How to Start a Business on the Internet: The Anatomy of a Follow-up

How important is it to make a follow-up? It makes your customers know that you care about what they think. Moreover, not all customers would say no right away. Others want to bide their time, but you need to make your presence felt so they don’t forget about you.

How do you do a follow-up? Here are our suggestions:

1. Don’t wait. There’s always the question of when is the best time to do a follow-up. We’d say as soon as possible. That’s why you need auto-responders. The moment the lead provides you his/her e-mail address and name, the follow-up process begins. It’s also a good idea to follow up with those who have already tried your product. Among them could be some golden testimonials that you can feature on your website. It’s also a good idea whenever you’re conducting a webinar or tele-seminar, to ask your participants to fill out a feedback form right after the event or the next day.
   Nevertheless, think of timing too. It’s not a good idea to send follow-ups during holidays since your e-mail may end up getting buried underneath a pile of other e-mails. The best times to send follow-up e-mails are during early morning and evening, before they’ve hit the snooze button.

2. Let them know of your presence in other ways. If you don’t want to treat your customers or leads like commodities, then just don’t send your follow-ups only when you have a product launch or they purchased something from you. Use your database to remind you of their birthdays, for example. Don’t forget the electronic cards during special holidays such as Christmas.

3. Use your CRM software. CRM programs may cost you, but they can also be extremely essential, especially when it comes to making a follow-up. It informs you of those who called or sent you an e-mail for inquiries. You can also easily note whether you’ve already followed-up with a certain person or not. You’d also want to avoid calling the same person twice as you’ll run the risk of appearing like a spammer and which could possibly annoy your lead enough to opt-out of your database altogether . A CRM application can let you assign values on each one of your leads, so you’d know whom to prioritize during follow-ups (it’s advisable that you work on the most targeted list first).
4. Listen to their response. There’s no point in making follow-ups on those who already unsubscribed to your e-mail. They made it clear they don’t want to receive any further communication from you. The best thing is to determine what made them opt-out in the first place and use that information to better your communication strategy.