss their quotas. It got me thinking about how reps can improve their performance – and naturally – it got me thinking about referrals.With referred clients being 4X more likely to close, salespeople can drastically improve their performance by focusing on a sell-by-referral strategy.
The reality is that we drop the ball when it comes to referrals. In fact, despite over 80% of past clients being willing to make a referral only 29% actually follow through. So what happens? We simply hope that referrals will come our way, instead of actively asking for referrals. As salespeople we often don’t ask for referrals because:
- We fear rejection
- We don’t have process in place
- We focus on chasing cold leads instead of following up with past clients.
So, how should we ask for referrals? A successful strategy should address these three issues.
We’ve all referred friends & family to our favorite restaurant, pediatrician or gym – so we shouldn’t think clients are uncomfortable sending referrals our way. Be confident in the service you provide, be specific when asking for referrals & make sure to follow up with quickly.