Why do networking groups, in general, fail to deliver significant results for successful professionals? They don’t charge enough (or anything) for membership.
Think about it for a minute.
Here is what happens when you don’t charge enough for membership in a #networking or #referral group:
- You have too many members by default. This is endemic in the larger, multi-national organizations. I used to be a franchisee of one and before selling my franchises I continually struggled with having the economic necessity of having more members ($$$) and the resulting loss of true income generation for the best members. Invariably, lower cost of membership increases mediocrity and complicates meeting logistics, increases obligations to network with and spend time with more people. One of the hardest things in the world is to convince bad members to leave after they join.
- You don’t attract the best potential members because the price doesn’t get their attention. The best groups will charge serious money (1k or more per month) and, as a direct result of that price, will have to be structured and managed to deliver a result that meets and exceeds the obligation. What kind of business does a member that is investing 12k per year and attending meetings and events need to get to be interested in considering becoming a member? However, that price ensures that the potential and subsequent member is engaged and focused on doing their part to make sure they get their desired ROI.
- You can’t afford to have the right kind of leadership to run the group. In most referral groups the day to day operations are run by the members and they aren’t compensated for it. To have someone like myself interested in doing the work of screening members, running meetings, delivering exceptional training and coaching to the members and mediating disputes/challenge takes $$. You need to have enough revenue generated to make it interesting. I, personally, wouldn’t consider it if I wasn’t making 10k/month. We would be talking about, in a group of 10 high performers, 10 one on one coaching sessions, up to 4 meetings per month, at least one training session of 90 minutes or more and some form of group community chat (Slack or the equivalent) that I would monitor daily.
I am not crapping all over referral groups…just most of them.
However, I am specifically pointing out that they have consistent issues that are largely derived directly from their lack of true financial cost to members. When you charge more, you have a better sales process before members join. Yes, you will have less potential applicants, but that is a really good thing if you can deliver on the value after they join…and that significant price is actually one of the key ways to guarantee that the new member is paying enough attention in the beginning to almost guarantee success.
The types of members you are looking for need to be getting serious revenue and profit from new clients. For example, good #financialadvisors can earn between $60-$200k revenue from a client over a normal retention period.
All of the sudden, professional training and coaching in a facilitated referral group doesn’t sound so expensive does it?
I have been out of the referral group game for quite some time after some devastating betrayals personally and professionally. In my work with very successful financial advisors and business owners over the past 20 years I have become more and more convinced that, for my coaching clients, that I need to get back in the game for them.
Over the next month or so I am going to be exploring setting up one of these in my hometown and potentially in another location that I have a client in that I visit often. The key thing with this new venture is that I will be the salesperson for the group and my clients will be the group. It will be my job to serve them, to be directly accountable for their success within the group and their revenue growth outside of it as well…and get some #flyfishing in also!