You will be able to write follow-ups that give the buyer a reason to reply.
Open your sent messages and scroll back through the follow-ups you have sent buyers in the last month. Count how many begin with "Just checking in", "Hi, following up on my last message" or "Any updates?" If the answer is most of them, you are in large company. It is the default follow-up for nearly everyone who sells, and it is also the message buyers find easiest to ignore.
The reason is simple. A just-checking-in message asks the buyer to do something, reply, and gives them nothing in return. This lesson shows you how to write follow-ups that carry something the buyer can use, so replying feels worth the effort.
Before you send a follow-up, ask yourself one question: what does this message give the buyer that they did not have before? If the honest answer is nothing, do not send it yet.
There are four things a follow-up can add. The first is an answer to a question they asked. In most meetings a buyer asks something you could not fully answer on the spot, and the follow-up is the place to answer it properly. The second is something relevant to their problem: an article, a short guide, a checklist or a worked example that helps them whether or not they buy from you. The third is a new option. Maybe you found a cheaper plan, a way to start smaller, or a payment arrangement that fits the timing concern they mentioned. The fourth is a deadline the buyer would be annoyed to have missed, such as a price change, an intake date or an enrolment window.
Notice what is not on the list: your quarter-end target, a promotion that suits your numbers, or a reminder that you exist. Those add something for you, not for them, and buyers can tell the difference.
"Just checking in" does more harm than wasting one message. Each time a buyer sees a message from you that contains nothing, they learn that your messages can be skipped. After two or three, they stop opening them. Then, when you finally send something useful, it goes unread with the rest.
It also puts the buyer on the spot. "Any updates?" asks them to report back, and if they have not made progress, the honest answer feels awkward. Silence is easier.
Here is a worked example. Kelvin is a financial adviser who met a young couple in Sengkang about protecting their first home loan. At the end of the meeting the wife asked how their existing CPF-linked cover would work alongside a private policy, and Kelvin said he would find out.
His first draft of the follow-up read: "Hi both, just checking in to see if you've had a chance to think about what we discussed. Let me know if you have any questions."
His rewrite read: "Hi both, you asked how the cover you already have through CPF would fit with a private policy. I've put a short answer on one page, attached, so you can see where the two overlap and where there's a gap. Would it help to go through it on a ten-minute call this week?"
The second message answers her question, gives them something to read together, and ends with one small request.
Keep follow-ups short enough to read on a phone without scrolling. Three or four sentences is usually plenty. If you have more to say, put it in an attachment or a link they can open when they choose.
End with one question, and make it easy to answer. "Does Thursday or Friday work better?" is easy. "Would this be useful?" is easy. "What are your thoughts on the proposal and when do you expect to make a decision?" is two questions, and both are hard. A question that can be answered in a few words gets answered, and a question that needs a paragraph waits until the buyer has time to write one.
Follow-ups sent too close together feel like pressure. Leave a few days between them, more if the buyer told you they were busy, and never send a second message before the first has had a fair chance to land.
It also helps to vary the channel. A buyer who lets emails pile up may answer a phone call. Someone who never picks up an unknown number may reply to a short WhatsApp message. A sequence that goes email, then a call a few days later, then a brief WhatsApp, reaches the buyer in more than one place without repeating the same words three times. In Singapore, many buyers expect WhatsApp for quick messages and email for anything with an attachment, so match the channel to the content.
Lesson 6.4 turns this into a three-message sequence you can reuse. For now, go back to the sent messages you scrolled through at the start, find your most recent just-checking-in message, and keep it in front of you.
Rewrite your last just-checking-in message so it adds something specific and ends with one easy question.
Junxiong-WFG Organisation is an authorised representative of AIA Financial Advisers Private Limited (Reg. No. 201715016G).