Every one of your clients can send you at least one referral, or introduce you to someone who can. Some clients will send you a lot of referrals. Some won’t send you any. But if you get an average of just one referral from every client during their “leftime” as your client, you’ll never run out of new clients.
Each client will “replace” themself.
It’s the power of one.
And it should be one of your goals.
Sounds simple, doesn’t it? Easy math. But how do you make this happen?
Start by reminding yourself that every client knows people who have, or one day will have, a legal situation you can help them with. Everyone knows people they can refer.
They also know other influential people they can introduce to you and those people have clients or customers or personal contacts they can refer.
Everyone knows one or more insurance agents or brokers, CPAs, real estate brokers, or other lawyers. They know business owners and executives, pastors, and other centers of influence in their industry or local market.
And each of these folks can refer clients to you even if your original client can’t.
Your clients can also refer people with legal situations you don’t handle. You do commercial bankruptcy, for example, and they know someone with a tax problem or who needs a divorce. If they refer that person to you, you can refer this would-be client to another lawyer you know, which can lead to that other lawyer reciprocating and sending you business they don’t handle.
Referrals can come from anywhere. And people can always lead you to other people.
Referral marketing isn’t just about the people you know, it’s about who they know.
When you have a new client or prospect or business contact, find out who they know. You should have a form for that. With prompts to ask about their professional contacts, colleagues, and others in their industry or market.
If every client or prospect gives you the name of their insurance broker or real estate agent, for example, you can contact them and (with permission), tell them you have a mutual client. That’s the first step towards getting referrals from them, and being introduced to their circle of contacts..
Everyone you know can send you (at least) one referral, or lead you to someone who can.
It’s the power of one.
How to get more referrals from your clients
