Selling Boldly

14Taking Constant Communication Action versus Overplanning and Underexecuting

Doing Things versus Thinking About Doing Them

Sometimes when I'm teaching client workshops—with their customer‐facing teams, including sales and customer service people—and I'm reviewing a sales technique like asking for referrals, someone raises a hand (usually an outside salesperson) and says, “Oh, I ask for referrals all the time.”

And then the conversation goes like this, almost always:

Me: “That's great! Let's talk about that. Tell me about the referrals.”

Salesperson: “My customers are really happy, so they give me a lot of referrals.”

Me: “That's great! How many would you guess?”

Silence.

Me: “In a week, how many referrals would you say you get like this?”

Salesperson: “Two or three.” Then: “At least one.”

Me: “That's great! So about four a month?”

Salesperson: “Yeah. Probably one or two a month.”

Me: “Okay. And when you get these referrals, are they coming in organically, or are you asking for them?” [Remember, this salesperson jumped in to say he asks for referrals all the time.]

Silence.

Nodding.

Silence.

Salesperson: “I guess they're just coming in.”

Me: “That means you're doing great work, and I'm not surprised because I talked to your customers before this workshop started. But I think I'm hearing you say that you don't ask for these referrals?”

Salesperson: “No, I guess I don't.”

So what happened here?

This salesperson thought he often asked for referrals.

But when we talked about ...