To The Next Level
Referral Power!
The key to making your chapter a superstar.
By Jerry Schwartz, BNI Executive Director - Maryland & D.C.

In the summer of 2000, I wrote an article for SuccessNet entitled "The Power of 40/90," which discussed how important it is to productively grow your chapter. By request, I am offering this as an updated version of that article.

There are many chapters with good averages, but what does it take to be better than average? Here are current statistics of two of our chapters:

# of Members	Yearly Revenue	Revenue per member
20	US$533,166.00	US$26,658.30
35	US$1,950,820.80	US$57,377.08

You can see how your chapter revenue more than triples as your number of chapter members double.

Then sometimes there is a superstar. Congratulations BNI Olney Thursday Breakfast Chapter! Here are their impressive statistics:

# of Members	Yearly Revenue	Revenue per member
24	US$3,290,185.00	US$137,091.04

And they're not the only superstar out there. I feel the true essence of a successful BNI chapter is exemplified by the BNI Gaithersburg Wednesday Lunch Chapter. In 2007, without including repeat business, BNI Gaithersburg Wednesday Lunch Chapter had a total of 1,984 referrals from their 35 members, and their revenue was $10,480,000. Their closed sales average was 49% and the value of each member was $299,428.57. That's certainly productively growing your chapter!

How did they do it? Susan Bierly, BNI Gaithersburg Chapter of the Decade member and President of IMC Water Coolers, LLC, explains: "What we have observed over the last 14 years is the number of members we have directly correlates to the referrals we pass. The philosophy in our chapter is to hold our members accountable for production as well as the quality of our production. The quality of our 1-to-1s directly affects the quality of referrals.

"When you walk into a meeting each week with the attitude of training your sales team to go out and find new business for you, it makes it the most important appointment you have all week."

There is a common thread among the most successful BNI chapters: they follow the BNI agenda each week; they have a very strong Membership Committee; and, they work completely as a team. I also notice that these chapters are the most focused at Leadership Training and are very goal-oriented.

So what does it take to make your chapter a superstar? It really is not that difficult. It starts with focused goals and working with your local director to achieve them. You need to run the meeting as a business not a club. In other words, you just need to follow the BNI plan! There is a lot of experience to draw from, and you have a great support team to help you along the way.

Abraham-Hicks states, "It is as easy to create a castle as a button. It's just a matter of whether you are focused on a castle or a button."

Now is the time to create your BNI Chapter Castle!