When playing a football game, diving under water or climbing
mountains, we see that two or more like minded people join forces and work
towards a single goal.
There is a famous saying that one is one and two is eleven,
so when two or more complimentary business work together towards a single goal
which is to serve more customers we can call their relationship a small business power group.
It has long been proven that referrals are one of the best
way to acquire more customers so why not join forces with likeminded businesses
and work together and serve your customers better.
Business networking and referrals is not a new concept, many
small business use it regularly to reach more customers and grow their business
but in most cases they are doing it alone. Imagine if you hire ten sales people
and each one goes out and promotes your business, the overall outcome would be
ten times better than what a single person could achieve, similarly when two or
more complimentary businesses join force and work together and promote each
other’s business the result would be more customers and better service.
Here are few points to consider when you should start your power
group
Complimentary
Businesses
The first thing to consider would be to go through your
contact list and find businesses which are complimentary to your services or
products, for example if you are an IT shop, may be you want to join forces
with a web site development company or social media marketing company, if you
are a building inspector, you may want to look for property management
businesses and join forces with them.
Taste it First
Every business wants more customers so you will definitely
get a positive response when you will meet a few businesses and present your
idea of building a power group. However most of them will not start referring
their customers straight away. The reason is that they don’t know much about
other businesses in the new group like their strengths and weaknesses, so the
best way to build a new relationship is to trial each other with a small job
and taste the quality of each other services and products.
Keep in Touch
When joined forces it is essential to keep in touch, the
ideal time frame is once a month. It is good to catch up for a coffee or lunch
with other businesses in the group and refresh the commitment. Another way to
keep in touch is via social media channels and email drops. A facebook update
or a short tweet will help build the relationship.
Thanks plus
It is natural that some business will be more likely to get
referrals than the other, for example a bookkeeper or an accountant will
definitely get more referrals because every business needs a bookkeeper or an
accountant, in contrast to that only a few businesses will need services of a construction
or a building company so it is not possible to match one for one referrals
between the power group members. To be fair it is good to have some formal or
informal arrangement in place, a small thank you card and a gift will go a long
way in building relationship and getting more referrals in future.YZM Technologies is a Perth based Software Company specialising in building custom software, databases and mobile apps and helping small businesses achieve better results by optimising business processes.
