What is a follow-up email and when should you send it to clients?

What is a follow-up email

A follow-up email in the business world is a message you send to someone you've previously been in contact with. In other words, it builds on a prior interaction, and its purpose is to move the recipient further along in the sales process.

There are dozens of situations where salespeople send a follow-up email. For example:

• you met a potential customer in a meeting and want to summarize the outcome and propose next steps,
• you’re sending a proposal to a potential client after a meeting,
• you met a potential business partner at a networking event and want to follow up on the conversation,
• the customer is using a demo version of your solution and you want to check how it's going or whether they need help,
• a meeting with a potential client is approaching, so you want to remind them of the date and outline key discussion points,
• a potential customer hasn't responded to your email for some time and you want to follow up,
• a client has an unpaid invoice and you need to send a reminder.
  
  

As you can see, without follow-up emails, you often can't move the deal forward in the sales funnel. Sending them is an essential part of the sales craft.

Follow-up emails also offer these advantages:

• they strengthen mutual trust between the salesperson and client (you show that you care),
• they increase conversions,
• they help filter out irrelevant leads (if you're unsure whether a lead wants to work with you, a follow-up email will confirm or disprove it).

When and how to write a follow-up email

It depends on the situation and the reason you're sending the follow-up. Sales experts generally recommend sending the first follow-up two to three days after the event you're referencing. This way, you don’t come across as too pushy, yet the topic is still fresh in the recipient’s mind.

If the recipient doesn’t respond to your follow-up, you have two options:

• try again – experts recommend following up on these days after the initial email: day 3, day 7, day 14, day 21, day 28, and day 38,
• give them a call – this helps you confirm whether they even received your message and you’ll get an immediate reaction.
  
  

Unlike other business emails, follow-ups must be:

• as brief and clear as possible – the recipient should understand what you want within seconds,
• action-oriented – clearly state what you want the recipient to do,
• highly personalized – they mustn’t blend in with the pile of ads and spam your recipient gets every day.
  
  

If you’d like tips on how to craft a follow-up email both stylistically and content-wise, we’ve written a separate article – check it out.

How CRM makes follow-up management easier

As a salesperson, you handle multiple follow-ups at once. That’s why it’s helpful to have a tool that reminds you when to send each email and to whom. A CRM system is ideal for this purpose.

For example, in Raynet CRM, you can manage follow-ups as follows:

1. You regularly log your tasks, calls, or meetings with clients in the business calendar.
   
   
2. When a follow-up results from a meeting, you right-click on the event in the calendar and select the option to schedule the next step (i.e., the follow-up).
   
   
3. The CRM pre-fills part of the information from the event the follow-up relates to, and you just describe the task (such as creating and sending a proposal) and set a deadline.
   
   
4. You don’t need to remember the follow-up – the CRM will remind you on time. Plus, it's linked in the system to the specific lead, client, or deal, so you can easily access all related information.

Creating follow-ups is just one of many tasks that a CRM simplifies for salespeople. It also offers a smart client database, an overview of all ongoing deals, and analytical tools that give you detailed insights into your business performance. You can try the CRM free for 30 days to see for yourself how it can support you in practice.