Struggling With Proposals and Follow Up? A Simple 17hats Sales Workflow for Small Businesses
If closing leads feels harder than it should, the problem probably isn’t the quality of your service, it’s your lead and sales process. Good news: By making these small, strategic tweaks and “stealing” my repeatable process will help you get the most out of 17hats and transform your conversion rates.
Let’s dive in…
1. Get leads on a discovery call
Anti-Phone Callers, Introverts, and anyone feeling nervous about discovery calls, don’t let internet “advice” keep you from building real connections. Discovery calls are where leads turn into clients, no lengthy sales script required. Show up, listen deeply, and use their own words to describe how you help them solve their problem. This is exactly how trust and rapport are built to help seal the deal. This is the magic of a great discovery call (and much harder to create in website messaging or DMs alone).
Inside 17hats: A simple lead capture form and online scheduler can automatically route new inquiries straight to a “Discovery Call” project, so you stop losing leads in your inbox and always know the next step.
2. Send a same-day actionable quote
The #1 reason discovery calls don’t convert is slow and confusing follow-up. Your leads shouldn’t have to chase you down or wonder what to do next to hire you, while you wait HOPING they do. Immediately following your discovery call, send a personalized quote and lay out exactly how to get started with you—accept the quote, sign the contract, pay the deposit. Lucky for you, 17hats makes this easy and seamless. No confusion, no hoping, just a clear call-to-action, which is exactly what you want.
Inside 17hats: When your quote, contract, and invoice are bundled in one seamless email, not to mention automated inside a 17hats workflow, sending a professional proposal the same day becomes your default, no longer something you procrastinate on.
3. Create (light) urgency to your quote
Ok, you’ve completed the discovery call and sent the quote… sit back and watch the money come in, right!? Wrong. The biggest mistake you can make is when you stop here because you’re leaving money on the table. Instead, lightly create urgency to help them make a decision by setting a “Valid Until” date within your quote and include a message about when their quote expires in the email. This not only helps prompt a decision but also enables 17hats to send automatic quote reminders as that date approaches.
Inside 17hats: This kind of “light urgency” feels supportive, not pushy, and works especially well when combined with clear next steps and automated reminder emails scheduled right inside your 17hats setup.
4. Follow up emails that get replies
Statistics show that over 80% of sales happen after the 5th follow up, while only 2% close on first contact—i.e. your discovery calls. Yet most service providers give up after the first email and blame it on ghosting. Why? I’ve had hundreds of conversations with my clients alike that they feel awkward following up for fear of being pushy or annoying. But genuine, caring follow ups—asking if they have questions and helping them feel valued—actually helps build trust. And following up multiple times, with the right words, helps leads make the best choice = working with you!
Inside 17hats: 17hats can help you streamline these touchpoints by combining to-dos and automated follow up emails so you stay consistent without needing to remember every single follow-up on your own.
Steal my lead workflow
You don’t need to reinvent your sales process or start from scratch.
Grab my Proven Lead Conversion Workflow: Turn Leads Into Clients in the 17hats Marketplace that includes discovery call online scheduling setup, exact wording for email follow ups (including my ghosting antidote 4-word email), quote templates, and a sample service contract to help you consistently convert leads into clients.
If you’re reading this and thinking, “This sounds amazing, but I’m newer to 17hats and I don’t even know where to start,” you are exactly who the 17hats Implementation Lab was built for.
In this 5-week, done-with-you program, you’ll map your unique client journey, configure your 17hats account correctly, and build a complete lead workflow—from first inquiry to signed contract and paid invoice—so these 4 steps happen automatically in your business FOR your business.
By the end of the Lab, you’ll walk away with a set up account, a working lead workflow, quote and proposal templates, follow-up email sequences, and the confidence to keep building additional workflows on your own.
Ready to stop losing leads and start booking more clients with 17hats?
Join the 17hats Implementation Lab and build your streamlined lead and sales workflow in the next 30 days.
FAQs: 17hats, proposals, and follow up
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A simple lead conversion workflow in 17hats usually starts with a lead capture form, routes new inquiries into a “Discovery Call” project, and then triggers your quote, contract, invoice, and follow up emails following the call. Designing these features to support your specific business and mapping these steps as a workflow creates professionalism and consistency within your business so every lead gets the same polished experience and you never forget to follow up with them.
If you want to learn how exactly to build this for your business, join us for the 17hats Implementation Lab!
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Immediately after a discovery call, you should send a personalized quote or proposal the same day, clearly outlining how you can help them, your price or rate, and exact next steps on how to get started. You have to make it crystal clear and easy for them to accept the quote, sign the contract, and pay you so they know exactly what to do. When you have templates and a custom workflow in 17hats, it takes minutes instead of hours and dramatically reduces the chance that you’ll forget or lose them as a lead.
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Aim to send your quote within a few hours and no later than 24 hours after the call so the conversation is still fresh in your lead’s mind. In the case that you need more time, either tell them on the discovery call when you will send them the quote or follow up with a brief email that you will send it the next day so they know what to expect. 17hats quote, contract, and invoice templates help you do this quickly and professionally without having to rebuild from scratch every time.
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In a 17hats quote, make sure you enter a clear “Valid Until” date and mention it in your email how long the quote is good for as a friendly nudge that creates urgency for them. This helps leads prioritize making a decision to work with you or not so that months don’t go by with no answer or a “I’m still thinking…” Based on this “Valid Until” date, 17hats will also send automated quote reminders before and after the expiration date, that are more reminders you don’t have to remember to send.
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The majority of sales close after multiple follow ups, so I would say to plan at least 3–5 check-ins over a couple of weeks instead of stopping after the first email. In 17hats, you can schedule these as a mix of to-dos and automatic emails so following up consistently feels organized instead of awkward.
We also cover this and specifically design this follow up stage for your specific business in the 17hats Implementation Lab, so join us to build your own Lead system today!
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Believe me when I say, I’m an introvert myself, and I convert most of my discovery calls. My best advice is to treat discovery calls as problem-solving conversations, not high-pressure sales pitches with scripts and perfect language. Use a few simple questions to guide your call to understand their problems, challenges, and goals, and when it’s the right fit, share how your offer can help them.
Plus, when you know 17hats will present your quote, contract, invoice, and follow up professionally and seamlessly, it becomes much easier to relax and focus on listening instead “getting it right.”
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Inside the 17hats Implementation Lab, I’ll help you setup your account and build out your full lead process—from inquiry to quote to follow up— step-by-step, with expert guidance on what to automate and how to customize it for your specific business. You’ll leave with a functioning lead workflow, quote templates, follow up sequences, and a clear roadmap for expanding your 17hats system beyond leads.
Want help building this inside your own account?
Learn more and join the 17hats Implementation Lab here
