That’s how Bill Cates, author of Beyond Referrals, opened his session for our sales team. If you enjoy working with referrals in your business and you’re not familiar with Bill, I can tell you that you’re missing opportunities to earn even more referrals and introductions.
Bill is an accomplished speaker and founder of Referral Coach International. Bill worked in the referral space for over 25 years and has developed a proven system for acquiring more referrals through word of mouth, and personal introductions.
I recently hired Bill to work with my sales team to share his V.I.P.S. referral method. Bill states that when you discuss the value recognized, treat requests with importance, gain permission, and suggest names; you can collect referrals without having to beg. Our workshop contained great exercises in which we put his method into practice, and fostered collaborative discussion among the team.
Beyond Referrals contains many pearls of wisdom that goes beyond just asking for referrals and breaks down into 6 Strategies. Those strategies are broken down as follows:
- Adopting the Right Mindset for Growth
- Becoming Super Referable
- Asking for Introductions
- Securing a Solid Introduction
- Introductions from Referral Alliances
- Social Event Marketing
My favorite part of the workshop was around tapping into the power of Your Customer Focused WHY. This exercise was a fantastic reminder for our group about the great work we do, and the power of sharing our personal value.
Whether it’s an onsite workshop, or his books, I highly recommend Bill if you value referrals!
For an introduction to Bill check out the video below.
Catalyst Consulting 