Problems / Winning more work

How to ask for referrals — and when the ask actually works

Happy customers would recommend you. Most are never asked — or they're asked at a random time instead of the moment they're happiest.

9 industries · prices checked 27 July 2026

What to know

$0

There is nothing to buy

Every industry lands on the same answer: a saved message, sent at the right moment. The software's only job is reminding you to send it.

Ask right after the good thing happens

The tax refund landed. The sale settled. The claim paid out. That's when people say yes to 'know anyone else who needs this?'

The people you pay can refer you too

Property and strata managers send trades thousands of dollars of work — a standing deal turns that into referrals coming back.

How to implement this today

  1. 1

    Pick your moment: the point where customers are happiest — job done, refund landed, sale settled, claim paid.

  2. 2

    Write the two-line ask and save it as a template.

  3. 3

    Add it as a step in your closing checklist, or set your software to send it at that trigger.

  4. 4

    Ask every time for a month and count what comes back.

The fixes, industry by industry

1 of the 9 industries already own a fix for this.

Pick your trade and this rewrites itself in its words, its tools, its prices.

Already in software you pay for · 1 fix

A setting inside a product you already license. Check your plan.

Free, but you set it up · 7 fixes

No new subscription — a template, a habit, or a free tier.

Costs money · 1 fix

A real bill. Prices as checked in each source guide.

When not to solve this with software

There is a purchase that looks like this work and isn't — software that tracks referrals you were never going to ask for.

A marketing automation suite. accounting & bookkeeping guide

A small firm's growth is referrals at lodgment, advisory conversions from data it already holds, and answering enquiries same-day. All three cost templates and discipline, not a campaign platform with a monthly fee and a certification course.

Marketing automation suites. allied health guide

A 2–6 practitioner clinic grows on rebooking discipline and referrer relationships, not drip campaigns. The suite money buys a lot of outcome letters and recall follow-through instead.

The full guide for each trade

Keep browsing

23 problems, grouped by what they cost you.

All 23 problems →

For your business specifically

The $500 AI Opportunity Diagnostic measures these problems against your business and ranks the fixes by what they return.

Book the 20-minute fit call →