Terms

Follow-up

A follow-up is a subsequent action or communication intended to build upon a previous one, often to find out more information, check on progress, or increase the effectiveness of the initial event. It serves as a crucial step in various contexts, from business to medicine, to ensure that matters are seen through to a successful conclusion and that initial efforts are reinforced.

Importance of Follow-up

A follow-up is more than just a simple check-in. It's a strategic action designed to build upon an initial interaction and increase its effectiveness. This continued engagement shows persistence and reinforces your message, preventing initial efforts from being forgotten.

In business, consistent follow-up is often the key differentiator between a missed opportunity and a closed deal. It helps clarify outstanding questions, address concerns, and maintain momentum. Ultimately, this persistence moves conversations forward and significantly boosts the chances of achieving your desired outcome.

Best Practices for Follow-up

Effective follow-up is an art that balances persistence with respect. To make your outreach successful, ensure every message is timely, relevant, and adds value to the conversation. This approach keeps the dialogue moving forward without overwhelming your prospect.

  • Timeliness: Reach out while the initial conversation is still fresh.
  • Context: Reference your previous interaction to provide a clear anchor.
  • Value: Offer new information or resources instead of just checking in.
  • Clarity: State your purpose and desired next steps clearly.

Follow-up vs. Follow-through

While often used interchangeably, follow-up and follow-through serve distinct purposes in professional communication and project execution.

  • Follow-up: This refers to a subsequent action, like an email or call, to reinforce a previous interaction. It is preferred in sales and customer service to maintain contact and gather information. While effective for increasing engagement, excessive follow-ups can be resource-intensive and may annoy recipients.
  • Follow-through: This describes the act of carrying a task or commitment to completion. It is critical in project management and operations to ensure goals are met. Follow-through demonstrates reliability and accountability, though it requires sustained effort to see initiatives to their end.

Tools for Effective Follow-up

Leveraging the right tools can transform your follow-up process from a manual chore into a streamlined, data-driven strategy. These platforms help organize contacts, automate communication, and ensure no opportunity falls through the cracks, making your outreach far more effective.

  • CRMs: Centralize customer data and track every interaction for full context.
  • Email Automation: Schedule and personalize follow-up sequences to engage leads at scale.
  • Sales Engagement: Combine multi-channel outreach with powerful analytics and task management.
  • Scheduling Tools: Eliminate back-and-forth emails by allowing prospects to book meetings instantly.
  • Task Managers: Organize follow-up activities and set reminders to stay on track.

Common Challenges in Follow-up

Effective follow-up requires overcoming several common obstacles.

  • Silence: Facing non-responsive prospects who ignore outreach efforts.
  • Timing: Striking the right balance between persistence and becoming a nuisance.
  • Value: Crafting messages that offer new insights instead of just checking in.

Frequently Asked Questions about Follow-up

How soon should I follow up after an initial meeting?

Aim to follow up within 24-48 hours. This timeframe ensures the conversation is still fresh in the recipient's mind, reinforcing your message and maintaining momentum without appearing overly eager. Timeliness demonstrates professionalism and keeps the dialogue active.

How many follow-up attempts are appropriate?

Persistence is key, but always add value. A sequence of 5-7 follow-ups across different channels is a common best practice. If a prospect asks you to stop or remains unresponsive after multiple attempts, it's best to move on.

What should I include in a follow-up message?

Always provide value. Reference your previous conversation, offer a new resource, or propose a clear next step. Avoid generic "just checking in" messages. Your goal is to be helpful and move the conversation forward, not just to remind them you exist.

Other terms

Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.
00 items

Sales Intelligence

Sales intelligence is technology that gathers and analyzes data to help salespeople find and understand prospects and existing clients.

Sales Intelligence

CPM

CPM, or Cost Per Mille, is a key advertising metric. It's the cost an advertiser pays for one thousand views or impressions of a single ad.

CPM

Unit Economics

Unit economics are the direct revenues and costs of a business calculated on a per-unit basis, revealing its fundamental profitability.

Unit Economics

Average Order Value

Average Order Value (AOV) tracks the average dollar amount spent each time a customer places an order on your website or mobile app.

Average Order Value

Business Development Representative

Learn about business development representative, including skills and qualifications for BDRs, & roles and responsibilities of a BDR.

Business Development Representative

Below the Line

Learn about below the line, including key strategies for below the line marketing, & distinguishing above and below the line tactics.

Below the Line

Pipeline Management

Pipeline management is the process of tracking and managing potential customers as they move through the different stages of your sales process.

Pipeline Management

Edge Locations

Edge locations are globally distributed data centers that cache content close to users, reducing latency and delivering web content much faster.

Edge Locations

Bottom of the Funnel

Learn about bottom of the funnel, including maximizing conversions at the funnel's end, & strategies for nurturing bottom-funnel leads.

Bottom of the Funnel

Small to Medium-Sized Business

A small to medium-sized business (SMB) is a company whose employee count and annual revenue fall below certain industry-specific thresholds.

Small to Medium-Sized Business

Email Deliverability Rate

Your email deliverability rate is the percentage of sent emails that successfully land in a recipient's inbox, rather than bouncing or going to spam.

Email Deliverability Rate

Hybrid Sales Model

A hybrid sales model blends traditional and digital sales methods to engage customers across multiple channels and buying preferences.

Hybrid Sales Model

Sales Bundle

A sales bundle groups multiple products or services into a single offering, often at a discounted price to provide greater value to customers.

Sales Bundle

Operational CRM

An Operational CRM is a system that automates and improves customer-facing business processes like sales, marketing, and customer service.

Operational CRM

Account

An account is a company or organization that you're targeting for sales. It can be a prospective, current, or even a past customer.

Account

B2B Intent Data Providers

Learn about B2B intent data providers, including evaluating intent data quality, leveraging intent data for growth, & B2B intent data: key providers comparison.

B2B Intent Data Providers

Data-Driven Lead Generation

Data-driven lead generation is the process of using data insights to identify, attract, and convert high-quality leads into customers.

Data-Driven Lead Generation

Sales Productivity

Sales productivity is the measure of a sales team's efficiency, focusing on maximizing revenue generation while minimizing the resources spent.

Sales Productivity

Cloud-based CRM

A cloud-based CRM is a customer relationship management tool hosted online, letting teams access and manage customer data from anywhere.

Cloud-based CRM

Customer Churn Rate

Customer churn rate is the percentage of subscribers or customers who cancel their service with a company during a given time frame.

Customer Churn Rate

Deal Closing

Deal closing is the final step in a sales cycle. It's when a prospect signs a contract and officially converts into a paying customer.

Deal Closing

Sales Prospecting Techniques

Sales prospecting techniques are methods used by sales teams to identify, contact, and qualify potential customers, also known as prospects.

Sales Prospecting Techniques

Brand Awareness

Learn about brand awareness, including understanding its importance, building an effective strategy, key metrics to track, & examples in the real world.

Brand Awareness

Solution Selling

Solution selling is a sales approach focused on understanding a customer's pain points to offer a comprehensive solution, not just a product.

Solution Selling

Intent-Based Leads

Intent-based leads are potential customers whose online actions—like searches or content engagement—signal a clear interest in buying a solution.

Intent-Based Leads

Lead Velocity Rate

Lead Velocity Rate (LVR) is the growth rate of your qualified leads, measured month-over-month. It's a key indicator of future revenue.

Lead Velocity Rate

Account-Based Analytics

Account-Based Analytics measures engagement and impact across target accounts, not just individual leads, to guide B2B sales and marketing efforts.

Account-Based Analytics

Overcoming Objections

Overcoming objections is the process of addressing and resolving a prospect's concerns or hesitations to move a sale forward.

Overcoming Objections

HubSpot

HubSpot is a customer relationship management (CRM) platform with tools for marketing, sales, and service, all aimed at helping businesses grow.

HubSpot

Marketing Performance

Marketing performance is the process of measuring a campaign's effectiveness against set goals using key metrics like ROI and conversion rates.

Marketing Performance

Contact Discovery

Contact discovery is the process of finding accurate contact details for potential leads, including names, emails, phone numbers, and job titles.

Contact Discovery

API

An API (Application Programming Interface) is a software intermediary that allows two applications to talk to each other and exchange information.

API

Knowledge Base

A knowledge base is a self-serve online library of information about a product, service, department, or topic.

Knowledge Base

B2B Sales

Learn about B2B sales, including key strategies for B2B success, types of B2B sales models, & B2B vs. B2C sales: understanding the differences.

B2B Sales

B2B Demand Generation

Learn about B2B demand generation, including strategies for effective B2B demand generation, & key components of a demand generation program.

B2B Demand Generation

Persona-Based Marketing

Persona-based marketing uses fictional customer profiles, or personas, to create targeted messaging for specific audience segments.

Persona-Based Marketing

Account-Based Sales Development

Account-Based Sales Development (ABSD) is a focused strategy where SDRs target key stakeholders within specific, high-value accounts.

Account-Based Sales Development

Key Accounts

Key accounts are a company's most valuable customers, vital due to their significant revenue contribution and strategic importance for growth.

Key Accounts

Sales Methodology

A sales methodology is the framework that guides how your sales team approaches the entire sales process, from prospecting to closing deals.

Sales Methodology

Event Tracking

Event tracking is the method of collecting data on specific user actions, or 'events,' on a website or app, such as clicks or downloads.

Event Tracking

Virtual Selling

Virtual selling is the process of selling to customers remotely using technology like video calls, rather than meeting them in person.

Virtual Selling

C-Level or C-Suite

The C-suite, or C-level, refers to a company's most senior executives. Their titles usually start with 'Chief,' such as CEO, CFO, or CTO.

C-Level or C-Suite

End of Day

End of Day (EOD) refers to the close of business hours. It's a common deadline for tasks and reports to be completed before the workday ends.

End of Day

Email Cadence

An email cadence is a scheduled sequence of emails sent to prospects over a specific period to nurture leads and drive engagement.

Email Cadence

Ad-hoc Reporting

Ad-hoc reporting is the creation of one-off reports to answer specific business questions as they arise, providing instant, targeted insights.

Ad-hoc Reporting

Incident Response

Incident response is an organization's systematic approach to managing and mitigating the aftermath of a security breach or cyberattack.

Incident Response

Total Audience Measurement

Total Audience Measurement (TAM) provides a holistic view of content consumption, tracking viewership across all platforms and devices.

Total Audience Measurement

Sales Prospecting

Sales prospecting is the process of identifying potential customers, or prospects, and initiating contact to convert them into paying customers.

Sales Prospecting

Precision Targeting

Precision targeting is a marketing strategy that uses data to identify and reach a highly specific audience most likely to convert.

Precision Targeting

Intent leads

Intent leads are prospects who show buying signals through their online actions, indicating they're actively looking to make a purchase.

Intent leads

Call Disposition

Call disposition is the process of labeling the outcome of a call. It helps sales teams track interactions and plan their next steps effectively.

Call Disposition

Multi-touch Attribution

Multi-touch attribution is a marketing analytics method that credits multiple touchpoints on the customer journey for a conversion.

Multi-touch Attribution

Channel Marketing

Channel marketing is a strategy where a company sells its products or services through third-party partners, like resellers or affiliates.

Channel Marketing

Salesforce Administrator

A Salesforce Administrator is a certified professional who manages and customizes the Salesforce platform to meet a company's specific business needs.

Salesforce Administrator

A/B Testing

A/B testing is a method of comparing two versions of something, like a webpage or email, to determine which one performs better with your audience.

A/B Testing

Sales Operations

Sales Operations, or Sales Ops, streamlines sales processes, manages tools, and analyzes data to help sales teams sell more effectively.

Sales Operations

Conversion Path

A conversion path is the journey a visitor takes to complete a desired goal, such as making a purchase, filling out a form, or subscribing.

Conversion Path

Representational State Transfer Application Programming Interface

A Representational State Transfer (REST) API is a web service that uses a simple, stateless architecture for systems to communicate online.

Representational State Transfer Application Programming Interface

User-generated Content

User-generated content (UGC) refers to any form of content, like images, videos, or text, created and shared by users on online platforms.

User-generated Content

Marketing Analytics

Marketing analytics involves measuring and analyzing marketing data to understand campaign performance and improve return on investment (ROI).

Marketing Analytics

Data Appending

Data appending is the process of adding new data fields to your existing database records to enrich and complete your information.

Data Appending

Version Control Systems

A version control system (VCS) tracks changes to files over time, allowing you to recall specific versions and collaborate without conflicts.

Version Control Systems

GPCTBA/C&I

GPCTBA/C&I is a sales qualification framework for understanding a prospect's goals, plans, challenges, timeline, budget, and authority.

GPCTBA/C&I

Supply Chain Management

Supply Chain Management oversees the entire production flow of a good or service, from raw materials to final delivery to the consumer.

Supply Chain Management

Closed Won

Closed Won is a CRM status for a sales deal that has been successfully concluded, resulting in a signed contract and a new customer.

Closed Won

Brand Equity

Learn about brand equity, including understanding its importance, building strong brand equity, measuring brand equity, & real-world applications.

Brand Equity

Lead Routing

Lead routing is the automated process of distributing incoming leads to the right sales reps based on predefined criteria.

Lead Routing

Customer Segmentation

Customer segmentation is dividing customers into groups based on shared traits. This allows for more targeted and effective marketing efforts.

Customer Segmentation

Custom API integration

A custom API integration is a bespoke connection between software, enabling them to communicate and share data to meet unique business requirements.

Custom API integration

Data Security

Data security protects digital information from unauthorized access, corruption, or theft throughout its entire lifecycle.

Data Security

Customer Relationship Management Systems

A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system is a tool that centralizes customer data to help manage interactions and nurture relationships.

Customer Relationship Management Systems

Data Cleansing

Data cleansing, or data scrubbing, is the process of detecting and correcting inaccurate records from a dataset to improve data quality.

Data Cleansing

Freemium Models

A freemium model offers a product's basic features for free, enticing users to upgrade to a paid version for more advanced capabilities.

Freemium Models

Inside Sales Rep

An inside sales rep sells products or services remotely from an office, using digital tools like phone and email to connect with customers.

Inside Sales Rep

Net Promoter Score

Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a metric measuring customer loyalty by asking how likely they are to recommend your company or product to others.

Net Promoter Score

Sales Plan Template

A sales plan template is a reusable document that outlines your sales strategy, goals, and tactics, providing a clear roadmap for your team.

Sales Plan Template

Value Statement

A value statement is a clear, concise declaration of the unique benefits a company provides to its customers, outlining its core purpose.

Value Statement

Sales Enablement

Sales enablement provides sales teams with the necessary tools, content, and information to help them sell more effectively and efficiently.

Sales Enablement

Sales Pipeline Management

Sales pipeline management is the process of organizing, tracking, and managing potential deals through every stage of your sales funnel.

Sales Pipeline Management

Decision Maker

A decision-maker is an individual with the authority to make significant choices for a company, especially regarding purchases or strategy.

Decision Maker

Pipeline Coverage

Pipeline coverage is a key sales metric. It's the ratio of your total open pipeline value to your sales quota for a specific period.

Pipeline Coverage

Ransomware

Ransomware is a type of malicious software that encrypts a victim's files, holding them hostage until a ransom is paid for the decryption key.

Ransomware

Corporate Identity

Corporate identity is the visual and verbal persona of a company, encompassing its logo, color palette, communication style, and core values.

Corporate Identity

Drupal

Drupal is a free, open-source content management system (CMS) for building websites and applications. It's known for its robust flexibility.

Drupal

Revenue Operations KPIs

Revenue Operations KPIs are quantifiable metrics that track the performance, efficiency, and health of a company's revenue-generating engine.

Revenue Operations KPIs

Lead Magnet

A lead magnet is a free incentive offered to potential customers in exchange for their contact details, like an email, to generate sales leads.

Lead Magnet

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

A Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) is a prospect who has shown interest based on marketing efforts but isn't yet ready for a sales conversation.

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

Programmatic Advertising

Programmatic advertising uses AI and real-time bidding to automate the buying and selling of digital ad space, targeting specific audiences.

Programmatic Advertising

Sales Development

Sales development is the process of identifying and qualifying potential customers to create a pipeline of sales-ready leads for closers.

Sales Development

Outside Sales

Outside sales reps sell products/services in person, traveling to meet clients and close deals face-to-face, outside of a traditional office.

Outside Sales

Outbound Sales

Outbound sales is when reps proactively contact potential customers through cold calls or emails to generate leads and build a sales pipeline.

Outbound Sales

Bounce Rate

Learn about bounce rate, including understanding bounce rate implications, key factors affecting bounce rate, & reducing your bounce rate effectively.

Bounce Rate

Dynamic Data

Dynamic data is information that updates in real-time. Unlike static data, it reflects the most current state of information automatically.

Dynamic Data

No Spam

“No Spam” is a commitment to sending only relevant, solicited messages. It means avoiding bulk, unwanted emails to respect the recipient's inbox.

No Spam

Open Rate

The open rate is the percentage of recipients who opened an email. It's a primary indicator of a subject line's effectiveness.

Open Rate

Market Intelligence

Market intelligence is the process of collecting and analyzing data about your target market, competitors, and industry to guide business strategy.

Market Intelligence

Subject Matter Expert

A Subject Matter Expert (SME) is an individual with profound knowledge and authority in a particular area, topic, or industry.

Subject Matter Expert

Weighted Pipeline

A weighted pipeline forecasts sales revenue by assigning a closing probability to each deal based on its stage in the sales funnel.

Weighted Pipeline

Challenger Sales

The Challenger Sales model is a methodology where reps teach prospects, tailor their pitch, and take control of the sales conversation.

Challenger Sales

Discount Strategies

Discount strategies are pricing tactics used to attract customers and boost sales by temporarily reducing the price of products or services.

Discount Strategies