Apr 26, 2016
Who wouldn't want more referrals to their veterinary practice? In today's episode, I cover strategies that will help you to create referral partners who can help create new clients in your practice. The strategies I cover will work if you are a standard small animal practice or if you're a specialty practice.
The first step in find people to refer you clients is to think about where your potential clients are spending time and who they're already doing business with. The potential referral partners don't necessarily have to be veterinary related, but they definitely can. Go through an exercise of writing down all the possible people who could refer you new clients. Some examples of people who could refer you are groomers, specialty acupuncture or laser services, trainers and pretty much anyone you can think of who comes in contact with pets or pet owners. It should be pretty easy to think about certain segments of your practice where you might not offer services and look to find referral partners.
So once you think about who you want to partner with, how do you find them? I cover the best ways to find these potential connections on Linkedin and Facebook. Once you find the person, then what do you say? I have found that treating online connections like in person connections or meetings works really well. Ask them about their job, experience or just introduce yourself. A good way to break the ice is to ask them to do an interview for you once you've vetted the potential contact and their web presence.
Once you have people who you can do cross promotion with, it is just a matter of coming up with new topics and ideas to promote. Find people who have engaged client bases and offer value to those people! It is really pretty simple, and it is one of the best ways possible to grow your business.