Fatal Attraction and Being Ghosted by Prospects

Fatal Attraction is a brilliant psychological thriller with an unforgettable performance by Glenn Close. A story of infidelity and revenge. What’s great is how the tension and unease is built up over the course of the film, which is both gripping and hard to watch.

But to my analogy: what happens when your prospective client, who seemed so keen at first, suddenly goes quiet or ghosts you?

If you'd prefer to watch my video, click here. Otherwise, keep reading.

This can be a real source of frustration, particularly if you feel they are a great fit, you’ve qualified them, built up rapport in your early conversations and established their need to work with you.

Here are a few points to remember:

First, don’t make any negative assumptions.?

It can be very easy to jump to conclusions about what has happened, which can taint your relationship going forward.?

There could be any number of reasons why they haven’t returned your calls or replied to your emails, and the only thing you know for sure is that you don’t know why. So don’t try.

Secondly, remain professional in all your outreach attempts.?

This can be hard if you’ve made assumptions, but remember, even if they don’t respond, they will likely read your email or listen to your voice message - being rude or unprofessional won’t help you.

Third, where possible, keep the conversation moving forward.?

Use your emails to share information - that way you’re adding value and continuing to educate your prospect, giving them something tangible they can review.

Fourth, if you were supposed to meet or have a call, propose a new date to reschedule.?

Very often, there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for the prospect missing the appointment, so keep the momentum going.?

Either propose a new time for the prospect to confirm, use a scheduling app to let them choose, or be bold and simply send over a calendar invite with the new date and time - they’ll let you know if it doesn’t work for them.

Lastly, respect the fact that your time is valuable too.?

If you’ve tried a number of follow-ups and had no response, you may need to force the issue by sending an email acknowledging that perhaps now isn’t the right time for you to work together and you’ll try them again in 3-6 months.?

You will almost always get a response to that message, which could be an apology and agreement to catch-up, or it may be confirmation to push things back for a while.?

And if you are parking things, at least you’ll have paused the process on good terms.

Which is much better than bunnies being boiled!