90% of marketing – or at least 90% of marketing education – is about grabbing people's attention.

Elevator pitches, Facebook Ads, Linkedin profiles…all the advice is about how to grab the attention of your potential clients.

It's the marketing equivalent of shouting “hey you!” to someone across the street.

But what happens next?

After the person you've shouted at turns their head? After you've got their attention?

That's the important bit.

Although it often doesn't seem like it, getting someone's attention is relatively easy. What's difficult is keeping their attention.

You can't do that just by shouting or making a noise. You have to give something valuable. Something that engages them beyond a knee-jerk response to stimulus.

That's where value-added follow-up is so powerful in marketing.

Whether it's in-person, over the phone, via email marketing or the latest new-fangled messaging tool: follow-up that your potential clients find useful and interesting is the difference between a lifetime client and fleeting attention.

How are you following up? How are you making sure you get more than just that initial spark of attention but instead begin to build a real long-term relationship?

If you don't have a plan in place for how you do it, it's time you did.