Most consumers and professionals WANT to give referrals but home care salespeople and business owners rarely ask for them. Why?

Most of us are too worried about closing the deal and starting the case to also ask for a referral. Right?

• Home care agencies that actively look for referrals obviously benefit more than those that don’t repeatedly ask. 
• Top home care agencies ask for referrals consistently.
• Home care agencies getting recommendations increase their conversion rate and have a faster close time due to the fact that referrals build immediate trust with home care consumers.

Because getting a referral costs almost nothing (it’s just a matter of asking), every home care agency needs a referral plan to grow its business.

The Best Strategy To Get Your Home Care Referrals To Increase

When you have clients and professional referral sources to ask for referrals, follow a simple system:

1. Ask for a home care referral at the right time.
2. Use the right communication method.
3. Know that they might stall, or are simply busy.
4. Keep asking and following up for that referral.
5. Thank your referral source when the referral turns into a new client.
6. Perfect, and repeat.

Here’s  how you’ll get that referral plan to work:

Ask For One Home Care Referral Every Day

You’re already looking for new home care clients every day, so asking for just one referral shouldn’t be too hard. Following this plan will give you a follow-up strategy to bring in referrals automatically, so this process will take half the time it currently does. If you get one new home care client referral every week, that’s 52 home care leads in one year. Which referral sources you reach out to all depend on timing.

Ask for Home Care Referrals at the Right Time, Using the Right Communication Method

Home care referrals need to be timed correctly. It also takes confidence and persistence.  Here’s how a typical timeline should look:

• Make first contact during the “honeymoon phase”, or the time your home care client (or referral source) is most happy with your service. This could be right after the contract is signed, or during the first week of care, or right after a smooth transition to home. These times work well because your referral sources are still thinking about you and they’re happy with the way you solved their problem. Send a thank you message to your professional referral, and to your clients. Ask for your first referral no more than three days after this positive interaction.
• Check in one week later to see how everything is going with home care services and answer any questions. Ask again for your referral if you haven’t received one, or thank them for the one they did send over.
• Keep communicating/visiting to deepen the relationships with your clients and your professional referral sources. Reach out monthly at a MINIMUM (preferably every 8 days).

Include them in your email marketing newsletters and regular content, which will also position you as an authority figure easily worth referring to.

Now, the term “referral” can mean a lot of different things to different people. Some of your clients may not understand what you mean when you ask them for a referral so it’s important to spell out exactly what you’re expecting.

Be Specific!

Referrals come in many different forms, but the message to the consumer is that you want them to personally recommend your home care agency for your ability to solve a senior care problem as you promised.

Types of referrals you can ask for include:

• Introduction to a person in your client’s circle of family or friends who may need home care.
• A review or testimonial to show future home care leads that you can be trusted to deliver.
• A story or case study that talks about how you helped your client solve a specific, measurable problem. (decreasing readmission rates, happier discharge planning, Friday discharges that are successful)
• A social media post or recommendation.

Give your clients all the details you need so they can fill in the blanks instead of being too overwhelmed by the task. This is key!

 Give Your Clients and Referral Sources Some Examples

Give your clients and referral sources an idea of what you need.

• Send them a link to another recommendation.
• If you are looking for an introduction, let them know the type of home care leads you’re looking for (senior care challenges, Friday discharges, challenging cases, companionship, etc).
• If you want a review or testimonial, a template works. Create an email for your referral source to send out, with blanks they can fill in!

Use Email Templates (ASNSpark! CRM, whoot!)

Don’t waste time and brain energy on repetitive emails.

• Create templates for each stage of your home care referral follow-up program. (or let our team at Approved Senior Network do it for you!)
• Set up an automated drip email campaign in your ASNSpark! CRM to trigger a series of messages for the home care clients or professionals you are seeking referrals from.
• Always ask a few questions. Emails with 1 to 3 questions have a 50% higher chance of being replied to than those without.

Here are a few you may want to close your email with:

• How happy are you with our home care services? Are you happy you chose us?
• Do you have any questions?
• Who else do you know who may benefit from the home care services we provided?
• Which of your connections is in a similar position and could use our help?

Of course, none of this will be possible without the ASNSpark! CRM in your corner.

Are You Using the Right Home Care Sales and Marketing CRM?

Your ASNSpark! CRM will help you maintain a consistent follow-up schedule with your contacts. A janky CRM will only slow you down!

Your CRM should do the following:

• Emails and texts your clients/referral sources.
• Shows you which leads have been inactive by marking your last contact date
• Alerts you when recipients open your emails or click any of the links
• Allows you to segment your lists of contacts and track their referrals

Another way to stay on top of your referrals is by using lead tracking.

What is Lead Tracking?

Each of your professional referral sources knows another good referral source for your business.

Consider this a warm home care lead.

Monitor your follow-up efforts to make sure your lead nurturing is going according to schedule.

Lead tracking saves you time by showing you key performance indicators of your referral marketing strategy.

So when you learn how to track your leads like a pro, you’ll be able to organize your referrals based on their:

• Referral source– This is the best way to get a jump start on managing your leads. If you know where they came from i.e., clicking on a webpage, or from a local assisted living, you immediately have valuable information to work on. Knowing the source of your leads can tell you a lot of interesting things about them. For example, it can tell you what their browsing habits are, what content they are interested in or if they already have an established relationship with you or any competitors or partners.
• Referral quality- When thinking about lead quality, rushing to judgment can literally cost you. Stay mindful of the fact that not all prospects can be slotted neatly into a “good” or “bad” camp, especially at the start of a long sales process. Remember, you give leads value by following up with them in a consistent and compelling way. And don’t mistake a cautious lead for a cold lead. With a relevant sales approach, you may find that a shy lead can quickly turn into a repeat customer. At the end of the day, people are super complex. You can’t expect to have a prospect “all figured out” after just one call. Commit to learning more about your prospects over time and you won’t run the risk of dismissing a potential customer just because they didn’t immediately match your vision of a picture-perfect lead.
• Lifecycle stage– Leads are not static. Each one will enter and travel the sales funnel with different levels of intent and motivation. Some will be ready to buy, others will be months (even years!) from a purchase. Your lead management system needs to be able to move in step with your prospect’s changing needs and priorities. Any time you receive information that lets you know how close your lead is to purchase, organize (or reorganize) them in your lead tracking system based on that info. A simple, ‘Hot’, ‘Warm’ and ‘Cold’ list is the classic example, but depending on your CRM, this can be tagged and segmented based on your unique business and sales approach.
• The number of touches – 80% of sales are made on the 5th-12th contact.
  • For example: In real estate, this is a BIG reason most agents don’t make it past the 5-year mark. And it’s the same story in many of the industries known for long sales cycles (sound familiar). You have to be committed to consistently following up, even when you haven’t seen any action in months. The good news is, once you’re in, you’re in. When tracking your leads by the number of touches, there are two key factors to consider: the length of time you’ve been in touch, and the number of interactions you’ve had with a lead over that period of time.
  • For instance, you may have been ‘in touch’ with a lead for a few months but after the initial contact, they paused communications to speak with other decision-makers. In the same time frame, another lead has been in constant dialogue with you, requesting information and details. Even though both leads have been with you for exactly the same amount of time, your relationship is at a very different stage with each. This information is critical. Without it, how can you and your team know what each lead needs? A great lead tracking system helps you easily and immediately update the status of every lead in your pipeline so that you and your team never have to think twice about whether or not to follow up with a lead.

Monitoring these statistics will improve your outreach efforts and guarantee that you will nurture leads the right way. It will also help you follow up after that referral turns into a sale.

Show Your Appreciation

Consumers and professionals refer more because they want to help both you and their contact.  Anytime one of your contacts follows through with a referral, send them a handwritten note to thank them.

• If their referral becomes a home care client, a gesture of appreciation in addition to that thank you note may include a low-cost, $5 or less small token of appreciation. (Be careful here! Gifts are frowned upon in healthcare. (READ THE SAFE HARBOR REGULATIONS)
• Touch base with these active professional referral contacts at least once a month- preferably every 8-10 days.
• And don’t forget to leave reviews and refer clients to your contacts too!
• This mutually beneficial relationship will help you earn referrals now and throughout your career.

“You’ll Never Lose a Sale For Asking For A Referral, But You Can Lose Business If You Don’t Ask for One!” – Dave Lawrence, Follow Up Boss

Since home care referrals are key to your business, you need a strategy to follow up and ask for them.  Warm home care leads will be the key to increasing your revenue and growing your home care brand awareness without spending much time or money to do so. So start by upgrading your CRM to handle all the steps we discussed today and you’ll be ready to unlock all your referral sales in no time.