Do believe the headline of this post is true? If you don’t by the end this article I hope you will, because it’s true. Cash isn’t the best thing for your referral sources – it’s kind of like getting a check from your girlfriend for your birthday – it’s the easy way out and there are other things that mean so much more.

Think about it from the other way around. Let’s say you are looking for someone to help you re-tile your bathroom. You ask a friend of yours if they have anyone they can recommend and they say they know a great Tacoma tile installer and give you their information. You, as one might, ask your friend how he knows the person. He tells you he’s a friend from college but there’s an added bonus because every person that he refers he gets a $100 referral bonus from the guy.

Does that referral all of a sudden seem a little less helpful? Does it matter to you that the guy is getting paid for sending you on to his college friend? I think it does.

So what can you do? How can you keep getting all of those referrals and thank people without just buying them off? It’s easy, you just have to get a little creative.

If you were the Tacoma tile contractor I alluded to earlier, you could do several things that would work just as good as cash and make those referred to you feel comfortable about being sent to you. First off, you can make sure that whoever gets referred to you gets the five star treatment. You want your referral sources to be proud to send people your way. Second, you can reach out to people whenever they’ve referred you someone and tell them specifically how happy you are to have that referral. And I’m not talking about an email. Pick up the phone! And last, but not least, you can thank those people that send you business by sending business their way.

Cash isn’t the best way to thank your referrals. It isn’t even the fifth best way. Create a culture of referrals based on trust, on respect, and on friendship, and you’ll see your business grow more than you could ever imagine.