Following up on leads is 90% of the game, right? At least that's what we hear. You spend all this time networking, marketing yourself, making cold calls, looking for the right client, but what's the point of it all if you don't follow up on the leads you DO have?

This was a major obstacle for one of my nutritionist clients this week and a shift got created when I shared the Low Hanging Fruit List with her.

Let's think about Low Hanging Fruit on a tree for a moment, as it relates to its counterpart higher up on the tree. The Low Hanging Fruit is heavier, probably riper and because of that, easier to pick. Think of your warm prospects, those that have already expressed an interest in working with you, as this type of fruit. Ready for the picking.

Yet, many of us focus a lot of our energy on the higher fruit, the harder-to-reach fruit or prospect. We spend a lot of time working on far-fetched Client Attraction projects, when we really could be spending the time contacting and closing the deal with people who've already said they'd like to work with us but haven't been turned into clients yet. Logically, this doesn't make much sense, does it?

Well, starting today, you're going to change that by putting more focus on Low Hanging Fruit, while you continue to market your practice as a whole. Here's how…

Your Assignment:

Have a Low Hanging Fruit chart on your desk at all times. It should have several columns:

name phone number email address referral source that client's particular concern status/when to contact them next Leave this sheet on your desk at all times, in a place where you can refer to it several times per day.

Go through your mental Rolodex or past potential-client notes to see who in your network has expressed interest in wo

rking with you over the last 6 months to a year, but hasn't been converted into a client or patient yet. This could have been either in passing ("Oh, I should work with you one day" to "I want to work with you, but I'm not quite ready yet") or more intently ("Let's set up a time to talk about working together"), via email, verbally, or third-party referral.

Please list all of these people on this sheet. This can also include those who you met with for an initial consultation but who never signed up, for whatever reason.

This will be one of your more important documents you'll use for getting clients and you should plan on using it for the long haul. This method of keeping track of people who are closest to becoming clients (and then following up with them regularly) is somewhat deceptive because it's so simple, but the good things usually are.

The bottom line is, when my clients use this list, they enthusiastically report they convert more prospects into paying clients. When they stop using this list briefly, prospective clients slip through their fingers. That should tell you something.

© 2006 Fabienne Fredrickson

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