Chances are good that your next job isn’t going to come via a classified ad. Few people hire unknown quantities. Your next job, most likely, is going to come, directly or indirectly, via someone you know. If it’s direct, that’s easy. But by expanding your network via referrals, you increase your network of contacts exponentially. Five friends can become 25 potential employers, and so on.

If you want to learn how to get a referral, talk to people who make their living from referrals. The masters of the art of referral are salespeople. There’s an old saying among sales professionals: “Salespeople who can’t get referrals have skinny kids.”

There are all kinds of techniques for getting referrals. But this article is going to take one proven approach now in use by thousands of salespeople worldwide. The purpose is to give the non-sales professional an easy, nonthreatening, and effective, proven roadmap to expanding your referral base.

Step 1. Get Over Your Fears

It’s tough asking for a referral. Pride gets in the way. And we feel uncomfortable exploiting our network of friends, family and business contacts for economic gain. Cher had the right idea in the movie “Moonstruck:” “Snap out of it!” Not a single person you will talk to wants you to stay unemployed, underemployed or unhappy. Not a single one. They all want you to succeed. The best of them would feel hurt if you were hurting and didn’t come to them.

Second, everyone wants to feel important, and they want to help. If they know you to be a good worker, who can provide good value and really be a help to whatever organization you join, they want to be a referral source. If they know someone who needs your skill set, it’s a feather in their own cap to be the person who refers a great employee.

Third, some employers actually pay a referral bonus to employees who refer a new successful team member. Often, this bonus is $1,000 or more. Why would you want to deny your friends the opportunity to collect?

Job hunting is salesmanship. And like any good salesperson, you must leverage your contacts to have the best chances for success. You owe that much to yourself and to your family. Don’t let false pride get in the way.

Step 2: Bring Value

The best source of professional referrals is happy clients or former employers. They are the ones who know your worth best. And their word carries the most weight with their own network of contacts. Contact these people first.
But there are many other ways to bring value to a relationship than just via being an employee or contractor for someone. If you have demonstrated leadership, generosity or any other quality in the past (and I hope you have!), then those whom you were associated with can also be great sources of referrals, too. Stay in touch with colleagues from the military, fraternities and sororities, professional organizations, churches and synagogues, community service organizations, youth sports leagues and other volunteer organizations. Write down their names and go down the list. The bottom line is that each of these people should already know your worth, and that you have every reason to believe that they will be positive references for you, and perhaps even be enthusiastic partners in your search.

3. Invite them for a cup of coffee.

If you’re unemployed, you don’t want to be springing for dinner. Coffee is cheap, noncommittal, and informal. And with free refills, you can meet people in a coffee shop one after another and spend very little money. If you must have a meal, breakfast is usually cheapest. Avoid dinner, which often comes with alcohol. That gets pricey fast.

4. Lay the foundation.

There’s a reason you asked to see them. Spell it out, in a positive, complementary way. “Look, I wanted to see you because I respect your opinion, and I know you know a lot about the industry.”

You want your guest to actually take pride in his or her industry knowledge, and the worthiness of their own opinion or referral. Make it clear that you’re talking with someone you really respect and admire. Yes, you can call it “buttering them up.” And you can call it a few other less printable things, too. But I prefer to think of it as “creating a favorable mindset.”

Why? Because lots of people enter “shields-up” mode when they sense they will shortly be pumped for referrals. Before asking for names, you must first disarm this reflex. Otherwise, you are likely to experience the “stonewall.” As in “yeah, I don’t know anyone. But I’ll keep you in mind. Send your resume to me!” This is what you don’t want.

Instead, you need to close the rhetorical trap door behind them. By first complementing them on their industry knowledge, or their standing in the community, and getting them to assent, before you go on to the meat of the conversation, you eliminate the “I don’t know anyone,” escape. Instead, you want to create a circumstance where they are inclined to want to show off their industry knowledge. You want to tap the “pride” cortex, and reinforce that, prior to the next stage.

5. Get permission to mention them.

No one likes to be blindsided with a reference. So it’s important to get your friends’ assent and cooperation up front. Here’s one way of doing it: “Look, I’m planning on contacting a lot of leaders in this industry/community just like you, and I know you know a lot of them. I just wanted to ask if I needed an icebreaker or something, would it be ok with you if I mentioned that we worked together?”

Almost no one will tell you “no.” If they do, that’s an important signal for you: It means this person is not going to be a good reference for you, if contacted. Time to pay for the coffee and get out of there.

But 99 percent of the time, if they were willing to meet with you, and you buttered them up appropriately, they will tell you yes. Move on to the next step.
Where’s the next step? Well, it’s in our next article! Stay tuned!

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