Last Updated on Apr 8, 2020 by James W
One excellent way to help to grow your business is through networking, and it does not matter what type of business you work. Networking allows you to get up close and personal with a client or prospective customers and can be a powerful way to promote your business. Some people can network naturally, while others need to work at it, and you can get some excellent tips on networking effectively on different references online. Once you have met your prospects though, you need to follow-up the meeting, so here is some advice on composing the perfect follow-up email.
Saying Hello
As you have met your prospect, it is perfectly acceptable to use a level of familiarity by addressing the email with their first name. If they have a title such as Doctor or Professor, then you may wish to keep some formality and use these when you address your email.
Keeping It Polite
Although you have met the person, you need to maintain a level of professionalism and make sure that you are polite and mind your manners. Do not be over friendly or too familiar with the prospect, but you can still keep the tone light and friendly, and without any pressure.
Reference Your Meeting
It is always a good idea to reference your meeting with the prospect as if you met them at a large event they will most likely have met a lot of people as well that day. Unless you use a unique email signature generator like Zippysig, even when you look at the name in the signature you sometimes need help jogging the memory to remember them accurately as they can all look the same after a while.
Answer Their Questions
If the person was asking for information of questions to be answered, you could give them a precise answer to their query in your email. You can also send attachments to your prospect with any relevant information, but make sure the documents are not too big as a lot of people will receive work emails on their smartphones. When you have answered all of the questions that they had, you can then pitch your solutions to them.
Tell Them How You Can Help Them
There is no point in beating around the bush, and if you have an effective solution to their requirements, you need to let them know what it is. You can attach documents on the subject, or even send links to your website if this has all of the information that could show them the answer to their problems.
Offer A Follow-Up
When you have pitched your products or services to the recipient of your email, you can also offer a follow-up call or meeting so that you can talk more about what you have to offer. They may wish to conduct business over email, or they may be happy to meet up with you and discuss your business further.
Give Them Time To Answer
It is important that you are not too keen and do not follow-up your email too quickly, especially if you have given them a lot of information to digest. Give them time to process everything and let them contact you themselves, or if you do not hear after a week, try giving them a call. You never know, your follow-up email could just be the point that pushes the customer to choose to do business with you!
