Matt Vaadi explains why referral partnerships beat cold outbound sales for small firms. His "1 1 3" approach: earn trust, work closely together, then generate dozens or hundreds of referral accounts over time. Partner with CPAs or healthcare brokers instead of knocking on doors one by one.
Why are referrals so important? Well, I used to do this presentation back when I was with one of the large national providers on— I called it 1 1 3. So if I can go out and I can earn the trust and, you know, work closely with a partner, whether that be a CPA firm, a healthcare broker, or whoever, then they might refer me 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 20, 30, 50 accounts over the lifetime of that relationship, which is much better time spent rather than going out and to pound on one door at a time to sell a small business or a mid-sized business on our, our products and services. So 1 1 3. Why would I not invest my time and energy, especially if I'm a smaller firm, which I know a lot of the firms listening are a little bit smaller, maybe just getting started. So if you can only focus your time and energy on one sales channel, outbound that is, focus on referral partnerships.
