Don’t Confuse Recommendations with Referral Leads

Just because clients are willing to refer you doesn’t mean they will.
“Turn 70 percent of your prospects into customers with referrals.” That statement got my attention—not just because it sounded too easy, but because I wasn’t sure where the data came from or how accurate it was. Sure, referral leads are top-notch, but they don’t just appear. That kind of referral success rate requires a disciplined referral program with skills-building, ongoing coaching, and accountability for results.
I dug a little deeper and learned the statistic referred to the Net Promoter Score (NPS)—a tool many companies use to survey clients about their willingness to recommend these businesses to others. And therein lies the problem: Referrals and recommendations are not the same thing.
NPS may not be what it’s cracked up to be, according to Ron Shevlin on Forbes. NPS provides relevant data that measures how well customers like us and our products. It