I was asked to join a panel on a webinar last week to discuss “whether sales should follow up content marketing”.

There were a lot of strong feelings. Panellists reported feeling hassled and “spammed” when business called them after downloading a whitepaper or signing up for reports.

And many businesses struggle to know how to follow up appropriately once they've made first contact. “Am I being too pushy? Am I following up fast enough?”.

Here's the answer hiding in plain sight: let your potential clients tell you themselves what's appropriate.

I don't mean just ask them outright. They probably won't know. I mean let their actions tell you.

Whenever someone signs up for my regular emails they usually fall into two camps. One group is ready to take action straight away, the other (usually larger group) needs some warming up.

So I send helpful emails with useful information to build credibility and trust. But I mix in emails that ask questions or offer something for them to do like watch a video or complete a survey.

Who should I focus my personal follow-up on? It's the people that take actions that show they're the most interested. The ones who watch the videos straight away or hit reply and ask me questions or give feedback.

I don't ignore the others. They keep getting my regular emails and I hope they find them useful. I've learned that at some point something will happen and many of them will get more active and I'll pick it up then.

You can do the same no matter how you interact with potential clients. Keep a regular “drip feed” of valuable communications going: invite them to events, mail them useful articles, invite them for coffee. Make sure you can see when they take action and if they do, increase the follow-up.

That way you'll get your follow up right. Fast and frequent for the ones that want it. Regular and value-added for those who aren't ready yet.

And it's effective follow-up that wins clients.