For a lot of small businesses, word of mouth has always been enough. A good reputation, a handful of people who know your work and will say so – that’s how the phone kept ringing for years without a marketing budget or a formal strategy. Just good work and good relationships.
But I’ve been hearing the same thing from a lot of clients lately: the referrals have slowed down, and they’re not sure why. The business hasn’t got worse. The relationships haven’t soured. It’s just… quieter than it used to be.
In my experience, there are two things going on.
Why referrals slow down
The first is that COVID genuinely disrupted a lot of professional referral networks, and they never quite recovered. Staff turned over. People who knew to recommend you moved on and their replacements don’t have the same established relationships. Face-to-face contact that used to happen naturally – at industry events, over coffee, in passing – stopped during lockdowns and for many people it never really restarted.
The second is that the way people ask for recommendations has changed. Word of mouth still happens, but more and more it happens in WhatsApp groups, private Facebook communities, local neighbourhood forums and school portals. If you’re not visible in those conversations – or if the people having them don’t know enough about what you do to mention you – you’re simply not being recommended there, even if your reputation is excellent with the contacts you built five years ago.
The result is a referral network that looks intact but isn’t really functioning. The contacts are all still there. You’d still describe yourself as well-connected. But the actual introductions have thinned out, and because it happens gradually it can take a while before the drop in enquiries gets your attention.
The simplest fix
Referral partners refer to people they’re actively thinking about. If you haven’t been in touch for twelve to eighteen months, you’re probably not top of mind when a relevant client comes their way.
The most effective thing you can do is also the simplest: get back in direct, personal contact – not a mass newsletter or a social media post, but an individual message or a phone call to the specific people who have referred clients to you in the past, or who work with the same clients you do at a different stage of their journey.
Start by writing down who those people actually are – not “my network” as a vague concept, but a real list of ten to twenty specific people or businesses. Who has actually sent you work? Who serves your clients in a complementary way? Who is well-connected in the communities your clients come from?
Then contact them directly. It doesn’t have to be elaborate. Acknowledge you’ve been out of touch, ask how things are going for them, mention what you’re currently working on.
What to actually say
If you’re not sure what to write, something like this works:
“Hi [name] – it’s been a while and I wanted to reconnect. Hope things are going well for you. I’ve been busy with [brief description of recent work], and I’m looking to take on a few new clients over the coming months. If anyone in your network ever needs [your service], I’d love the introduction. Happy to do the same for you if it ever comes up.”
Most people respond well to this kind of message because it’s honest and doesn’t ask a lot of them.
After that initial reach-out, staying visible doesn’t take much. A quarterly email to your referral contacts – sharing something genuinely useful, not a sales pitch – keeps you present without demanding their attention.
Make it easy for people to pass you on
Personal relationships are what drive referrals, but they work better when there’s something concrete your contacts can point to.
If someone mentions you in a WhatsApp group or a Facebook community thread, the next question is usually “have you got a website?” or “what exactly do they do?” If your website clearly explains what you do, who you help and how to get in touch, that conversation ends well. If it’s vague or out of date, you lose the referral at the last step.
It’s also worth being specific with your referral contacts about what a good client looks like for you. Most people want to send you the right work but they can only do that if they know what the right work is. A sentence or two – “my best clients are usually [type of business or person] who are dealing with [specific problem]” – makes it much easier for someone to spot an opportunity for you.
If your website or digital presence isn’t currently making that easy, that’s a practical thing to fix. Our communications and marketing service covers exactly this kind of visibility work.
For more on how to think about your broader online presence, simple ways to promote your website is worth a read.
