Although the full complexity of your network may not be apparent even to you, the results of a good referral networking system are measurable.

If you’re expecting to find a direct, immediate correlation between your networking activities and the dollars you harvest as a result, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. It’s not like cold calling, where you can check off 500 phone numbers and see that you talked to 50 people and closed 7 sales and that 493 of your calls were a huge waste of your time. It’s not like sending out 1,000 mailers and getting just three of them back, which gives you a hard number (exactly three-tenths of one percent) but pretty wimpy results (exactly three-tenths of one percent). If your goal is immediate results, no matter how poor, these alternatives may be right up your alley. Mass advertising? Sure, it works, but even that traditional method can’t tell you exactly how many customers came into your store as a result of the enormous sum of money you spent.

The returns you receive through networking are like the apples you pick from an orchard you started from a single seed. You don’t expect anything the first year, or even the second or third. But in the fourth year that tree will not only bear fruit, it will spread the seeds that ultimately become a whole grove of apple trees. With networking, the time scale is not that daunting; it may not take years to start seeing results, but it will probably take many months. You might get a few early referrals, but the real payoff in measurable business comes after you’ve stuck with it long enough to build a substantial referral network. That’s when you’ll find that you’re getting referrals from people you never … Read More