Episode 013: Ask for Referrals

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Last week’s challenge: Get MOAR Sleep!

Natalie and Alex discuss getting enough sleep from last week’s challenge. These two have been neglecting their sleep and they have been getting into bad habits. Adults need about seven to nine hours of sleep per day.

Natalie tried to be conscientious about having less screen time and set a hard sleep time and created a routine around getting to bed. It helped her get more sleep time, mentally shutting down and waking up more rested.

For myself (Alex), I had a client who worked on a documentary about the harm that our mobile devices cause which freaked me the eff out. That said, I made a policy of no screens in the bedroom. But also, like Natalie, I created a routine around going to bed. My bedtime would be 10:30 pm. I use the Philips Hue lights and have them set to begin dimming around 10 pm. Mentally, I think this helps me “check out” and get in the right mental state to go to bed.

This week’s challenge: Ask for Referrals!

This week we welcome our second guest for the challenge! Jay Gibb is a friend of the podcast and also the founder of CloudSponge. CloudSponge is a service that allows users to share their address book with a product or service to increase referrals, shared promotions which ultimately generates more leads and sales.

Jay Gibb had a simple, yet often overlooked challenge for us this week: Ask for a referral. Jay notes that people, service providers in particular, just don’t ask for referrals from folks they’ve done work for in the past. The act of asking for a small favor can generate anxiety, Jay notes. But more often than not a former or current customer is happy to help you out!

• One of the ways Gibb suggests that we can ask a favor from a client is to ask them for a write-up or blog post for how your service benefitted them.
• Ask for a review on a popular platform like Yelp, Google My Business, Clutch, or LinkedIn.
• Next, Jay suggests creating a system around asking for a referral. And there are a couple of approaches for that. For one, you can create automated email sequences (using something like ActiveCampaign) whenever you complete a project to ask people for a referral and take action on the appropriate networks. Or, if you do support requests, you can ask for people for a review right away by responding to tickets upon resolution and asking for that referral or testimonial.

Resources for this challenge

Power your lead generation through referral marketing with CloudSponge.
Check out ActiveCampaign for email marketing and automation.
Local review sites your small business should be using

Show Notes:

• 02:45 — Alex gets cozied up to talk with Natalie about last week’s challenge of getting more sleep. They get sleepy AF!
• 12:10 — Natalie and Alex welcome Jay Gibb, of CloudSponge to the podcast to discuss next week’s challenge.

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!