Additionally, according to a sales study by\u00a0<\/a>Marc WayShack<\/a>, 57.9% of salespeople said they ask for fewer than one referral per month, while 40.4% report rarely asking! Only 18.6% ask every customer they interact with.<\/p>\n You might have referral program banners, promotions, FAQs, email campaigns, and still struggle with getting people to refer. You might even have your customer support team promoting the referral program or other influencer marketing strategies. But they still might not ask, so why don\u2019t people ask?<\/p>\n We\u2019ve discussed some ways to ask for referrals here:<\/p>\n How to Ask for Referrals and Unlock Potential Sales<\/a><\/p>\n How to Write an Email Asking for a Referral or Recommendation<\/a><\/p>\n In the above articles, we\u2019ve provided examples of what questions to ask and how to position yourself to maximize your conversion. However, it\u2019s important to remember that asking for a referral can be defined as sales, opinions, marketing, and copywriting. And coming across too salesy can make or break your referrals. Therefore, learning how to integrate your questions with your brand style is vital.<\/p>\n It\u2019s important to know how to ask questions, but more importantly, how to ask the right questions. To begin, let\u2019s review the most basic questions that every salesperson would ask to get the sale, starting with your business itself.<\/p>\n Before you ask your customers for referrals, you need to know how to guide your conversation in your favor. Here are some questions to ask yourself:<\/p>\n Take a look at the first question. When interacting with a customer or potential customer, you might notice certain types of personas being revealed.<\/p>\n Maybe someone who decides based on incentives instead of the product itself needs more motivation or a\u00a0referral reward to help make that decision. Understanding how they came to your site can help you tag these potential customers if they did not make a purchase even after they clicked on your promo ads.<\/p>\n Success is built upon and duplicated. Not all product or service features are going to be groundbreaking, but once you identify what drives the most conversion, run with it. Ask yourself:<\/p>\n Isolating key features and turning them into benefits helps people understand the intangibles.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s take a look at Apple and how we can utilize their sales method to create more referrals.<\/p>\n Whenever Apple does a Keynote, they lure you with their features and benefits. They review the price and when the product will be available. If the product is available for pre-order or ready to purchase, word of mouth goes wild. Whether you\u2019re a SaaS, eCommerce, b2b, or b2c, you most likely take the normal product updates strategy by posting it on your blog. Why not entice and incentivize your customers even more?<\/p>\n If you think about it, each product update or new product you might launch is a way to create customer loyalty and increase referrals. If the product is a one-off purchase, why not create a campaign that provides customers with a sneak peek?<\/p>\n Other possible strategies include:<\/p>\n Ask yourself how your customers can benefit from your product or services and watch the number of opportunities to ask for referrals increase.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s take a look at a typical upsell pitch from McDonald\u2019s: \u201cWould you like fries with that?\u201d This pitch made them successful, and they later integrated \u201cWould you like to Super Size?\u201d as well as others. However, if customers listen to the words carefully, you only have a 50\/50 chance of getting an upsell. While 50\/50 is still better than none, there are better ways to ask and increase your chances for the win.<\/p>\n On our first\u00a0how to ask for referrals<\/a>\u00a0article, we mentioned the \u201cfoot in the door\u201d method described by two Stanford researchers, Jonathan Freedman, and Scott Fraser. Having your customer say yes is important. Some people call it the power of persuasion, but I call it simple marketing.<\/p>\n You can do this several ways:<\/p>\n \u201cIs there anyone else you know that might want the same level of service?\u201d<\/p>\n Maybe your customer support provided amazing support, and the customer was wowed by your service. You might be able to hit a home run and have them agree to answer \u2018yes\u2019 to your question. But then you might also get a \u201cno\u201d or \u201cmaybe\u201d response. Giving them the chance to say yes is great; creating value for your customers and meaningful reason goes beyond the 50\/50 percentile. Let\u2019s talk about these two different approaches and how you can optimize referrals.<\/p>\n Closed-ended questions can be answered by a simple “yes” or “no,” while open-ended questions require more thought and often more than one word to answer.<\/p>\n Open-ended questions can help customers really understand and think about something before they answer. If your customers says no, that eliminates a workaround or any room for opportunity. The advantage is that you can use their response and obtain more information that can help them agree to something. If you strongly believe that your customer will say yes, then open-ended questions are the way to go.<\/p>\n![\"how](\"https:\/\/referralrock.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Xfh2EbQlMnQEiuyXmxL9-6d4AvCQ0KWvrrcxGtYxggz8oDDMjVWNV0KvDPhy6kVm-iS2ZljRjmv-lYdLt8naUykFXw5-XinK5WVf51TZ-4y-qmL3J4puvMAAu4r9MgTlKura7TH8P67Yc8xXYg.png\" "\\"\\"")
<\/p>\nAsk yourself these questions to come up with a strategy<\/h2>\n
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Think about your product or service<\/h2>\n
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Interesting word-of-mouth (WOM) referral example<\/h2>\n
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Increasing your odds for more referrals with your questions<\/h2>\n
Differentiating between close-ended and open-ended questions<\/h2>\n
Create Value: How to use close-ended questions the right way<\/h2>\n