25: Stop Failing at Follow-up

Jaz 0:01 Welcome to The Business Animal podcast. saddle up for a gallop to the top of the animal industry, where you’ll learn how to tame your wild business beast, with tips, techniques, and tools that will take overwhelm to obedience school, and have you wagging your tail with joy. And now your hosts, Kim Beer, and Cara Taylor Swift. Kimberly Beer 0:23 Hey there business animals. It’s Kim with Be More Business and Cara with Fast Horse Photography, and welcome to The Business Animal. Today. I know we’re talking about a subject that is probably near and dear to every one of our listeners hearts. And that is follow up. Yeah, right. Hmm. So I know that there’s a lot of us that fail at follow up. And you know, what I want you to first of all know, you are definitely not alone. I still and I’ll raise my hand as much as I do automation. As much as I teach all of this to people, there are times that I do not follow up the way that I should that said, I am 1000 times better than I used to be at following up. How about you Cara? Do you ever fail at follow up? Cara Taylor Swift 1:11 I mean, I can’t say that I’ve never failed at it. But I’m actually pretty good at follow up. I’m pretty anal about it. Like it’s something that I try to do quickly. And I get to it really quickly. And I don’t like to have people like floating around out there. I think one of the things that I struggle with, is I have certain types of communication that I’m more comfortable with. And I tried to steer people in that direction. So maybe I don’t always approach them from the way that they approached me originally. But I actually I like following up. It’s just it’s one of my superpowers. Kimberly Beer 1:40 That is so awesome. I I’m going to have to steal some of that good Juju from you on that. So what does it mean when you say you you kind of filter them into a communication method? Does that mean you like to talk to them on email more than on the phone? Yes. I think that’s a lot of us. Cara Taylor Swift 1:59 Well, it’s important for me Yeah, cuz Well, I mean, what happens and I think a lot of people out there running those animal based businesses are saying to themselves, oh my God, I’ve got people coming at me on the phone, I got text messages coming in. I’ve got DMS coming in Instagram and Facebook, and I’m getting emails and people are coming in through my website. And then there’s these, you know, people are giving me their business cards and asking me to get in touch with them. And so there’s all these different things that are happening. And so for me, my ultimate goal is to steer everyone into my system. So I want to get the people that are coming to me in my dms. I’m gonna fail at follow up if I’m constantly having to go and check Instagram messaging, have to check Facebook Messenger having to check my email, having to check my voicemails, my text messages, like I’m gonna fail, because that’s just too many balls in the air. Kimberly Beer 2:47 Yeah, and too many places. Yeah, it is. It’s just too much. Cara Taylor Swift 2:51 So I do try really hard when direct messages come in to steer people all to the same place so that first of all, I can then capture their emails, and then I can communicate with them. And so my favorite types of follow up communication are email and phone, Kimberly Beer 3:07 email and phone are good phone probably closes more than then email does. But email is so much easier. And it’s easy to automate email, which makes it my favorite way to communicate and to follow up, and it’s what has saved my butt on so many occasions when it comes to those follow ups. I am a big networker. I go to a lot of networking events. And I want us to know if our listeners can resonate with this because I bet you can I have a box of business cards on my desk, because usually when I come back from a networking event, my pockets, I don’t carry a purse, I’m such a bad woman, I don’t carry a purse. So my pockets are always crammed full of people’s business cards. And I dumped them in that box. And back before I got Keap and got some good automation practices pocs guide completely full. And I mean, it’s not a little index box, it’s a pretty good sized one, it got so full, I couldn’t even close the lid on it. And that was how much money I left on the table how many people I didn’t follow up with because it mostly required phone calls. And and I’m a little reformed in that area. Because then I can enter the people into Keap there’s a business card scanner on the device on your phone for it and it makes it a whole lot easier. So my business card pile is not nearly as big as it used to be. But I will fully admit I still do have some on my desk just because I’m occupied and distracted with other things kind of like I’ve been all morning this morning. Anyway, squirrel on to the next topic. So you guys know what we’re talking about today. I want to cover our big three and what we’re going to kind of try to help you understand. So the first of the Big Three is probably the most important step and it’s also the most skipped step in learning how to not fail at follow up and that is to become aware of what stopping you from follow up success and how it shows up in your business. And we’re going to spend a little time being really honest about the things that tend to stop us from executing good follow up, and also the impact on what it really means to your business, then the second of the big three is to recognize and remove the blocks. So the first one is gonna to bring up, hopefully bring up some of your blocks for you. And then number two is to remove those. And then the final one is to set up a system that can be relied on when you can’t be. So that’s definitely my My plan is to always have a system that can be relied upon when I can’t be relied upon, because I’m not the most predictable book person on the planet. So those are, those are what we’re going to talk about today. If we take a look at the first one about becoming aware of what is stopping you from your follow up success, just a couple of questions to see if they resonate with you. Do you get a knot in your stomach right before you have to make a follow up call? Do you feel anxiety before you hit Send button on a mass email? Have you gotten so frustrated with the round and round of reaching out and rescheduling that you just simply gave up on a prospect and it’s just like this is not worth it? Cara Taylor Swift 6:20 Well I, was going to add to that Kim, the other thing that is fear of feeling like you’re pestering someone, or you’re bothering people, or you’re spamming up their email, please. Yeah, I think that there’s a whole list of people out there like I think there’s a statistic that you shared with me before about the number of follow ups that typically people need. What was that? What was that four or five, Kimberly Beer 6:42 it was five, five is the number I think that’s in the presentation that I give. But it can take 7, 8, 10, 12. If you are following up about an item that takes a lot of either time, back to our big three of time, fear and money, if you’re asking people to do something that’s either scary, cost them a lot of money, or is going to take a lot of time that five follow ups is not enough, it generally takes a lot more than that. And I’ve seen in my business, in my own business, and also in my clients businesses that it can take up to three years and maybe even 20 or 30 follow ups, if you have something that that hits one of those big three nerves in your buyers for them to be able to actually pull the trigger on it. So you got to get over the thought of pestering people. But that’s a people pleaser thing, right? I have it, I don’t like to bother people. You know, I don’t, I don’t want to be bothering them. Cara Taylor Swift 7:40 It’s a fine line between making sure that you’re following up enough and appropriately and doing that in a way that is going to meet the needs. And finally get to your client. And feeling like you’re overdoing it and becoming a pest, it’s nice to hear for me that the average, you know, needs to have at least five follow ups and is it gives you at least a place to like kind of start thinking about, okay, if I only follow up with them a couple times, I don’t need to just give up, you know, at this point, I can still set a plan in place don’t give up. Kimberly Beer 8:11 It’s a really noisy environment for consumers out in the world. There’s a lot of things just like there’s a million people coming at you at your business, consumers have a million other advertisers coming at them. And the sad part of that equation is that it’s usually the one that they meet their problem the closest to and that person’s in the inbox, or has a voicemail or a text message. And that’s the provider or the product that they pick, because it was the easiest for them. And if you give up too soon, that’s never gonna be you. It’s the persistent bird who catches the worm more than the earlybird. The thing is, is that sales is hard. And we’ve talked about this on other episodes. It’s I’m not going to rehash all of it. You guys can go back and listen to the one about sales conversations. That was a really good episode about this. But a lot of people have anxiety around sales in my personal life. I got over that when I was a telemarketer. So I don’t get as big a knot in my stomach before I make a follow up call as I used to Cara Taylor Swift 9:21 That was like follow up bootcamp Kimberly Beer 9:23 follow bootcamp. But I also want you to recognize that that knot may not be a knot of anxiety, it could be a knot of excitement. And I think sometimes our bodies get confused because we live in such a state of anxiety that your body doesn’t recognize anxiety as different from excitement or excitement is different from anxiety. Cara Taylor Swift 9:44 I was planning on talking about this in another section but I think it’s really pertinent here. Like one of the things that helps me have more confidence when I’m having to follow up or I’m in the process of following up is just reminding myself of the value that I bring, you know with my follow up and I’m not sure calling them to just take up space, right and to be in front of them, I bring value. And hopefully every time I’m following up, I’m bringing some kind of value. So if I can justify that, in my mind, the reason for my call the email, the direct message, whatever, you know, outlet I’m using, then it really flips that script for any of those mental blocks that fear of annoying someone or being spammy to someone, you know, just reminding myself that they originally chatted with me or reached out to me because they have a pain point, they have a problem that needs solving. And if you can flip that script and remind yourself, and then remind them in that call, you know that you’re calling because you know that they have this pain point and you have the solution, it really makes a big difference in my confidence level, Kimberly Beer 10:39 it makes a big difference in your confidence level, and also allowing people to say no, I think this is where women a lot of times have difficulty, men seem to be easier because I think they’ve been conditioned to not take no personally, women tend to take no really personally. And also we want to be respected when we say no, there’s there’s a whole lot of culture and psychology around women in the word no. And that last one of Do you fear hearing the word No, that’ll make you rejected before you even begin the sale. You know, it’s okay for people to say no to your sales pitch. And it’s okay for you not to take that personally. And it’s okay for you to respect it. And it’s also okay for you to understand that until they do say no, it’s okay to keep asking. So all of those things are great. The problem with all of them, though, is that there’s usually something underneath them. And we’re going to talk about more of that here in a moment, I really want to pull in on this particular point on the first one of our big three to get you to realize what this does to your business and what it does to your bottom line. So if any of the things that we have already talked about the knots in the stomach, the fear of hitting that send button, the fear of seeing no pestering people giving up on communications, if any of that rings true for you, the truth is, is that’s not just a you problem, that’s a business problem that you need to take a look at. Because it has a much wider range impact than that one phone call or than that email way it shows up in your business is that you may have weighed some or all of your service calls or emails, that’s a huge problem, because then you’re not being communicative. And particularly service calls are also I’m dumping that into this follow up discussion, because this is when somebody has a problem, a lot of us have like major stuff around conflict, we don’t want to be involved in a conflict conflict makes us uncomfortable. People who have complaints make us uncomfortable, we get defensive way too quickly, we react instead of respond. So you may avoid those sales and service calls. And that’s a big deal that affects your bottom line directly. Another way I see this play out, and this is something that’s probably an unpopular opinion of mine. But I see people who have difficulty with all of this follow up process that they rely too heavily on social media for customer service. And for their sales process. It always amazes me when a client finally gets it when we’re working on their marketing strategy. That word of mouth and networking and building relationships is really what drives their sales and service and not social media. So many times we use social media as a cop out. It’s like, well, I posted this, you know, thank you customer thing on my social media. That should be good enough, right? Or I answered that frequently asked question on Facebook, that that should do it. It’s there for eternity is not the case. And then thinking also that just by posting on social media, that’s all the marketing program or all the sales program that you need. That’s not a good thing. So relying too heavily on that as a problem procrastinating the follow up process. I find myself doing this and have done it many, many times. If it’s uncomfortable, you tend to put it off and do the easy things. We just finished our interview with Betsy and eating that frog. So do the hard thing first eat the frog first. And if you’re laughing and going, What the hell are they talking about? You have to listen to the episode with Betsy Bird where we talk about eating that frog letting that frustration close the communication channel prematurely means you don’t get the sale allowing fear of rejection to lose the sale before you even begin the conversation. And I’ve watched clients do this. Oh, so and so I met this person this at a networking event. I’m so excited. They would be so great for my business and I’m super pumped and I’m like Okay, so how are you going to follow up with them? Well, would I be bothering them if I sent them an email? What if they say no what well that would that would not be good and then they they talk themselves out of the Follow up before they even have a chance to make one communication. You have any others Cara or any thoughts around how this impacts people’s businesses? Cara Taylor Swift 15:10 Well I was just thinking about there might be some people out there that are like me, and they’re super, like any, like the conflict thing that you were talking about, about how postponing the conflict, I’m one of those people that super sensitive to the conflict. And when I feel it or sense it, I physically like can’t do anything else until I deal with that, like, it’s got to be my first. It’s like the first thing I do that day. I’m like watching the clock, wondering when I can pick up the phone and call them because I can’t move past it and move on to other things until I hit that level of follow up. So I just was sitting here thinking about that I’m like, yep, but there’s some people out there that are like that too Your equine based business has unique needs. It’s your job to tell the story of your horse brand. You know what you want to say. But creating or finding powerful storytelling images that grab the attention of your ideal client can be a challenge, especially when you’re busy running your business. That’s why equine industry business leaders turned to Fast Horse Photography, and a library featuring 1000s of searchable images available for businesses just like yours. And guess what 100% of those images are horse related. Now finding the right horse images for your website, social media, and all your other needs is easier than ever find the perfect images for your equine business right now at FastHorsephotography.com. That’s FastHorsePhotography.com. Kimberly Beer 16:35 Yeah, I’m one of those as well. If I have somebody who I think is disappointed or upset with me for any reason whatsoever, I want to clear that energy before I can do anything else. Because otherwise it just it’s a wall that I run into again and again and again. And until I get it, get through it to the other side, it’s really difficult for me to even think about anything else. I think you and I are a lot alike with the level of anxiety that we get in making sure that people are happy. Cara Taylor Swift 17:05 We’re pleasing people, right? Yeah, Kimberly Beer 17:09 that’s not always a healthy things, y’all. Cara Taylor Swift 17:12 We’re not saying this is healthy, okay? Kimberly Beer 17:15 No. And I hope that everybody who listens to our podcast understands that we’re all the struggle is real work Cara Taylor Swift 17:26 for all of us. But the big thing is, is that having issues with follow up, that’s your bottom line. I mean, that is, that is literally you leaving dollars on the table. So just bringing it back to that, like, you know, think about your methods, think about your processes, and how you’re going to put some of this stuff into play. And, you know, for me, just having that light bulb go off the two things, first of all, the number, the average number of follow ups needed for some of these, you know, types of sales, but also the getting frustrated, you know, you’ve messaged a couple times, you’ve tried a different types of contact, and they just haven’t been ready. Like I do just find myself writing people off. And so that is definitely two areas that I think I probably can leave money on the table. 100% Kimberly Beer 18:16 Yeah, and it’s, it’s scary. When you look at how much you do leave on the table and occasion for me, I like to work my centers of influence. And those take forever, when it comes to follow up like finding a place that I’m going to be able to like be involved. It’s a long game, it is the long game. And sometimes it takes literally years. And if I give up, I really miss a very big paycheck at the end of it. You know, hopefully by this point, you’ve recognized a few of those things. And now you have a little better understanding of maybe how it shows up in your business and and is an obstacle to your success. So the next step in this is awareness is curative. So you have to recognize where these things are happening, and then start to dig down into why why are they happening? Here’s a big realization in my own business. And that is that until I can get out of my own way, I’ll never make any progress. And my personal journey has been a multi year one to understand how my unfinished business and a lot of crap from my childhood and other points in my life affect how I do everything in my business and they really start to show up a lot. Our unfinished business our past our strategies really show up big when it comes to follow up. Because a lot of times this is this is things that that we’re dealing with that have some very deep roots in our past and so to remove the blocks, it’s sometimes necessary to get some help to hire a business or a life coach. that can help you clear those things out. That’s the certification program I’ve been involved in, in the last couple of years, we had Melisa Pierce on the podcast, and she talked about this some as well. But that’s become an important part of my life. And it’s something that I’m bringing to my own business for my clients, because I understand the impact, because I can tell you all day long, that you shouldn’t have a fear of sales that, you know, you need to follow up five to seven times. And this is how it’s going to cause your business to fail if you don’t reach out and start doing it. But the truth is, is until you deal with whatever the root causes, you’re not going to be successful at me telling you to do, it’s not going to change anything, you have to change that script in your own head and the script of the way you feel about it, that has to get rewritten in order for you to be able to do it. So if you resonated with some of the stuff that we’ve talked about, I’ve recommend that your very first step is to take a look at why that’s happening. And if the if you come up with I don’t know, that’s the perfect thing for you to go explore with a business or a life coach. That’s what they’re here for. So that’s why we have so many of them. Right now in the world. They’re here to help with that. What are your feelings about that, Cara? How does that resonate with you? Cara Taylor Swift 21:25 Yeah, 100%, you got your own crap you got to deal with and it shows up in your business. And it shows up when you’re trying to follow up in it and you self project, I think a lot of things onto your clients, that’s really your own issue, you’re making assumptions about people and how they’re going to respond to you. But what I come back to is, you know, do those things, work on your stuff, get your life coach, talk to your therapist, whatever you need to do to work past that stuff, so that you can be a healthy business owner and get better at follow up. But at the same time, you still have a business that you’re working in every single day. While that’s happening. So I put together just a few things that you can think about in order to you can do these things while you’re working on that other stuff to get you going. But one of the things, you know, we talked about flipping that script earlier, you know, reminding yourself that before you pick up that phone, that you are not just calling them up for the heck of it, you’re calling them up, because you have a solution to a pain point that they have, you can help you’re that person for them. So once you do that, one of the first things I do when I check in with people is I always start that conversation off with something about that person that I know. So I work really hard to know about the families that I work with their connections with their family, their animals, their work, maybe they’ve got an incredible upcoming life event that I’ve that I know about. So I’ll talk about that. But I’m always it’s always comes back to that pain point that I’m aware of. And then I sensor that conversation around the pain point and how working with my business can alleviate that issue. And then of course, you know, you’re always going to bring the value to the conversation. So if you’ve got a special offer or a program or some kind of package that fits what they need, that’s great value that you’re bringing, this is a great time to mention it to them and make sure that they know what that program is. And then I think one thing that when you struggle with follow up that often gets forgotten is you have to be prepared to really clearly define the next steps for your client. What do you want them to do? An example I have here is I always tell my clients like what that next step is for them how they can book with me. So I’ll say something like, Okay, so the next step for us moving forward would be for you to set up your consultation. How does next Tuesday at 10am work for you? You know, so I give them it’s not a yes or no answer that I’m looking for. I’m looking for does this work for you? Let’s get it scheduled. Let’s get it on the calendar. I’m really giving them the clear next steps. So what I’m trying to say here is that, yes, we have stuff we have to work on. And we can do that while simultaneously still following up with our clients. And then if you have a game plan in place, and you have a script that you’re going to follow or you know the value you’re going to bring, I think the anxiety around it can come down so much more and you can have confidence when you make that phone call. And if you make the phone call you don’t answer leave a voicemail. Don’t be one of those businesses that just calls and doesn’t leave a voicemail, like leave a voicemail, and then follow up via email if you need to. But anyway, I’m just thinking you know, having some clear steps in mind can be super helpful. Kimberly Beer 24:32 Every small business owner wants to gain traction in their marketing. After three decades of working with small business owners just like you I have developed what I call my four by four marketing method. In just one 90 minute session you’ll discover the four major focus areas of a successful marketing plan and together we’ll uncover where your business is getting stuck. You leave the session with an action plan of next steps that engage your revenue engine drop by BeMorebusiness.com to request your session today. That’s Bemorebusiness.com. See you there. Practice really does make things easier. Practice does in and there are times, and I’m with Cara, I by all means saying to get a business and life coach, it does not mean that that’s what you should do and kind of let your business or your follow up fall on its face. Nope, you got to keep on marching. And sometimes you have to talk the talk before you can walk the walk. So you may not it may not be with confidence, it may not be the best possible solution or the best possible plan or you may stumble over your words like I’m already doing and talking on a podcast. It’s okay. It is completely okay. Most humans, in my opinion, I still abide by this are good people. And they’re, they’re gonna be perfectly happy with however you present it. So it doesn’t have to be perfect. And sometimes you’ve just got to do it, and practice it and keep on doing it until it feels more natural. And then also, dealing with the underlying reasons and the whys are really important. Another thing that I want to mention around this and it has to do with the mindset as well as all of the things that Cara mentioned. And that is to work on understanding yourself with some true clarity so you can make better decisions on how to work with yourself. So understanding if you’re an introvert or an extrovert, or understanding if you are well organized, or you like to do more of the go with the flow without having a specified time for things. One of the greatest freedoms in my own business was when I realized that just me trying to restrict myself to doing what was blocked onto my calendar is work time, like I planned my projects out for the entire week. I hated it. I absolutely positively hated it. And I would rebel. So but that’s my temperament. That’s my personality is to be more go with the flow. So now I make those plans in the morning. So I know how I’m going to feel and follow up needs to be a part of that. But if I don’t feel like doing it, right this second, I allow myself some latitude to be able to do it in an hour. While I get something that feels more urgent out of the way instead of being really restrictive. Other people like to have things very organized and compartmentalised some people who are introverts. I’m an extrovert, so I have no problem with this. But introverts need a little bit of a break from it. You know, you can’t, you can’t spend all six hours on the phone one day and not be completely worn out from chasing people around. So make it a little bit more bite sized. Work with yourself, understand yourself, seek clarity about yourself, and then apply that to how you run your business. Definitely, I get people out really easy. So being able to set like some time blocks around when I’m going to follow up so I can get myself in the mindset get myself organized. And then I just I knock out all my follow up at one time. And then I can do things that don’t involve peopleing for a while. I’ve seen new people pretty well though Cara Taylor Swift 28:32 I can people in time blocks no problem. Kimberly Beer 28:34 When you flip on that people switch. You can people pretty darn good. So the final of our big three is to setup a system that can be relied upon when you can’t. And boy, I tell you, I feel like we’re beating this into people’s head. But automation, automation, automation. And there are some reasons why automation is critical, especially when it comes to follow up, it dramatically decreases the time that it takes you to do it. That’s one it removes a good chunk of the thinking or overthinking from the follow up equation. So you’ll be less likely to avoid it or let fear or anxiety or something that is internal to you override the the correct thing to do it provides some consistency. And customers always appreciate a cohesive message. It allows you to build confidence in your message and marketing because you get to repeat it a lot. And it allows you to focus your time on doing what you really want to do in your business instead of things that may make you uncomfortable. So the way that you go about it and we have some great episodes are that break these down a little further. But for this one, you first need to figure out what your process is and then systemize those processes one by one and don’t try to do them all at one time. That’s I think where a lot of people get really disgusted with automation is that they go, Okay, we’re going to automate, let’s automate everything all in one day. So take take those processes one by one, and then automate as many of them as possible employs some good technology and tools that will facilitate that system and the automation and make life easier. So for those of you who are going, Okay, we’ve listened to this automation message a million times, what in the heck are they talking about? When it comes to follow up. So here’s what happens, you would have a follow up email with your contact information in it already inserted in there, everything you really need, you know, hey, visit my website, go follow me on social media, subscribe to The Business Animal podcast, and it’s pre written. And then you have to take your little business card, you scan it with your phone, and then when it pops up in the CRM, you apply a tag that says follow up, and the system sends the email to that person, right then or six hours or the next day, however, you want to have that setup. So you don’t have to write the email, all you do is scan the card and put a tag on it. That takes you less time. And you don’t overthink what you’re going to say because it’s already written. And it really works. It really, truly does. And to do this process, it’s really simple. I’m going to break it down into something I know that you guys have if you’ve been in business longer than a minute, somewhere in your email box, from your sent box, there is an email that you wrote to somebody that was a follow up email, I can guarantee you, it’s in there somewhere. So think about the last person that you had to follow up with, and go find that email and know you It’s near and be able to use it probably word for word, but it has the basics of everything you need to say, in your next follow up email. So go find it and then start with it. That’s your first process into making this work. It’s simple as that. What are your thoughts? Cara? Cara Taylor Swift 32:05 Well, like you said, I think we’re all doing that to some extent already. So the next step is literally automating that part of it. And it’s a easy, it’s an easy first step if you have a system in place. So I mean, we all have these things we it may be a text message too or a direct message that you’ve cut and pasting over and over again to your clients. Kimberly Beer 32:24 And if you’re cutting and pasting, you’re already doing some level of automation, I want you to know that automation doesn’t always have to be an expensive complicated software program, it could be something as simple as you have a really good word document with all of the text in it. And you’re using your Gmail, I hope that you outgrow that quickly. But but that is also part of it. So the final thing that I have to add to this conversation is I developed for those of you who do like routine and systems, by the way, I love to create them, I just don’t want to live within them. So I have a wonderful little system that I’ve created for people who appreciate having something a little bit more organized. And it’s the 30 minute follow up workout. And I encourage you to make it a habit to do this. I do it at some point during my day, I will do it. But a lot of people, if you do it first thing in the morning, Eat That Frog first thing in the morning, if this is hard for you, this will make follow up a lot easier. So the first thing you do is you focus on people that is really super important. Your customers should always be the focus of your business. And this helps you put that mindfully ahead of everything else. So the first thing you’re going to look at is there anybody who’s a current customer that needs support, do you have any, like emails of complaints or questions or something like that, or somebody that you’ve been working with on a project that needs an update. So those are your current customers, because your current customers are always the best source of your next business. And they’re always more important than prospects or leads. So they come first, as soon as you’ve completed all of the communications and follow ups that need to be for those current customers, then you look at prospects. So these are people who you know, are qualified to work for your business or work with your business, there are people you know would be a good fit, they’ve expressed an interest and they need nurturing. Maybe they don’t need a personal phone call but a little follow up email or they need to be dropped into a nurture series that will help support them to make a purchase with you. But the important line with a prospect is that you know that that’s a right person for your business. And then lastly on the people end of things, look at the leads that need followed up with these are people you’ve just met, or businesses that you’ve just met and they may or may not be called At this point, and your goal with them is to get them qualified. Is this a good fit? Or is this somebody who would be a better fit for a different business. So look at the leads, and when you’re focusing on the people, so that’s number one, focus on the people first, current customers, prospects, and then leads, then focus on your tasks and appointments. What in conjunction with follow up needs to get done today. Sometimes it’s you’ve got to do something for a customer before you can really follow up with them. So focus on the tasks and appointments. And then the final piece of follow up my lovely business owners, then number three is to get mindful about your money. Is there any quotes or invoicing that needs to go out? This is a place that I know that the customer says, Hey, I want to work with you. Now you’ve got to come up with the quote or the invoice so or you finished the job and now you need to get paid. So be mindful of your money. So step one, focus on the people, current prospects leads, focus on your tasks and appointment second, and then in the final, like 10 minutes of it. Get mindful about your money, what do you need to do for quotes or invoicing that can get you paid and bring back into you. So that’s the 30 minute follow up workout. And I recommend again, do it first thing in the morning, Eat That Frog. And if you’re not, if you have more of a go the flow kind of person, then at some point during your day, make sure you set aside 30 minutes and go through those three steps. Cara Taylor Swift 36:36 Okay, thanks, Kim. For that I think what we would like to do at this point is we’d like to ask you guys to let us know what are the tips and techniques that you’re loving about your follow up process, please jump over to Instagram or Facebook. And let us know what you’re loving about your follow up process or what you’d like to hear more about. But before we say goodbye, we just want to run over our big three one more time. First of all, number one, just becoming intimately aware of what’s stopping you from your follow up success and how it shows up in your business. And then recognizing and removing those blocks. We talked a lot about that today. And then the last piece really is setting up your system that can be relied upon when you can’t be and there are so many episodes that we’ve already created that support this. So if you’re tuning in for the first time and just getting acquainted with our podcast, please go back and check out the other episodes that we have from season one. And enjoy. Thank you guys. Jaz 37:29 Thanks for listening to this episode of The Business Animal. Be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. And if you learned something today, leave us a review. To learn more. Find us at TheBusinessanimal.com we’d love to hear from you. Until next time, keep your business well trained with The Business Animal Transcribed by https://otter.ai