A customer who has not ordered for sixty days is not necessarily lost. They may buy every quarter, still hold stock, or be waiting for a dispute to be settled. A good follow-up starts by understanding that silence.
Set inactivity from the buying rhythm
A single threshold produces two errors: contacting occasional buyers too early and regular customers too late. Calculate the intervals between orders for the same outlet, over a long enough history. The median stands up to an exceptional interval better than an average, but a handful of orders is not enough to establish a reliable habit.
In a simulation, one customer orders roughly every 28 days, another every 85 days. At 60 days without a purchase, the first deserves a check; the second may simply be following its normal rhythm. An alert threshold at 1.5 times the usual interval would be a working rule to test, not a market standard. Check seasonality, closures and promotions before applying it.
Sort the causes before launching a campaign
| Situation to check | Useful information | First action |
|---|---|---|
| Stock still high | Last delivery and reported stock | Review the range together, without pushing overstock |
| Dispute or delay | Sales admin ticket and resolution commitment | Solve the problem before making a commercial offer |
| Change of contact | Current role and business contact details | Identify the right person |
| Seasonal purchase | History across several seasons | Get back in touch at the relevant moment |
| Range dropped | Reason given and alternatives considered | Understand the gap in the offer or the service |
| Objection to prospecting | Recorded preference | Exclude from sales follow-ups |
Check for duplicates as well: the recent order may have been recorded under another customer code. For multi-site chains, distinguish the outlet that receives the goods from the entity that is invoiced or centralises purchasing. A list of inactive accounts built at the wrong level sends inconsistent messages.
Is the inactivity confirmed once the rhythm and the channels have been checked?
- NoCorrect the signal
Match the missing orders or adapt the alert to seasonality.
- YesUnderstand what is blocking
Check stock, disputes and contact, then prepare a useful conversation.
A refusal to be contacted must be respected whatever the cause of the inactivity.
Write a message that justifies the contact
The first email can run to a few lines: recall the exact context, ask a useful question and propose a simple action. Avoid false pretexts, invented urgency and phrasing that assumes a need you have not verified.
Replace every piece of information with verified data. If you do not know the stock, ask for it; do not present a reorder as urgent. A relevant message can end with “call me back in November”. That answer has value: it lets you schedule a contact the customer expects and stop pointless follow-ups.
Plan an end to the sequence
For a small qualified base, a working sequence can be an initial message, a second contact bringing different information, then a pause if there is no reply. The interval depends on the buying cycle and on the relationship. It is neither a required number of messages, nor permission to press someone who has objected to being contacted.
Coordinate field sales, sales admin and marketing
An automated campaign must not keep running while the rep is talking to the customer. Record the answer, the owner and the next date in the CRM. A quotation request suspends the reactivation sequence; a dispute replaces it with a resolution follow-up.
Respect the rules on business prospecting
The French data protection authority’s guidance on electronic prospecting (CNIL, French) explains that B2B prospecting can rely on legitimate interest where the message relates to the recipient’s profession. The recipient must be informed that their contact details are used and be able to object simply and free of charge. Every message must identify the organisation and offer a simple way to refuse the next ones.
An objection must be carried through to the tools the team uses. Do not simply remove the contact from a file that will be re-imported the next day. Keep strictly the information needed to honour that preference, following your data protection policy. Having been a customer does not authorise unlimited retention, nor messages unrelated to the recipient’s professional activity.
Measure the extra orders, not only the replies
Track the eligible accounts, those actually contacted, those that replied and then ordered within a defined window. Add net contribution and the objections received. A promotion can increase the number of orders while reducing profitability; the margin calculation after discounts must go with the result.
- →Attribution: a purchase after a follow-up is not necessarily caused by it.
- →Comparison: if the size of the base allows it, a comparable group that was not contacted helps estimate the incremental effect.
- →Duration: check whether the customer reorders afterwards without an exceptional incentive.
- →Learning: the reasons for the silence should improve the offer, the service and the next selection.
With 80 customers contacted and 12 distinct customers placing an order, the gross reactivation rate is 15%. Without a point of comparison, you can say that twelve accounts ordered after contact; you cannot attribute those twelve reactivations to the follow-up. That distinction makes reporting more useful than a flattering campaign figure.
For following up straight after an appointment, the guide to AI-assisted sales follow-ups offers a sample message and a prompt to adapt to the requests actually made during the visit.
By Anatole Briant
By Anatole Briant
By Pierre Lerebours
CEO of Salesia
Anatole Briant is CEO of Salesia. He is your contact for demonstrations, pricing and partnerships.