Refer.com a Great Conference

Brandon Barnum is the President and Chief Referral Officer at Refer.com. Over the past 23 years, Brandon has dedicated himself to helping business owners and professionals achieve breakthroughs by applying his referral partner blueprint. In this episode of In The Clear podcast, Brandon chats with Justin Recla about the great conference that Refer.com has. We explore how his network helps cross-promotion and delivers customized curated content that puts your interests first – adding value to your network relationships.

Welcome to In the Clear Podcast. I’m your host, Justin Recla. Today, we are talking to Brandon Barnum from Refer.com. Refer.com is another great conference out there that if you get an opportunity to go to, I highly, highly recommend that you attend. Brandon and his team are doing some amazing stuff, doing some things a lot different than what you’re seeing in some of these other professional sites not to be mentioned here. Brandon, thank you so much for joining us. Welcome to the show.

My pleasure, Justin. Thanks for having me on.

Brandon, could you tell us a little bit about Refer.com and what you’re doing with it?

Yeah, you bet. What we do is we help business owners and professionals grow their business by referral. We built an online referral marketing system, so it is a platform that does have a referral network where people can create their own profile and promote themselves, but the secret sauce is that we help professionals that serve the same ideal clients team up and partner with each other so that they’re cross-promoting and building their businesses together, and then we’ve got some pretty cool tech in the backend that helps you deliver customized curated content based on the receiver’s interests.

For example, if I know that you’re into skiing, or horseback riding, or mountain bike, or whatever it is that you’re passionate about, I can put that interest in the system, and it will … Within two clicks in two seconds, I can find an article, or a blog, or a video, or something of interest to you that I can send to you to add value and nurture that relationship.

I like that because that’s a lot different than some of these other platforms that are out there where my inbox gets spammed on a regular basis for stuff that I wasn’t even looking for nor did I want.

Right.

I like the fact that Refer.com got that whole system built into the backend. What I like even more is, is what you’re doing from the face-to-face stuff. You just recently held an event here in Phoenix, and can you give us a little insight as to what the vision is for those continued conferences?

Yeah, so what you attended was our Profit Partner Summit. That was the first event that we’ve done like that, but we’ve gotten some good fantastic feedback, and so we’re looking in 2018 and hope it goes in three different markets. Really, that event is all about bringing together top-quality professionals and helping them connect and create profitable partnerships so that, again, people are building their businesses together. You’re going to hear that common theme because we’re all about collaboration and partnership.

I know. That’s the other piece I love about what you guys are doing over at Refer.com and … is the collaboration piece. That collaborative capitalism is, my opinion, is really the future of business. Going out there and doing it on your own just no longer works. More importantly, that uplifts your business when you help uplift other people’s businesses as well.

Yeah, totally. Building your business by yourself could be a grind, right? You’re out there just … Here we are on a Monday morning, and a lot of people are sitting there, looking at an empty calendar in the week going, “Okay. Now, what? What do I do next to try and grow my business?” Once you have a team, say 10 professionals or business owners that you’re working with on a regular basis, and you’re recommending and referring them, and they’re doing the same, number one, it’s a lot more fun because you got a lot more activity going on, and hopefully, you’re building your business with people that you know I can trust and enjoy spending time with anyway. When you do that, man, business is fun.

Yeah, it is. I’m glad that you’re bringing this up because it is so important to business that you do business with the right people. Refer.com, first off, was just an absolutely great conference. Definitely high-frequency. The people that were there were amazing and so forth, and the sheer fact that you’re doing a conference alongside it is so unique because people around the country, around the globe for that matter can come attend these conferences and connect with people that they’ve met through your platform and now see them in person. I think that’s so important.

Yeah, it’s huge, and people always ask, “Oh, how do you guys compare to LinkedIn?” We don’t think we’re anything like LinkedIn. We actually have a proactive referral marketing system, right, that helps you grow your business, and you have a dashboard that you can take simple daily actions to spend 10 minutes a day to grow your business, so it’s totally different, but we recognize and realize that relationships happen in the real world. They’re not happening online. You might do some business with somebody that you meet online, but it’s only when you meet them face-to-face and you really build the relationship and a solid partnership that you really start to see your business grow.

Absolutely, and that plays into the concept that we refer to as “intuitive due diligence.” You got to make sure that you like the people that you’re getting involved with. The mechanical side is a little bit different, but on the intuitive side of the house, if you can’t communicate, if you don’t like the person, and then you get involved with them, then you’ll find out the hard way that three weeks, four weeks, whatever it is into that relationship that the person is a jerk and …

Right.

You know?

Yeah.

They may be really good at what they do, but if you can’t get along, then that puts your business at risk as well, and so the conferences, that conference aspect piece of being able to meet people face-to-face is huge.

It is huge, and because like with our event that you attended, you were part of our VIP Mastermind in addition to the summit itself, so we had two separate days of activities and gatherings. That VIP group was really invitational, and so the intent there is to bring just high-caliber people and professionals that are playing at a much different level, and so I’m glad you got to experience that first-hand and be a part of that. That’s what we want to deliver is an exceptional meeting where not only people who are getting educated, but they’re connecting at a deep level with people that can really create massive breakthroughs in their business.

Absolutely. Folks, if you’re not on Refer.com, go. Go take a look at the site. See what they’re doing. I know you can set up a free account, but there’s so much more going on behind the scenes that you can get value in your business from, and I want to talk a little bit more about that when we get back from the break. If you’re just joining us, we are talking to Brandon Barnum from Refer.com. You can go to Refer.com and take a look at what they’re doing, all the exciting stuff. The business is growing. Refer.com is literally … It is a great conference to attend. Stay with us. We’re going to dive into what Refer.com has got planned for the future right after this break.

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