I want to talk to you about the fuzzy feelings that we can amplify, as well as the funds that we can amplify in the all important follow-up.
When we get to this stage with clients, we already have an amazing connection with them. We’ve heard their story, the heartfelt details about where they’ve been and where they want to go. But when we go to re-book them at that time, they might not have their calendar with them, they might not have someone else’s schedule that they need, but they intend to re-book.
Maybe two or three months pass and I’m sure you’ve been in the same position before. You go, “Ah! I really wanted to go and do that other flotation tank, or do that massage thing, or go to that class again.” But two or three months later and you make all kinds of reasons why it’s been too long.
When we are the practitioner on the receiving end, all of a sudden this whole other thing comes up. “It’s been two or three months, it must have been what I did for that person, must have been this or it must have been that.”
In actual fact, life just happens. Life happens to all of us.
Open Loops
I talk about this a lot in the Club, about closing loops. This past month it’s been so highlighted in my personal life about closing loops. We wander around and create open loops all the time. I was experiencing it this week just with cleaning the kitchen.
For instance, we have our dinner, we have our meal, we get ready to go to bed and we just leave the dishes there. It’s an open loop that’s not quite closed until we actually go do the dishes and put the things away. Then it’s a closed loop.
We also have these loops in conversations with people. We say, “Yes, I’ll get back to you on such-and-such.” Then a couple of weeks pass, life happens, and we don’t quite get there.
These leave open loops and when we have open loops, we’re sending energy out without bringing it back around. Unless we close it, it can’t quite keep that full circle of energy going.
Seth Godin talks about this in his new book on marketing. We have tension that builds up and as human beings, we don’t like tension. We’re used to having it around but as soon as the tension is relieved, that’s the feeling we want to feel.
When you’ve got an open loop with somebody about their follow-up but you don’t call them or send them that email, it’s an open loop. That tension is still open. Your client is not relieved of it and you’re not relieved of it.
You’ve made up a story about that tension in your head and they’ve made up a story about that tension. The only way we can get through it is to stop jumping into other people’s heads. You can’t possibly know what they’ve been thinking or what their #LifeHappens looks like until you close the loop.
Close Your Loops
So what does closing the loop actually look like when it comes to follow-ups? It looks like a conversation.
For most of us, the conversation is the quickest. You might have all kinds of ideas about what you *think* your client is thinking. But you can’t possibly know what they think about you. Just have a conversation with them without getting attached to where that conversation is going to go, to whether they are going to book in with you or not.
If you just have that conversation, you have an opportunity for that loop to be closed and that tension to be resolved.
How To Have the Conversation
Maybe you’re freaking out about talking to a client on the phone, that you’ll appear salesy or annoying. Remember that the follow up call is purely because you care about that person and their well-being. They said they wanted to follow up with you, so it’s time to have the conversation.
Your conversation might go something like this:
“Hey, we had this amazing conversation last time we met. I heard you and I heard that this is what you want your future to look like. So, I’m just following up and closing the loop. I’m just coming back around to check that you’re still on track for that thing that you said you wanted.”
It’s as simple as that.
By doing that, it’s not being salesy, it’s duty of care, really. As a good practitioner, you are checking up on them.
They chose you to begin with and they chose you to follow up with them. They chose you as their partner in their health journey and you’re being a good partner in that journey.
It’s also creating a level of trust and nice fuzzy feelings so they feel like they are actually special.
Don’t feel like this is a conversation that needs to be hard. Just have the conversation and wherever it goes, it goes. Wherever it doesn’t go, it doesn’t go. It’s all cool, but you have the time now to have this quick conversation.
Create Connections
It creates a yummy, fuzzy feeling of connection. There’s a feeling of trust and – interestingly – sometimes the rule of reciprocity kicks in. It’s not like you expect that to happen, it just does.
So instead of your own story rolling around in your head and their story rolling around in their head, you can actually connect and give them an opportunity to come back and see you, to come back online for their health conditions, to come back online for what they actually wanted in their life.
Following up on a phone conversation or an email inspires a level of trust. It creates a level of fuzzy feelings. You get that yummy connection and it also stops any of that negative self-talk that we perpetuate.
I know that self-talk happens not only from personal experience but I also see it in all of our Facebook groups. This negative self-talk happens when we’re making stuff up in our heads when we don’t have the actual data and we don’t have the actual script of what’s going on in somebody else’s head. We can’t possibly be in their head.
So having the conversation stops the negative self-talk and the flow-on effect is that the funds follow.
First and foremost are the fuzzy feelings. If you go in with the intention that you just want to make more money out of it, then you are going to come off as salesy, spammy, and weird. Instead, come from a place of duty of care like, “Hey, we started on this partnership together, let’s just follow up.”
It’s can literally even be a one line email.
“Hey, we started on this journey together. Do you still have the same goals for 2019? If you do, here’s my booking system. I’d love to see you right at the beginning so that we can start off as optimal as we can. I’d love to be able to help you on your health journey.”
These things are super, super simple.
Follow-Up Is Where the Funds Are
If you’ve got a new program or offering, following up gives you the chance to tell that person about it. If you don’t follow up, there are no fuzzy feelings and no funds available to you. You are literally leaving that connection and that money on the table.
Here’s a good example.
Last week, our kitchen sink was completely blocked. My husband tried to fix it, but after many attempts and plungers and a weird snaky thing, we conceded and called in an expert.
We made phone calls to five plumbers. First one, we left a message. Second one, left a message, then text messaged and he text messaged back with the number of another guy. So we called him.
We also Googled in our area and only one of them answered. One answered and he said, “We’ll see you tomorrow, today’s not a good day.”
This whole thing took place over 3 days. On Sunday, we were fed up and weren’t taking No for an answer. We’d gone through four and none of them had called back.
They were literally leaving funds on the table. So the final one says, “Yep, be there tomorrow at 11 o’clock.”
11 o’clock rolls around. My kids are at their swimming carnival that I’m missing out on because I’m sitting there waiting for the plumber. Then 12 o’clock rolls around and he’s still not there. So we ring up the plumbing company. They couldn’t find us in their system, but said they could send somebody around at one o’clock.
So around comes the guy at one o’clock. He was amazing!
He told us all about his business back in Scotland and some other things that he was interested in. When he got there, he fixed the problem. Fixed the problem and then said, “Look, I can fix this problem and it’ll be cheaper if you go on a plan. All the plan is, is two hundred and fifty dollars every year. We come around and check your plumbing, check your electricity, check this, check that. You get a free tap every year, you get this other thing.”
Because he was there and he fixed our problem and he said, “Look, you probably don’t need all of those things but if it does come up it actually brings the cost down by 50%. So every time when you do this, it’s never ever going to cost you the amount that it costs you this time. Over five years, I’ve seen lots of people save money.”
So not only did he follow up, he then had a chance to offer an upsell to me and my hubby. Then he was able to go and change taps and do these other things that we never would have signed up for. In the end, we spent $800 getting all of our taps cleared.
We’ve lived in our house for nearly five years now and we haven’t had anything done to electricity, air-conditioning, plumbing, or anything like that. So it’s kind of like maintenance for our house. Just like health maintenance that we have for our human body.
So we spent $800 with him. Those four other people just missed out on $800 by literally not following up.
They also missed out on the fuzzy feelings. We left a wonderful Google review for this plumber. I’ll absolutely tell other people about him.
All just purely from the fact that he followed up and then while he was in the consultation with us, was following up and following up and following up.
Not only did we get to have the fuzzy feeling of connection with that plumber, but he also got so much more funds from following up. The same thing can happen with you.
One of the other plumbers ended up texting and saying that it was his kid’s first birthday on Sunday and could we text this other guy. That’s cool – but then follow up the next day! Following up is key.
I am absolutely committed to leaning in to where this happens to me all the time. I wanted to bring it to your attention because we are literally leaving all of this wonderful connection and all of this wonderful money on the table by not following up.
Take Action
So the actionable step today is – can you set up a friendly reminder using your email marketing system or CRM?
Can you send out a friendly reminder for those people that have had their first visit this year and haven’t ended up coming back?
Don’t stop yourself in this moment because I can hear all your little cogs turning. You’re thinking, “But they didn’t come back because they didn’t like me. They didn’t come back because. . . “
Life happens. #LifeHappens.
You’ve done it yourself this year. You’ve started something and haven’t followed through with it. The same thing happens with them and this is a beautiful opportunity to get those fuzzy feelings.
Send out an invitation or a friendly reminder that you’re here for them. That you’d love to follow up with them to see if you can still be of assistance.
You know, the same thing happens with everything that we have to keep on top of. Not only our human systems but health, our business, our mindset, all of those things – we need those friendly reminders to get them back to top of mind.
Then have something that you can upsell, too. That was one of my biggest lessons this week with the plumber. Have something where the funds can be amplified. There is a strategy around it but we are in business for a reason. In the long run, I’m actually saving money by getting everything looked at every year. Same thing with you guys.
What could you offer? Could you offer a new program? Could you offer three visits package to make sure that they are at their optimum and they booked them in straight away so that they don’t miss them like they have this past year?
Where can you follow up? Where can you send a friendly reminder? Can you make 3 follow up calls to close those open loops?
Hopefully, this has been beneficial to you. If you got something out of this, please share it with someone that you know, other practitioners. Most of all, please take some action today! There are so many fuzzy feelings out there to be had and so many more funds to be had! It’s all just a matter of one conversation, one sentence in an email. You just never know where it could take you!
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