DGS 258: New Property Management Clients Through Raving Referrals
Description
At DoorGrow, we teach property management business owners to build referral engines to feed them new owners and doors.
In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert sits down with Brandon Barnum, CEO of hoa.com to talk about how property managers can bring on new clients through Raving Referrals.
You’ll Learn
[03:21 ] The 3 Steps to Getting Referrals
[09:52 ] Automate the Ask
[13:43 ] Hyper-Local Social Farming
[22:24 ] Become the Expert
[30:41 ] Incentivizing Referrals
Tweetables
“Most people feel uncomfortable asking for referrals, so they don't get many referrals.”
“The more you ask, the more you get, that's just how it works.”
“By having that team of people that you're recommending, they'll recommend you back as well.”
“Coaching is the breakfast of champions.”
Resources
Transcript
[00:00:00 ] Brandon: Most people feel uncomfortable asking for referrals, so they don't get many referrals.
[00:00:04 ] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow property manager.
[00:00:26 ] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:48 ] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGroww, and now let's get into the show.
[00:01:13 ] What's up DoorGrow property managers. A quick disclaimer for this podcast episode. Unfortunately, the first few minutes were cut off by our streaming software. That means we will be jumping right into the meat of the episode, but quick intro for our guest today. Chatting with me in this episode is Brandon Barnum, CEO of HOA.com, the king of referrals, and he is here to talk with me about getting new clients through raving referrals. Enjoy the show.
[00:01:42 ] I was young, I was in my twenties, and I had two daughters and I was like, "how am I going to take care of them or have time with them if I'm working a standard nine to five job?" Like there's no space for that. And so I was like, "I need something with more flexibility and freedom." And it's funny, you know, they say that this need or maybe pain is the mother of all invention.
[00:02:03 ] I don't know. But yeah, so I had to figure something out. I can definitely resonate with that. And with daughters, it can be a little tough because I'm like trying to go through airports or take them places and I can't take them into the normal like my bathroom, but I don't want to go in to use the bathroom like without taking them, so I'm like, "do I take them in the men's bathroom with me so I can use the bathroom?"
[00:02:23 ] Like things have gotten a little bit more easier nowadays, but it was difficult back then. So, Awesome.
[00:02:28 ] So you exited refer.com and would you still recommend that tool? Are you allowed to say?
[00:02:35 ] Brandon: You know, it honestly, it has pivoted and the people, the company that bought us out completely shifted.
[00:02:41 ] So we were a B2B platform to help people build their referral business. And the private equity firm that bought us really bought us for the database. So they've shifted. So it's no longer referral based. In fact, you can't even find refer.com anymore.
[00:02:55 ] Jason: That's wild. Okay.
[00:02:56 ] Brandon: Well, they bought it for the community. They bought it for 5 million members and 46 million people in the database. And so they chose a completely different path. They're about, I believe, to exit in their new venture. So. Wow. I wish I could say the tool exists, but it gave us the opportunity to build something similar here at HOA.com.
[00:03:17 ] Jason: Yeah. Well, okay.
[00:03:19 ] So we're going to learn the magic trick to get current clients and vendors to refer like clockwork, right? That's the claim. So let's get into this. How does this work?
[00:03:30 ] Brandon: Well, there's a number of different ways that you can boost your business by referral. And one of the things that we teach is called the art of the ask, right?
[00:03:38 ] Because one of the things that we know is most people feel uncomfortable asking for referrals, so they don't get many referrals. But there's an easy way, and it's three steps to ask for more referrals and get more referrals. And it's step one is setting the stage. Step two is listening for the referral triggers, and then step three is to A-S-K to G-E-T.
[00:04:00 ] Okay, so let's unpack that a little bit, Jason. So, when you first have a new client that signs up for your service, what you want to do is at the end of that conversation, before you let them off the phone, off of Zoom, or in person, what you want to do is just say, "Hey, before I let you go. Can I ask you for a favor?"
[00:04:18 ] Everyone's either going to say "yes," or "maybe tell me more." And then what you want to do is just say, "Hey, we're so committed to giving you a five star experience. And once we do, and you experience our service and we take care of everything for you, and it just runs like clockwork, would it be okay to ask you for referrals?"
[00:04:38 ] Everybody's going to say yes, because you're not putting them on the spot right now. You're basically saying, "I'll do a great job for you and give you amazing service." Right? So that's step one is setting the stage. Now you're going to get some referrals right then because they're going to be like, "well, now that you mentioned it, I'm in this real estate investor group and I've got three other guys. We were just having this conversation about needing a new property management firm. So let me introduce you to Tom, Bobby and Susie." Right?"
[00:05:04 ] Jason: Okay. So you ask the step one, you ask for a favor, you express that you're committed to five stars. So that's a nice pre frame, you know, experience, and then you're getting permission to hit them up for that later, basically.
[00:05:19 ] Brandon: At a later date, right?
[00:05:20 ] And that's the key because you're not putting them on the spot now, everybody's totally comfortable. You're basically just saying, "I'm going to do a great job."
[00:05:27 ] Jason: Sure. Yeah, of course. "If you do a good job yeah. I'd be happy to do that for you."
[00:05:32 ] Brandon: So it's the easy "yes," and you'll pretty much get 100 percent buy in on that, right?
[00:05:36 ] So that's setting the stage. Now you go into step two, you start serving them and you're listening for the referral triggers. And that's something like, "Oh, thank you so much. You guys did such a great job, right? I just, I love working with you guys." You're listening. For those expressions of appreciation, right?
[00:05:55 ] And when you hear that, that means that somebody is in a peak referral state because they just recognize that you're doing a great job and they've expressed their appreciation for you. And that's when it's time to ask for referrals. And the way you do that is say, "I'm so glad to hear that. We love helping investors like you manage their properties and we're looking to take on a few more clients. So remember at the beginning we started working together, I told you we were going to deliver five star service. Well now that you know what our service is like, I'd love to see if there's any other investors you know that we can help."
[00:06:31 ] Jason: Yeah, this is really funny. It's like eerily odd to me because we use a very similar framework at DoorGrow for getting reviews from clients. And I like the idea though of the pre frame and setting the stage early on. So our formula for getting reviews is we like, identify peak happiness, which usually in property management is like when the tenant is placed. And then we reach out at peak happiness and then we first showcase the invisible.
[00:07:00 ] So we highlight everything we've done for them. So, "Oh, we've got your tenant placed. We got the rent check collected. It should be hitting your bank account right about now." Like all this kind of stuff. Then
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