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"What is a Referral?" - Proper Use of the ActiveRain Referral Network

Well, it seems as though we've had a 'Failure to Communicate' moment here in the Rain (Gee, fancy that!).

There appears to have been a difference of opinion as to what constitutes a 'referral' in real estate terms.

We've had a significant number of members contact us, voicing their frustration with our 'Referral Exchange' feature. Evidently, people who have been accessing this feature, and responding to their Referral Alerts, discover that the referrals really aren't referrals. Confusing, I know!

For the sake of clarity, to ensure the value/integrity of this feature, and so that everyone using this feature is on the same page, we have recently added the following language to the Referral Exchange Main Page:

"The Referral Exchange is the place for members to effectively pass/share client referrals with one another. A referral is a 'live' client contact, someone who is seriously considering either buying or selling a home in the near future. The Referral Network IS NOT a place to advertise your listings, promote your development, or solicit 'potential' referral partners for some unknown possibility down the road. It is ONLY for members to share/pass actual 'live' clients who need a real estate professional to assist them now."

We hope this serves to adequately dispel any doubts or questions as to the definition of a 'referral.' In the future, anything posted to the Referral Exchange that does not meet this definition will be removed.

As always, we greatly appreciate the valued input of our vested members. This is YOUR community, and it exists to provide meaningful benefit to your business.

Rich Jacobson, ActiveRain Community Builder

Posted by ActiveRain Real Estate Network on 03/15/2008 12:42 AM

Comments (82)

referral exchange, activerain community support

82 Comments on "What is a Referral?" - Proper Use of the ActiveRain Referral Network

MAR

2008

Thank you Rich.

Thank you so much for working on this! It has really been a pet peeve of mine to go into the referral section and see ad after ad. I appreciate your diligence with this matter. I'm sure that things will be clearer now!

Thank you!!!

Thanks for shouting this again.... :) Oh, and I love Cool Hand Luke....."what we have here is a failure to communicate"....

This post is greatly appreciated! I have been excited to see a few referral leads lately only to find out that they are bogus. Hopefully the right people will read this post!

Greatly appreciated. I wasted my time applying to a certain stager's 10 or so "referrals" that were posted only to not even have the referrals mentioned when I was emailed by them. It's like the referral leads are being used as "WISH LIST" .

Amen, someone must have goten tired of me flagging "not a referral". :)

Thank you, thank you, thank you. There are always those that will try and "game" the system. Just an annoyance. I'm of the thought that the ones who "do" will continue.......probably don't read the rules anyway.

Excellent, I have to admit I was getting confused about how to use it. That clarifies it for me.

Thank you so much for clarifing this. Every time an alert would come up it was completly different. Thanks!

Thank you. Thank you. I'm new and asked this question last month because I got "referral" but it turned out to be "not referral".

Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you

So... not to be picky, but what is going to happen to the dozen or so that I flagged?

Rich,
Thank you, personally I thought that was quite clear from day one.

Thank You. I was see people use it as a farming tool.

Thank you for the clarification! I have to admit, I was confused by a referral I received:)

Rich, I'm glad you posted this again and thanks for the hard work being done to keep the listing spammers at bay!

This should be make the difference now that the policy has been restated. Thank you

Thank you for posting an offical blog about this. It was clear to me from the first time I looked at it, but I see so many that are people asking for business. Are you guys going to go in and delete the ones that aren't really referrals?

Even though it may have been clear up front (if I could understand it...), sometimes you can't explain something too many ways and too many places. I've found that a fair number of people on AR don't follow the guidelines or contest rules or whatever, even though they're posted clearly. In most cases, I think it's enthusiasm to jump right in with both feet, and not anything more.

Thank you, I have never gone to Referral Exchange section before. Now I understand it.

Thank you for clarifying this point - again. I just received another referral solicitation from someone at Chase. A "talent acquisition specialist." He sounded suspiciously like the person who sends me (and everyone else) those emails from South Africa saying I am the long lost relative of (insert your name here) and could I please hand over my identity to them...

yep, all the crap dilutes the value of the referral system. Thank you.

Debi - Yes, the plan is to go in and begin weeding out those that don't obviously meet the definition. It will probably take a little while, but we'll get things cleaned up.

Rich - As usual, THANK YOU! Now, I have one other request. Is there a nice way to ask them to list a town? I just want to scream every time somebody just puts in Alaska. For crying out loud it's 8 times the size of Washington state. It's like sending a referral to someone in Seattle for a property in Denver.

Thank you, thank you, thank you! It was driving me nuts, now I can relax and go enjoy a glass of wine!

Rich,

Thank you! It is a little extremely frustrating to get 'referrals,' that aren't really referrals!

Rich- All I can say is about time :) It seemed so simple but then people decided it was for self promotion, and it went downhill from there. I have flagged tons of them for months, and like others here it was frustrating that these guys just couldn't get it :)

Thank you very much... I was so excited about using the Referral section .. and I have both given and received referrals from it. But then I started getting so many Listing advertisements, I was getting frustrated. I was trying to figure you who to write to, and then I saw this post... I am glad the "wrong" posts to the referral section will be deleted. Thank you!

Marie.

ACTIVERICH is at it again! This was annoying, although I didn't complain... THANK YOU !

Thank you. Apparently the 8 months of flagging "referrals" as the ads they were has paid off...

As with most of the opinions above . . . it will be nice to see the Referral tool used appropriately. I was on the verge of refusing any further "referral" contacts, which were mostly spammy listing promotions. Will stay in the game a while longer to see if things improve from here on out . . .

The question is Rich, will something actually be done about it. I don't think anyone really doubted what it meant, but are you going to enforce it? At one point Bob told me he was going to make me the Florida monitor and someone else volunteered for Ohio, but nothing came of that either. This needs an enforcer!!

Thanks for clearing this up. All I have seen is spam. I don't think the problem is just going to go away though.

Amazing -- I always thought of a referral in exactly the way you explained it! It is difficult to believe that others didn't get it. For those who truly were confused, now they have NO EXCUSES!

Glad to see the ActiveRain Team address and clarify it. The Referral Exchange can be a great resource when used correctly.

Thank you very much. I too have received the "talent acquisition specialist" email - and though I don't take solicitations like that seriously, it is annoying.

I agree. I don't think there was a miscommunication though. I think it was intentional....lol. Hopefully, it will become what it was built for!

MAR

2008

I hope the farmers take heed. I only went there once and the "too vague" posts seemed like they had too much baiting in them. Thank you!

Thanks for clearing that up, but i also don't think the people who do that are not doing it because of miscommunication as well.

Rich, I got a referral directly from AR. Do you guys keep track of the referrals agent receive on here? If so, hash two more on there and THANK YOU!! ;)

Good News and lots of good comments! Debbie in AK -ok I spit coffee on my screen while reading!! What the heck am I doing drinking coffee at this hour anyway! Serves me right!

without reading all the comments - and not the place for loss mitigation agents to build up a network.... just plain old regular referrals - THANK YOU!!! This is such a great resource and it is widely abused right now just from what I have seen - I am anxious for th eday when it can work reliably because it is a great idea and tool!

It would be cool if we could demerit or turn those Realtors in who misuse the service. First time its a warning, second time its a little ding, second time, a larger ding. How many points is it worth for sending out spam via ActiveRain? If I wanted a listing agent in your area, I'D be sending out the referral, NOT YOU!!

Excellent info. Thanks!

Thank you, Cool Hand Rich!

Hooray,

In the Michigan referral area there were so many "potential" referrals from mortgage people. Not good

This is great that you are clarifying this for everyone. I have received several alerts that were just someone trying to sell a listing.

You know, the funny part about those referral that are put up falsely like that? I would NEVER do business, either referring to someone or using the services of a real estate support professional (mortgage, stager, title, etc) that would solicit like that and abuse the referral system...so I guess in the short run it may help the person doing it, but not from a $$$ in pocket standpoint from me at least!

Rich, thanks for issuing the new guidelines.

Rich, thanks for this. I actually stopped looking at this group after two referrals seemed to be bogus. It's beyond me what someone has to gain by making up referrals?? Thanks for all that you do for us here!

Thank you for this...I hope this will now be e-mailed to every past offender of this service. I know some agents get mixed up the first time and don't really understand, and then there are others who know it's wrong and post their listings anyway.

Perhaps this post could be on that referral posting page for people to read one more time before they submit their post. Maybe the creepy photo will make them think twice.:)

Thank you for clearing this up.

Sharon

Thanks! Haven't gotten any yet but this should help.

Being NEW on AR...thank you for expaining this feature.....

A much-appreciated post that eliminated the confusion and frustration I was having with this part of the sytem. Thank you!

Hopefully, this clarification will eliminate a lot of those solicitations that the poster thinks is a referral!

Good job of monitoring the feedback about this feature and fixing it for us all.

Rich, you are so right about us being vested. I consider AR as being a part of my day, each day I spend a combo of work/play time. I am receiving numerous leads because of my posting and they have become valuable. If people don't abuse the referral program it will lead us to success also. Later in the rain~Deb

Rich, thanks for putting this out there. I hope that it will help clean things up on the Referral Network. Not be pessimistic, but as usually is the case, those who are reading this are not the ones who are liley the biggest offenders.

Hi Rich - I'm glad to see this clarification as I've had several solicitations come through my email alerts for referrals. It is frustrating to receive that kind of 'referral' and not the real kind that the system was set up for. I suspect you'll have to post this same message repeatedly because those who really abuse it just won't see it.

Ann

Rich, Thanks for the explanation. I too would get frustrated seeing false leads appear...is it possible to put a "spam" button there for us to report if AR doesn't have time to delete?

Rich, thanks. Please make a general blog post when the posts are what they're supposed to be. I haven't clicked on that group in months because the majority of posts aren't "Here's a referral for ..." but "I pay x% for referrals".

Thank you, I posted a frustrated blog about this a few week's ago...your explanation is what I thought that
referral button was for...now! please have a few people monitor the spammer's...then it will be a useful tool!

I like ERC's post...put a "spam" button there for us!

Thanks!

Karen,

Thanks for thinking I"m a genius, but there is already a spam button that I had not seen before, lol. If you click on the lead, you will see it at the bottom of the lead area. I just used it! Enjoy using it!!!

Elizabeth,

LOL, OK, I'll look for it!!!

MAR

2008

Rich, thanks for the clarification. I know that some members had been misusing the referral area. BTW, great graphic of Strother Martin to illustrate the point!

Good point, Rich. When it first came out, I used to go to the Referral Network frequently. Sad to say, it's been months since I've been there - I don't need to spend my time reading posts from people who want me to send them referrals.

MAR

2008

Thank you for clearing this one up, I have noticed some advertisers in there.

MAR

2008

Thanks Rich, Many were eagerly hoping for this kind a official Blog to create a awarness and clarification.

Thank you so much. Glad to get this cleared up. Thank you for this clarification.

MAR

2008

Thanks SO MUCH for the clarification! I received at least 7 or 8 "referrals" but not one even mentioned a potential buyer in my area.

APR

2008

I haven't been over to the referral section lately, but I think it's pathetic that you even had to post this! Some people will try anything. *sigh*

OK. Now I just came from the referral section and I have to ask, why are there so many duplicates? It looks like there are 10 to 15 duplications of every "referral"!

APR

2008

Thanks for sharing this information and trying to clarify this for people. Unfortunately I just don't think people are reading it before their referral requests. I've gotten several notifications this week and all of them have been agents telling me they will gladly pay me a referral fee to send them clients, but no specific referral requests.

APR

2008

Obviously, this article did no good. Since it was posted I have received 5 referral alerts. Each one was an area agent looking to RECEIVE referrals, not give them. Perhaps a "Report Violation" box should be added to the referral alert.

MAY

2008

This was very informative. Yes, I am a newbie here and have just started to learn how to read and navigate through the website.

AUG

2008

In the referrals for Alabama, there are more "referrals" posted by people soliciting business, i.e. mortgage brokers and agents with a property to sell than true referrals. I would be nice to have a way to report violations for those that misuse this wonderful tool.

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