How to get clients when referrals dry up
A new member joined Friday’s Build with Brad call. She’s run her own studio for two years, doing branding, web design and email. Every client she’s had came by referral. And for the first time, she had no projects lined up.
Here’s what I told her.
The best, absolute best action you can do on a daily basis is manual outreach to the people already in your network. Start with the people closest to you and work out to the people furthest away.
Start with the people who already know you
The closest circle is existing clients and people you just finished a project with. If they get an email from you, they recognize you. They’re not going to delete you or ignore you or report you as spam. They’re going to think, oh, that’s a delight. That’s your biggest advantage right there.
If you had no clients, you’d start with people you know, from ground zero. But if you’ve done client work, you’re not starting from zero.
Put everyone on a list
Put their names in a spreadsheet, or whatever tool makes the most sense for you. Asana, Notion, a piece of paper. I don’t care which tool. They all do the same thing.
Put everyone you know on that list. I’ve told a few people in the group, don’t talk to me until you’ve put everyone you know on a list. There should be 40, maybe 50, maybe 90, depending on how long you’ve been doing this. Maybe 20. Better than zero.
Beside each name:
- How you know them (existing client, past client, someone in your network)
- Status (current client, past client, prospective client)
- When you last reached out, with a note about what you talked about
The point is a system that tracks your manual conversations. Emails, text messages, phone calls, running into someone at a networking event.
Warm the relationship, then ask
Start at the top of the list. Say I’m messaging a member of the group. I’d say something normal, because we know each other. Hey, how’s that thing you’ve been working on? Any updates on that project?
They respond and we go back and forth a bit. The objective isn’t to try and get more work out of them every time. If I texted every other day asking “how about now?”, they’d start ignoring my messages fast.
But as the conversation goes, I might say, hey, by the way, do you know an executive director or a CMO at a nonprofit? Could you put me in touch? Or, who do you know that would benefit from our email marketing services? It’s a really specific ask, after you’ve actually engaged in the relationship. That doesn’t happen in one text. It might be seven back and forths.
Sometimes they share something and you can say, can I help you with that? And they’ll say, oh, I didn’t know you did that. That’s fine. My fault, I should’ve been better at communicating that. Here’s me telling you now.
Then make it easy to say yes or no. Let’s meet Monday. Does 9 work? I’ll give you three options for how I can help, and you give me a gut check on what makes the most sense.
If they say now’s not the right time, ask why. Maybe the answer is to change the offer and start in March. Maybe it’s, let me get back to you. That’s fine, you follow up then.
You want a yes or a no. If your conversations don’t get you either, you’re not asking anything. It’s okay to get a no.
Set a reminder for every conversation
When I’ve contacted someone, I update their row. Contacted Friday, October 9, talked about this. Then I want a reminder to contact that person again. Let’s say two weeks, to be conservative. If we haven’t talked in between, I just email them again.
Now imagine 20 or 40 or 60 people. You will always have someone to message.
Here’s a trick a client told me last week. She does a lot of outreach, finding decision makers at companies she wants as clients and emailing them in tasteful ways. When she sends the email, she puts her own address in the BCC field. That copy lands at the top of her inbox, and in Gmail she hits snooze for a week. There’s the one-week reminder for that specific conversation.
So whenever you start a conversation by email, BCC yourself and snooze it for a week or two. If they didn’t reply, or didn’t get you what you needed, you follow up in a way that’s not annoying and keep the conversation going.
Block off the time
You’ll have so many people you could be talking to that you’ll need to block off time on your calendar for it. Afternoon or first thing in the morning, whatever makes sense. Thirty minutes to an hour, every day, where you’re just emailing people. Reaching out, starting conversations, nurturing relationships, making offers.
It’s the biggest, most boring, obvious thing you could do. When I check in with people the week after we talk about this and ask how many people they emailed, they’ll say, uh, none.
I hold myself to this too, and I’m honest about when I’m good at it and when I’m not. Lately I’ve been good at it. It leads to calls. It leads to proposals. I’ve sent a few proposals over the last month, and none of them would have happened if I hadn’t been stirring the pot. When you make noise, you find where the signal is.
She said it out loud: it’s super boring and she hates doing it. It’s boring until you realize it’s working. Conversations happen, you get more comfortable, and it doesn’t feel weird anymore. You find your voice, what works and what people respond to. Eventually it replaces the mindless stuff, like checking notifications or swiping on Instagram or LinkedIn. Who am I emailing? You look at your list. Write the email. That’ll remind me in a week. Next. Next. Email time’s over, back to client work.
People are always looking for the hack. This is old-fashioned. And especially now, with AI everywhere, people desperately need a real human connection. You can automate cold outreach, but you’re burning through your reputation. You’re building a service business, not selling widgets. One client makes a difference. Two or three active clients and you’re humming along.
Ask past clients for more work, then for referrals
This is where your next work comes from, by the way.
Reach out to past clients. Hey, how’s it been going? I saw you’re launching a new book, congratulations. Then offer to help with the next thing. Do you need a website refresh? I see you’ve been posting on Instagram, do you want us to take that over? Want to jump on a call so I can show you three ways we could help?
First, ask for work. If they don’t have anything right now: got it, no worries at all, I’ll check in with you soon. Before I go, can you put me in touch with another author you know? We’re putting together a package for that.
When they introduce you to someone, that person goes on your list too, with their reminder.
Know who you’re asking for
When I asked who her best fit client was, she said founders. That’s a very broad term. I’m a founder. Everyone in the group founded their business. If you ask someone to put you in touch with a founder, they’re going to ask, what kind?
Her actual clients were an author and speaker, a coach, an event rentals company and a glass recycling nonprofit. That’s not “founders.” That’s something more specific.
So start with what you have. What did you do for one client that you can repeat for others like them? That best-selling author knows other authors. Ask for more of that. It’s fine to have a mishmash at first. As you notice the clients you get more of and like working with, you ask for more of those and stop asking for the rest.
She’s not doing different services for these clients. It’s the same service for different people. So get specific on positioning. You don’t have to nail it, and you can have two or three versions. Here’s the template I gave her to fill in:
I help [specific type of person] who has [specific problem] build [certain thing] so that they can [achieve a certain outcome].
For example: I help authors establish their digital presence through websites, branding and social content planning, so they can book more speaking gigs, sell more books and build their authority.
That affects everything else. Who you start emailing. Who you ask for referrals. How you update your website, and whether you have landing pages for specific types of client you can send people to.
Start tomorrow. Put that list together, put it in a system that makes sense, and block off time every day to email people.
This came out of a Build with Brad call. We meet live every Friday.