Follow-ups
Promises your business makes to itself to get back to someone.
A follow-up is a promise your business makes to itself: on this day, someone will get back to this customer. It is the simplest thing in CLEO, and the one that most often decides whether an opportunity survives.
One at a time
Each customer has at most one follow-up waiting. Planning a new one replaces the old, and every change stays in their history. That is deliberate: a customer you owe three different call-backs is really a customer you owe one conversation.
A follow-up holds three things: the day, an optional time, and a reason — a few words about what it's for, so the day it arrives you don't have to remember.
Planning one
On a customer's record, use Plan a follow-up (or Change the follow-up if one exists), then set the day, the time if it matters, and the reason.
On a client's record, the same thing lives in its own Follow-up section, noted "A promise to get back to them", with Schedule follow-up or Change follow-up.
You can also ask CLEO: "Follow up with Marta next Tuesday about the quote." CLEO prepares it, and it is recorded when you press Confirm.
When it comes due
- Without a time, it is due all that day, and overdue only once the day has passed.
- With a time, it is due at that moment.
A follow-up that is due, or past its day, appears under Needs you on Home and on the customer's own record. Due follow-ups are also the first thing CLEO puts in Today, because they are promises you already made.
Marking one done
- On a client's record, press Done in the Follow-up section. To drop it instead, press Cancel it.
- For anyone, tell CLEO: "I followed up with Marta." CLEO prepares it; Confirm records it.
Several at once
When a list of people needs the same treatment — everyone you haven't spoken to in a while, say — ask CLEO to set follow-ups for them in one go. It prepares the whole list, names anyone it is leaving out, and waits for Confirm. Up to twenty at a time.
What CLEO does with them
- Due and overdue follow-ups appear under Needs you, and lead the order in Today.
- The Leads list shows a lead's planned or due follow-up in place of its usual line.
- The Clients page keeps a prepared list of everyone whose follow-up is due.
- After a lead is recorded as Lost with a date to look again, that date arrives as its own reminder.