The Referral Challenge: A Case Study about Yesterday’s Surge of New Members
If you’re in The Referral Challenge Facebook group, yesterday you witnessed a surge of new Members signing up for TRC/joining the group.
Around 80 so far (not all have requested to join the FB group yet). More are still trickling in today.
I haven’t done a single thing to personally promote TRC.
Everyone that’s here now – all of you – came by referral.
Isn’t that cool?
So I want to share some of the strategy behind The Referral Challenge because it will help you better understand what I’m trying to accomplish, but most of all it’ll help you think about how to improve your own referral strategy – and the single most important part of that strategy – the KEY part that gives you leverage:
Other people.
A little back story…
I grew up overseas. Mostly in the Middle East: Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. My folks were Foreign Service Officers. We moved every couple years.
Out of necessity, I learned how to make new friends quickly. But I always hated having to do that because I’m more of an introvert. I always felt uncomfortable in new social situations (still do sometimes).
But I wanted to fit in and be a part of things, so I sucked it up and made the effort. And that effort paid off. I made great friends, some of whom are still my great friends today.
If you’re like me, you know the effort and energy it requires to put yourself “out there” and meet new people. And you may not enjoy the process very much, but you recognize the benefits…because you’ve experienced them.
And inevitably, regardless of how uncomfortable or difficult it may have been, you’re glad you made that effort because you’re smart enough to understand those benefits – those new friendships – could not be realized without it.
As it turns out, that ability to suck it up and forge ahead even when uncomfortable comes in handy in another situation: selling.
And that’s how I got good at face-to-face selling – by just making myself do it (and learning best practices so it wasn’t all just sheer force of will).
That background in sales helped me become a pretty good copywriter. And copywriting was a revelation. Because it tangibly demonstrated the principle of leverage to me.
In one day I could meet with maybe 2-3 prospects in a face-to-face sales situation and possibly make a couple sales.
But with copywriting, I could put my sales message in front of dozens or hundreds or even thousands of people and potentially make a crap load of sales…in one day. (Crap load is a technical term I enjoy using.)
Once you get bitten by the leverage “bug” – you’re never the same. You start seeing things differently. Your eyes open to new possibilities, usually involving visions of a crap load of money!
And like copywriting, other people are also a form of leverage.
When I got started with Fitness Marketing Systems back in 1998, one of my first customers was a great lady named Susan Block. She had just started a company called Fitness By Phone. She bought my “Ultimate Personal Trainer Marketing Program” and used the direct response marketing principles I shared to explode her business.
And then she became a referral champion for me.
Susan endorsed me like crazy to all her people, and I got a lot of new customers from that relationship.
Ryan Lee and I did the same thing. Then Forrest Walden. Then Phil Kaplan. Then Pat Rigsby. Then John Du Cane. And many more.
My business exploded…and a good chunk of that explosion was a result of relationships I had with great people who helped me out (and I helped them – it’s always got to be win-win).
But I’ll admit I made a big mistake along the way. I damaged some relationships because I didn’t properly value them. I became overwhelmed with work and stopped communicating consistently (and correctly) with the most important people in my life: my customers, my business friends/JV partners, my personal friends, even my family.
I’m not making excuses. It was all manageable; I just didn’t know how to manage it. And so I withdrew and hid behind my computer…for a couple years.
And a lot of stuff – the most important stuff – my relationships with people I cared about – went down the crapper. I’ve since reached out to most of those folks and apologized. And many of them have graciously accepted my apology. I’m thankful for that.
I’m telling you this for two reasons:
- It’s cathartic for me just to write it.
- And because I want to illustrate how powerful and valuable relationships with the right people can be, and how important it is to nurture those relationships and never take them for granted.
Just a handful of the right relationships can literally transform your business. But they have to be developed and nurtured consistently.
Don’t make the mistake I did by taking them for granted – by failing to communicate consistently.
And the more relationships with your clients and strategic partners you develop and strengthen, through consistent communication (just can't make that point enough), the stronger, bigger and more profitable your business will become.
I’m pretty sure you intuitively understand that. Nothing groundbreaking there.
But the gap between knowing and doing can sometimes be cavernous.
And the purpose of The Referral Challenge is to close that gap.
The Referral Challenge Business Referral Strategy
I think you’d agree that what I’ve provided you inside TRC is far superior to any free program you’ve ever signed up for.
It’s a true system, including most of the tools and tactics you need to implement it. And if you do, you will get more referrals from your clients.
But most of all, you’ll get more referrals consistently, reliably and systematically…from your strategic partners.
The combination of PPL, PPL Plus and the Sudden Surge Campaigns is POTENT.
Client referrals are great, and we all want more of them, but the BIG breakthrough for you will come from partner relationships, and the referrals they can feed you.
And that's precisely why The Referral Challenge is free.
I want you to feel comfortable referring your existing and potential partners to TRC so I can train them for you. Because properly prepared partners can be a literal gold mine for your business.
Will you have to kiss a few frogs to find the princes? Maybe. But it’s really no skin off your back because now you have a system for sifting and sorting through those partners to find the best ones. And that system is TRC.
If they go through TRC and are excited and engaged, odds are they’ll make great partners for you. If not, next.
And I’ve given you the tools and the training to get an almost unlimited number of new prospective partners. All you have to do is use them.
So the TRC business strategy is synergistic – it’s win-win.
You send your prospective partners to me and I train them to be great partners for you. So you win. And I win because my reach and influence grows because you sent me more local service business owners.
Make sense?
As you’ve already experienced, beyond a few affiliate links (only to great services I personally use), I’m not selling anything. That will change going forward. I have a few powerful solutions I’ll introduce you to. But I’ll never pressure or badger or “pitch” you relentlessly on those things. I’ll make some suggestions, and if you’re interested, you can pursue it further with me. That’s it.
I’m in business after all, and that means I’ve got to monetize at some point. But not until AFTER I deliver outstanding value to you. Because then you know you can trust me.
So The Referral Challenge is a vehicle for me to develop trust by helping you, and everyone else who participates, implement a system that produces a crap load more referrals for you. And it’s a vehicle for you to help me expand my reach by referring folks to me. That way everyone wins.
But nobody is going to refer clients to you if you don’t provide high quality service, right? And very few will refer to you if you don’t consistently (and creatively) communicate your desire for referrals, right?
That’s the first and most important part of the ReferralSurge™ formula. It’s the “golden thread” that creates killer businesses.
So I’ve created TRC to do just that.
First I deliver high quality service and second I communicate my desire for your referrals.
See, I’m not just teaching you these principles, I’m putting them into practice in my own business to prove how they work. And yesterday’s surge of new TRC Members is that proof.
Most of you know who Alicia Streger is.
She’s an awesome woman who runs one of the most successful fitness boot camps and personal training companies in Florida. On top of that, she also teaches fitness professionals how to run a more successful business.
And she does all of that exceptionally well. She’s a dynamo of fun and exciting energy. She and her husband, Keith, are also good friends of ours.
Alicia was one of the first TRC Members. And after seeing everything inside TRC, she enthusiastically agreed to refer TRC to her house list…because she saw the value in it for them. She knew I could help her people. And so she endorsed TRC yesterday and around 80 new Members signed up because of her referral.
I didn’t pay Alicia anything for that referral. It wasn’t a joint venture, and I don’t have an affiliate program. She did it because she wanted to give even more value to the people she cares about.
And I hope you’ll do the same.
In Florida you only need to have a real license plate on the back of your car. So I put this personal plate on the front of my car…
I have that plate because it’s a way for me to promote a value I feel strongly about.
Sometimes I get some thumbs-up signs from folks who get it. And sometimes I get questions from folks who don’t.
To those folks I say, “Capitalism is the most productive economic system ever because it’s based on the most powerful motivator ever, self-interest.”
Everyone does almost everything in their lives because of self-interest. Even purely altruistic things like giving to charity or helping someone else in need are motivated – not exclusively, but at some level – by the desire to feel good about ourselves.
And that’s why we always have to focus on answering “what’s in it for me?”
That’s not just a marketing principle, that’s a life principle.
When you can find and articulate or demonstrate what’s in it for people to take an action you want them to take, you will absolutely get more of those people to take that action.
Alicia is motivated to help me because we’re friends. But there’s NO WAY she would risk promoting The Referral Challenge to her house list – people she absolutely cares about and values tremendously – if she did not know for certain that TRC would be helpful to them.
Because that would not be in her self-interest.
I’m the same way and you’re the same way. Everybody is.
I hope you see how encouraging your existing and prospective strategic partners (and anyone else you think could benefit) to join The Referral Challenge is in your self-interest.
Make it a profitable day - Eric
P.S. If you have a comment, question or suggestion - I want to hear it. Post below and I'll respond. Thanks for your time.
