How To Close More Deals with Effective Sales Follow-Ups

When it comes to effective sales follow-ups, it’s important for your sales team to find the right balance. You can’t completely rest on your laurels, but at the same time you don’t want to be overly persistent and pushy.

Finding a middle ground, of what the “Goldilocks principle” would class as neither too hot nor too cold, isn’t always a walk in the park …or woods in her case! It can take years of practice to perfect.

Working in B2B sales you’ll know that your team simply doesn’t have that length of time to refine the process. Effective sales follow-ups need to be accomplished right now.

Marketing Automation can help to keep your sales funnel turning, maximising the effectiveness of your sales follow-up process with minimal effort from your sales team. We’ve put together a few insider tips from our decade of experience working alongside hundreds of businesses across numerous different industries.

ESTABLISH A PROCESS

Follow-up processes are often created on a whim, pieced together reactively or individually by each salesperson with no clear consistency.
Try switching this up by establishing a follow up process across your business before any lead generation activity. That way you’ll avoid any confusion from your sales and marketing departments as to who is responsible for initiating contact with prospective clients.

According to Gartner Research,

Marketing Automation works by establishing your ideal ‘workflows’, which can be tailored individually to each activity, call to action or pain point. The service works seamlessly in the background from opportunity creation to close of sale.

You can schedule communication or sales emails to go out automatically based on each lead’s engagement. As well as delegate tasks based on opportunity profile and fill in any gaps in your messaging, which can often get lost within the sales funnel.

TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE

According to HubSpot, 35 to 50 per cent of sales go to the vendor that responds first.

Far too often sales opportunities are missed due to tardy response rates from sales teams. Time is of the essence when it comes to follow-ups, being too busy isn’t an excuse for a slow response.

A study by Harvard Business Review found that those who reached leads within an hour were nearly seven times more likely to have meaningful conversations with decision-makers than those who waited an hour to respond.

Opportunities have a shelf life and leaving prospects waiting around for answers won’t cut it when it comes to beating your competition.
Programming follow up emails through marketing automation software gives you the peace of mind that each engagement is being taken care of. So whether you’re stuck in traffic, tied up in a board meeting, or just haven’t had time to monitor your sales pipeline, you can rest assure that queries are being actioned.

Emails can be posted in real-time to follow-up any immediate inquiries. You can also schedule email drops for certain times, days, or months when your prospects are more likely to pay attention.

In a recent HubSpot survey, 30.9 per cent of marketers reported the most email engagement between 9am and 12pm and 26.7 per cent said between 12pm and 3pm. Remember to do your research – consumer behaviour and performance will change and vary depending on what industry you’re targeting.

CONTENT THAT MAKES A KICK

It’s imperative to carefully consider what content you’re sending out throughout the follow-up process to encourage prospects to get on board.

Slapdash emails with two lines asking them to get back in touch really won’t cut it anymore.

DemandGen found that,

Although it’s crucial to be a quick responder to maximise sales opportunities, don’t underestimate the importance of the quality of your responses.

Marketing Sherpa found that something as simple as personalising emails with a recipient’s first name in the subject line boosted open rates by up to 30 per cent!

Plan your content before you think about contacting potential prospects. Build a central database of useful information and material that you can dip into when you need to. Most automation software will allow you to build up your own media centre to draw on should you see fit.

Companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50 per cent more sales-ready leads, and do so at a 33 per cent lower cost.

So, remember, just because you’ve got your foot in the door, doesn’t mean a prospect has bought into your offering. Be persistent, without being pushy – create content that captivates your reader. Take the pressure off your sales team by using marketing automation and lead nurturing methods as tools to provide you with high returns.