According to a study conducted by email marketing experts Constant Contact, 70% of small business owners anticipate moderate to significant growth 2009. Several organization worked in conjunction with Constant Contact to put together the “Small Business Attitudes & Outlook Survey”. These companies included the American Chamber of Commerce Executives (ACCE), SCORE and the Association of Small Business Development Centers (ASBDC).
In 2009 do you expect your business to?
If growing significantly or moderately, do you plan on hiring additional employees this year?
How has your cost of doing business changed in the last 12 months?
In which areas of your business have you seen an increase in costs during the last 12 months?
Have you taken any of the following actions in response to the current economy?
Do you conduct outbound communications with your customers on a regular basis?
If yes, what avenue do you use to conduct your outbound communications?
How do you feel you are keeping up with technology?
Are you using any of the following online tools to market your product or service?
*Results from more than 3,000 respondents were recorded. This survey was conducted from April 30, 2009, through June 12, 2009.
As you may know, Referral Key is a part of Constant Contacts partner program. Consider a combined marketing effort for 2009. Referral marketing, combined with email marketing will ensure you generate sales leads even in a downed economy.
Referral marketing is not an isolated activity. Any successful networker will tell you that the opportunity to send and receive referrals happens anywhere, at anytime. Waiting around for a biweekly networking meeting or handing out business cards, is not only antiquated, it’s counter productive.
It’s easy to see how digital communication such as text messages and cell phones have added to the productivity of our businesses. Referrals are no exception.
We took Referral Key for a spin on the iPhone, the Blackberry Storm, and the LG Touch; we were quite pleased with the results. You can send, receive, track and manage your referrals anywhere in the world.
How’s that for a mechanical advantage?
You are more likely to meet new people outside the confines of your office. It is only natural that most new referral opportunities are also created outside the office. You may find yourself chatting-up your neighbor at a ball game. Wouldn’t it be nice to send a timely, trackable, sales lead to an associate who’ll be able to follow up with the prospect?
Better yet, you’re sitting on an island in the Caribbean. Don’t you want your colleagues to know they can send you leads anytime, anywhere? They’ll be confident you received the prospect’s contact information and both parties will be able to track the referral for success. That will soften the jet lag!
With the right tools and the right mentality, you’ll be exchanging a limitless amount of referrals.
Calling all referral networkers! Here are are some tips from the pros to help you keep those referrals flowing.
Follow this advice and generate a tidal wave of new business.
1. “The best way to get a referral is to send one.”
Christopher Ott, Referral Key
2. “Try out a referral incentive program: gifts, discounts, etc.”
Kim Fenolio, America’s Best Companies
3. “The reality is that effective referral networking requires a two pronged approach. First we need to exchange referrals with professionals and customers who already know us and are familiar with the quality of our work; a tool like Referral Key helps track and manage those referrals. Second, we must build relationships via an open dialog with those who are not comfortable with us yet.”
Len Bruskiewitz, Constant Contact
4. “You must instill a referral marketing mind-set into your business’s culture. Do this by making every customer a marketing and referral contact.”
John Jantsch, Duct Tape Marketing
5. “We all know and understand the power of referrals. Word of mouth is as potent as it gets. You can’t buy it or force it. But you can encourage it.”
Drew McLellan, The Marketing Minute
We get to help a the wide variety of small business owners; they may not have the time to try the “social site of the week” or every doo-dad on the net. So, we help them keep everything in perspective. In this day in age, small business must take advantage new technologies yet, they must also effectively allocate their online time.
Even your typical internet user is likely to receive a friend request to join an online network about every other day. This can become quite daunting even for the most avid networker.
The real question is do you accept or not? Through the lens of a small business owner, the answer requires some very fundamental questions many of us forget to ask.
1. Do I know this person?
It may sound obvious but many professionals that are new to online networking get in the habit of accepting any and every request to network. Unless you’re trying to build a phone book, it’s much better to have a smaller more powerful network than to have a cache of people who don’t know you. Spam, shameless promotions, and privacy are some of the more apparent reasons to not accept an invitation from someone you don’t know. Yet, the biggest reason is the integrity of your network. We may not think of ourselves at the center of our social sphere but a powerful network of a few dozen key professionals can do the impossible. Think of your network as a brand. Once you begin to move beyond your niche(people you actually know) you begin to lose traction. It’s not as easy to see the dilution as it is the fact that you have 1000 friends on your profile. It may seem chalice but if I receive an invite, even from someone I know, and they have a loose network of a 1000 friends, I am much less flattered and am not too keen on becoming just another “fan” in their army of connections.
2. What is my goal in networking with this person?
Again, the rules for good professional networking practices didn’t change when we moved online. Is the person who’s sending you the invite someone you can help? Can this person help you? You might be surprised how often the answer is “no”. If your objective is to cycle through personal photos and say “hi” on the person’s birthday, that is a very different goal than let’s say, swapping qualified sales leads. Neither reason for networking is invalid it’s just that successful professional networkers have an underlying strategy and clearly define their intentions. Creating a distinction between your personal and professional network will help avoid conflict, wasted time, and keep expectations clear. You wouldn’t bring all of your favorite baristas from the local coffee shop to a BNI or Chamber of Commerce networking event, would you?
3. What service was the invite sent from?
If you don’t see the site from which the invite was sent as useful then don’t accept. Like “space junk”, you’d be surprised how many dormant profiles there are on the net. These profiles are barren and often don’t reflect well on the person or organizations that created them. Even worse, they could be in the top Google searches for you or your company’s name. If you’re not going to actively engage the service it’s better to invest your efforts into just a couple of services you see a ROI in, rather than spread yourself thin.
Many members know that our case studies at the Harvard Business School have been instrumental in shaping Referral Key into the powerful tool that it is. Located in Boston, there are many points of connection between us and the institution.The HBS has strong insight into growing your small business and we often check in on them when we can. We came across a great article today on the Harvard Business blog entitled, “ Big Company Lessons for Small Businesses“. In this article, CEO of Cue Ball investment firm, Anthony Tjan, interviews Dick Harrington. What’s particularly interesting is that Mr. Harrington has made the transition form CEO and President of the world’s largest media company, Thomson and Reuters, to working with early stage and small businesses.
Rather than regurgitate an already great post, I thought we could frame some of the points in the context of relationship based business growth, referral marketing.
Mr Tjan: “After spending about a decade running a Fortune 500 - the world’s largest information media company - what motivates you to now work with early stage and small businesses?”
Mr. Harrington: “I get excited about having the opportunity to mentor them and hopefully share some lessons.”
Referral Key: No matter what stage of growth you are in, never forget to leverage your most valuable asset. Sharing expertise with other small business owners is a great way to lay the ground work for a strong relationship. It’s rewarding, cost effective, and could make a huge difference to your associate. Your expertise is your most valuable asset so don’t hesitate to barter a little knowledge.
Mr Tjan: “Give some examples of how you are applying big company lessons to the small firms you are investing in today.”
Mr. Harrington: “We all must understand our customers and the markets we serve, put the right people in the right places, and be sure the
organization is aligned to deliver on our goals and objectives.”
Referral Key: Who are your people? Are they in the right places? Are the people that help you grow your business merely the small team inside your office or do your trusted colleagues and clients beyond your walls actively advocate for you? Be sure to define your objectives. If your goal is to make 2009 a year of growth, put it down on paper. Fill in the blanks by asking, “What am I going to do to make my goal a reality?”, “What am I going to do different this year to create the difference in results” , and “How can my network help me get there?… How will I help them?”
Mr Tjan: What strengths shold entrepreneurs focus on?
Mr. Harrington: “They know their business and customers better than anyone else, and this knowledge can be hugely leveraged with the right operational practices. I am a huge believer that customer-driven strategies win over the long run. ”
Referral Key: You know your clients better than anyone. You know what they like. You also know that with the right motivators, they’ll become your biggest proponents; far more valuable than any magazine spot or newspaper plug. Good service and the right incentive can be all it takes to generate all the qualified sales leads you can handle. Try running a referral offer, focusing on what your clients really want. If your clients are a fan of the arts, send them to a show for driving new business your way.
Mr Tjan: What is the most significant challenge facing small businesses?
Mr. Harrington: It’s important for entrepreneurs to realize that one person can’t control everything, that they can’t be VP of marketing, sales, operations, etc. That kind of mindset just won’t work in the long run.”
Referral Key: Mr. Harrington is referring to hiring within your own company however, the same laws of codependency can certainly be applied within a network of small business owners. Again, this is why you’ll want to occasionally share your expertise with your network. Becoming a valued contributor of knowledge can make you an invaluable part of others businesses. This ensures the success of their business is contingent on the success of yours. Surrounding yourself with other motivated professionals can create an incredible upward thrust for everyone.
A recent case study by Cambridge based online marketing consultants HubSpot, revealed a 230% increase in traffic leads to the online referral network, Referral Key.
This exciting news is important for two reasons.
First and most importantly, it tells us that small business owners are thriving. They’re driving more sales by banning together and taking a proactive approach to exchanging qualified sales leads. Members can track these numbers right from their Referral Key homepage. Yet, these aren’t figures you’re likely to see on the evening news. And while the talking heads churn out report after report of massive layoffs and corporate failings, you aren’t going to see any figures about the solid sales leads so many talented small business owners have been able to generate in the face of naysayers and pessimists.
Second, Referrals Key’s own growth is indicative of the power of a relationship based growth strategy. Whether it’s working with HubSpot to offer up useful content to the community as well search engines or it’s working with its members night and day to individually teach each members how to really take advantage of this tool, it’s all about reciprocal behavior.
Everyone wins this wins when we exchange referrals!
Ok, your office is flooding and you’ve got two minutes to get out. What do you take with you? Perhaps, a computer, some files, or your printer? Wrong! You need to preserve your small business’s most valuable asset… your professional contacts.
While you may be thinking “I’m on the 99th floor of an office building in Death Valley, there’s no way I’m getting flooded”, we’ve all had a bout with lost contact information. Whether it’s referral partners, clients, or friends; finding out you don’t have the proper contact information when you need it, is a terrible feeling.
If you’re up on your Mashable then you know there are dozens of online contact management systems and their functionality goes way beyond mere storage. Clearly, storing your contacts online allows you to retrieve them anywhere with an internet connection but not all contact systems offer the same options. Are you using the best one for your needs?
Below, I’ve outlined three of my favorite contact storage methods. While there are third party add-ons and widgets, I will be covering the functionality of the built in contact managers. Yes, there are also dozens of down-loadable software managers and many people may not think of Facebook as a “Contact Manager” but in all actually, if you’re living in the 21-first century, then you might be using Facebook to reach out more so than that bloated CRM System.
What did you expect? I’d be steering you wrong if I didn’t mention the Referral Key contact manager. Referral Key’s contact management is ideal for small business professionals that view their contacts, not just as colleagues, but as a critical source of new business.
Referral Key allows automatic importing from files, Gmail, Yahoo and most webmail services.
This contact manager gives small business owners unprecedented control. You can split your contacts into sub folders, add notes and add other relevant information.
The most unique feature to the Referral Key contact manager is that Gold Key members can seamlessly integrate it with the promotion campaign tool. You can execute various promotional offers within a group. For example, let’s say I want to offer all of my New York based contacts a dinner for two at Peter Luger’s steak house for every new client they send me and I’d also like to send my Boston based contacts to a Red Sox game for every new client they send me. With just a few clicks I can simultaneously run both campaigns, manage the results, and add new participants if necessary.
Because of its focus on network intimacy Referral Key does not currently allow you to check your database against the entire Referral Key network. Also, Referral Key is a relatively new tool so if you’re inviting a contact to exchange referrals with you, you may need to give them a heads-up and explain how it works.
The networking powerhouse’s contact manager can be very useful for navigating the corporate sphere and advancing your career.
Linked In allows automatic importing from files, Gmail, Yahoo and most webmail services.
You can easily see many degrees of separation. You’ll be privy to the connections of contacts as well their contacts and so on… people who do not know you yet. This can be particularly useful for job hunting and resume posting. Also, sales people may find it useful to see three degrees of separation. For example, let’s say you sell an enterprise level IT solution. You may be able to get an introduction to a decision maker through a connection of a connection. Another great feature is the ability to export your contacts back to your desktop.
If you aren’t careful you may just end up inviting your entire contact list to join Linked In. As a default, Linked In invites all of your contacts to Linked In. So, if your intention is to merely manage your contacts and not necessarily promote Linked In, you better go through your entire list and only check those who you’d like to invite to Linked In. It can also be difficult to distinguish between clients, coworkers and colleagues.
Who doesn’t love Facebook? Managing your contacts, or should I say “friends”, can be a lot of fun as well as handy.
Facebook allows automatic importing from files, Gmail, Yahoo and most webmail services.
Facebook is so large that it is likely some of your contacts are already on board. After importing your contacts you can see a thumbnail picture next to each contact if they have a Facebook profile. This is particularly useful if you have a bad memory…um… I mean if you are a visual learner. Having personal information about your contacts at your fingertips can make for good conversation starters and relationship rekindling.
Facebook is not a very professional environment so you are almost certainly going to run into a conflict of interest between what information you share with your family, friends, colleagues and clients respectively.
While Facebook does offer some filtering features, after you’ve added more than a dozen contacts it becomes quite impractical to really control what information each of your contacts will and won’t be able to see. Furthermore, you can’t always control what information will be displayed on your own profile. For example, your buddy Rick has the best intentions but he posts a silly picture of himself passed-out at wedding on your profile. Now you’re left with the tough decision of making it a full time hobby to monitor your profile, upsetting Rick and banning him from your profile or chatting-up a key client with a picture of Rick passed-out in the background.
Also, like Linked In, if you aren’t careful during the importing process you may just accidentally invite all of your contacts to Facebook. This is great for Facebook but your goal may not necessarily be to get your contact list of 500 clients to join your social network
In a recent interview with Hubspot, a leading online marketing company, Referral Key founder and CEO Lewis A. Weinstein described some of the marketing techniques that have helped him build several successful small businesses.
“So we were doing everything in marketing us through traditional ways. We had ads in the Yellow Pages, we had ads in the TV guides, we were going to the Toastmasters, we were doing the business meeting clubs and so forth… what dawned on me after doing that for a number of years was that most of our business was coming from people we know and trust; through referrals.” -Lewis A. Weinstein
The full interview, which is posted below, provides insight into the most fundamental approach to growing a successful small business.
In a perfect world, we would provide our service to a client and assuming we did a good job, that person would start telling their colleagues and all we would need to do is sit back and let the referral business roll in. The reality is that effective referral networking requires a two pronged approach. First we need to exchange referrals with professionals and customers who already know us and are familiar with the quality of our work; a tool like Referral Key helps track and manage those referrals. Second, we must build relationships via an open dialog with those who are not comfortable with us yet.
To this end, it is important that we build an ongoing communication stream with the people we want to recommend us. This serves multiple purposes; it reminds them that we are an expert in our field who is willing to share that expertise with them and it keeps us “top of mind” so that when an opportunity to refer comes up, they remember us. There are a number of ways to build these types of relationships (in-person meetings, webinars, direct mail, etc.) but the most efficient is via an Email Newsletter sent through a service that creates a professional-looking message that is trackable. These newsletters can be short – no more than a paragraph or two – but as long as they are providing valuable content to the recipient, they meet the dual objective of confirming your expertise and staying in touch with potential referrers. When thinking about newsletter content, always try to make sure that after reading it, your recipients will either feel “smarter” or “cooler” than they did before. If instead, your recipients will feel like they just endured a long sales pitch, start over again.
A real-life example of how this works is a Human Resources consultant who sends out a few sentences in her monthly newsletter regarding issues relevant to Human Resources personnel. Within a few hours of sending the newsletter, her phone rings and she gets business either from one of her recipients or someone that received a forwarded copy of it. Many times, the business has nothing to do with the content of her newsletter but is a result of her sending useful information and building relationships through regular communication.
Building relationships through a dialog with your current clients and members of your business network is crucial to generating referrals – and it is easy to get started. Share your expertise and you will be on your way to building your referral network.
A CEO, International Speaker, and bestselling author, Jill Lublin knows it’s all about developing strong professional relationships. Her new book “Get Noticed Get Referrals” maps out a solid approach to playing your best game, even amidst this dismal economic situation. We here at Referral Key are big fans of Jill because she promotes a proactive networking strategy.
Jill stresses the importance of viewing clients, customers, referral sources, and vendors as friends. Like any relationship, maintaining that friendship requires effort. Tracking and managing your referrals with a referral system will ensure you reward those who advocate for you. The most important point Jill drives home is that PR is not an isolated activity. Every time you communicate with someone you are either strengthening or weakening your reputation so don’t take a halfhearted approach or you will lose overtime.
There are plenty of business networks but don’t let going to a weekly meeting give you a false sense of accomplishment. Successful professionals regard reputation building as a full time job. Along with the quality of the services you provide, it may be the most important thing you do.
We think Referral Key is the perfect tool to put Jill’s philosophies to work. I’d recommend you pick up her new book at Amazon or you can visit her website.
Referral Key, a powerful online referral management tool, is joining in a partner program with Constant Contact, a leading email marketing/survey company.
Thousands of small business professionals already know the benefits of leveraging Referral Key and Constant Contact into their regular business practice. The new standard, these tools enable you to grow your businesses exponentially and blast past your competition.
The result of this partnership is a giant step in the effort to empower small business owners everywhere. “Referral Key’s ability to help small businesses generate and track quality referral leads from their trusted business networks coupled with Constant Contact’s commitment to helping its customers effectively communicate with their client base via email marketing makes this partnership a logical fit,” said Lewis A. Weinstein, CEO of Referral Key.
Both organizations recognize a positive social shift which translates well when applied to small business. It is crucial that every small business maintain positive customer relationships and grow its practice through qualified business referrals.
“Email marketing and online surveys are proven tools that help small businesses connect with their customers and build successful customer relationships,” said Len Bruskiewitz, senior director, Partner Programs, Constant Contact. “We are pleased to be working with Referral Key since we share the belief that one of the best ways for small businesses to remain competitive is to capitalize on the business relationships they already have.”
While business referral networking is the single most important source of new revenue for over 90% of us, there’s value in supplementing your network with other low-cost, yet effective methods of generating more sales. A presence on the Internet can give your business added exposure.
Small businesses face a particularly puzzling challenge when it comes to web visibility. Many newcomers become enthusiastic when they learn how inexpensive and easy it is to create a website. Unfortunately, the joy is soon replaced by frustration when they realize the economic laws of scarcity apply to Internet traffic as well. In other words, because there are so many websites competing for your customer’s attention, you need to spend more of your resources promoting your site instead of concentrating on growing your business.
Fortunately, you can have your cake and eat it too. Sites like Referral Key, Linked In, and Facebook have already done the hard work for you. By adding your business profile on these sites you are in effect, utilizing them to promote your business without the catastrophic prices and risks involved with promoting your own site.
The question then becomes, which networks should I add my business profile to? The answer is all of them! For instance, it’s foolish not to take 3 minutes to add a complimentary business listing on Referral Key. Even if it results in just one sale, it’s surely worth spending the time.
It’s common sense that the more people you’re connected with, the more opportunities they’ll be to exchange business referrals. But because you’re connected to 600 people on Facebook, doesn’t mean that those connections are going to be beneficial to the growth of your small business. When it comes to business networking, it’s imperative to build a trusted network in order to get the most out of your relationships.
Teresa Morrow, Board of Advisors with The WECAI Network agrees that, “Networking is not about how many people you can get on your list (by receiving business cards in record speed) or how many followers you can get on twitter or friends on Facebook. It takes time to build a solid connection and meaningful relationship with another person.”
These meaningful relationships that you develop will quickly turn into a trusted network. Of course numbers can matter while networking, but the point is that you want a large effective network. If you can manage your network and trust that each referral you receive will generate a positive outcome, then your business will prosper.
Don’t call Len Rosen a businessman, blogger, networker, or humanitarian… because he is all of the above. Len’s approach to small business networking encompasses everything from furthering biomedical research technology to capitalizing on new social media tools like Referral Key. Occasionally, it is important to take a step back to understand the full potential of relationship building and the true power of developing your trusted circle of professional relationships. A strong network can be utilized to enact positive results in a variety of endeavors, wherever your career may take you.
On Tuesday August 5th, Referral Key CEO Lewis A. Weinstein was asked to provide a little insight into how Referral Key has been such a powerful tool in helping small businesses drive more revenue. Lewis explains how better management of your professional relationships will create new referral opportunities and ultimately help you drive more revenue through your business network.
SummerMash is an event hosted by the networking blog Mashable. Innovative web-based companies go to SummerMash to network, stay informed, and to ensure their customers are receiving the best in new technology.
You may recognize some of this year’s roster but many of the names will be new to you. Not all attendees are small business oriented however; we think there were a few companies you should know about.
Take Stickam for instance. Stickam connects users via streaming video. While YouTube may be dominating the video space, Stickam has taken video one step further by allowing its 2 million users to stay connected via personal streaming video channels. With a little bit of patience and a webcam, you can forgo those costly video-conference fees and keep your organization on the same page. You can watch Stickam in action as they interview Referral Key founder and C.E.O., Lewis Weinstein.
Budding entrepreneurs may want to consider EFactor for help with financing, health insurance or even exchanging advice with seasoned entrepreneurs. The site takes an unorthodox approach to “business as usual” and aims at providing entrepreneurs with some important tools.
Yoono, a messaging/aggregator service allows its users to stay connected to several tools at once. A Firefox browser add-on, Yoono will integrate with your instant messenger, keep an eye on your Facebbook account for you, and even stay up to date with Referral Key on all of your business social networking news; all from a window adjacent to your browser.
The attendees comprised of a diverse group of organizations, all at the top of their industries. However, the common consensus was that professionals who take advantage of these user-focused technologies are experiencing better results than those who insist on “doing it the old way.”
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Referral Key is proud to have participated in the 10th annual MIT Venture Capital Conference and in the Entrepreneur Showcase Event at the MIT Museum on November 29th and 30th.
Referral Key was one of 30 companies selected from an entry field of almost 100 applicants to the Entrepreneur Showcase, and was one of the only startups chosen to represent the business networking and referral category.
The event, organized by the MIT Sloan School of Management and supported by the MIT Entrepreneurship Center with several VC firms, corporations and media outlets serving as corporate sponsors, drew a heavy crowd of venture capital firms, private equity partners, Sloan students, fellow entrepreneurs and press.
The atmosphere was upbeat, and the overall opinion that the current environment for technology based startups generally positive, consistent with t he conference them of “Enabling the Entrepreneur.” “This is much different than the last time,” one attendee was overheard saying, referring to the last internet bubble boom that did not end well for many venture backed startups in the late nineties. According to the MIT student organizers of the two day event, “More than ever, with the plethora of capital available for new businesses and technologies, VCs, angels and mentors are looking for new ways to enable startups.”
Referral Key was front and center in a heavily trafficked area of the Showcase event, and our live video tour and product demonstration served attendees well.
“It was a very competitive field, and we are extremely excited to have been chosen to participate,” said Lewis Weinstein, founder and CEO of Referral Key. “We were able to showcase the product to a wide and influential audience, as well as accomplish some great networking.”
Frank Moss, Director of the MIT Media Lab and an experienced technology industry executive and serial entrepreneur, was on hand for the lunch panel, and Boston Globe “Innovation Economy” columnist Scott Kirsner moderated both the “Media, Technology and the Consumer” panel as well as the closing chat with Head of Special Initiatives at Google, Chris Sacca, whose resistance to PR protocol was refreshing and sometimes surprising.
Referral Key made enough of an impact with the “Sloanies” to be invited to participate in the prestigious MIT Lab series, so watch for an upcoming speaking engagement featuring our CEO Lewis Weinstein.
For more on the conference, please visit: http://www.mitvcconference.com/.
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Calling all referral networkers! Here are are some tips from the pros to help you keep those referrals flowing.
In a recent interview with 
