The Key to ALL Prospecting

In this episode, I want to talk about a subject that I actually love. Why do I love it? Because in my opinion, and most marketing stats will agree with me, it’s where the money is made in your business.

Am I talking about bringing in more clients, getting more sales, spending less to acquire a client? Yes, all of the above in a roundabout way. What I want to talk about is follow up. I know you are thinking, ok Robert, that was quite a build up for such a basic principle. Everyone in sales or trying to grow their business knows that you should follow up with potential clients, so that seems like a no brainer.

I agree with you that it’s a basic that everyone should do. However, reality is always a little different than theory. We should eat better, we should exercise more, we should spend more time with our family, whatever. We all have “shoulds” and not a lot of musts, and I’ve found in 25 years in sales and marketing, that this is definitely a should for most salespeople and most entrepreneurs.

I know, because I am guilty of this as much as anyone. Follow up with prospects whether you sell in person, over the phone or online is not an activity most people like to do. It can be boring, time consuming, difficult to organize, easy to procrastinate on, and oh by the way, absolutely essential for survival of your business.

Follow up is where most of your sales and growth as a company will come from. Not right now, but if you are patient and committed, it will happen over time.

While it’s still great to send personalized notes through the mail, it can be just as effective to write personalized emails, and I don’t mean a colorful html email that is full of graphics and pretty formatting. I’m talking about a text based email that appears you sat down and wrote yourself. The prospect may realize it’s an automated email depending on what they know about you, but we’ve found over the years that psychologically they will still respond better to a text based email.

If all you do is email someone for follow up, you will not stand out. Only with phone calls or in person visits will you make the impact you need in order to get their business.

For example, my insurance agent, who happens to be the owner of his agency, and I really don’t deal with him but one of his agents, he calls me personally on my birthday each year and has without fail for 15 years. Because of that personal reach, I’m very loyal to him. So follow up is just as important for your existing customers and clients as new prospects.

In my mind, there are 4 components to effective follow up. Timeliness and consistency of contact, providing value when you do follow up, personalization of contact, and some kind of physical connection on the phone or in person.

If you and your team implement this in your business both for new prospects as well as your existing clients, you will reap the rewards of not only new sales, but keep the ones you already have, particularly if you have a product that is subscription based or some kind of recurring contract.

I hope you got some kind of value out of these ideas. It has made a huge difference in our business and that of our clients. In the next episode we are going to talk about some specifics on how you can implement follow up plans and automation to minimize the hassle and maximize your results.

Key Talking Points of the Episode:

Follow up is where most of your sales and growth as a company will come from. There are 4 components to effective follow up. Follow up is just as important for your existing customers and clients as new prospects.

Resources Mentioned: 

Grab the FREE eBook “Top 10 Secrets for B2B Small Business Owners” at http://www.growyourb2bcompany.com.

Website: https://www.salesdouble.com

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