Follow Up Guy

How to followup?

It’s interesting about followup. For some reason many people think of it as being way more complicated than it is, and even intimidating. Really though, effective followup is just about applying common sense and being thoughtful, considerate, and respectful … and there is no ‘only one way’.

I’m often asked, “What’s the best method for following up? Is it email? Phone calls? Text messages? Cards or letters (actually, few people even think about this method anymore)?” Once again, I don’t believe there’s only one answer … just apply common sense and do it in a way that’s meaningful and appreciated by the person you’re following up with. In other words, don’t be an annoying pest and do stand out from the norm by demonstrating thoughtfulness, consideration and professionalism.

I personally like to use more than one method depending on the person and situation. For example, if I meet someone at a networking event and we exchange business cards I will typically followup the next day with a very brief email letting them know I appreciated meeting them and expressing a willingness to stay connected. That same day I will send them a physical greeting card that will then arrive in the mail a few days later. This almost always elicits a response of some kind (either email or phone call), which sets the stage for another step in the relationship building process.

One of the great things about sending a physical greeting card through the postal system is that it really stands out from the clutter. All most people get in the mail these days are bills and unsolicited marketing materials, so when a personal card arrives it’s like a breath of fresh air. Greeting cards as a followup tool are great also for anyone that finds making followup phone calls intimidating.

The downside to greeting cards is the cost, inconvenience, and time requirement but I use a method for this that bypasses all of these … more on this in a future post.

During the course of the relationship development process I tend to use several methods including emails (I’m not really into texting), phone calls, greeting cards, and frequently, in person coffee meetings. I try always to be thoughtful, considerate, and respectful, and keep my focus on the other person and how I might bring value to them in some way. My intent is to give the relationship a fair opportunity to develop because through relationships come opportunities for all concerned.

Associates followup – should I?

Associates are yet another group of people that we would benefit from staying in touch with. But who are they? To me they are all those people I’ve had some connection with through my business or community involvements.

In my business world they may be suppliers, people in a related field, those I have mentored or who have mentored me or competitors I’ve developed a relationship with, to list just a few who might fit into this category.

In my community service world they may be fellow volunteers, individuals in other organizations, and sponsors or any other interested stakeholders I’ve come to know.

These people are very easy to get lazy with from a staying connected perspective (and I’m speaking from personal experience when I say that) because we tend to rely on connecting with them through the course of our normal activities. Because we may see them on a somewhat regular basis we tend to feel there’s little need to do anything else to stay in touch.

The problem is that with some of these people we interact regularly for a while and then they drop off our radar screen for long periods, often years, and what was once a relationship fizzles out to nothing.

But what’s the big deal, why bother making an effort? In my view it’s for many of the same reasons that apply to other groups we’ve identified, reasons such as …

• Shows you have an interest in them as a person, that you care.
• Keeps the relationship alive.
• Enables you to know when things change in their organization or personal situation.
• Provides potential access to their network.
• Makes you memorable because few others do it.

The thing is it takes very little to keep these relationships alive, just a small effort once or twice a year can do it, and you never know when they might be just the person you need in some future situation.

Networking followup – do I have to?

First of all, you don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to. You can choose to stay in touch with people in your network or not, but the reality is if you don’t stay in touch they probably won’t be part of your network for long. So the question really is, do you want to develop a large network?

Why would you want to develop a large network?

Well, it’s been said that the most successful people have very large networks, and I believe that to be true. I consider a network to be an asset of tremendous value, and not only from a business  perspective. To help illustrate this point let me share with you a short story.

For nearly 3 years I’ve been quite involved (in a volunteer capacity) as a director with a wonderful non-profit organization called the Kindness Foundation of Canada. The organization’s vision is ‘a kind world’ and our mission in a nutshell is to inspire people to be more kind. Pretty simple really but the results of kind action can be very powerful and have far reaching ripple effects.

The Kindness Foundation has experienced significant success and accomplished incredible things in it’s almost 11 year history but as a board we recognized a couple of years ago that in order to ensure sustainability and remain relevant, we needed to embark on a major internal restructuring process. We’re just coming out the other end of that tunnel now and it’s hugely exciting because we’re now poised to accomplish even more amazing things over the coming months and years.

Why do I mention this here? Because it has everything to do with our topic of networks.

You see, at various times during this transition we had a need for knowledge, experience and skill-sets not possessed by any of us on our current board, yet vital in terms of us getting from where we were to where we wanted to be, and were able to successfully recruit that talent primarily by tapping into our individual networks.

Our networks have connected us with some amazing people and by utilizing simple ‘followup’ practices we were able to develop these connections into relationships and commitments that have served our organization extremely well.

Important reasons to follow up with your network:

• Develops and strengthens new relationships.
• Nurtures and strengthens existing relationships.
• Keeps relationships alive that may not appear to have much value now but might one day provide you with exactly what you need in an unexpected situation.
• Provides you with access to the networks of others.
• Enables you to connect other people for their mutual benefit … establishes you as a valued resource.
• Leads to referrals.

We’ll explore ‘how to’ methods around this subject in upcoming posts, so come back often and please feel comfortable in commenting or contributing along the way.

Referrer followup – say what???

Interesting topic, don’t you think? We all want our friends, associates and clients to refer other people to us and of course we’re grateful when they do, but then what? Oh sure, we may have some kind of rewards plan that hopefully makes it worth their while, like providing cash, gifts, gift certificates or some other incentive, but is that enough?

It may be for some but having been both the giver and receiver of referrals over the years I’ve come to see that in many cases it’s not. There’s another ingredient that when added to the ‘getting more referrals’ recipe produces even better and more consistent results, and that is to simply keep the person who did the referring informed of what’s happening.

We’ll get into the ‘how’ of this in a future post but in a nutshell it simply means expressing immediate verbal or written (preferably both) appreciation for the referral and then keeping the referrer informed of how the process is developing until it comes to some form of conclusion.

Think about it. Have you ever referred a friend or associate to someone and then heard nothing more about how it all went? How did that feel? Did you feel your referral was appreciated? Did you wonder if the person you referred was actually being well looked after? Did you feel inspired to go out of your way to refer someone else? Hmmm.

Based on my experience, here are a few important reasons to follow up with referrers by keeping them informed:

• Demonstrates you value their referral gift.
• Validates their confidence in you.
• Suggests that the person they referred is being well looked after.
• Solidifies your relationship.
• Sets you apart from the vast majority of your competition.
• Inspires them to continue referring others.

As I mentioned earlier, in a future post we’ll discuss some specific methods for keeping the referrer informed in a meaningful way … so watch for it. In the meantime, please contribute to this discussion by posting your questions, comments and suggestions.

Customer followup – does it actually pay?

Are you a product or service provider? Do you followup (at least on a periodic basis) with your clients? It’s nothing short of amazing to me that many don’t … but here are some reasons why I believe YOU would want to:

• Shows you care.
• Shows you value their business.
• Allows you to maintain and further develop your relationship.
• Allows you to address minor concerns or issues before they become major ones.
• Provides opportunities to ask for referrals.
• Provides opportunities for additional sales.
• Provides opportunities for gathering valuable information (either positive or negative) about their satisfaction with your product, service, sales process, and company.
• Provides opportunities for collecting testimonial letters.
• Sets you apart from the majority in your field … makes you memorable.

Personal experience has taught me that following up with customers on a periodic basis certainly does pay and aside from simply being the right thing to do, yes, it is also financially well worth the time and effort.

Prospect followup – why even bother?

Based on my experience there are several reasons for wanting to stay in touch with prospects, at least some of which are:

• Shows you care.
• Demonstrates you value them as a prospective customer.
• Allows you to continue building relationship, which leads to increased trust, confidence, and perhaps even obligation.
• Allows you to continue gathering information pertaining to who they are as a person, what their practical and emotional wants and needs are, and what motivates them.
• Keeps you in the loop … allows you to stay informed of changes regarding their situation, wants, needs or budget. You need to be aware of this if you’re going to stay in the game.
• Enables you to continue providing relevant ‘credibility building’ information, additional perspectives, or testimonials pertaining to your product or service.
• Provides an opportunity to introduce other options that may be appropriate.
• Occasionally  leads to ‘on the spot’ referrals during the course of the conversation.
• Sets you apart from the majority of your competitors.

About followup.

Perhaps one of the first challenges facing most of us regarding followup is who we should followup with in the first place.

During the very early years of my sales career I thought it was just prospects, they hadn’t bought from me yet so it seemed obvious that staying in touch was important. Later I came to understand that it was also important to follow up with customers after they had bought from me … what a novel concept.

But that was only the beginning. With time, experience and learning from others I gradually came to see the importance and value in staying in touch with almost everyone in my life.

We’re going to discuss this in upcoming posts, beginning with the most seemingly obvious people to followup with and then moving out to those that perhaps we hadn’t considered as being that important. So stay tuned … it’s going to be fun, informative, and beneficial in many practical ways.