$1M Sales Follow-Up System for Marketers

Build Your GTM Playbook

When you're wearing multiple hats in a GTM role, managing sales follow-ups can feel overwhelming.

You finish a promising demo call, send the initial follow-up email, and then... crickets.

We've all seen those cringe-worthy check-in emails. "Have you had a chance to review my proposal?"

But here's the reality - most follow-ups create friction for buyers rather than remove it.

They add noise to an already noisy inbox. And they rarely focus on what matters to the buyer.

Brady Lauze, Enterprise Account Executive at Loop Returns, understands this fundamental truth: Buying software isn't your prospect's job.

They're already drowning in their actual responsibilities.

Through a systematic approach to email follow-ups, Brady closed an unprecedented $1M in ARR in a single quarter - a milestone that helped accelerate his journey from SDR to Enterprise AE.

I sat down with Brady to learn how he transformed basic follow-up principles into a revenue-generating machine.

His framework isn't about sending more emails. It's about making each touchpoint genuinely helpful for the buyer.

If you’re a GTM Generalist who has to take on sales deals and run marketing, Brady’s approach may be exactly what you need!

You can listen to our full conversation [here].

If you want a quick summary, here are the key insights we discussed:

Building Trust Before Building Pipeline

When Brady started at Smile.io, there was no sales playbook.

Like many GTM generalists at early-stage companies, he had to figure out what emails to send and how often to send them through trial and error.

"In the early days, I stepped on a lot of toes," Brady admits. "I would email too often or send messages full of redundancies. There just wasn't much value in my approach."

This experience taught Brady a crucial lesson that many salespeople miss: Your product isn't the center of your prospect's universe. It's just one small piece of their tech stack and daily responsibilities.

GTM Generalist Takeaway: Your follow-ups should genuinely make the buyer's life easier. Before sending that next email, ask yourself: Am I adding value or just adding noise? This takes real work and effort, which is precisely why most salespeople don't do it.

The Power of Value-First Discovery

Brady's early days involved high-frequency calls - often 10 new conversations per week.

This volume forced him to develop a systematic approach to identifying and assigning value.

"Don't confuse transactional sales with building a transactional process of assigning value," Brady explains. This distinction is crucial.

Many AEs and startup founders waste their discovery calls uncovering surface-level product problems instead of building a compelling business case.

I’ve personally experienced this challenge when I was at Submarine.

We would go right into demoing our subscription app or preorder app, without getting context around the overall business goals and objectives.

Without that we were left with not knowing how high of a priority Submarine’s solutions were for the brand.

And that also meant we had a hard time knowing if there was a deadline for the prospect in making a decision.

We realized we needed to establish the value first by getting this information.

Doing so helped us more accurately forecast our pipeline. And if you can’t forecast, it makes it feel like every deal has the same level of priority, when that’s not the case.

You need to have deal priority if you’re running a sales motion.

GTM Generalist Takeaway: Structure your discovery calls to uncover three key elements:

• A compelling business case for your software

• A committed champion on the buyer side

• Clear path to consensus with the buying committee

Engineering Your Follow-Up Framework

Forget creative follow-up strategies with lengthy emails about features and integrations. Thank goodness!

Brady's framework is refreshingly simple:

1. First follow-up: A succinct email recapping aligned value from the initial call

2. Second follow-up (two days later): "Have you had a chance to review and reflect on our conversation?"

3. Third follow-up: Adapts based on prospect's response or lack thereof

Using Superhuman, Brady tracks email opens and frequency.

High open rates signal engagement and warrant faster follow-up. After 2-3 touches, he can usually tell if a deal will progress.

GTM Generalist Takeaway: Before sending any follow-up, ask yourself:

• Can my champion defend this in front of their CFO tomorrow?

• What's my champion stuck on today that I can unblock?

• Am I helping their internal buying process or adding to their workload?

If you want to see this follow up playbook more in-depth, reply to this email with “Superhuman playbook” and I’ll send it to you!

Email as a Bridge, Not a Destination

While email is crucial, Brady's win rate increases by 50% when he gets prospects on follow-up calls rather than relying solely on email communication.

Here's what most GTM generalists miss: Spend 5-7 minutes at the end of your first call planning the agenda for the second call.

This small investment prevents your pipeline from becoming bloated with deals lacking clear next steps.

GTM Generalist Takeaway: Without an intentional approach to follow-up calls, you'll create more work for yourself. Each new deal without clear next steps adds complexity to your follow-up process and makes prioritization impossible. And you can’t afford to waste time on unnecessary pipeline hygiene.

The Enterprise Evolution: From Templates to Tailored Outreach

Brady's transition from mid-market to enterprise sales required significant adaptation.

Mid-market typically involved one decision-maker, while enterprise deals involve multiple stakeholders and longer cycles.

In enterprise deals, Brady learned to think like a quarterback, strategically directing teammates to contribute their expertise at crucial moments.

Whether leveraging partner relationships or executive influence, he coordinates multiple "plays" to move deals forward.

"In enterprise sales, you can't go it alone," Brady explains.

"Success comes from knowing exactly when to bring in the right internal experts to address specific stakeholder concerns."

If you’re not handling enterprise deals, you can still GTM generalists looking to scale their approach, I recommend a systematic review process: Sit down with your CEO, head of product, and head of customer success to analyze your top 5 won deals and top 5 lost deals.

Then look specifically at deals with longer-than-average cycles - you'll often find gaps in follow-up strategy or enablement materials.

GTM Generalist Takeaway: Use this analysis to identify where you need MVP enablement pieces to help similar deals progress to the next call. Working with your leaders to build these pieces helps you build a scalable follow-up playbook.

Beyond Case Studies: Making Performance Personal

Building custom case studies for every prospect isn't realistic.

Instead, Brady pulls anonymized performance data from similar brands to move deals forward.

"When it comes to validation of the numbers, especially if you're the premium option, you need a quantitative way to justify a higher price point," Brady explains.

He shows prospects results from five similar brands with matching order volumes, demographics, and verticals.

GTM Generalist Takeaway: Screenshots and screen shares of actual performance data often feel more authentic than polished case studies. This approach lets you have more relaxed, human conversations rather than scripted pitches.

The Discipline of Inbox Zero

Brady processes 20-100 emails daily, completing 50 emails in just 30 minutes during his mid-market days.

As a GTM generalist, I find myself constantly context switching between deals.

Each email requires me to pause, recall the deal context, and dig through Hubspot notes - a common challenge when you're juggling sales alongside other responsibilities.

Brady's secret? Memorization and systemization.

"For me, usually, it's an element of memorization to remember where that deal is going and what you want out of it," he explains.

He can look at a prospect's email domain and immediately recall their place in the deal cycle.

His approach is intentionally streamlined: "I rarely send emails that are over three paragraphs long, unless I'm really trying to get a point across and they're unwilling to meet.

Most of the time, I'm either pushing for a call or pushing for the close."

Brady also has systematized his early-stage follow-ups through templates and shortcuts.

"If I have six net new conversations in a day, I can send out six emails in four minutes because it's very systemized.

For follow-up calls, I use a shortcut for my discovery follow-up - done, send that across. Pretty simple, unless there was something very specific covered on the call that I'll attach."

GTM Generalist Takeaway: The key isn't just organization - it's having a clear next step for every deal in your pipeline. Most follow-ups should either push for a call or push for the close. With the right system in place, you can achieve the same efficiency in your follow-up process.