I've read in some sales books that say not to use name dropping in your sales approach. I try not to but sometimes will mention some of my conquests. I think it give credibility. Just don't do what I once did. I went into the administrative office of a MRI group and mentioned that we cleaned one of the largest and fastest growing MRI groups. Boy was that a mistake. The woman looked at me like I spoke of the Devil. I made sure not to do that again.

What do you guys think?

I DISAGREE,and learned a long time ago.
It's not what you know,It's WHO you know.

In Business, networking is the vehicle to spread "word of mouth". Networking is the primary source of referrals. In the business world, referrals are warm leads, almost ready to buy, as opposed to what you can get from cold-calling or direct mail.

Networking is inexpensive, sometimes even free, and it works because of two major psychological truths:

1. People are afraid to do business with strangers.
2. People prefer to do business with people they know or with people who were recommended by someone they know.

Therefore, the MORE people you know (i.e. the BIGGER your network), the more business you'll do.

Take a look at this article:
http://ezinearticles.com/?Networking---Its-Not-What-You-Know---Its-Who-You-Know&id=363736

Best,
T

name-dropping is definitely bad.

Rick Gelinas taught me that.

I've never heard that it's a bad idea to refer to other clients that you service. I have always used references in my carpet cleaning business. Seeing that we have many satisfied customers (just like them) helps them to feel more comfortable doing business with us. It's an easy way to help the client see that you're capable of servicing their accounts. In fact I would disagree emphatically that it's a bad idea to drop names. How many successful companies have you seen that list a handful of their top clients on their website and marketing material? I have read many sales books that encourage the use of referrals to your satisfied customers.

In our cleaning business we have maintained a file of our "Job Vouchers" with the comment field filled in for each job that we service. Over the years we were able to build up an enormous collection of customers saying how delighted they are with our service. These testimonials are highly valuable to help others build confidence in our service.

Another variation of "dropping names" that we have used successfully is we leave postcards at neighboring businesses that say that "we just cleaned the carpets at _____" so they can check with their neighbor about the work we performed. This simple technique has brought us new business too.

I would say that you should definitely develop a program for acquiring testimonials and don't hesitate to use them. Dropping names, with discretion, can be an effective tool to use in your marketing.





Rick Gelinas

but seriously, i agree with Tad & Rick. it's definitely a positive thing, not negative. can give you instant credibility to some people.

If some are having a hard time growing commercial carpet cleaning, try this. I have and it is working very well.
A guy in my BNI chapter has a Jan-Pro cleaning that he sells to people that go out to businesses and do regular cleaning. Not all of them do carpet cleaning....They service about 320 businesses in the Twin City area of Minnesota. Over the last couple of months I have done about 20 jobs for them. A few nice ones too. The Cimex rocks!! He is getting rave feedback about how goood the carpet looks! More jobs are on the way too. Beats knocking on doors/cold calling. If you are in a major city and they have Jan-Pro, contact them!!! It's working for me!
Fred