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Email & SMS Follow-UpEmail and SMS follow-up that brings customers back.
The cheapest job you will win this year is the next one from somebody who already paid you. We keep you in front of that list by email and text, on a schedule, without you writing anything.
Free 15-minute review. No pitch deck. You leave with a map either way.
Your customer list is money you are not collecting
Most shops have a few hundred names of people who already trusted them with a job. Almost none of them hear from you again unless something breaks.
They forget who you are
You did good work in April. By the time they need you again in October, they remember a truck and a first name. So they search, and they find whoever paid for the ad.
The quote that went quiet
They got your number and never called back. Most of those people did not pick somebody else, they just got busy. Nobody followed up, so the job never happened at all.
You are paying for strangers instead
Every new lead costs money. The people on your list already know your work and already said yes once. Going back to them is the cheapest work in your business and it is the part nobody does.
What actually goes out
Written once, in your voice, then it runs on its own.
- Reminders for work that comes around againSeasonal service, annual checks, the thing you told them to watch. It goes out on the right month for their job, not on a generic blast to everybody at once.
- A second run at the quotes that went coldAnybody who got a number and went quiet gets worked again, on a longer clock. Some of them come back months later. That is normal and it is why the sequence keeps going.
- Text for the things that need to land todayAppointment confirmations, a crew running late, a cancellation you want to fill this afternoon. Email is for the long stuff. Text is for the stuff that has to be read in the next ten minutes.
- The review ask, sent to everybodyOnce a job is done, the request goes out. Every customer gets asked, not just the ones you think are happy. Filtering out unhappy customers before the ask is against Google policy and the FTC has gone after it, so we do not build it. See reputation management for how that runs.
- Something worth opening, a few times a yearNot a newsletter nobody reads. Short notes that are useful on their own: what to check before winter, what a repair like theirs usually runs now, what you are booking out to. You stay in their head without asking for anything.
- It stops the moment they replySomebody answers a follow-up and the automation shuts off for that person. From there it is a real conversation in your CRM. Nobody gets chased after they have already booked.
Three steps, no mystery.
We clean up the list you already have
Old invoices, your phone, the spreadsheet, whatever is in your current system. We pull it into one place, strip the duplicates and the dead addresses, and mark who is a past customer and who never booked.
We write it in your voice and test it
You read every message before a single one goes out. We send the whole run to a dummy contact first, so you see exactly what your customers will see, in the order they will see it.
It runs and we watch what works
Opens, replies, and the only number that counts, which is booked jobs. What gets ignored gets rewritten. You get a one-page doc for every sequence the day it ships.
Every touch, in order.
Gold means the system sends it. Blue means it is back in your hands. There is only one blue one.
Who ends up on the list
Right after the job closes, every customer gets asked. No survey in front of it picking who is happy enough. That filtering is against Google policy and the FTC has gone after it, so we do not build it.
The one thing they should keep an eye on with the work you just did. It costs you nothing and it is the reason they remember your name in October.
Anybody who got a number and went quiet gets one message asking if they still need it done. Some of them come back. That is the run that pays for the first quarter.
What to check before the weather turns, what a job like theirs runs now, what you are booking out to. You stay in their head without asking for anything.
Service due, annual check, the thing that comes around again. Timed to when their work actually needs it, not to a blast that goes to everybody on the first of the month.
The sequence shuts off for that person and the thread lands in your CRM with their whole history attached. From there it is you and a customer, not a system.
Every email carries an unsubscribe that works on the first click and your postal address in the footer, because CAN-SPAM requires both. Every text stops with one word. Anybody who opts out drops off the entire chain, not just the message they were reading.
What a year of this actually looks like
Say you did four hundred jobs last year. That list is sitting in your system right now doing nothing.
In January, the people whose work has an annual rhythm get a short note reminding them it is coming up. A handful book on the spot. In March, everybody who got a quote in the last eighteen months and never called back gets one message, not a campaign, asking if they still need it done. A few of those turn into real jobs, and some of them are jobs you had written off a year ago.
Through the spring and summer, the review ask goes out after every completed job and your rating climbs on its own. In the fall, one useful note goes to the whole list about what to check before the weather turns. Nobody is being sold to. They just hear from you four or five times a year instead of never.
Here is the part that matters. None of that required you to sit down and write anything. You approved it once. The system knows who got what and when, so nobody gets the same message twice and nobody who just booked gets asked again.
Where this sits next to the CRM
The CRM is the list and the record. This is what gets sent to it.
That distinction matters more than it sounds like. Follow-up only works if the system knows who somebody is: whether they are a past customer or a lead who never booked, what job they had, when it was, and whether they have already replied. Send without that and you are blasting. Send with it and every message lands on somebody it actually applies to.
It also means we do not build this on a separate email tool bolted onto the side. We have watched two systems both think they owned the follow-up, and what comes out the other end is a customer getting the same text twice. If the platform can send it natively, it sends it natively.
The rules we keep, whether or not you ask
Every email goes out with a real unsubscribe link that works on the first click, and a physical mailing address in the footer, because CAN-SPAM requires both. If you do not want your home address on it, we use a box, and we will tell you to get one before we ship.
Texts only go to people who gave you their number in the course of doing business with you, and every one of them can stop it by replying STOP. We do not buy lists, we do not scrape numbers, and we will not import a list you bought from somebody else. Not because we are precious about it. Because it torches your sending reputation and gets your number shut off, and then the messages that would have made you money stop arriving too.
What it will not do
It will not fix bad work. If a customer had a rough experience, a well-written email nine months later makes it worse, not better.
It will not manufacture demand that is not there. Somebody who does not need a roof is not going to need one because you sent a note. What this does is make sure that when they do need one, you are the name they already have.
And it is slower than the rest of the system. Missed call text back pays for itself in a week. This one you measure over a season, because you are waiting for people to need you again. If you need work booked this month, start somewhere else and we will tell you that on the call.
Real shops running this right now.
Numbers from these accounts are on the case studies page, with the window and the source for each one.
What owners ask first.
Am I going to annoy my customers?
Do I have to write any of it?
My list is a mess. Is that a problem?
Can I text customers, legally?
How fast does this pay for itself?
What happens when somebody replies?
Find the work hiding in your old list.
On a fifteen minute call we will look at how many past customers and dead quotes you are sitting on and what going back to them is worth. You keep the map whether you hire us or not.
Or call (585) 299-5148 and ask for Zack.
North & Nova Co. · Rochester, NY · (585) 299-5148
Sold → Done → Paid