Your Sister on the Lane

Dear friend,

The riddle first, as ever. Your century today, and the question at the heart of it is one you have almost certainly asked in a form that cannot be answered.

Two firms both ask for names to try,
Same happy customers, same reply.
One says: do let me know of any.
One says: your sister on the lane.
Same goodwill sitting in the room.
Why did one leave with nothing gained?

Hold your answer. Story time.

The Story

Two firms in the same trade, and the work, all together now, was equally good. Both finished a job for a delighted customer in the same week, and both asked for an introduction, which is more than most manage.

The first asked the way it is nearly always asked. If you know anybody who might need this sort of thing, do send them my way.

The customer said she certainly would, and meant it entirely, and did nothing at all. Not from meanness. She was being asked to perform a task with no shape to it: search the whole of her acquaintance, decide who might plausibly want this, work out how to raise it without seeming to sell to her friends, and then do so at a moment that never quite arrives. That is a great deal of work to hand somebody as an afterthought at the door.

So she carried a small vague intention around for a fortnight and then lost it, as everybody does with vague intentions.

The second firm asked a different question, having noticed something during the job. The customer had mentioned twice that her sister on the same lane had the identical problem and had been putting it off for two years.

So the request was: would you mind mentioning me to your sister? And then the part that matters: I'll write you two lines you can send her, and if she'd rather, she can ring me and I'll tell her honestly whether it's worth doing.

The customer sent the two lines that evening, because it took eleven seconds and required no judgement, no searching and no awkwardness.

Three things had been removed. The searching, since the person was named. The wording, since it was supplied. And the risk to the friendship, since the sister was being offered an honest opinion rather than a sales call, which is what a person is really protecting when she hesitates to recommend anybody.

And note where the naming came from. He had not guessed. She had told him, in passing, during the work, and he had written it down, which is the only unusual thing he did in the whole business.

The Lesson, Since You've Earned It

A request for anybody is a request for nobody. Goodwill is not the scarce thing in most trades: your customers think well of you and would gladly help. What stops them is that the help has no shape. Asked for a name they must generate one, which means searching, judging and then risking a friendship on your behalf, and a person handed that at the doorstep will agree warmly and never begin.

So do the work for them, and it is three small pieces of work. Name the person, which means listening during the job for the neighbour, the sister, the man at the other branch, and writing it down when it is said. Supply the words, a couple of lines they can send without composing anything. And remove the risk to the friendship by offering the other person something other than a sale: an honest answer, a look at it, a plain opinion on whether it is worth doing at all.

That last one is what most trades miss entirely. Your customer is not weighing whether you are good. She is weighing whether introducing you might cost her something with somebody she cares about, and until you take that off the table, her hesitation is perfectly rational.

Then the timing, which is the same as everywhere else in this series. Ask on the last day or within the week, while the work is visible and the feeling is at its height, as the letter on those ten days insisted. A request made in March about a job done in June is a request made to somebody who has stopped thinking about it.

Two cautions. Ask for one, not several, since a request for three names is the vague version wearing a number. And do not pay for it in most trades: money changes what the recommendation is, and your customer would rather do you a favour than earn a commission, which she will have to declare or conceal, neither of which she wants.

Three questions, and use a real recent job:

1. Who did they mention during the work? Go back through the job in your head. There is nearly always somebody: a relative, a neighbour, a colleague with the same trouble. If you cannot recall one, that is a listening problem rather than a marketing one.
2. What are your two lines? Write the short message you would want sent on your behalf, in the customer's voice rather than yours. It should mention what you did and nothing else.
3. What are you offering the third person? Not a quote: an honest look and a plain answer, including that they may not need you. That is the sentence that makes an introduction safe to make.

The Answer to the Riddle

Why did one leave with nothing?

Because he asked for a stranger and she would have had to find one. The goodwill in both houses was identical and so was the customer's willingness; what differed was the size of the task. One woman was handed a search, a judgement and a small social risk, and did what people do with such things, which is intend to get to them. The other was handed a name she had supplied herself, two lines already written, and an assurance that her sister would be told the truth. That took eleven seconds, and eleven seconds is the correct price for a favour.

The verse:

Ask them for anyone at all,
And they will search, and never call.
Name one, and write the words to send,
And say you'll be straight with their friend.

Until next time. Go back to your last finished job, remember who they mentioned, and ask for that one person with the two lines already written.

P.S. And when an introduction does come, tell the person who made it what happened, whether or not it turned into work. A customer who hears nothing back assumes it vanished into your business, and will not trouble twice. One sentence of thanks with the outcome in it is what turns a single favour into a habit.

Also in the archive: The Baker's Thirteenth Loaf, The Mason's Witnesses and Ten Days After.