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sales follow-up emails

10 Proven Strategies for Effective Sales Follow-Up Emails

By Rajneesh Negi / March 17, 2023

April 12, 2023
10 Proven Strategies for Effective Sales Follow-Up Emails

When a business invests in a powerful CRM and marketing automation system, they frequently think their campaigns are the finest and can do anything. Still, most small business owners lack the skills and time needed to dedicate multiple days to campaign development.

Most of your potential clients will not make an immediate purchase from you. You cannot simply give someone a brief overview of your products or services and then assume they will figure out the rest on their own. But this is not true at all.     

Of course, the initial point of contact is important. There is no such thing as a second chance to make a good first impression. But, a lot of salespeople and marketers make the error of creating the ideal sales email, hosting an excellent meeting, then doing nothing.

The challenge emerges when you need to follow up with them and persuade them to commit, whether it be on your first attempt or your fourth. And there are so many potential problems. Either you make too many contacts, oversell your goods, or you come across as intrusive and bothersome.     

How can you differentiate your business from others? How to get rid of the clutter in your inbox? Also, how do you walk the path between being persistent and outright annoying?

In this post, we will provide some of our most effective sales follow-up email tips, including when to send them and how to do so without annoying your prospects.     

What is a follow-up in sales?   

After your initial pitch, you should conduct a sales follow-up to encourage the potential client to act. There are several ways to execute sales follow-ups, but the two most popular ones are by phone and email.

Sales follow-up is a skill that many salespeople must possess. But 40% of salespeople follow up with leads just once before abandoning up. And around 90% of salespeople give up after four follow-ups.

The ability to master sales follow-up is a crucial one for salespeople, yet multiple do not follow up adequately.     

Effective Sales Follow-Up Email Strategies You Must Know!

Salespeople always are optimistic when you craft a marketing email, but sometimes your message gets no response. Despite this, you still have a valuable marketing opportunity ahead of you. If you need help writing a follow-up email, start with the basics and provide a reason for your customer to respond.

They have a lot going on, so you just need to be constant to catch their attention. We will now discover what are the best follow-up techniques and strategies and how to master them.     

sales follow-up emails
[embedimage]

1) Make use of various follow-up techniques     

Different people have different communication preferences, so what catches one person's attention may not catch another's. Do not limit yourself to merely using the phone and email.

The likelihood is that you will find someone on every social media site you can think of, but if you are connected to a business site, do not hesitate to follow up on it.

So, experiment with different follow-up techniques if you are unsure about someone’s preferences. You should appreciate someone's choice of communication channel if they are clear about it.

And if you call a prospect repeatedly after they have indicated they want to conduct all business through email, you will not win their favor.     

2) Always take your time     

Salespeople experience a lot of stress during this phase of the sales process. This is because they are worried that too much follow-up can annoy potential clients, make them seem spammy, or even cause them to lose the deal.

You can best space out your follow-ups if you are aware of your prospect's timing. You should always respect the timings of your customers.

You should not typically expect prospects to decide today or even tomorrow because buying decisions might often take some time.     

Also, read: Sales Performance Management with Cutting-Edge Technology

3) You should personalize wherever possible     

In B2B email marketing, personalization is an important factor since it consistently produces results. The simplest methods are frequently the most successful.

In the title, greeting, and body of the email, use the recipient's name. Mention their previous interactions with your brand. You might mention something they have just seen. Explain how your good or service can help them or their business now.

The reason you are contacting them should be clear to the receiver as soon as they click on your follow-up email.     

4) Keep it brief   

You only have a small window of time to catch your prospect's interest and convince them to act, thus you should be direct because they are busy people.

They do not have time for lengthy meetings, confusing phone calls, or complicated emails. Instead, jump right to the point and keep your follow-ups brief and to the point.

There should not be more than six lines in a follow-up email. A follow-up phone conversation should not last longer than 10 minutes as well.     

5) Concentrate solely on the one recipient     

After receiving no answer, you should not copy anyone who is not already involved if you wish to send a follow-up email. Concentrate your efforts on the initial receiver.

It can be tempting to attempt to CC someone on the recipient's team if you have not heard back after the second or third email in the hopes that you will. This is especially true when making cold calls to businesses where you might already have contacts.

Also, CCing others who are not involved in the chat yet can come across as unprofessional because they might feel like you are wasting their time.     

Also, read: Sales Prospecting the Right Way – 10 Salesforce Tips

6) Each conversation should be concluded with a specific next step     

The end of each talk is the ideal chance to commit to a subsequent discussion. An error is to not specify the prospect's next stages in the process.

If the prospect says they need some time to discuss your offer with their team and you agree to contact them again in a week or two, then do so.

Moreover, schedule a follow-up call as soon as possible to move the process along if your product demo went well and they showed interest.

Do not allow them to get away with the tired "send it over, I'll get back to you" line either. This will most likely end up with no results.    

7) The subject line is important        

Producing a fascinating subject line because getting them to read your email is the first challenge that you will face. If you are sending a follow-up email, the subject line will have a significant impact on how it turns out.

Do not bury it in the email body if you have anything valuable to say to your receiver. Tell them about it in the subject line. So, you need to capture their curiosity just enough for them to open your email in the first place.

They are extremely easy to disregard or throw away. Instead, you need to produce something enticing that will get them curious about what you have to offer.

The most crucial step is to personalize your subject line with the recipient's name.    

Other notable examples of follow-up subject lines are as follows:     

  • Write in a clear, direct, and informal manner.  
  • Create a sense of urgency.  
  • Ask a direct question.  
  • Make it clear in the communication that it contains useful information.     

8)Work with the business, not the customer.     

It is challenging to quickly establish a personal working relationship with every team member. Put your attention on the business rather than the prospect.

Reaching out to one individual might be sufficient if you are selling your goods to small businesses. Nevertheless, if you are selling to larger businesses, many people will be contributing to the decision to buy, so you need to cultivate relationships with each of them.

Also, while pitching to larger corporations, you must concentrate on separating your product or service from the hundreds of businesses that are providing a comparable good or service and emphasize the after-sale service you offer.     

Also, read: Examples of Sales Reports: From Daily to Advanced

9) Add value to each follow-up email     

Many follow-up emails or calls fail because they come across as a sales pitch. It is up to you to adapt the conversation to their requirements by offering pertinent information if you want your prospects to participate in it.

Ensure that you create value for the prospect with each follow-up by maintaining their interest. This will lead to improved outcomes.  

The following strategies can help your follow-ups be more valuable: 

  • Ask the prospective client how they are and how business is going to begin.  
  • Keep track of the difficulties and problems the prospect is trying to address in your notes, and keep the dialogue focused on these matters.  
  • Provide a link to a relevant article, blog post, or video in your follow-up email. The potential and the problems they have exposed to you must be directly addressed in the text.     
  • Tell them about a limited time offer or discount.   

Simply make sure that you are offering someone something useful every time you speak to them. Keep in mind that bringing out fresh, useful material can boost conversion rates by three times.     

10) Understand when to stop     

You cannot continually follow up. It eventually turns hostile, intrusive, or plain pointless. After three to four attempts, you still have not heard back from the prospect. During this time, you should send a "break-up" email.     

It is advised utilizing this as your baseline as five follow-ups are typically needed for 80% of successful sales. Send no more than six or seven in total, without a doubt. Absence of a reaction eventually equates to rejection. Send one last email to the prospect before you terminate all communication.     

How much is enough? Because it depends on the specifics, it is difficult to say. Some marketers advise persistently following up until you get a firm response. In the event that the prospect responds with a resounding "no" or otherwise makes it apparent that they are uninterested, you should terminate all further contact right away.     

Also, read: Strategies To Improve Salesforce Lead Conversion Rates

Final Thoughts  

Even the smartest sales reps can benefit from having the right tools and automation to speed up their follow-ups. Do not forget, being persistent is important in sales, but being annoying is not. If you stay polite, schedule your touches, commit to investing in the relationship, and try different mediums of contact, you will be able to get a response without being irritated. Among the start-up hustle, the follow-up is the most underrated part.     

Using email follow-ups to improve performance is not difficult; all you need to do is have trust in your abilities and experiment with a few different strategies to find the ones that work best for you. Get ahead of the competition by implementing these above-defined best practices to follow up with prospects and close more sales. Once you have an effective email follow-up strategy in place, it may help you stand out from the competition, attract more customers, improve your KPIs, and improve overall sales. All the best! 

[sc name="Salesforce Automation"] [add_newsletter] [add_related_page_diff_contents blog_cat = "salesforce"]

When a business invests in a powerful CRM and marketing automation system, they frequently think their campaigns are the finest and can do anything. Still, most small business owners lack the skills and time needed to dedicate multiple days to campaign development.

Most of your potential clients will not make an immediate purchase from you. You cannot simply give someone a brief overview of your products or services and then assume they will figure out the rest on their own. But this is not true at all.     

Of course, the initial point of contact is important. There is no such thing as a second chance to make a good first impression. But, a lot of salespeople and marketers make the error of creating the ideal sales email, hosting an excellent meeting, then doing nothing.

The challenge emerges when you need to follow up with them and persuade them to commit, whether it be on your first attempt or your fourth. And there are so many potential problems. Either you make too many contacts, oversell your goods, or you come across as intrusive and bothersome.     

How can you differentiate your business from others? How to get rid of the clutter in your inbox? Also, how do you walk the path between being persistent and outright annoying?

In this post, we will provide some of our most effective sales follow-up email tips, including when to send them and how to do so without annoying your prospects.     

What is a follow-up in sales?   

After your initial pitch, you should conduct a sales follow-up to encourage the potential client to act. There are several ways to execute sales follow-ups, but the two most popular ones are by phone and email.

Sales follow-up is a skill that many salespeople must possess. But 40% of salespeople follow up with leads just once before abandoning up. And around 90% of salespeople give up after four follow-ups.

The ability to master sales follow-up is a crucial one for salespeople, yet multiple do not follow up adequately.     

Effective Sales Follow-Up Email Strategies You Must Know!

Salespeople always are optimistic when you craft a marketing email, but sometimes your message gets no response. Despite this, you still have a valuable marketing opportunity ahead of you. If you need help writing a follow-up email, start with the basics and provide a reason for your customer to respond.

They have a lot going on, so you just need to be constant to catch their attention. We will now discover what are the best follow-up techniques and strategies and how to master them.     

sales follow-up emails
Copy Infographic
×

1) Make use of various follow-up techniques     

Different people have different communication preferences, so what catches one person’s attention may not catch another’s. Do not limit yourself to merely using the phone and email.

The likelihood is that you will find someone on every social media site you can think of, but if you are connected to a business site, do not hesitate to follow up on it.

So, experiment with different follow-up techniques if you are unsure about someone’s preferences. You should appreciate someone’s choice of communication channel if they are clear about it.

And if you call a prospect repeatedly after they have indicated they want to conduct all business through email, you will not win their favor.     

2) Always take your time     

Salespeople experience a lot of stress during this phase of the sales process. This is because they are worried that too much follow-up can annoy potential clients, make them seem spammy, or even cause them to lose the deal.

You can best space out your follow-ups if you are aware of your prospect’s timing. You should always respect the timings of your customers.

You should not typically expect prospects to decide today or even tomorrow because buying decisions might often take some time.     

Also, read: Sales Performance Management with Cutting-Edge Technology

3) You should personalize wherever possible     

In B2B email marketing, personalization is an important factor since it consistently produces results. The simplest methods are frequently the most successful.

In the title, greeting, and body of the email, use the recipient’s name. Mention their previous interactions with your brand. You might mention something they have just seen. Explain how your good or service can help them or their business now.

The reason you are contacting them should be clear to the receiver as soon as they click on your follow-up email.     

4) Keep it brief   

You only have a small window of time to catch your prospect’s interest and convince them to act, thus you should be direct because they are busy people.

They do not have time for lengthy meetings, confusing phone calls, or complicated emails. Instead, jump right to the point and keep your follow-ups brief and to the point.

There should not be more than six lines in a follow-up email. A follow-up phone conversation should not last longer than 10 minutes as well.     

5) Concentrate solely on the one recipient     

After receiving no answer, you should not copy anyone who is not already involved if you wish to send a follow-up email. Concentrate your efforts on the initial receiver.

It can be tempting to attempt to CC someone on the recipient’s team if you have not heard back after the second or third email in the hopes that you will. This is especially true when making cold calls to businesses where you might already have contacts.

Also, CCing others who are not involved in the chat yet can come across as unprofessional because they might feel like you are wasting their time.     

Also, read: Sales Prospecting the Right Way – 10 Salesforce Tips

6) Each conversation should be concluded with a specific next step     

The end of each talk is the ideal chance to commit to a subsequent discussion. An error is to not specify the prospect’s next stages in the process.

If the prospect says they need some time to discuss your offer with their team and you agree to contact them again in a week or two, then do so.

Moreover, schedule a follow-up call as soon as possible to move the process along if your product demo went well and they showed interest.

Do not allow them to get away with the tired “send it over, I’ll get back to you” line either. This will most likely end up with no results.    

7) The subject line is important        

Producing a fascinating subject line because getting them to read your email is the first challenge that you will face. If you are sending a follow-up email, the subject line will have a significant impact on how it turns out.

Do not bury it in the email body if you have anything valuable to say to your receiver. Tell them about it in the subject line. So, you need to capture their curiosity just enough for them to open your email in the first place.

They are extremely easy to disregard or throw away. Instead, you need to produce something enticing that will get them curious about what you have to offer.

The most crucial step is to personalize your subject line with the recipient’s name.    

Other notable examples of follow-up subject lines are as follows:     

  • Write in a clear, direct, and informal manner.  
  • Create a sense of urgency.  
  • Ask a direct question.  
  • Make it clear in the communication that it contains useful information.     

8)Work with the business, not the customer.     

It is challenging to quickly establish a personal working relationship with every team member. Put your attention on the business rather than the prospect.

Reaching out to one individual might be sufficient if you are selling your goods to small businesses. Nevertheless, if you are selling to larger businesses, many people will be contributing to the decision to buy, so you need to cultivate relationships with each of them.

Also, while pitching to larger corporations, you must concentrate on separating your product or service from the hundreds of businesses that are providing a comparable good or service and emphasize the after-sale service you offer.     

Also, read: Examples of Sales Reports: From Daily to Advanced

9) Add value to each follow-up email     

Many follow-up emails or calls fail because they come across as a sales pitch. It is up to you to adapt the conversation to their requirements by offering pertinent information if you want your prospects to participate in it.

Ensure that you create value for the prospect with each follow-up by maintaining their interest. This will lead to improved outcomes.  

The following strategies can help your follow-ups be more valuable: 

  • Ask the prospective client how they are and how business is going to begin.  
  • Keep track of the difficulties and problems the prospect is trying to address in your notes, and keep the dialogue focused on these matters.  
  • Provide a link to a relevant article, blog post, or video in your follow-up email. The potential and the problems they have exposed to you must be directly addressed in the text.     
  • Tell them about a limited time offer or discount.   

Simply make sure that you are offering someone something useful every time you speak to them. Keep in mind that bringing out fresh, useful material can boost conversion rates by three times.     

10) Understand when to stop     

You cannot continually follow up. It eventually turns hostile, intrusive, or plain pointless. After three to four attempts, you still have not heard back from the prospect. During this time, you should send a “break-up” email.     

It is advised utilizing this as your baseline as five follow-ups are typically needed for 80% of successful sales. Send no more than six or seven in total, without a doubt. Absence of a reaction eventually equates to rejection. Send one last email to the prospect before you terminate all communication.     

How much is enough? Because it depends on the specifics, it is difficult to say. Some marketers advise persistently following up until you get a firm response. In the event that the prospect responds with a resounding “no” or otherwise makes it apparent that they are uninterested, you should terminate all further contact right away.     

Also, read: Strategies To Improve Salesforce Lead Conversion Rates

Final Thoughts  

Even the smartest sales reps can benefit from having the right tools and automation to speed up their follow-ups. Do not forget, being persistent is important in sales, but being annoying is not. If you stay polite, schedule your touches, commit to investing in the relationship, and try different mediums of contact, you will be able to get a response without being irritated. Among the start-up hustle, the follow-up is the most underrated part.     

Using email follow-ups to improve performance is not difficult; all you need to do is have trust in your abilities and experiment with a few different strategies to find the ones that work best for you. Get ahead of the competition by implementing these above-defined best practices to follow up with prospects and close more sales. Once you have an effective email follow-up strategy in place, it may help you stand out from the competition, attract more customers, improve your KPIs, and improve overall sales. All the best! 

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Gary Moultry
Gary Moultry
March 20, 2023 1:49 am

Thank you for sharing this insightful post. I found it to be engaging and informative, and I appreciated the unique perspective that you offered. Keep up the excellent work.

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