Who Else Has Your Customer?

Do you love it when you connect with someone and both of you benefit?

Rather than seeing other businesses as your competition, have you considered the benefits of collaboration?

Cross industry partnerships are a great way to share, or increase, your database. You can integrate marketing campaigns. You can build your brand awareness in your community, whether that be brick and mortar or online, by partnering with industries that share your customer with you.

It’s a terrific way to draw from the knowledge of like-minded business people or partners.

Ask yourself, “Who else has my customer?”

Clients are glad to hire someone you endorse rather than go through the painful process of finding and hiring someone on their own.

Don’t you feel exactly the same way?

What if you teamed with five other professionals and said to your clients, “Here are my 5 new friends, you’ll need them today or in the future. I can highly recommend each of these professionals.” You set a referral fee schedule with your new professional friends and the person with the referring customer list gets the overriding referral money.

A realtor can team up with an electrician, a landscaper, a painter, a plumber, a house cleaner, a dog walker, a tree trimmer, etc.

A wedding planner can partner with a photographer, a cake maker, a travel agent, a bridal shop or a tux shop, a DJ or music group, etc.

A massage therapist can partner with a chiropractor, a health supplements distributor, an acupuncturist, a health club or spa… all businesses that are likely to share customers.

A cross referral system like this can explode everyone’s business. Your customers will continue to buy from you but they will also really appreciate the help you’ve provided by making your trusted partners and vendors available to them.

Who else has your customer?

Tagged as: Networking, Sales and marketing, Small business