How To Write a Follow-Up Email With 10+ Templates & Examples

You’ve probably seen or written one of these follow-up emails before:

Although a bland follow-up like this can generate responses from time to time, it doesn’t actually add any value; thus, it is ineffective at generating high response rates. 

Ultimately, poor follow-up will ruin your chances of sending effective emails.

You may think: why should I even care?

After analyzing 65 million email messages, we found out that 55% of cold email campaign replies come from a follow-up.

Thus, it's crucial to master the art of writing effective follow-ups if you want to succeed with cold email outreach.

To help, I’m going to teach you how to craft an effective reminder email that will ensure your prospects respond. I will go over the structure of highly effective follow-up emails, as well as templates, and sample emails for sending out your own.

Let’s start by looking into the key takeaways for writing a follow-up email.

• How To Write a Follow-Up Email

• 8 Follow-Up Email Best Practices

• 3 Common Follow-Up Email Mistakes To Avoid

• 6 Tools To Send Better Follow-Up Emails

• 10 Follow-Up Email Examples and Templates

• Best Way To Send Follow-Up Email

How To Write the Perfect Follow-Up Email

While different follow-ups work for different situations, the same principles apply most of the time. 

Keep the following things in mind when writing follow-up emails.

1. Use Follow-Up Email Format

Your follow-up email format should consist of the following key components:

1. Subject line

2. Greeting

3. Opening line

4. Body text

5. Call to action (CTA)

Let’s go through each one and what they should consist of.

Follow-Up Email Subject Line

The best practice is to keep your emails under the same thread as your previous emails, meaning you don’t need to switch up the subject line. This way, your prospects don’t have to guess who you are and can easily recognize your original emails.

Make sure your initial outreach email subject line is catchy to get a high open rate for your follow-up email. If you need help with crafting one, check out our article on the best cold email subject line examples.

Follow-Up Email Greeting

You shouldn’t overcomplicate the greeting line in your follow-up email.

Here are a few simple examples that work: 

• Hey {{first.name}},

• {{first.name}}, 

• Hopefully you’re doing well {{first.name}}!

You'll be fine as long as the greeting line is not too pushy and spammy.

Follow-Up Email Opening Line

The opening line is the first sentence after your greeting line. If you’ve had a previous email exchange with the recipient, this is a good place to remind them of what you talked about. 

This could mean adding a following line:

• Thanks for attending the {{webinar.name}} webinar yesterday!

• It was nice talking with you at the {{conference.name}} last week.

Anything that brings familiarity to the email recipient is good. For example, if the person reading your outgoing email is a potential employer, you should give them a friendly reminder of the previous job interview.

If you haven't had any previous conversations with the recipient, it's harder. In that case, you can use platforms like LinkedIn to find personalization points to the opening line.

A personalized open line to cold prospects could look like this:

• I saw your LinkedIn post about growing your sales team. Congratulations!

• Wanted to check if you've filled the {{job title}} you're hiring for?

• I saw your talk at {{event}} and found your points on {{subject}} particularly interesting.

As a thumb rule, don’t make your opening line the same as the subject line. For a prospect looking at their inbox, the same opening line and subject line look like this:

Wasting prime inbox real estate like this is a surefire recipe for unanswered emails.

Follow-Up Email Body text

This is the body of your email, where you get to share additional details about your product or service.

You will want to provide details on how it works and why the reader should be interested in making a purchase. Make sure to keep it concise and to the point so that it’s not overwhelming for the reader.

We have some great examples of the email body down below in the templates section, so if you need inspiration, keep reading.

Follow-Up Email Call To Action (CTA)

Usually at the end of the email, just before the email signature, having a powerful CTA is crucial. Some good examples of CTAs are the following:

• Is this something you are qualified to discuss? If not, who should I contact?

• Would you be available on Friday to discuss {{main.benefit}}?

• Should I check back in a few months?

• Would you like a free audit for this?

• Interested?

As you can see, it can take many forms and it depends on your business goals with the email.

A good CTA is what motivates people to take action and respond to your follow-up.

2. Establish Goals For Your Follow-Up Email

Without a clear objective of what you want to achieve with your follow-up, it can come across as confusing to the person reading it.

This is what I mean by a confusing email:

While the goal here is clear: to get a call, it is not delivered well enough for the recipient. It's confusing instead.

To make sure your email comes as clear for the person who reads it, make sure:

• The email body communicates what you want

• A clear call to action (CTA) is included

• You don’t have typos in your text

No matter if you're a job seeker doing a job application email or a sales rep working on sales follow-up emails, you should keep these points in mind.

3. Give The Prospect a Reason To Respond

Why should a prospect bother to respond to your follow-up message?

If there is nothing for him, it’s highly likely that you will not get a response. For that reason, you have to focus on providing something for him with the follow-up email.

Here are four ways to do that:

1. Show the benefit. Come up with a benefit of why the reader should respond to you. Here are sentences you could use to show the benefit:

• “I have an idea that could provide {{company.name}} with its 50 next customers. Up for a quick 15-minute chat?”

• “Our team helps {{company.name}} increase bookings through Google Ads. A client of ours saw a 5x increase in conversions after we updated their campaigns.

• “Since we only get paid if we deliver results, there really isn't anything to lose!

2. Describe the pain point. What’s your potential customer struggling with? Combine their pain point with your solution, and they'll be eager to respond. Here are a few examples of that: 

• “In our previous talk, you mentioned that you’ve had struggles with making your paid ads profitable. We helped {{company.name}} in the same niche to get {{x.results}} with a minimal budget. Would you like to discuss how we could do it for you?”

• “Saw that you’re using {{[your.competitor}} on your website for customer support. Our customers who migrated from [[your.competitor]] have cut their support tickets in half thanks to our smart automation.

3. Ease the sales objections. Sales objections (the hesitations your prospect has about your product) act as a barrier to purchase. It is, therefore, important to ease them in. In a follow-up email, you can do it with sentences like this:

• “On top of the information you requested, I have attached some estimations based on our past campaign performance. We estimate you are likely to gain {{x-times}} better results within [time frame].”

• I just reviewed your website and wanted to share some suggestions that might help improve conversion rates (we've tested these with clients and in some cases saw conversion rates double). 

4. Add social proof. Adding social proof to your follow-up could be the nudge you need to get a response. Depending on the purpose of your email, here are a few sentences for adding social proof:

• “Forgot to include some of the previous articles we’ve done for other companies. I attached them to this email.”

• We recently worked with {{company.name}}, and they saw a 3x ROI increase in under a month.

• I forgot to share my CV and contact details for my job interview. I’ve attached it here so you can see my previous work and contact info.

You don't have to include all those key details in one follow-up email. Instead, do A/B testing of different versions and see what works best for your campaign.

Learn more: What To Say In a Follow-Up Email

4. Keep Follow-Up Emails Under The Same Thread

When sending a follow-up email, in most cases, you should keep it under the same thread as your initial message and send it from the same email address.

This way, the respondent doesn’t have to go back and try to find your original message from another email thread if they don’t know what the follow-up is about.

On ESPs like Gmail, you can do this by directly replying inside the initial thread.

If you use a cold email solution like QuickMail, you can make this automatic by creating an email sequence inside our dashboard. When a prospect doesn’t reply to your email, you can add a follow-up step to send a reply automatically.

P.S. You can create automated follow-up emails with QuickMail. Get started with a free 14-day trial.

8 Follow-Up Email Best Practices

Okay, we’ve given you the practical steps required to write the perfect follow-up email. Now let’s share our top best practices to help generate more opens and replies from your follow-ups:

1. Give Context About Your Initial Message

Remember: this isn’t the first email in your sequence. And while not every recipient will have opened or replied to your original message, some will.

So it makes sense to reiterate the key points from your initial email in your first follow-up (and, optionally, in subsequent follow-ups too).

Of course, you don’t need to copy-paste your entire initial message into your follow-ups. Keep things simple by:

• Mentioning when you last spoke (e.g. “It was great to speak to you at [event] last week.”)

• Reminding the email recipient what you spoke about (e.g. “I reached out last week to discuss [conversation topic].”)

Sum up your original email in 1-2 sentences, then dive into the rest of your follow-up.

2. Restate Your Goal

Having provided valuable context for your follow-up message, now’s the time to remind your prospect why you’re keen to strike up a conversation with them.

Most likely, your goal is to arrange a meeting or generate a response to a previous conversation (such as a sales pitch).

Again, you’ll want to state your goal in a sentence or two. This clarifies what you want the prospect to do next, which encourages them to reply.

3. Ensure Each Follow-Up Adds Value

The whole purpose of sending follow-up emails is to generate replies. And you’re not going to achieve that by simply “chasing up” recipients. Each and every follow-up you send needs to add value, giving your prospect a clear reason to open, read, and respond.

There are lots of ways you can do this. For instance, you might:

• Share a relevant news story, a market report, or a piece of original content you’ve created

• Provide a case study featuring an existing customer in the prospect’s industry

• Recommend a free tool or resource to overcome a common pain point

When you send valuable emails, your prospects will start to view you as a trusted subject-matter expert rather than just another salesperson. Which means they’re more likely to buy from you.

4. Send Multiple Follow-Up Emails

The biggest mistake most sales teams make is to give up after sending a single follow-up email.

That’s a bad move, with our research revealing that the highest email reply rates come after sending three follow-ups.

To be clear, we’re not suggesting you spam your email recipients. That’ll get you flagged as spam, which will harm your email deliverability.

Instead, remember to keep adding value at each step and test different CTAs to encourage responses.

5. Always Send Personalized Initial & Follow-Up Emails

Identical, generic mass emails are quick and easy to send — but they don’t get results. Instead, personalize every follow-up message in your sequence. 

At the very least, you should be mentioning basic details like the prospect’s name, role, and company. But for best results, you’ll want to get even more personal with custom icebreakers, calls to action, and more.

Now, you’re probably thinking: “That doesn’t sound very scalable.”

If you’re doing everything manually, you’re right — it’d take way too long to create highly personalized emails for every recipient.

But with QuickMail, the process is quick and easy. Use attributes to personalize subject lines, names, opening lines, CTAs, signatures, and more.

Learn more: Cold Email Personalization: The Complete Guide 

6. Follow Up Quickly (But Not Too Quickly)

We’ve already mentioned how sending regular, frequent emails is the best way to boost replies.

But there’s another key factor: timing.

Fact is, following up in the ideal period can make or break your campaign. So what is a reasonable time to leave between emails?

As a general rule, the ideal time interval for sending follow-up emails is around 3-5 business days after your initial email (assuming you haven’t received a reply within this period). This demonstrates that you’re serious about building business relationships with your prospects, without getting too pushy.

QuickMail makes this process simple by letting you add wait steps to outreach sequences, so you can send follow-ups after a defined delay — in days, hours, or even minutes.

7. Get To the Point

Your prospects are busy people, so lengthy messages won't get you anywhere. 

Encourage recipients to read and respond to your messages by keeping things short and direct (while still being polite and professional).

Don’t forget that you’re not trying to close the deal in a single follow-up email. Your primary goal is to start a conversation, which will hopefully turn into a sale down the line. So there’s no need to provide a ton of detail about your product at this stage.

8. Sense-Check Before You Hit "Send"

Last but not least, be sure to read over every message in your sequence — from the initial email to the final follow-up — before launching your campaign.

It only takes a couple of minutes, but it reduces the chances of any embarrassing typos, grammatical errors, or formatting mistakes slipping through. Which, in turn, will make your emails look more professional.

Different approaches work for different people, but we find the best tactic is to read your messages out loud. If something sounds super clunky, take the time to rewrite it.

3 Common Follow-Up Email Mistakes To Avoid

Winning follow-up emails don’t just take into account the best practices we shared in the previous section. They also avoid these common mistakes:

1. Don't Say You're "Just Checking In”

It’s easy to dismiss an email that starts with “just checking in” because you can be pretty sure it’s not going to add any real value.

Clearly, the writer isn’t prepared to put in the hard yards — they just want a response. Unfortunately, just like any low-effort cold outreach tactic, it rarely works.

2. Don't Mention "Following Up" in the Subject Line

Another big red flag.

If you use some variation of the phrase “follow-up” in your email subject line, don’t expect many opens (let alone replies). Your subject line should compel the recipient to click, not make them feel like they’re being harassed.

We generally find the best approach is to stick with the same subject line as your initial email. But you’ll want to A/B test different follow-up subject lines to see what works for you.

The only time when this rule doesn’t apply is if you’ve already spoken to a prospect and agreed to send them a follow-up containing additional information, meeting notes, or next actions. In that case, it makes complete sense to add “following up” to your subject line.

3. Don't Be Demanding

Effective cold outreach campaigns don’t nag prospects into responding — they make people want to reply by adding genuine value and clear CTAs.

So you should never be too demanding with your follow-ups. It’ll make your prospects feel as if you’re setting them homework, which is never a good way to get them on-side. 

6 Tools To Send Better Follow-Up Emails

It’s pretty much impossible to nail your email ramp-up while also making every email in your sequence feel totally personal. That’s why you need to choose the right cold outreach and email marketing tools to handle some of the leg work.

Here are six of the best options:

1. QuickMail

Pricing: $49 – $129 per month 

The best way to run efficient, high-performing cold outreach campaigns is to automate labor-intensive tasks like sending follow-up messages and personalizing individual emails. And if you’re going to send automated follow-up emails, you need a third-party email outreach tool like QuickMail.

QuickMail is a cold email software tool that lets you…

• Build automated email sequences to foster positive connections

• Personalize emails at scale through custom attributes

• Stay out of spam folders through inbox warmup and deliverability monitoring

• Integrate with CRMs, email service providers, email verification tools, and other essential platforms

• Reach out via multiple channels to boost response rates

…and lots more besides!

Learn more: Case Study: GrowthLabz Drives Lead Generation With QuickMail 

2. GMass

Pricing: $25 – $145 per month

As the name suggests, GMass lets Gmail users send bulk email campaigns from the comfort of their inbox. Let’s take a look at some of its key features:

• Exceed Gmail’s standard sending limits, allowing you to send thousands of emails per day

• Built automated follow-up sequences with up to eight steps

• Personalize emails via mail merge by integrating with Google Sheets

3. Yesware

Pricing: $0 – $65+ per seat per month

Yesware is part-outreach platform, part-prospecting database. Use it to:

• Run multichannel campaigns combining emails, cold call reminders, and LinkedIn InMails

• Receive notifications when prospects read an email, click a link, or view an attachment

• Track down prospects from a database of 100+ million business profiles

4. OutreachBin

Pricing: From $19.97 per email account per month

OutreachBin is an email warm-up service and outreach tool that helps you improve email deliverability and build automated email sequences. Key features include:

• Improve your sender reputation through inbox warmup, helping you avoid spam folders

• Create automated follow-up sequences with multiple steps and time-based delays

• Limit how many emails you send per step, per day

5. MailFlow

Pricing: $0 – $99 per month

MailFlow is a pure email warm-up service. So, unlike OutreachBin, you can’t use it to send outreach campaigns — but on the plus side, it’s a lot cheaper! Here’s what it does:

• Monitor nearly 100 email blacklists so you know if your account gets flagged as spam

• Improve email deliverability by warming up new accounts

• Generate daily sender reputation reports

6. InTouch Tool

Pricing: From $0 – $12 per user per month

As you may have guessed, InTouch Tool is a LinkedIn automation platform. So it won’t help you send follow-up emails, but you can use it alongside your existing email tool — because multichannel campaigns typically see higher open and reply rates. Key features include:

• Send automated connection requests to second and third-degree contacts

• Build automated LinkedIn drip campaigns to reach first-degree connections

• Understand when it’s safe to increase activity levels without breaching LinkedIn’s sending rules

10 Follow-Up Cold Email Templates & Examples To Use Today

Next, let’s jump into the best follow-up templates and email examples for different scenarios. 

We have divided all the sample email templates into their own categories. No matter which type of email you want to send, you can easily find a suitable template email here.

1. Polite Follow-Up Email Template

If a prospect showed interest initially, but you haven’t heard back from them afterward, you can send them a polite follow-up email.

Here is a polite follow-up email sample to use in professional settings:

Template

Subject line: Quick follow-up on our last discussion

{{prospect.first_name}},

I know you have a busy schedule, and there is a chance my last email got lost. 

Just wanted to check in on the previous conversation we had regarding {{prospect’s company}} and the {{prospect’s pain points}} you’ve faced. 

How does your calendar look? Would you have time for a quick 15-minute call Friday morning? I think I’ve got a solution.

Best,

{{inbox name}}

When you bring up the pain points of your prospect as well as a possible solution, it’s hard for them to ignore your polite request.

Example

Here is an example of the polite follow-up email template in use:

2. Client Follow-Up Email Template

Whether we want it or not, following up with clients is necessary.

Some may be potential clients, some may be unresponsive clients who need warming up.

Check out these templates for help.

Template (Unresponsive Client)

If your client is not responding, here is a template to use:

Subject line: Still want to work together?

Hi {{prospect.first_name}},

I know you have a lot of work on your plate. Hopefully, that's the result of our work together in Q1! 

Are you planning to continue your lead generation campaigns next quarter? If so, we will start planning your campaigns. If not, we'll pause your campaigns, and you can restart them whenever you're ready. 

What do you prefer?

Best,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

Here is an example of the above template in use:

Template (Potential Client)

While the above template was for an unresponsive client, this works for a potential client:

Subject line: Quick question about {{company.name}}

Hi {{prospect.first_name}},

I thought you’d be interested in seeing this case study of how we helped a software company just like {{company.name}} redesign their key landing pages and increase their conversion rate by 20%. 

Do you have time for a quick chat to see if we can help {{company.name}} in a similar way? 

Best,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

This is how you could use the template for getting a potential client:

3. Meeting Follow-Up Email Template

If you’ve met someone at a conference or a seminar and heard about a challenge they’re facing or just want to stay in touch, a meeting follow-up email is a good idea. Use these messages to clarify key details from your meeting or request a follow-up meeting.

To bring familiarity, the email should start with a gentle reminder of where you’ve met and the topic of conversation.

Template

Here is an example template of that in action:

Subject line: We met at {{initial meeting location}}

Hey {{prospect.first_name}}

It was nice meeting you at {{prospect.custom.Meeting_Location}} over {{prospect.custom.Conversation_Topic}}! 

I wanted to ask how things are going with {{company.name}}? I'd like to know more about how you're handling this {{challenge}}?

I'm happy to share our playbook with you as well! 

Would you have time for a quick call in the next couple of days?

Thanks,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

This is what it could look like when put into action:

This template could be easily switched up a bit and used in a job search or hiring process. For instance, say you're writing an interview follow-up email. Instead of talking about a challenge the company is facing, refer to the previous job interview.

4. Meeting Request Follow-Up Email Template

You’ve struck up a conversation with a prospect and invited them to a meeting. So far, everything’s going great — but then they don’t respond. What gives? 

Don’t panic. Sure, it’s frustrating that things got derailed, but you can get them back on track with an effective meeting request follow-up email that reminds your prospect of the meeting topic and date.

Template

Here’s a template for your next meeting request follow-up email:

Subject line: Still on for our meeting on {{day}}?

Hi {{prospect.first_name}},

We spoke on the phone last week and arranged a meeting to discuss your lead generation challenges at {{company.name}}.

Can you confirm you’re still available on {{day}} at {{time}}?

Let me know so I can share my proposed agenda.

Looking forward to your reply,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

Here’s how this email template could look “IRL”:

Optionally, you could add a calendar link to this template so the email recipient can reschedule if the original meeting time doesn’t work for them.

5. Phone Call Follow-Up Email Template

Every time you have a call, send sales follow-ups to summarize what you discussed and add any additional details you promised. 

Here is a follow-up email you can use for that situation.

Template

Subject line: Follow up - {{prospect.first_name}} & {{your company name}} 

Hi {{prospect.first_name}},

It was great to learn about {{company.name}} and your upcoming plans on our call. The potential for you to scale your acquisitions with Facebook Ads is huge, and we'd love to help.

As agreed, I’ve attached a quotation with a breakdown of the cost structure and total price for a 3-month engagement.

Let me know if you have any additional questions after reviewing it. As soon as you are ready to move forward, I will send you our contract. 

Looking forward to your reply,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

This is what it looks like when sending the actual email:

6. Networking Follow-Up Email Template

If you’ve started a business or just want to network with another business owner, you could send them a networking email. Here is a template you can use if you do not get a response to your initial networking email.

Template

Subject line: Collab between [prospect’s company] and [your company] 

Hi {{prospect.first_name}}, 

I sent you an email last week about the potential collab between [your company] and [prospect’s company]. 

I’m in the early stages of building up my {{business type}} business, and after some research, {{company.name}} caught my eye.

Would you be open for a 30-minute chat sometime? I feel like it would be valuable to discuss some of the common problems we face in the {{business.type}} industry.

Best,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

Here is what the networking email template looks like in use:

7. Quote Follow-Up Email Template

If you’ve sent a quote to a potential customer and there is no response, you can follow-up with the following template.

Template

Subject line: Any questions about the quote sent on {{day}}?

Hi {{prospect.first_name}},

Did you review the quote for your upcoming design project at {{company.name}}? It covers everything from updating your logo to refreshing your email templates.

Do you have any additional questions on it that I can help answer?

Best,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

Here is the above template in use:

8. Finding The Right Person Follow-Up Email Template

If you use LinkedIn to find emails, you send an email but there is no reply, you can use the finding the right person follow-up. The goal is to find the right person, so it should be short and simple.

Template

Subject line: Are you the right person to talk to at {{company.name}}?

Hi {{prospect.first_name}},

Are you the right person at {{company.name}} to talk to about this? If not, would you be able to put me in touch with the right person to discuss this with?

Best,

{{inbox.name}}

Example

This is the above template in action:

9. Webinar Follow-Up Email Template

If you want more attendees to your webinars or if you want to sell your services afterward, webinar follow-up emails are useful.

Template (Before Webinar)

To increase the sign-up conversions for your webinar, use this template:

Subject line: Reminder of {{webinar.name}} webinar

Hey {{first.name}}, 

You can still save your seat for tomorrow’s {{webinar name}} webinar.

The webinar features an industry expert [name] who is sharing 

Plus, you get a free [product/service] as part of the webinar.

Reserve your seat from here: {{link}}

Example

This is how it could look in action:

Template (After Webinar)

After you’ve held the webinar, you should send a follow up to sell additional services or products. 

Here is a template for it: 

Subject line: Thanks for attending {{webinar.name}}

Hey {{first name}}, 

I hope you got some ideas on how to deal with your {{prospects.pain_point}} from yesterday’s webinar. 

Would you be open to having a 20-minute chat on Friday morning to see how we could implement these ideas directly into {{company_name}}?

Best,

{{inbox_name}}

Example

And, this is how to use it:

With a little editing, this could be used by sales professionals as a follow-up email template too.

10. The Break-up Email (Last Follow-Up)

The “break up” email acts as the last email in your email sequence. You should send it to prospects who haven’t replied to your original email (or any subsequent follow-ups).

As the prospect hasn’t responded at this point, there is a high chance they aren’t even the right person. 

For this reason, we like to keep it simple:

Template

Subject line: Final email

{{first name}},

Who is the best person on your team to coordinate a [your reason for contacting] for {{company.name}}? 

Best,

{{ınbox.name}}

Example

You can use the breakup email as follows:

Best Way To Send Follow-Up Emails

The question “how to write a follow-up email” changes depending on the subject matter of your previous message, but good follow-ups always follow the same principles. This applies even if you're a sales rep looking to boost your reply rate to get more sales or a person in a job interview process.

To send the actual follow-up message, you can do it through popular email service providers like Gmail or Outlook.

The only problem is that you have to manually send the follow-ups using these services.

If you want to set up automated email sequences for potential clients, consider QuickMail.

With QuickMail, you can follow up with clients automatically by creating varying email sequences. These can be timed to be sent out whenever you want.

Get started with a free 14-day trial.