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Creating a Client Follow-Up System That’s Genuine and Works

Bylori

As much as we might want sales to happen immediately, customers often don’t respond to sales and marketing efforts on the spot. For multiple reasons, they might not be ready or able to commit to a purchase.

Your responsibility as a marketer should be to remind them of your interaction by reiterating your marketing message within a reasonable time frame. An effective client follow-up system will help you track your time-delayed marketing and will tell you when you should contact potential customers again.

An effective client follow-up system is a tool that you can use to provide gentle and timely reminders that show past and current customers you’re interested in their needs and considerate enough to keep in touch.

Consider the following elements as you design and implement your client follow-up system:

  • Choose technology that works for you: Customer relationship management (CRM) systems can be as complex as you want, ranging from simple tracking databases to sophisticated, specialized standalone systems. The software should provide features such as thorough scheduling, automatic reminders and space for recording detailed notes. Determine what you need and want from a client follow-up system and implement the technology that will provide it.
  • Assign clients to categories: It’s easier to track and identify clients if you put them in a category. Your CRM system should allow you to attach an identifier that corresponds to their category, such as a code indicating products they asked about, their location within the sales cycle or their business type.
  • Use templates: Create a selection of message templates that you can customize for follow-up contacts. Templates provide a quick and convenient way to send out contact emails, notices of missed calls or appointments and updates about your product and service offerings.
  • Update regularly: Your client follow-up system will only be as good as the data it contains, so make sure to update the information in it frequently. Establish a schedule for updating, cleaning and purging the database and stick to it as rigidly as possible.

How can you improve your client follow-up techniques to ensure both top-level customer service and increases in sales?

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