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A follow-up is a subsequent action or communication that occurs after an initial interaction or event. It is typically used to maintain contact, provide additional information, ensure completion of a task, or address any outstanding issues.
Follow-ups help ensure that communication is ongoing and that nothing important is overlooked or forgotten. They demonstrate professionalism and attentiveness, and can help build stronger relationships.
And your networking is based on a successful relationships.
By making follow-ups a regular part of your networking strategy, you can turn casual encounters into valuable professional relationships.
Want to improve your sales? Here are 10 ways to capture even more leads at any event! ✅
Source: outboundengine.com
Follow-up is crucial for networking because it helps solidify connections, demonstrates professionalism, and can lead to new opportunities. Here are several reasons why follow-ups are important in networking:
1) You Can Strength Your Relationships: Following up shows that you value the interaction and are interested in maintaining the relationship. It helps move from an initial meeting to a meaningful connection.
2) You’re Showing Professionalism: Consistent follow-ups are proof that you are organised, and serious about building your network.
3) You’re Building Trust: By following through on promises or providing additional information, you demonstrate reliability and integrity - which is rare today, and everybody will show more respect and trust in you if you follow your promises.
4) You Can Keep the Connection Alive: People meet many individuals at networking events. Following up helps ensure you stay on their radar and keeps the relationship from fading, which easily can happen because once you get back from the event you’ll have usual obligations, challenges, and tasks, and you can quickly forgot whom you met, and how you can help each other.
5) You Can Improve Career & Business Opportunities: Many job offers, partnerships, and business opportunities arise from networking. A follow-up can be a way to explore these opportunities further.
We live in a digital age, and there are endless number of tools that can serve you as a follow-up reminder. But, let’s see how we can use the apps we’re using on a daily basis as a follow-up reminder generators.
Google Calendar
Most of you are using the Google Calendar to manage your time, set different events, organise team and/private meetings, and track how in general you’re using and dealing with your time. An AI note taker for Google meet captures meeting discussions automatically, making it easier to set accurate follow-up tasks without relying on memory
Source: zapier.com
Regarding the follow-ups, Google Calendar can be useful because right after the meeting or a phone call, you can easily set a task inside it, and just name it in this way: Follow-Up → [email of the person you’ll need to follow-up]. You’ll get pop-up notification from Google when it’s time for the task to be completed: you can set up desktop notifications, as well as pop-up notifications on your mobile device, just to make sure that you’ll get that task done ✅
Viber Notes
This can seem odd, since Viber is chatting app, but it also has Viber Notes, which is like a space only for yourself, and here you can write any kind of messages you need, like reminders, tasks, even some ideas - especially if you got the idea while having a lunch or during the conversation with your friend.
Source: viber.com
If you’re using Viber often, this is a good way of setting follow-up reminder as a task, because in that way you’re making sure that you’ll check the Viber at some point during the day, and your Notes will contain reminder for that potential crucial follow-up. Maybe not that often, but interesting tactic to use.
Slack Canvas/Chat
This is something similar to Viber Notes, but we must admit that Slack is one of the most used software for cross-communication between teams, companies, or working groups in the world. Almost every big corporation in the world, especially in the Marketing, HR or IT sector is using Slack.
If you would like to make a list of the follow-ups you need to do, you can write that inside that chat with yourself (of course, nobody can’t access it), or by setting follow-up tasks and reminders inside Slack Canvas (especially if that follow-up is for somebody from your sales team, or so) - which is a great tool if follow-up reminder is just one of the task on your To-Do List in your team.
Source: slack.com
Notion Tasks
Notion is one of the most popular tools for project management, web creation, and blogging. Yet, AI project management tools are now taking productivity further by automating tasks and improving team collaboration.
It can be a great tool for your sales team and entire sales strategy you’re having. You can easily set follow-up tasks for each team member, set additional info inside one follow-up reminder, like important notes and tag the person whose obligation is to do the follow-up.
Source: notion.so
Yes - and here’s how. 👇
Most of digital business card providers come with web/mobile app that allows you to easily update your digital business card (profile), so you won’t need to reprint the business cards all the time.
Some of the providers, like Tapni, have web/mobile app that comes with additional features that are more than needed for a great networking + lead generation. It even includes useful tools like an SPF generator, which helps ensure your follow-up emails don't end up in spam.
Follow-Up Reminder is one of them. This feature allows you to set follow-up reminder for any connection/contact you created inside your Tapni profile. Here’s the quick instruction on how to do it:
→ Login to your Tapni profile via Tapni Mobile App or Tapni Web App (t.link)
→ Go to Contacts
→ Find the right contact - the one you should email in an hour, send a pitch deck in 2 days or to call in a week - and click on three dots next to their name:
→ Set when the follow-up should happen: in 2 days, 5 days or in 3 weeks, or set the custom date.
→ Add a note regarding the follow-up reminder, for example: Send the sales presentation to John ✅
Once it’s time for reminder, you’ll see it like this in a form of pop-up notification 👇
Pretty easy, right? It saves your time, and you’re making sure that you’ll do the right stuff at the right time.
It’s important to show that you’re persistent - to everyone: your peers, your customers, your business partners, your investors, and everybody that’s part of your community. It’s essential to answer as soo as you can, while making sure that you’re not interrupting your work whenever any message or email comes to your mailbox.
Source: livespace.io
The follow-up practically can’t have negative effects, and here are 4 reasons for that:
Bonus Tips For Doing The Follow-Up Consistently
Building a strong network of connections is essential for success nowadays, and the follow-up is crucial in converting those connections into opportunities. Because of that, it’s great if you can:
Follow-up within 24 hours after you’ve met/talked with someone - that will significantly increase the chances of turning lead into customer, connection into opportunity and talent into new team member.
Email, call, and message via social media platforms (LinkedIn) - that will increase number of responses. Maybe someone is not using the email you saved, but you can quickly check that by sending them a message via LinkedIn. Bonus-bonus tactic: if they’re Tapni user, you can easily check their profile, since Tapni allows you to instantly update your info as a digital business card user - maybe they have updated their email in their Tapni Account.
Personalise your follow-up messages - show others that you do remember some details from mutual conversation or email messages, and make sure that you know how to use those details for your offers, questions or ideas.
Introduce new connections to others in your network - make sure that others can access the same resources and opportunities as you. That will show that you’re not selfish, and that you’re open to help others achieving their goals. And you know what - that will make them want you to achieve your goals + they’ll try to connect you with their own network.
Message on WhatsApp if your contact shared a mobile number - in most of Europe, LATAM, India and the Middle East that’s where business conversations actually happen. Follow-ups sent there get opened at 95-98% against roughly 20-25% for email, and most replies land in minutes rather than days. Before deciding which channel gets your first follow-up and which gets the backup, it’s worth seeing WhatsApp vs email response rates.
Follow-Up is so important today because it shows your consistent efforts to improve the sales numbers, deal with different customers, and learn more by putting yourself in the different situations. Also, by doing the follow-up in smart and effective way, you’re showing to your manager that you’re not giving up easily. On top of that, you’re giving a proof to your customers that you really believe in your offer, in the quality of the product and/or service you’re selling, and that you sincerely believe that you can help them solving their challenges with your product/service.
Also, by following-up on a daily or weekly basis you’re making sure to keep all those connections alive, and that you’re keep working hard on your business and skills. You choose to try one more time, to ask better questions, to create better offers, and to communicate better with your potential customers - and that will surely pay off.
Keep going - do that follow-up one more time (then do it again).
If you want to dive deeper into how networking can improve your everyday job, and how much it is important to nurture your existing business connections, make sure to read some of the articles bellow:
Want to personalise digital business cards for your team, and allow them to network and follow-up more effectively? Try Tapni For Business - starting with 30-days free - today! 🚀
