Most of us in sales are familiar with following up on opportunities or proposals. I don’t know if there is a secret method that always works regarding order capture, but I do believe I won’t have any luck obtaining work for my company if I don’t have the guts or the energy to follow up.
You and I may vary on our approach. It depends on the circumstances. If you chase work in the Public Sector, there are set rules about letting work. It may be that a public entity first selects a team based on their qualifications and work history. Only after team selection is the proposal written. There is also the private sector that has it’s own rules around awarding work. Here, you may have to be invited before offering a proposal that hopefully meets and or even exceeds the client’s expectations. Sometimes awarded work is selected by being the low bidder. Sometimes it’s a “best value” formula determined by the buyer. Every once in a while, it’s schedule driven.
Are you lucky enough to have some kind of “inside track” about a project or have a very strong sales relationship with the client? If you are, then your chances of winning the work may be higher because you know what the client wants or needs. Maybe you’ve already broken the code as to how the client really buys or maybe you helped them with budgeting prior to a request for proposal (RFP) being advertised. No matter what the criteria is for awarding work, you have to follow up.
If you’re new to the client, then the old fashioned way of follow up and asking for time to review your proposal together or at least get their feedback on your offering is most essential. Regardless if you win the work or not, you need to know where you stand. This is information for the next opportunity at the very least. And I mean more than finding out if you won or lost the work. Ask specific questions about how they selected the winner and what you can do better next time if you weren’t selected. I would also want to know who my competition is on the proposal if I didn’t already know.
There are those proposals that I follow up immediately and those that I follow up at a designated time. If I don’t get the client to communicate with me about my offering in my first attempts, then I have to try back but I usually let them know when that will be so as not to be so persistent that I take the client’s voice mail or email hostage.
I must say though, that early on in my sales career I followed up too intensely. There were people that gave me feedback to not be so “intense” (I thought I was being enthusiastic), to not call so often (I thought I was just being assertive). I had to learn sensitivity with each client. However, there are those clients that if you don’t chase them down, you will never get an answer and they know it and expect you to put in the extra effort. Know Thy Customer!
Communication is key so let people know how you will be communicating with them. After all, it’s only fair to get feedback since you spent time putting together a thoughtful proposal with their needs in mind. But don’t scare them off by being a pest. They may not give you another opportunity for fear you will do the same thing next time. Ask how they want you to follow up PRIOR to giving the proposal. This is being thoughtful of their time.
Lastly, and I feel this is most important, please be gracious when you win and lose work. If you win, be grateful, thank the Client and then knock their socks off with amazing service. If you lose, thank them for the opportunity and congratulate them on their choice. If you really care about them, then be a good sport.
I would like to hear how other people perform follow up so to round out this conversation because every salesperson (or sales process) is different.
Sandra Palone and Associates 
Before follow up, I make sure I am available in the public view in a unique way. In a sense I make sure I am waving my invisible flag without being aggressive going after them. There is a very fine line about approaching customers, clients. For instance, I get turned off when the person is passing out flyers right front of me while I am walking the street. And that is very, very, very annoying and I am sure a lot people feel the same way as I watch them and these people passing out the flyers do not feel the same way or not on the same wave length with the audience/passer by. Like a car salesman that froth at their mouth and chasing you all over the car lot and calling you constantly for weeks thereafter not buying their car, now that’s a big turn off. Bad stereotype, very bad.
Word of mouth is the best weapon for sales as long as your products is attractive and stands for what it serve promptly. Just because someone turns you down does not mean they are not interested alone, it could mean they have other issues to deal with like finances, need the time in feeling out your products, raising cash flow, permission from their clients before yours or simply could not meet your expectation to buy your products.
For me, recently I have been changing and adding new format. It is more difficult for me to reduce my original long term clients without hurting them, their buying frenzy. I have been doing it so long on my own and they can see me clearly high on the pedestal that I am the one that produced my products, like a franchise. I have served so long and so well for the customers and myself and am very please with it. I try not to drown into chaotic situation or get too busy for life by managing just enough to get by. I don’t want to get too big or too small, just right for several companies to handle it for me besides myself.
Back to word of mouth, it takes longer and requires patience, and the other option is to mail out or pass out unique postcard to people you know well, give them several at a time so they can pass it out to the next people they know and so forth like ripple on the water, go with the flow. Business card is ok, but 5×7 or 4×6 inches postcard shows a world stage of who you are and cost just about the same and it is a great budget to work with. Or a small size google internet advertisement directing at your clients one at a time. A Hint for follow up, get “Thank you very much” small post card for everyone you meet for proposal, sales or no sales, give it to them or mail it afterward.
You are what you do and that is how people/clients will see you. First positive impression should be the exact same as the last impression regardless if you don’t make a sale but it will be a memory burn for them to pass it on to others as word of mouth, then they or others will follow up. You show, they follow. Give them what they want. The only common secret is “Let them know with gentle thoughts of them”, “Ask interesting questions on what they think of it without getting personal about anything” and “be available”. Hope this helps you from my experiences.
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Fantastic input, Christopher. Your experience in this is highly regarded. I especially like the postcard idea. Thank you.
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No problem, I love giving what it works for me and perhaps others can carry it on if it applies to them.
Thank you note and postcard are very important as being easy going, thoughtful and reminder. It is opposite of saying sorry because sorry does not work well or at all in the business.
Plus if you offer any multiple sales as delivering products at different time within let’s say several weeks apart. Offer and tell them to order it in bulk to get deep discount(s) in delivery rate or shipping if combined together and helps save money on gas. Tell them to take their time and no rush, this put them at ease and being thoughtful for them. That is one of my highest selling point and it’s very hot on the market (that’s one of my secret). Post office and delivery companies hates this because they lose the profit on the postages or delivery charge and they have no control over it, only you do.
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Too many companies and stores failed this very thing to control and serve as in “delivery” or “shipping cost”. Many of them even failed me because I feel hesitate to go back no matter how good it is. I found that customers really hates and despised overinflated delivery charge. It is really the biggest pet peeve especially when it becomes the repeated charge for each item(s) in which it could all be combined into one shipment at a low cost and customers/clients can see it and knows this. It is a very sensitive area and it helps the closing of the deal, to finalized it with a peace of mind for both parties.
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