Networking group, BDM or outsourcing: what introductions cost

What you're actually paying for

An introduction is a conversation with a business that might buy from you or send you work. Every way of getting one costs money, your time, or both. The four common options are a referral networking group, a business development manager (BDM) on your payroll, an agency that books meetings for you, and doing it yourself. Below are the real costs, using prices as published in October 2026. Where a price is not published, we say so rather than guess.

A referral networking group

BNI is the best-known structured referral group in Australia. Members meet every week and pass each other referrals. Its official 'Why BNI?' page sets out the rules that shape the cost: weekly meetings last 90 minutes, members arrive on time and stay for the whole meeting, only one person from each business specialty is accepted into a chapter, and attendance is critical (if you can't make it, you may send a substitute).

The cash

BNI does not publish one national price. Fees are set by region, and the national page says the details are given when you visit a chapter. One region that does publish its fees, BNI Brisbane Southside, listed these in October 2026:

• Onboarding and training fee: $847, paid once.
• Annual membership fee: $1,452.
• Venue fee: varies by chapter and is not published.

That makes the first year $2,299 plus venue fees, and $1,452 plus venue fees each year after. The page does not say whether the figures include GST, so ask. Visitors can attend up to two meetings free before deciding.

The time

Ninety minutes a week over about 50 meetings is roughly 75 hours a year, before travel, the networking time before and after, and the one-to-one catch-ups members are expected to make outside meetings. Plan on two to three hours a week, on a fixed morning. BNI Brisbane West's own page says referrals typically take three to six months of consistent attendance to arrive at a steady pace.

Best for

Businesses whose customers are also other members' customers: trades, cleaners, bookkeepers, photographers. It works less well if your category is already taken in the chapters near you, or if you can't promise the same morning every week. Local chambers of commerce and industry associations are lighter options; their fees are set locally, so check your own.

Hiring a business development manager

A BDM finds and wins new clients for you, full time. In October 2026 SEEK put the average BDM salary in Australia at between $105,000 and $125,000, based on salary ranges in employers' job ads. SEEK notes that some of those advertised figures include super and some don't.

On top of salary:

• Super. The super guarantee has been 12% of ordinary time earnings since 1 July 2025. On a $115,000 base that is $13,800 a year.
• Leave. Full-time employees get 4 weeks of paid annual leave a year, plus other leave entitlements. That is time paid but not selling.
• Workers' compensation and payroll tax. Workers' compensation insurance is required for employees, and payroll tax applies once your total wages pass your state's threshold. Both vary by state.
• Tools and travel. Phone, laptop, a car or allowance, a CRM, and usually a commission or bonus.
• Your time. Someone has to recruit, train and manage them, and the first months are slow while they learn your business and your customers.

Best for

Businesses with jobs big enough, and demand steady enough, to keep a full-time salesperson busy, and an owner with time to manage one.

A lead generation or appointment-setting agency

These businesses contact prospects for you, by phone, email or LinkedIn, and book meetings or pass on leads. Many don't publish prices and quote only after a call. Two Australian examples that do publish ranges:

The ranges are wide because the work varies: booking meetings with senior buyers at large companies is priced differently from reaching local business owners. Nousu Collective's comparison is written mainly for software and professional services companies selling to senior decision makers, so read its figures with that in mind.

Check what you're buying, too. A lead is usually a name and some interest; an appointment is a meeting in your calendar. A cheap price per lead can cost more than a dear price per meeting once you count the leads that go nowhere.

Questions worth asking any agency:

• What counts as an appointment, and do I pay if they don't turn up?
• Whose name and email address do you write from, and what happens to that address when I leave?
• Where do the contact details come from? Under the Spam Act you need consent for every address used in your name, even when someone else sends. See is cold emailing legal in Australia.
• What is the minimum term and notice period?
• Do I see and approve what goes out in my name?

Doing it yourself

There is no invoice, so this is the cost people underestimate. The work is finding the right businesses, reading their websites, writing a short email to each, following up, and answering replies. It is steady, unglamorous work, and the first thing to go when you're flat out on jobs.

Price it with your own numbers. If you spend five hours a week on it and value your time at $90 an hour (your charge-out rate, or what you'd pay someone to cover for you), that is $450 a week, or about $1,950 a month. Swap in your real hours and rate.

The cash cost is small. If you send more than a handful of emails a week, send from a separate domain so a mistake can't affect the address your customers use, and follow the Spam Act every time. Keep a simple log of who you wrote to and what happened, so after a month you can tell whether it's working. How to find business clients covers who to write to and what to say.

A workable weekly routine

Most owners who stick with it pick a fixed slot and a small number. For example, a painter might keep Tuesday morning for it:

1. Find ten businesses that could buy from you or refer you, such as property managers, builders or strata managers in your area.
2. Read each one's website and note one specific thing that connects their work to yours.
3. Write each a short, plain email that mentions that thing and asks one easy question.
4. Follow up last week's emails once, briefly.
5. Answer anyone who replied, the same day.

Ten a week is slow, but it is real. Over a quarter that is well over a hundred businesses who know your name, and the habit matters more than the number.

Side by side

How to choose

Work out what one new business client is worth to you in gross profit over a year. Then divide each option's yearly cost by that figure. The answer is how many new clients the option must bring in just to pay for itself.

A made-up example: a commercial cleaner in Ipswich who makes $6,000 gross profit a year from a typical office contract.

• A networking group at about $2,800 in the first year (allowing $500 for venue fees) needs one new contract to pay for itself.
• A BDM at $130,000 or more needs about 22.
• An agency at $3,000 a month needs six a year.

Those numbers don't tell you which option will work. They tell you how hard each has to work to be worth it. Then be honest about time: the cheapest option in cash is often the dearest in hours.

A fifth option

Curlew finds local businesses that could buy from you or refer customers to you, writes to them in your business name, answers the replies and passes on anyone interested, for $99 a month including GST with no contract. It doesn't replace the relationships a networking group builds or the selling a good BDM does, and you can combine approaches. See how it works or pricing.