When remodelers talk about marketing — finding new leads and turning them into signed jobs — most agree that new business comes from referrals. That's true of my business as well, which I have owned and operated for the past ten years in a suburb of Washington, D.C. I find my market to be extremely competitive — several award-winning remodeling firms are located in my area — so to maintain my share of the work, I have learned to network my referrals in a serious, sincere way that resulted in 100% referral work in 1997. It's something of a gimmick, but I've come to think of the word "referral" itself as an acronym for eight critical elements that must