At what point is too long for a response time?
One thing that matters greatly in getting referrals is our ability to reply and respond to inquiries, especially referrals from partners that put our name forward to others.
Which brings me to my latest rant! Back in January I was speaking with a prospect about a speaking engagement in Feb. I mentioned that I had a number of speaker friends who could also provide their services for this prospect. During the call, my prospect asked to send over some suggestions of speakers that might fit the goal and purpose of the organization. So I reached out to my network. I did so through a private Facebook group, in which a number of speakers replied to. One person commented with questions. I immediately sent an email out detailing what I knew and what I didn’t know. I was clear that my role was to submit their information to my prospect for them to review. 18 hours after sending the email, I got a response from the speakers assistant. It read:
“[redacted] here, [speaker] assistant. I just wanted to let you know that we got your email – thanks so much for sending!
I’ll connect with [speaker] but we will do our best to get you a talk title and something to work with in the next few days.
Just let me know if you need anything else at all and have a great week!”
NOTE THE WORD DAYS!
Also note that this was on Jan 7th!
Fast forward to today, June 10th!
I got this email:
“Hi Matt!
I just wanted to follow up. I’m so sorry about the delay, we got swamped with our spring launch.
Would you still like us to send topics for any upcoming availability?”
WHAT THE WHAT?
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
My response was:
“No, looks like this was 5 months ago! I didn’t end up working with them, and now with COVID-19, I’m sure they’ve shifted gears.”
FIVE MONTHS
To which they replied:
“Thanks for letting us know!
Please keep [speaker] in mind in the future and have a great rest of your week.”
ARE YOU CRAZY?
Seriously. If it takes you 5 months to reply to an email where you promised me something in 48 hours you have deeply misunderstood my future desire to refer you!
I’m good! I’ll find new folks to refer!
If you want to Fire Up Your Referrals don’t do this, reply to emails quicker AND get these two free resources at www.FireUpReferrals.com