Why "Just Checking In" Never Works

Your systems are in place, organized with people you know and have met who will be great connections and referral partners for your business. A past client, a contact from an event, people who could send you real business. 

And NOW for the follow-up...but you don't. Not because you forgot, but because you sat down to write it and had nothing to say.

So the message just becomes "Hey, just checking in." And you stare at that for a second and think, this sounds like exactly what it is. Me, asking for attention, with nothing behind it and no effort. So you close the app and tell yourself you'll do it later.

Here's what I've learned in fifteen years of this: that feeling isn't laziness and it isn't fear, it's your instinct telling you the truth. A "just checking in" or "how is the family" message is a withdrawal from an account you never put anything into.

Think about your own list right now, maybe you are looking at the contractor who did great work for a client last spring and hasn't spoken to them since or the insurance agent with forty warm contacts sitting in a phone, untouched, because every draft feels like begging, maybe even the real estate agent who knows they should call past buyers and keeps not calling, because what would they even say.

You're not out of contacts; you're out of reasons to reach out that don't feel like asking for something or just checking off a box.

And that's the whole problem, right there dear fans of Living Local! Every follow-up you avoid is one you simply could have made it about them. The ones that flow easily are the ones where you're trying to add value to their life and their business. They want to feel heard, that they have an ally in you and that you are following their business with a vested interest in their success. 

Nobody owes you a response to "just checking in." But almost everybody responds when you show up with something for them without asking for anything in return. 

That's the fix, and it's simpler than the systems you've tried to build. Stop following up empty-handed.

I'll get into exactly what "something for them" looks like on Wednesday. It costs you about five minutes and it requires nothing back.

For now, just be honest with yourself. How many follow-ups are you sitting on right now because you don't have a reason that isn't about you?