When you want sales, you’ve got to stay top of mind.
You’ve got to position yourself as the best option, and you’ve got to be there, ready to go when your prospects are. How do you do that? With consistent follow-up. There’s no way around it.
Perhaps you’ve heard of the “Law of Frequency,” a principle of association stating that the more often ideas, events (e.g., stimuli and responses), or other items co-occur, the stronger the connections between them. In other words, the more your prospects sees you, hears from you, or has some type of contact with you, the more they trust you.
This post will lay out how to spark the magic of follow-up, discuss the cadence with which you should follow up, as well as when to finally give up (if you should).
Let’s start by understanding this fact...
Fact: Only 3 percent of your prospects are ready to buy now.
No one explains it better than Chet Holmes, author of The Ultimate Sales Machine, with his Demand Generation Pyramid:
While Chet’s experience revealed that only 3% of your target market are actually ready to buy at any time, on the flip side, it means there’s a 97% chance that they’re not ready to hear your offer and will immediately shut you down.
Another fact:
92% of businesses, marketers and sales professionals
give up after the 4th touchpoint, but 80% of prospects say no
four times before they say yes. (MarketingDonut)
This is crazy! Salespeople tend to give up right when they’re prospect starts opening up to a real conversation.
This shouldn’t be surprising that it takes at least four touch-points though. Even if a prospect is the right person to be communicating with, they may not even be aware that a solution like yours exists yet.
That isn’t a negative.
By knowing that information upfront it can inform the right strategy or approach you should utilize to build relationships with the right kinds of people that will generate both short-term sales and long-term opportunities with the perfect buyers for your product or service.
The reason outbound lead generation and sales development works is that it is proactive and disruptive. Your prospects may not be actively seeking your solution today. But you can build that awareness and interest through the right outreach approach.
Considering this a failure is short-sided. Any relationship needs momentum and momentum can take time. Consistency leads to familiarity. Familiarity leads to trust. Trust leads to action. Action turns prospects into clients.
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