What are you actually recommending: not every recommendation carries the same weight
From the Buyer’s Chair: What sales, service, and business development look like from the other side of the conversation.
My daughter is about a year away from buying a home, so she follows several neighborhood groups and recently sent me a post that caught my attention.
A homeowner was promoting an upcoming open house and included a glowing recommendation for the realtor. A couple of weeks later, another homeowner posted about another open house and gave the same realtor an equally enthusiastic endorsement.
Maybe there was more history there than I knew. Entirely possible.
But from the buyer’s chair, I had a question:
What exactly are they recommending?
The house hadn’t sold yet. There hadn’t been a difficult negotiation, inspection issue, financing problem, or closing to navigate. At that point, the recommendation seemed to be based primarily on the experience of working with the agent.
And there’s nothing wrong with saying someone is responsive, knowledgeable, professional, or simply great to work with. Those things matter.
But they aren’t the same as saying, “I’ve seen this person deliver when it counted.”
We tend to lump all referrals together, when there’s actually a pretty big difference between recommending the experience and recommending the result.
I can tell you I enjoyed working with someone. I can tell you they knew their stuff. Or I can tell you they found the problem three other contractors missed, saved us thousands of dollars, handled a mess when things went sideways, or produced the result we hired them to produce.
Those recommendations carry different weight.
I’ve experienced this in my own business. A former client was incredibly generous with compliments while we were working together. I appreciated every one of them, although at some point I was running out of graceful ways to accept them.
But part of me was thinking, “Tell me this after we get you new business.”
Because that’s the standard I care about.
When I refer someone, I know my reputation gets attached to that recommendation too. So I want to be clear about what I actually know versus what I simply like.
A referral opens the door. It does not replace proof, fit, or performance.
Maybe I’m a little old school about that.
When you refer someone, what does it take before you’re comfortable putting your name behind their work?
#FromtheBuyer'sChair
Andrea Goodman
Appointments By Design
High-touch business development partner for B2B companies in facility services, trades, and beyond. We open doors to decision-makers—not just calendars.
Comments