Sales leadership · 3 min read

Networking Is the Follow-Up

The introduction is free. What it turns into depends almost entirely on the email you send afterwards, and when.

Most networking advice is about the room: what to say, how to open, how to work a conference. In my experience the room is the cheap part. What decides whether a meeting turns into anything is what happens in the days after it.

The coffee that turned into an investment

Around the turn of 2020 I had coffee at a Panera in Estero with a real estate developer from Minnesota. We talked about projects he was raising money for. Afterwards I wrote to him:

Enjoyed our last Panera visit.

Per our conversation, please be kind enough to send me the 4-5 different opportunities that we conversed about.

I asked for three or four sentences on each, the amount he wanted me to commit and when he would need it. Nine days later I asked again: “Any luck on this?” A week after that I set the next meeting: “Friday Jan 24 @ noon, same place, Panera Bread, Coconut Point.”

In October 2021 he emailed me a new investment opportunity at 4:30 in the afternoon. I replied eleven minutes later:

Count me in. I do have a couple of questions. Can we get on a quick call today?

That relationship ran for years. It started with a coffee, but it was built on the follow-up: specific asks, a chaser when nothing came back, and the next meeting booked before the last one went cold.

The one I was late on

I am not always the one who closes the loop.

In October 2020 I met one of the partners of a local venture fund. He thanked me for agreeing to send an introduction about their new fund to investors I knew, and told me the fund would close at the end of the month. I replied:

I will try to get the email out this weekend. Was nice seeing you and always open to get drinks with you.

I sent the list in January. His reply was gracious: the fund had closed at the end of October, so they could not take any more money, but thanks for the effort, and let’s catch up over a drink.

But I had been told the deadline, and the help I offered arrived ten weeks after it stopped being useful. “I will try” was the honest phrase, and it was the problem.

Introductions: make them, then get out of the way

The other half of networking is connecting people who should know each other. My rule is to make the case in a sentence or two and then step out.

In 2021, introducing a developer to a marketer I knew:

I think both of you should meet up sooner than later as I see a very strong potential fit for the both of you to work together and monetize together. I will let the two of you continue the dialogue; please feel free to connect without cc’ing me.

In November 2024 I introduced a fintech founder building AI tools for community banks to the head of a local community bank:

At the minimum, I’m confident you’ll find the conversation worthwhile. The two of you definitely need to connect.

They met four weeks later, and the founder wrote to thank me for arranging it.

What I still do

Write the follow-up within a day, and make it specific: what you discussed, what you are asking for, and when. If nothing comes back, chase it. Book the next meeting before the last one fades. When you offer to help someone, do it before their deadline, not when you get to it. And when you introduce two people, say why in one line and leave the room.