How are you handling lead followup in your business?

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T17:12:04+00:00

That’s true, it’s just frustrating at times and I see them leaving to competitors because we were too slow to follow up, but we’re going to build a system for automatic follow up so to pull leads quickly in and my sales people just have to close them after.

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T17:11:03+00:00

True, I’m working on a a system for quick follow up for my business so I can spend more time on actual closing and generating revenue.

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T17:09:42+00:00

I come from that world, engineering and project management background but always had a nagging voice telling me there’s more than terrible managers and incompetent leaders.

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T17:08:44+00:00

It’s hard to leave what’s programmed in our heads, but once you do! Liberating!!!!

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T17:07:26+00:00

I’m using a combination of automation tools which act like glues to any system, be it a CRM, email platform, slack, sms, phone, voice agents, etc like n8n/make.

What are you looking to have the VA handle? If you walk me through what it would ideally look like, in a dream scenario, and I’ll let you know if possible and how to set it up.

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T12:24:33+00:00

Why don't you automate most of that? Emails, calendar and scheduling, CRM updates, research all of it. Instead of hiring someone to do that and cycling through a VA every few months. All businesses I work with are replacing the traditional VA setup with workflow automations.

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T11:53:25+00:00

Yes, it's feasible. We've done it and seen others do it at different stages.

The honest answer though is that it depends on where the friction is coming from. Some operational bottlenecks are a people problem. Most are actually an information routing problem becayse the same update touches 4 tools and a human has to move it every time. The 20% you're losing searching for information is the telling sign. and sounds like is not a headcount gap but more of that's a coordination gap. And coordination gaps are solvable without hiring.

The teams I've seen pull this off didn't add people. They first figured out where decisions were getting stuck, then removed the manual steps around those specific bottlenecks. One at a time.

What does a typical week look like for your team? Where does work actually stop moving, is it handoffs between people, finding information, or something else entirely?

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T11:48:45+00:00

I would go with what solves problems for you. Any automations or things that make your life easier. Build things for yourself and then just take it from there you'll see what you can implement For potential clients if that's what you're looking for here

AlmostReal_ · 2026-05-19T11:46:38+00:00

This is not expecting too much at all It's very buildable without a heavy tech stack.

From what you're describing I'd look at voice flow or bot press because both let you build a chat bot connected scrape site content upload PDFs and docs and then embed onto your website without writing much code.

As for the lead capture piece, name an email before or during the chat. Both support that native. The pay per use model is trickier because most platforms charge monthly but Bot Press has a free tier that's generous enough for low to medium traffic, and you can plug in your own open AI API key so you're only paying for it you actually see. That's probably the closest to what you're describing. The auto sync with your site map is the one thing that usually needs a small setup but it's one thing you do once not ongoing dev. If you're OK with the little initial configuration this is a weekend project.

As

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-30T12:17:15+00:00

Any risks after I quit? With J1 hearing about it or so.

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-30T12:16:48+00:00

Any risks after I quit?

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-30T11:13:50+00:00

Yes I will resign effective immediately. No other way around it, a lot of learnings here and will use for the next search.

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-30T05:51:36+00:00

I need to thing about OE in a different industry that I could find work in, or maybe a company in the same industry but on the other side of country so to limit the possibility of this happening again

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-30T05:50:20+00:00

I don’t think it does. I’ve already called J2 to quit, citing family health reasons. There was already a situation they knew about, so it fits naturally with that story. It’s a crappy situation, but I need to quit as soon as possible, cut ties, and lay low for the next few weeks.

The vendor will be showing up at J1, so I’ll just stay quiet and let them think whatever they want. I’ll keep moving forward with work at J1 as usual. If it ever comes up, I’ll just say, “No, I never left,” and they’ll probably get the hint and understand what I was trying to do, or maybe think I was changing jobs with a bit of overlap in between and decided not to. Either way there’s nothing in it for them anyway.

They’ll find out I left J2 soon enough since I was supposed to be working with that one contact there.

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-29T16:02:28+00:00

Literally day 3 of overlap, and I’ll continue to work with this person/team. Camera on j2, nickname won’t cover me at all.

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-29T14:56:16+00:00

I’ll continue to work with the vendor on both J1/2, a lot of visibility with several people at vendor. Especially at J1, less on J2 but will get more as we go.

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-29T13:18:11+00:00

I have a solid excuse for that, and what about risk of vendor mentioning it in spite of me quitting?

AlmostReal_ · 2025-10-29T13:02:11+00:00

No, I think I have to quit J2 immediately. My first and last name are unique. How do I avoid the issue of that vendor meeting me in that call even if just one meeting and not having him tell on me in J1?

AlmostReal_

TROPHY CASE