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‘Your customer doesn’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.’

Great follow up and follow through shows your clients that you’re keen, organised and want to work with them.

Have you noticed that no one seems to get back to you these days even if they say they will? Whether it’s emailing you something, confirming a meeting, returning a phone call, and sometimes even sending a quote!
Everyone is sooooo busy. More and more people use ‘I’m so busy’ as a badge to let everyone know how important they are and excuse poor follow up. It feels like an excuse though – ‘sorry you aren’t that important to me and everything else came first on my list of things to do’!

Sincere communication, great follow up and then amazing follow through will do wonders to the bottom line of your business because so many others are so bad at it. It is the best way to stand out from your competitors and win more business.

If you aren’t so good at follow up, it is something that is very, very easy to fix. You just have to get disciplined, organised and have a good contact management system.

Everyone likes to feel important and having great customer service will have your clients singing your praises.
So what do you need to do to offer great follow up with your clients?

1. Quotes

People want their quotes asap. Get good at getting them out quickly and efficiently if you offer a service rather than a product. Make sure they look professional, sound professional and explain everything thoroughly. If you are unsure about when to follow up after your quote goes out, I generally think a couple of days is fine. Then if they still don’t have a decision you can always ask when can you follow up again with them so you’re not bugging them.

2. Newsletters

Newsletters are still important and will keep you top of mind with your clients whether you sell a product or a service. You can include links to new blog posts, links to your products on your website, and even tips or updates in your business. They can go out once a month or even every couple of months so you don’t bombard your clients. To grow your database, make sure you have some valuable give-away on your website so visitors to your site will want to join your list. These days just asking them to leave their details so they can receive your newsletter won’t be enough.

3. SMS

Everyone has unlimited SMS on their phones these days. You should send an SMS message to your clients to let them know you are running late, on the way or in the process of getting their quote to them etc. Whatever the update may be SMS has a 98% open rate compared to 22.87% open rate on emails. Everyone checks their messages on their mobiles these days. Use SMS for quick messages and your clients will appreciate it.

4. CRM – customer relationship management

No one can remember to do everything without some kind of contact management software. These days there are great app and mobile systems available, which you can update and check on the run. The first thing you should do each day is to check your to-do list and work your way through it according to the importance of each task. Re-allocate the task to the next day if you run out of time and it’s not high on your list of priorities. But remember, if you told your client you would get back to them on a particular day or at a particular time and you can’t, LET THEM KNOW. It’s not rocket science. Things happen in our busy working lives, but stay in touch. Follow up! Communicate! Don’t just ignore.

5. Social Media

Answer any questions, complaints or compliments on social media asap. Social media is all about interaction and if you get any comments, questions, complaints or compliments on social media, make sure they are answered or dealt with professionally and promptly. Don’t just ignore them. Follow up.
Great follow up is not about the method you use to follow up, but more about just doing what you said you would do or updating your clients if you can’t deliver what was promised. It’s easy.
Mary Kay Ash said: “Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, ‘Make me feel important.’ Not only will you succeed in sales, you will succeed in life.”

Anecdote

A couple of years ago we had a client who went to a very big digital marketing company in Sydney (no names divulged!!!) to get help to launch a product into the US market. They got an initial quote for approx. $20,000 at the time. Our client was going to accept that quote when the guy got back her. Do you know they never received a follow up call? Never to this day! How would that one small call have changed that company’s bottom line? That $20,000 was only the first part of the campaign!

So, get disciplined with your follow up and your follow through and your clients will certainly notice and appreciate it. And that’s how your bottom line will start to improve and your profits will increase.

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Judith Shuttleworth

Judith Shuttleworth is the owner of HotsWots Digital and a Director of Open House ID, an app for real estate agents. We have a range of expertise in all aspects of digital marketing and provide personal customer service. Your success is our motivation.

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