From the Founder
The Age-Old Question: How Do I Get More Referrals?
The simple (but not easy) answer.
By Dr. Ivan Misner, BNI Founder and Chairman

Over the years there is one question that crops up time and time again: "How do I get more referrals?"

The answer is simple, but not easy. It includes both a mindset and a skill set. The mindset involves a concept that most members have heard from me—"give referrals."

Let's operate from the assumption that a chapter gets that. No, really. I mean the chapter has to fully get it and engage it before the second part comes into play—the skill set.

The skill set is all about creating a culture of learning at both the macro and micro levels of a chapter.

This is where there's a disconnect for chapters looking for more referrals. The macro-dynamics of a BNI chapter are intentionally set up to create and foster an active learning environment. This has to be overlaid on a micro-dynamic of creating and fostering active learning at an individual level. Let me illustrate what I mean by "micro"—or individual—learning.

We still have members who are doing one of two things during their 60-second introductions:

1. Trying to close a deal or make a sale to the members; or
2. Being too general and all-encompassing.

In a micro-dynamic that fosters active learning, you are teaching your fellow members how to bring referrals to you. In other words, you are training a referral source. We have talked for years about the members of your chapter being like a sales force for you. We even use the phrase "Sales Manager's Minute" to drive this point home.

But how do you do this? How do you turn this minute into an educational moment that teaches members how to refer you?

Develop a curriculum for each week's meeting—weeks or months in advance
Seriously, you need to take a week-by-week approach to what you are going to teach in your 60 seconds so that your members can refer you effectively. Winging it during the introductions will not create that active learning environment predicated on training your referral sources. It will not teach others who to refer to you or how to refer you to others.

The more specific the presentation you do, the better. I understand that sounds counter-intuitive—it's like telling someone driving a car to "turn into a skid," but the truth is that being specific and compiling it into a weekly curriculum will get you more referrals.

Practice the Reciprocity Ring
Awhile ago, I conducted a BNI exercise for a chapter called the Reciprocity Ring. (If you don't know what that is, you should ask your director to do it for your chapter; if your director doesn't know what it is, ask him or her to contact BNI HQ.) During this exercise, members are taught to ask for a referral by a specific individual's name and title.

On this day, I asked people to share the name of someone with whom they've been trying to make a connection. A member of the chapter named Sally stood and asked for a referral to Marty R., the top salesperson for the last ten years in a row for Century 21 Real Estate.

Another member by the name of Janet stood up and said, "Sally, Marty is my sister-in-law!" Sally exclaimed, "Oh my gosh, why didn't you ever tell me?" and Janet replied, "Why didn't you ever ask?" Why, indeed!

Teach your members "Who" and "How"
When you teach your members who to refer to you and how to refer you to others, you are creating within them an instinctual, automatic response to specific phrases, actions, or observations. You are teaching them your language of referrals. Your language of referrals is going to be different than each other member.

Can you see why having 52 weeks a year is necessary to train your sales force well?

Gauge what your chapter needs to learn
This micro-dynamic of active learning is layered under an overall macro-dynamic of active learning within your chapter as a whole. Look, we felt this was so important that we created a position within your chapter to focus specifically on education: the Education Coordinator.

There are so many BNI-produced free supplemental educational materials that you could easily become overwhelmed. Your members are all at different levels on the networking growth curve. Not only do you need to know where you are as an individual in this developmental process, but you also need to know where your chapter is as a whole.

If you were going to ask someone for directions, you would start by telling them first where you are starting from, wouldn't you? By the same token, you would tell a doctor what your symptoms are before asking him to heal you.

There are tools to help you evaluate where your chapter as a whole is in this process and where you as an individual are as well. Your director is available to help you make this evaluation. Your leadership team can provide guidance to members and the education coordinator can give you a wealth of information, week by week. These folks can guide you to the materials relevant to where you and your chapter are in the learning process.

Engage the tools for active learning
There are many educational tools available to help foster this active learning environment. The BNI podcast at www.BNIpodcast.com is a weekly podcast that I do personally for BNI members which is offered absolutely free every week. My blog at www.NetworkingEntrepreneur.com is updated every few days and offers a chance for you to interact with others, as well as myself, personally!

I write monthly articles at Entrepreneur.com, which are also free to download and review. www.NetworkingNow.com offers a free month's membership to BNI members (use the coupon code: free30days) and contains a lot of downloadable material. BNI's monthly newsletter, SuccessNet Online, is another resource of free educational material.

In addition to these free support materials, there are other BNI resources in which you can invest, such as the books I have written on networking and audio cd's produced on networking.

You have a choice today. You can get plugged into BNI and the educational aspects of networking through these supplemental resources I've talked about in this article and create both the macro- and micro-environments of active learning.

Don't just keep on doing business as usual in your chapter if you are not already seeing this active learning environment in action. I promise you, that age-old question—"How do I get referrals"—will stop cropping up. Your members will be too busy taking care of the referrals that are coming in.

I told you—the answer would be simple, just not easy. First, give referrals. Second, create an active learning environment as an individual and as a chapter. It's that simple.

Called the father of modern networking by CNN, Dr. Ivan Misner is a New York Times bestselling author. He is the founder and chairman of BNI, the world's largest business networking organization. His latest New York Times best selling book, Masters of Sales, can be viewed at www.MastersBooks.com. Dr. Misner is also the Sr. Partner for the Referral Institute, an international referral training company. He can be reached at misner@bni.com.