I personally have no problem generating solid referrals. This is because I do genuinely strive to “exceed my client’s expectations” although I actually abhor that much over-used and often derided term. However, in the absence of a suitable alternative to describe my organization’s ability to provide a service which goes beyond what my client expects - and has paid for - then I’ll continue to use it.

If at the conclusion of any assignment, I do not receive endorsements then I really feel as if I have failed, and not earned my fees.

So why are referrals so important?

We all understand that generally speaking referred prospects will accelerate through the sales pipeline at a much faster rate than other types of opportunities, and they will also be more receptive towards providing future referrals.

What are the biggest barriers to getting referrals?

If asking for referrals has not been included and communicated in the sales process, this will deter salespeople’s focus as they will see asking for referrals as a ‘nice to do’ rather than a ‘must do’. This in turn usually means that there is no rigorous method for measuring and monitoring how many referrals are generated and what the conversion ratios are for closing referred customer business.

Energy goes where attention flows, so without specific attention to this salespeople are unlikely to invest their energy in this direction. (Even if they are firm believers in the positive impact that referrals can create!). For many salespeople asking for referrals is uncomfortable because they feel unsure about how to do this effectively, and they aren’t confident they will get their desired response.

If people don’t know how to do something and they believe that what they are doing will damage their existing relationships, then it’s better to avoid it all together. Additionally, if salespeople make the common mistake of asking for referrals too early on in the relationship this can result in more refusals that further erode salespeople’s confidence.

Therefore, to optimise the use of referral-based selling the following components are vital:
1. Asking for referrals and acting on them needs to be incorporated in the overall sales process.
2. Metrics around referrals should be sought and evaluated on a regular basis, because this contributes towards furthering the rationale for generating them.
3. Development and training needs to be delivered to the sales team so they can maximise the impact of referrals and feel confident with this skill.

When is the best time to ask for referrals?

People will freely give referrals when they have benefited from your product/service and have an established relationship with you. This rarely occurs during the initial meeting because whilst they may like you, they haven’t yet validated what you can do for them. That’s why asking for referrals should be when the relationship you have established is strong enough to ensure their trust and belief in you.

Assessing the strength of your existing customer relationships can be very subjective unless there is a meaningful set of relationship criteria in place.

Although these will vary from organization to organization, they may include factors like:
- Communication frequency with key influencers
- Satisfaction with product/service
- Speed of response to queries/problems
- Length of relationship

The customers with the highest scores (based on the relationship criteria) are those that should be approached for referrals.

What is the best way of generating referrals?
1. Prepare a description in the form of a criteria list that specifies the type of person or organization that you are looking to approach. This should be based on the profile of your “Ideal Customer.”
2. Evaluate all your customers using a relationship criterion and identify a list of those with the highest scores. For every customer your aim is to generate a minimum of 5 referrals. Therefore, if you have 25 customers on your list, your target number of referrals will be 125.
3. Contact each customer on your list and take the pressure of them by explaining that you don’t want to sell to them, you would like their help.

For example: “Do you know anyone (specify your criteria) that would be interested in learning about how our products/services can benefit them?” Preface your question with a softener such as: “I wonder if you can help me” or “I would really appreciate some advice.”
4. When customers give you referrals, ask their permission to use their name when making contact. Alternatively, where your relationship is ‘rock solid’ ask customers to make the initial introduction by letter or email. Often customers will give a glowing testimonial and create a relevant context when introducing people.
5. Thank customers for referrals and keep them apprised of your progress. This creates a positive association towards the giving of more referrals in the future.

Problem solved!

I do coach referral sales skills, but I have two good chums who are acknowledged as the very best in this highly specialized area, so if you are seeking advice, may I point you towards:

Joanne Black, author of the bestselling “No More Cold Calling” – Go to site HERE – and Paul McCord, author of the bestselling “Creating a Million Dollar a Year Sales Income: Sales Success through Client Referrals” You will find Paul HERE

News: I did a great interview with Mike Schultz of Rain Today, and you can catch it over at Top Sales World - “Influence, Persuade and Sell in Any Situation” – HERE and by the way, Mike and John Doerr have seven nominations over at the “2011 Top Sales & Marketing Awards!”

Today, I want to illustrate six beliefs that do have an impact on you, either positively or negatively…here we go.

1. Every individual is unique and their perceptions are true to them.

Because we each absorb 2 million bits of information unconsciously and can only process around seven chunks consciously we each have our own unique perception of the world around us. If everyone reading this was asked to explain beliefs, each individual would give a different explanation. So who is right?

Everyone is right because your perceptions are true for you. That is why the more respect we have for every individual and the more we seek to understand the viewpoints of others, the richer our communication becomes.

By respecting the opinions of others, does not necessarily mean that we have to agree with them, we just have to acknowledge that every individual’s reality is the one based on their own unique perceptions.

2. Communication is successful, only if it achieves your desired results.

It doesn’t matter if you think you’ve communicated well or if you think you’ve been crystal clear, what matters is that your communication is received and acted upon in the manner you wanted.

How many times have you said something to another person who has totally misinterpreted what you meant? Equally, sometimes we are on the receiving end of communication that makes us feel bad. If we can look beyond the communication and try to see a positive intention behind another person’s behaviour, then our relationships and interactions with people become more constructive and empowering.

When we communicate with people and if they are ‘not getting’ our point, then the responsibility is ours to adapt our approach until they do. For example; if we have communicated a price increase and the reasons for that price increase, and our customers have not understood those reasons, the responsibility for this mis-communication lies with ourselves. Therefore, we can only judge the success of what we have communicated based on the reactions we get from other people.

3. Resistance from another person usually signals a lack of rapport.

Rapport is a vital ingredient when developing relationships because it builds trust and allows communication to flow. When that state of rapport is there, communication is a lot easier even if you do not agree with the other person. When we do not feel that rapport or connection, we have a tendency to ‘nit-pick’ or find fault.

Customers respond to people they perceive understand their position and are on the same wavelength. If we are encountering lots of resistance from a prospect or a customer, then it helps us to notice that we have not built sufficient rapport. Even if our prospect does not agree with what we are saying, rapport enables us to have an open discussion where we can get an honest reason for their reaction rather than a ‘prickly’ brick wall.

4. Flexibility improves success.

The greater your flexibility, the greater your chances for achieving what you want. If we accept that, every person is a unique individual then we have to accept that each prospect and customer will require a different approach. Using the same approach with all prospects and customers is like playing the lottery; the chances of getting it right are extremely low. If we have high levels of flexibility that allows us to adapt to each prospect and customer’s style then we are able to build more rapport and reduce resistance.

Albert Einstein gave the definition of insanity as doing the same thing repeatedly whilst expecting a different result. As an example, think about a fly…have you watched how many times a fly bumps its head trying to fly out of a window? I guess that is why it is a fly. The more we are able to adapt, the more opportunities we create.

If what you are doing is not working, try something different and if that does not work try something different again. Flexibility of thinking and behaviour creates awesome sales people. Your team are also unique individuals requiring a unique approach with how you manage them. The greater your behavioral flexibility the easier it is to connect and develop better working relationships.

5. There is no failure, only feedback.

Of course there is failure. If you take a driving test or exam you either pass or fail. Your sales people will either succeed in achieving their monthly sales targets or fail to meet them. The key is how you perceive ‘failure’.

Every failure can be looked at as a learning opportunity that is beautifully epitomized by Thomas Edison, the inventor of the light bulb. Despite more than 10,000 failures, he stood by his dream until he made it a physical reality. He said that every discarded idea took him one-step closer towards finding the idea that would work.

One of the most powerful self-coaching questions sales people can ask is, “What will I do differently next time?” or “What can I learn from this?”

Sales people who make mistakes and learn from those mistakes have a tendency to do better than sales people who are scared to fail. Therefore if you can see that when you don’t achieve your targets you have an opportunity to learn, because you have been given great feedback on what not to do next month.

6. Accepting 100% responsibility creates transformation.

Every action you take creates a reaction that is based on the formula of cause and effect. Everything that happens is the effect of an underlying cause. Most people spend their lives operating at effect….”It’s not my fault I always end up in bad relationships.” “Life’s so unfair, things always happen to me.” “We’re in a recession, that’s why I haven’t achieved target.” “If I could only match our competitor’s prices, I’d win more deals.”

True personal power can only be achieved when an individual accepts 100% responsibility for what they create in their lives. To put it another way, you get one of two things; the result or outcome you want or the reasons why you did not (you may recognized these as ‘excuses’!)

The more you focus on the reasons (excuses) and blame circumstances beyond your control you push away your personal power.

Therefore, if you believe that you are in control of the situations that life ‘appears’ to throw at you, then you are in control of your thinking and emotions, and therefore in control of your own life.

This belief has given thousands of sales people the determination to breakthrough so many barriers and overcome countless challenges when at times it was tempting to wallow in self-pity.

If something good or bad happens, ask yourself, “How did I create that?” This question enables you to tap into your brain’s infinite potential and it will give you all the answers you need.

If you are prepared to commit 100% to taking responsibility, the results can be extraordinary.

News: One or two people have questioned the need to register before voting over at Top Sales Awards, so I felt it was necessary to explain – “Why do we need you to register? Because we need to do all we can to prevent voting fraud, and the use of “robots” to gain unfair advantage.

We respect your privacy and we will not use your details for any other purpose. In fact, you will receive just two messages from us: One containing details of how you can register to attend the live ceremony, and a second informing you of all the medal winners. Unless you sign-up to receive the Top Sales World or Top Sales Management monthly magazines and newsletters, your details will be erased on Monday December 19th – your privacy IS important to us!”

Hope that clears that up! So, have you voted yet? You can now vote every two hours …

I don’t really remember a time in my life when I had negative thoughts: I am sure there must have been some occasions, but not being able to remember suggests they have been rare.

In fact, thinking about it, one of the words most often used to describe me by friends, colleagues and staff is “positive”

I am genuinely uncomfortable in the company of negative people; I have nothing in common with them, but I do have my own “repellant” – more about that in a moment.

A quotation which my mother often used was this:

“Experience informs us that the first offence of weak minds is to recriminate.” – Samuel Taylor Coleridge

And indeed, I have discovered that negative people typically suffer from what I call the three “C’s” and are usually found to be: criticizing, condemning or complaining.

So let me share some tips to help you overcome negativity and to recognize it in others.

Try and develop and build your own understanding of what is really negative, but do remember that constructive criticism is not negative.

Check your conversation with others, are you being negative?  Check your thoughts and thinking process – remember that, if you are thinking negatively, the only person you will harm is yourself. Remove those thoughts as you would a spam email from your inbox. Discard them. You have the capacity to do that and your mind will respond if you are strong enough.

Build a bullet proof screen around you, so that negative comments or behavior from other people will not penetrate. You can do this by instantly recognizing negative criticism or conversation.

From time to time, check the company you are keeping. If you have been mixing in the wrong environment, talk to people who are positive. Go out and mix with people you know have positive, constructive ideas. Mix with people who are doing better than you.
Have your own negative repellent. I have mine – whenever anyone says anything really negative to me, I just say “fantastic!” No truly negative person enjoys hearing that word – they really run for cover!!

Remember, the negative is always stronger than the positive. Yes, it really is – sadly!

For example, imagine a barrel of 240 really healthy apples. You open the barrel, and you place one rotten apple, right in the middle. When you come back in two weeks time, you would think that at odds of 240 to 1, the healthy apples would have converted the bad one? Far from it, you will discover many more rotten apples. And that is exactly what happens within a company; within an office; within a sales team.

“The most evil, dangerous and cancerous complaint that humanity inflicts upon itself is to be negative” – Anon

News: There is a whole raft of new resources that have been added to Top Sales Management today, so do pop over and take a look.

Are your emails not getting through? Kendra Lee has some great advice for you over at Top Sales World

You can also catch an interview I did a while ago with Jill Konrath – “Is Social Media Relly Making a Significant Difference to the Way We Sell?”

Finally, do keep voting – it’s warming up nicely over at Top Sales Awards

For the past two weeks, I have been sharing eBooks from my library (if you missed any of them, you simply have to scroll down, and keep scrolling!) Today completes this season, before I move on next week, and focus on planning for the New Year.

However, today’s free eBook does have some relevance to what you may hope to achieve in 2012, as it discusses creating a “road-map” for your future success – rather than hanging around and expecting anyone else to make you successful!

Success should be something you do not just ‘Kinda Sorta’ want to achieve, but something you must achieve.

Generally, top achievers expect to be successful and consequently, they usually are. They are driven by a ‘Have To’ attitude – not a ‘Want To’ attitude.

If you have no concrete goals and you have been succeeding in spite of yourself, just think how much more success you could enjoy if you set your sights on a definite path and had a specific time-frame in which you expect to reach your destination.

Even though you do not need to set goals in order to reach some level of success, most professionals who fail to set goals reach a plateau and lack either the motivation or the direction to go beyond it. They are unable to move upwards to a higher achievement status.

So, here then is the FREE eBook I promised you - “My New Direction – Planning to Win”

News: Felt very quiet yesterday without my chums from across the Pond being around, and I expect many of them will awake this morning completely “turkyed-out” (yes, I know, I made it up) before heading off for some retail therapy and “Black Friday” Meanwhile, the rest of us can devote as much time as possible voting over at Top Sales & Marketing Awards – did you know that you can now vote every two hours? But you still need to register – just once – so that we can try to ensure we outwit the robots! There is always method in our madness – allegedly.

Have a great w/e - JF

Finding, interviewing and then selecting new members of staff is a key function that does not come easy to most managers.

In the old days, most decisions were made subjectively by interviewers looking for synergy with the interviewee – Do I like this person? Can I get on with them? Are they like me? Will they be a threat to me? Etc.

Then came personality profiling and psychometric testing and we moved to an almost totally objective process of selection where the human element was virtually removed.

So which method is more likely to result in success?

Based on thirty-five years’ experience of recruiting and developing front-line sales professionals, I believe a combination of both is essential – and here then are some tips and guidelines, which have helped me make more successful selections than unsuccessful ones….

“Recruiting & Selecting – Some Tips for Getting it Right ….”

News: Obviously I want to wish all my friends, colleagues and readers across the Pond a very happy Thanksgiving: Am I jealous or resentful that I have to wait another thirty days to tuck in to turkey? No … well maybe just a bit. Have a wonderful time everybody!

When it comes to looking after our customers, quite often there’s a gap – a huge gap – between theory and practice.

There are books about customer relations; there are videos about customer relations, and there are Gurus (mostly self-appointed) about customer relations. None of them actually have to deliver customer relations. That chore is left to what was known in the last two World Wars as the PBI – as in “Poor B….y Infantry”- the foot soldiers. The front line people – your front line people. So what do they make of it all?

You know about Pareto’s Law – I discuss it often enough – yes that one, the one that says 80% of the business comes from 20% of the customers? Well, it (almost) applies in this case. More than 80% of front line staff haven’t yet totally bought into the idea of effective customer relations. The other 20% have discovered a very enriching way of achieving a satisfactory outcome from interactions with customers. In other words, most of the time, they succeed! And when they succeed, the customers actually thank them!

This can’t be about you – can it? Let’s find out … Here is my latest FREE eBook for you “Isn’t it Time You Focused on the Customer Imperative? If you have missed any of the previous seven, all you need to do is simply scroll down.

News: Voting has started very strongly over at the 2011 Top Sales Awards, and there are some early leaders – have you voted yet?

To some, networking means simply meeting or calling someone new for what might be a one-off discussion or event. In this limited sense, networking is only a trading relationship in which two parties seek to discover whether they have anything of mutual interest to talk about. They either make some sort of exchange or quickly move on. This makes networking a highly ‘transactional’ subject, much like buying and selling or negotiating with someone.

My view is very different, because I believe that networking has a much wider definition. In fact, it can be a major social and life skill to be used in both a business/organizational and personal setting.

Within this compilation of articles that I have published on the subject, I have endeavoured to share with you my experiences, with the hope that you will enjoy improving your own networking skills.

Please download this next FREE eBook “Networking to Success” HERE

News: Have you discovered Top Sales Management yet?

We have assembled a team comprising of the very best sales management coaches in the world, who contribute daily to a number of essential resource areas from sales team development session formats to online profiling, sales articles and process tools to fundamental sales management skills …. This site is an absolute ‘must’ for forward thinking sales leaders.

This week’s articles are:

“Identify Selling Skills During Sales Recruiting” by Danita Bye
“11 Actions Sales Management Must Take Now!” by Ken Thoreson
“Steps to Powerful, Effective Sales Meetings” by Paul McCord
“5 Ways to Gauge Sales Management Coaching” by Steven Rosen
“Are Self-Limiting Beliefs Constraining Your Sales Team?” by Jonathan Farrington
“Celebrate Like You Mean It” by Kevin Eikenberry
“Fact Based Reasons Why New Salespeople Fail” by Dave Kurlan

Latest “How To” Guide

“How to Deal with Interruptions and Monkeys”
Despite being a busy person, it is easy to get sucked into doing things for others. Often these tasks have nothing to do with your job (perhaps they interest you or you are flattered to be asked!) Continue reading …

Latest Sales Team Development Session

“Time Management”

The most valuable resource we have is time and sales people more than anyone know how challenging it can be to cram everything that needs to be done into their available time. Continue reading …

Develop Your Own Skills Section

“Presentations”
In today’s competitive world Sales Leaders are required to be accomplished presenters, who know how to communicate with their audience, someone to whom people listen. Whether presentations are to their sales teams during meetings, at annual sales conferences or to big prospective buyers, the effective Sales Leader, just as in the political arena, is the one who can make people hear the facts and believe the message. Continue reading …

Featured Sales Management Expert

Keith Rosen is fanatical about increasing your sales and helping you achieve what matters most to you. That’s why he’s the Executive Sales Coach that salespeople and managers call first to attract more prospects, close more sales and develop a team of top performers. Almost half of the Fortune 1000 Companies and the top companies in six major industries chose Keith’s training and coaching solutions. Learn more…

Time is our most valuable commodity, and virtually everyone, if asked, would accept the offer of a few more hours each day.

So, how can you really control the time available to you? How can you guard against the stress that arrives from not having enough time?

Who or what is wasting your time – the time robbers?

How can you gain an extra month – every year?

Friends and colleagues often remark that I always appear to have plenty of time to spare; that I am rarely flustered and that I nearly always come in on schedule. But it wasn’t always like that… and I have had to teach myself how to be in total control.

Within this next FREE eBook I have for you today, I share some thoughts, some tips and also some experiences!

News: We have announced the finalists in all fourteen categories and the voting polls are finally open, so what are you waiting for?

I said on Monday, that ahead of the launch of the new Jonathan Farrington & Associates site on January 15th next year, I would be giving away a FREE eBook every day for the next two weeks, and I began with ….

“My Epiphany of Almost “Damascus Highway” Proportions”

“When a colleague loaned me Stephen Covey’s “The Seven Habits Of Highly Successful People” many years ago, it took me about three months to get round to reading it – I now realize that I wasted those three months! In fact, I read it three times in order to ensure that I had fully digested the wisdom.

Whilst I cannot claim to have experienced an epiphany of “Damascus Highway” proportions, it did cause me to make fundamental changes to the way I conducted business. In reality, I was practising much of what Covey suggests, but I was doing so in a fairly unstructured and ill-disciplined way. However, in what I now term my “Post Covey” period, I do ensure that I audit myself regularly and I would urge you to do the same.”

Here then is my first FREE EBook, which is my synopsis of “The Seven Habits …”

On Tuesday, I discussed the importance of rigorous qualification …

“Qualification is a Process – NOT a Single Event”

“With sales costs spiraling upwards and sales time becoming limited, considerable prudence is required on the part of the salesperson and only by rigorous questioning will they be able to answer the following questions:

Is there a requirement / need that my company can satisfy?
Is it winnable?
Do I want it?

The very best sales professionals will not pursue the opportunity, after proper objective analysis, if the answer to any of those questions is “No”. They will rather invest their precious selling time seeking out and closing opportunities that will provide a profitable return on that investment.”

Today’s FREE eBook – “The Value of Rigorous Opportunity Assessment” – HERE

On Wednesday, I wrote about “The Problem with Sales Training”

“Unfortunately, the task of selling never becomes any easier and, as competition continues to intensify; sales people will face issues that can be extremely difficult to deal with – i.e. decreased product uniqueness, increased competition within ‘safe’ markets, longer sales cycles and shorter product life spans. Every organization that intends to survive in the re – engineered environment which arrived with the recent economic downturn must, in my view, respond to those realities.”

Here then is a selection of articles that I have published on the subject of sales team development, in the form of a FREE eBook

On Thursday ….”If it’s to be, it’s up to you – The secrets of effective goal setting”

”Man is a goal seeking animal. His life only has meaning if he is reaching out and striving for his goals.” Aristotle
“One of the single, most important skills that a salesperson can possess is to set goals that are so well defined, and so compelling, that they become embedded deep into the unconscious mind – consequently acting as a powerful force that drives motivation and behavior.
So here for you is a fourth free eBook – “If it’s to be, it’s up to you – The secrets of effective goal setting”

Finally, on Friday .. “What Negotiation is – and What it is not …”

and the final FREE eBook “Negotiating to Win – From Open to Close”

I do hope you enjoy this first selection of eBooks, and I will continue to provide you with more next week.

“Negotiation involves three basic elements – Process, behavior and substance.

The process refers to how the parties negotiate – the context of the negotiations, the parties to the negotiations, the tactics used by the parties, and the sequence and stages in which all of these play out.

Behaviors to the relationships among these parties, the communication between them and the styles they adopt.

The substance refers to what the parties negotiate over – the agenda, the issues (positions and, more helpfully, interests), the options, and the agreement (reached at the end.”
(Source: Wikipedia)

That summarizes what negotiating is all about – to an extent.

What it does not highlight of course is that negotiating, as with most things in life, is all about “win-win”.

That approach has to be fundamental to any negotiation if both parties are to achieve a satisfactory outcome.

And so here is my final FREE eBook of the week for you - “Negotiating to Win – From Open to Close”

News: The most significant news today is that at 12 noon Eastern (6pm GMT) we announce the 2011 finalists in all fourteen categories over at Top Sales & Marketing Awards – which also means that the voting polls open and battle can commence