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Ramp Up a Systematic Referral Machine

such as home or office service businesses, send their technicians to do
their work. In these cases, it can be difficult to receive direct refer-
rals from clients, but smart business owners can tap into what I call
implied referrals.

An implied referral involves letting your potential clients know that
someone they know is a client of yours or is using your service to fix
a problem they are experiencing. For example, an electrical contractor
goes out to make a service call in a neighborhood and hangs a tag on
the doorknob of ten to twelve neighboring homes. There’s nothing too
exciting about that, but the powerful twist is that the technician adds
on the tag, “I was doing work for the Johnsons at 822, and they wanted
you to have a $10 coupon good for your next electrical service need.”

Here’s another example. Bowers Technology, a computer and net-
work repair firm, goes into an office building for a service call and
leaves a note at every business on the floor. Again, they reference the
company for whom they are currently doing work and leave a card in
the name of that business.

This tactic is powerful because it is personalized. Even though
your client has not actually made a traditional referral, the implica-
tion that someone else in the building or neighborhood used your
service lends credibility to your marketing effort. It should go without
saying that the homeowner or business that you are already doing
work for had better be happy with your work.

You can print many types of door hangers and cards to use in your
implied referral efforts, but I can’t stress enough the importance of tak-
ing the time to personalize them with the name of a client or project.
Without this step, you are simply distributing advertising materials.

Pardon Our Dust
One of my favorite examples of this tactic comes from a remodeling

contractor. When she starts a new job, she sends a personal “Pardon our
dust” letter to the owners of the homes surrounding her client’s. The

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