Just recently , a fairly new acquaintance of mine referred someone to me, or rather , I was referred to them.
This is not unusual – a lot of people see a lot of opportunity with the various business interests that I have, notwithstanding my startup Rocking Rose, and my new social networking App Network Buddy.
And if you consider my “Day Job” with Dolphin Worxs as their main person , chief chick in charge and all round general Bossy Person, you get the picture that a lot of people would like to sell me, or pitch to me, a variety of services or products, and even partnerships.
However – this recent incident brought a wry chuckle to my throat. For the sake of keeping things anonymous, I will not name the company, referee, or service that was referred to me, I shall instead talk about Baking Cupcakes.
The Story Begins
I was on the phone with said New Acquaintance, when I happened to mention that I hadn’t been able to call them back in recent days, because I had been a little busy Baking Cupcakes.
side note – I was in fact Baking Cupcakes for one of my largest clients, and it was an activity that I happen to be fairly good at, I have a custom recipe, which I have perfected over the years, and I follow it to the letter. The result is that the final Cupcake is exactly what the client ordered. I was being paid to Bake Cupcakes.
We continued our discussion, and the call ended.
A couple of days later , I was formally introduced by email to a Specialist Cupcake Maker. Someone to whom I could outsource my Cupcake Baking Woes.
Say What How ?
Cue extremely puzzled expression while reading emails.
A day after that , the Specialist Cupcake Baker replied to the email, thanked my aquaintance for the referral and confirmed their availability to speak with me.
Alrighty then.
 |
| but … I like Baking Cupcakes … |
I made a mental note to call or reply to Cupcake Specialist at some point to politely thank them and confirm that I was not actually in the market to outsource my Cupcake Baking Activities.
Before I could do that, I was called. On a Public Holiday. To discuss my requirements for the Cupcakes. It was a slightly awkward call I can assure you.
Said Cupcake Maker had done nothing wrong, and was in fact following all the right steps for a word of mouth referral. It would have been glorious, had I actually wanted, or needed to outsource my Cupcake Baking Activities.
But I didn’t, and in fact I didn’t even say that I wanted to, I simply mentioned that I had been very busy Baking Cupcakes. And that was it.
One Sentence. That’s it. And it turned into a referral.
So – what’s the point of my story?
If you are listening for subtle cues about pain points, that’s fabulous. Just don’t listen so hard, that you invent pain points where none exist.
And if you are going to refer, or you think there’s a potential referral, clarify.
All it would have taken, is one question about whether I was struggling with Cupcake Making and I would have quickly assured my contact that I was in fact thoroughly enjoying the work, and quite happy to do it. It was in fact not something I needed to outsource.
Don’t be a blunt instrument where tact and precision are called for. Don’t be the referral equivalent of the spray and pray letterbox drop, or the business card confetti at networking events.