What is follow-up? If you really need a definition then you must be new to marketing or sales. And if you are, you will soon find out how important follow-up is to making sales. Follow-up is an extremely important tool that can improve sales by as much as 50% if used properly. Many salespeople expect to make a sale after the first contact with a prospect and if this doesn’t happen they turn their attention to the next prospect. But sound research has shown that only 2% of sales are made after the first contact.
One problem is that many salespeople are trying to be nice, ‘considerate’, and don’t want to appear pushy; they don’t want to be a pest to their prospect. They believe, ‘Well, if they want it, they will come back to us’. The shocking news is that they won’t come back, 98% of the time. And there are reasons why. They include:
- Very busy and lack time.
- Price concerns.
- Budget issues.
- Other more important things to consider.
- Inertia.
- Not enough cash at the moment.
- They forgot.
- They are just playing hard to get.
These, and more, are reasons why many sales deals aren’t sealed on the first meeting. The good thing is that most of these reasons will fall away after a series of successive and strategic follow-ups. Humans, most times, need to hear about something five or more times before it sticks to their minds. They also like to be sure that they are making the right buying decision before they agree to buy.
We get it, a lot of people don’t like following up their prospects, for whatever reasons. But we believe that if they knew how important follow-up is to increasing their revenue, they would have a change of heart. And so we have outlined a few reasons why follow-up is very crucial to getting sales and staying in business. And they are:
1. Your Prospects Are Busy
It is highly unlikely that your prospects are just sitting in their homes waiting for you to call/visit them and sell them your products. You must understand that your prospects are modern, possibly tax-paying, humans who are preoccupied with a lot of things – including Netflix. They could be sick, traveling out of the country, working three jobs, taking a difficult course, binge watching the Boss Baby series, etc. In the end, these things could make a prospect forget or not respond and that is why you need to follow-up to remind them.
2. Your Prospects Need To Hear From You More Often Than You Think
As humans, our brains are wired to remember things only when we have come across them more than a couple of times. You need an average of five follow-up in order to land a sale. If your lead doesn’t respond to you the first time it may not mean that they don’t want what you are selling. Sometimes they get one time mails or calls from other people trying to sell them something but never hear back from them. Follow-up shows them that you are serious and that they need to consider what you are offering. Following them up consistently will cause their brains to prioritize you as important, thus, making it easier for them to listen.
3. You Are Leaving Money On The Table
Your money is in your leads. If you have worked hard to get leads and then fail to follow them up, you are literally leaving a whole lot of money on the table. Even though they don’t act like it at first, your prospects need what you are selling. They may want to buy but do not have enough information about your service or product to know if yours is the best for them. Therefore following up your leads will give you a platform to furnish them with more information and help the decision-making process easier. One thing is clear, if you do not follow-up your leads, you competition will.
4. Keeps You Steps Ahead Of The Competition
Your competition isn’t sitting down and folding their arms; they too are out there trying to sell a similar product in a similar market as you. If you want to increase your market share, you have to improve the consistency and strategy of your follow-up. Over 40% of salespeople throw in the towel after one follow-up, this means that if you continue following up, even in the face of seeming rejection, you will land more sales than your rivals. Keep in mind that follow-ups express your willingness to build a relationship with your prospective customers and this is the foundation of all successful sales.
After going through these points, you will quickly begin to realize how very crucial follow-up is to making sales. Everything you fear about following up your leads pales in comparison to what you stand to gain if you do. So don’t allow your fear (or laziness) stop you from closing more deals. Follow up. Follow up. Follow up!
