The world of referral selling

A personal referral is a compliment to the way you do business as a salesperson, and to the company for which you work. Buyers are often loyal to people that treat them professionally, quickly, efficiently and make it easy for them to get what they want. These loyal customers send you their friends and family so they will get the same attention from you that they did! Good Job! Make sure that the loyal customer has a refresher course in the world of sales that you live in. This means training them to call you directly with the name and number of the interested party. This accomplishes a few things: 1) It ensures that you get credit for the sale, 2) Your referrer gets his due credit 3) It keeps you in control and does not allow for the buyer to get handled by someone else. REMEMBER, if you wait for Joe to call because Jeff told him to, he might get another representative on the phone that invests time selling and is unaware of the referral for many reasons. He could be a snake and "steal" from you or at the other end wasting time if you come back and think you can just take credit for a sale he actually did all the work for.

COMPANY REFERRAL
A company referral is a compliment to the product and/or service you provide in the marketplace. Working at this type of place makes selling easy for you since the value buyers receive are more than worth the price in relation to what they receive elsewhere. You will get many sales calls because someone referred an interested party to check out XYZ company. Perhaps you are at someone's place of business or house admiring something they have recently purchased. You may want that same product yourself and ask where they got it. If they tell you to go to XYZ Company and do not mention a person there then ALL salespeople who work at XYZ Company benefit equally from this type of referral. If they tell you "you have to deal with Joe over at XYZ Company" there is still no guarantee that when they buy the product at XYZ Company, Joe will handle itS. UNLESS they call and ask for Joe and talk to no one else. What if Joe is out to lunch and they are in a hurry? If you were Joe wouldn't you have wanted to set an appointment with them or talked to then BEFORE they came to the business for the first time? MAKE SURE that you train your customers to give you a heads up on who will be calling and when, and ALWAYS get their number so you can be pro-active and in control. It is PREFERABLE to get their info so you can insure that they buy from you and your company and not someone else at your company, or another company, or not at all

IMAGINARY REFERRALS
A person is at a football party and admires a TV set. The owner tells him/her I got it at Best Buy. The person goes to Best Buy to purchase a TV and the sales representative says, "How did you hear of us?" The potential buyer says, "I saw this TV at Bob's house and he got it here." The salesperson says, "let me check out who sold that TV to Bob because you are now his customer also." Remember that many people will be exposed to the products/services that you are lucky to be selling. Always make it easy for buyers to know who you are and that you will treat their referrals well, and that you will PAY THEM for doing one thing and one thing alone. It is not for saying "go to XYZ Company and ask for Joe." TELL THEM YOU WILL PAY THEM ONLY IF THEY PICK UP THE PHONE AND GIVE YOU THE NAME AND NUMBER OF THE PERSON WHO WANTS THE PRODUCT/SERVICE. Otherwise they have not done the work they should in order to get the referral credit. You get paid for work you do not the good intentions you imagine.

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