The final part about making your civilians into awesome referral sources involves reassuring them that you will handle their referrals with care. Remember that these people don’t refer for a living. As a business person, you are referring a variety of people. Civilians often only refer their friends and family. That can be a scary thing. They don’t automatically have faith that their referrals’ experience will be the same as theirs.

So take the time to explain exactly what will happen when they refer you. Assure them that you will take care of their referrals as well as you took care of them.

And if something bad happens, don’t hide it. Be open with what happened and why. Remember, they are referring their friends. Don’t assume they won’t talk to each other. Assume they will and head off potential problems before they become real problems.

Will the things I talked about this week work well with the rest of your network? Of course. Nothing here is rocket science. Mostly it’s just good sense. Just be aware that your civilians need care and handling to meet their unique needs. And then they will refer you well an often.

The topic for this week is how to educate civilian networkers on how to become more effective referrals sources. If you’ve missed any of the previous posts, just browse back through the archive.

What better way to educate your civilians than to demonstrate business by referral in helping them meet their needs? This is particularly good for those of you in home services, but any entrepreneur can do it. Let your clients know that if they are looking for a good service provider, you are the person to call for referrals.

But do more than just tell them you are a referral source. Advertise it. Put links to good service providers on your website. Have cards of people you know, like and trust available in your office. Ask questions of your clients. A particularly good one is “What’s the biggest challenge you are facing right now?” That question can uncover a lot of referrals.

As you refer your civilians, it shows them what referring is and how to do it. It makes them rely on you as a good resource, which has them calling you on a regular basis. What better way to be “top of the mind” with your best referral sources?

Yesterday, I talked about how to trigger specific referrals in your civilians. But part of triggering is an explanation of what you mean by “doing business by referral.” lt varies from person to person and profession to profession, and it’s important to educate your civilians (and the rest of your network) on what doing business by referral means to you.

What do I mean? Referrals are referrals, right? Not always. Many attorneys get lots of their work from referrals from other attorneys and only occasionally by referrals from their clients. Real estate agents, however, rely on referrals from their clients to stay in business. They get fewer referrals from other professionals. Therefore, “Working by referral” means something completely different to an attorney than to a real estate agent. Explain what it means to your clients and let them know specifically how they can help you.

And a referral isn’t always to a client. Some people want introductions to organizations who need speakers. Let your civilians know that. Perhaps a home owners’ association brings in subject matter experts to speak on topics of interest to the residents. That could be an excellent referral, but your client won’t know you want it until you ask for it and explain how that is a referral.

What does doing business by referral mean to you? Educate us here!

Yesterday I wrote about civilians, who they are and why they don’t always refer us as much as we’d like. Today, I want to start with step one of educating your civilians.

Yesterday I showed that civilians don’t automatically make connections and think about what you and I think are obvious referrals. You can help them (and yourself) by giving them clear triggers to spark referral ideas in their minds.

First, as with all good networking messages, you will need to be specific. Take the characteristics of the client you are asking to refer you and ask them for introductions to people like them. Did they just get married? Ask for others they might know who just got married. Do they have kids? Ask for introductions to other parents at their daycare center. Everyone responds better to specific requests. But it’s critical with civilians.

Keep in mind that civilians might be more comfortable making an introduction to a referral source than to a potential client. That reduces the risk for them. So if you are in the health field, ask for an introduction to a family doctor instead of asking for sick friends. Would making a presentation to a bunch of parents be useful for you? Ask for an introduction to a PTA President.

You can also use visual or auditory triggers. For example, “If you see someone wince in pain when bending over, hand over my card.” This gives something specific to look for and a call to action. Or perhaps, “When you hear someone talking about buying or selling a house, mention me.” If my old Realtor had said that to me, she would have received more referrals.

Yes, these things may seem too obvious to you, but they do work and will get you more referrals.

Tomorrow we’ll educate them on what doing business by referral means to you.

No, we’re not in the military, but Civilian Networker is the term I coined for those 9-5 people who don’t network for a living. They might ask a neighbor for a referral to a plumber or their best friend for a good auto mechanic, but thinking about referrals is not part of their daily personal or work activity. Financial planners, insurance folks, real estate professionals and network marketers rely on civilians for the bulk of their referrals. But most of you don’t have good tools for educating them and making them a consistent referral source.

This is the first in what I plan to be a series of posts on civilians and how to educate them. But let me start with an example of a civilian and why they don’t refer as often as we’d like.

Ten years ago, my husband and I bought our first house. In those days, I didn’t network at all. In fact, I thought networking was something that only happened in smoke-filled rooms and on golf courses. We didn’t ask anyone for a referral to a good Realtor. We did what many people do. We went to an open house, struck up a conversation with the attending Realtor, liked her and retained her.

She was great. Not only did she find us a house we loved (and the one where we still live today), she figured out what we really wanted in a house, despite the often conflicting messages we sent her. She was everything one could want in a Realtor. I would have referred her in a heartbeat. But I never did.

Why? Because referring wasn’t something I thought about. If someone had asked me, “Can you give me the name of the Realtor you used,” I would have gladly given it out. I must have known other people who were buying and selling houses. But I never gave out her name because nothing triggered in me.

Now I look back and groan. I could have done so much more to help her, if she had only educated me on how. Which is the key thing for you to remember. Referrals come (relatively) naturally to you. You look for them. You give them. But civilians don’t. So how can you educate them?

Very carefully. You’ll need to give it to them in easy, bite-sized pieces. Not because they are stupid. But because this is a brand-new skill you’re asking them to learn. Some of them will want to. Some won’t. But even the ones who don’t want to can be brought around if you work with them.

Stay tuned. Tomorrow I am going to write about how to construct a message that will trigger referrals in your civilians.