Follow Up Until They Buy or Die

Many people laugh when I say this, some people cringe. I think most people are afraid to continue to follow up for fear of being rejected. But the truth is statistics show that the majority of sales happen somewhere between the 5th and 12th contact.

Some information from the National Sales Executive Association, ona study of online sales:

Percentage of sales generated from each contact:

• 2% on the first
• 3% on the second
• 5% on the third
• 10% on the fourth
• 80% on the fifth to the twelfth

We have all probably seen or heard stuff like this before and usually think in terms of follow up from our sales people. The truth of the matter is most salespeople do give up after the first few attempts. I read an interesting stat that said 90% of salespeople never continue beyond the fourth contact. Not sure if this is true but if this is happening in your business imagine how much more revenue you could generate by having a sequential marketing system in place.

This doesn’t have to mean follow up only by your salespeople. Here is an example of a marketing sequence of unconverted leads and the percentage of sales generated. This is from a company who does most of their business online and also generates their leads this way, but this type of sequence could be used in any business.

Step 1: Email (w/ a link to sales letter)
Step 2: Fax
Step 3: Email
Step 4: Fax
Step 5: Email
Step 6: Fax

The first six steps took place over 58 days and resulted in 41% of orders.

Step 7: Email
Step 8: Email
Step 9: Letter in Mail

The next three steps took place over 9 days and resulted in 59% of orders.

If they had given up after the sixth step they would have lost out on the majority of the business. One additional note: The orders generated were not just because of the sequence. They also had masterly crafted sales copy for each message in the sequence.

Each type of lead you generate should have its own well thought out sequence of follow up steps designed to get your prospect to become a customer. Generating leads costs money. You need to squeeze everything you can out of them to get your return on that investment. Remember your prospect raised their hand for a reason. Your job is to convince them they are making the right decision by choosing your product or service.

Do you have sequential marketing systems in your business? If not… or if the ones you do have aren’t complete or compelling enough… how much money are you losing out on? And how long are you going to allow this to continue until you get the right sequence(s) you need in place to convert all those unconverted leads?