If you’re tired of deals slipping through the cracks because someone forgot a follow-up, you’re not alone. Most sales teams waste hours every week chasing reminders and updating spreadsheets. If you’re using Profound and want to move leads through the pipeline faster—without babysitting every task—this guide is for you.
Let’s cut through the fluff and get practical about automating follow-ups in Profound so you can actually close more deals with less busywork.
Why Automate Follow-Ups? (And What Actually Matters)
Before we get to the how-to, a quick reality check.
What automation can do:
- Makes sure you never forget to follow up with a lead.
- Cuts repetitive admin work, like setting reminders or sending the same email over and over.
- Surfaces hot leads before they go cold.
What automation can’t do:
- Rescue a bad pitch or win over someone who’s not interested.
- Replace real relationship-building.
- Magically make people respond faster.
So, use automation to keep your pipeline healthy, not as a substitute for actual selling.
Step 1: Get Your Follow-Up Process Straight
Automating chaos just gives you faster chaos. Before you set up anything in Profound, map out your real-world follow-up steps.
Ask yourself: - After a lead comes in, what’s the first thing you do? - How many times do you follow up, and how often? - What counts as a “dead” or “won” deal in your process?
Pro Tip:
Write your follow-up flow on paper or a whiteboard. Don’t just copy someone else’s template. If your sales cycle is long and consultative, your follow-ups will look different from a quick SaaS trial.
Example of a basic follow-up sequence: 1. New lead comes in → Send intro email within 1 business day. 2. No response after 3 days → Send polite nudge. 3. Still no response after 7 days → Try a different channel (call or LinkedIn). 4. After 2 weeks of silence → Mark as “unresponsive” and move on.
You can always tweak this later. For now, clarity beats complexity.
Step 2: Set Up Automated Task Templates in Profound
Profound lets you create task templates and workflows so you don’t have to set reminders from scratch every time. Here’s how to do it:
1. Create a Task Template
- Go to the “Automations” or “Workflow Templates” section (naming may vary—Profound’s UI changes occasionally).
- Click “New Template” or “Add Workflow.”
- Give your template a clear name, like “Standard Lead Follow-Up.”
Include tasks like: - Send intro email - Schedule follow-up call - Check-in after demo - Send proposal
Set default due dates (e.g., “2 days after previous step”). Don’t cram every possible step in—just what you actually do for most leads.
2. Add Triggers
- Choose what kicks off the workflow: new lead, stage change, form submission, etc.
- Assign who the tasks land on (yourself, round robin, or a specific team).
Be careful:
Don’t over-trigger. If every status change spams your team with tasks, they’ll start ignoring them. Focus on triggers that matter, like “new lead assigned” or “deal moves to proposal sent.”
3. Make Tasks Actionable
Vague tasks like “Follow up” get ignored. Be specific: - “Email: Ask if they had a chance to review the proposal.” - “Call: Confirm decision timeline.”
If your templates are full of “check in” or “touch base,” rewrite them so future-you knows exactly what to do.
Step 3: Automate Reminders and Escalations
It’s easy to set a task and then forget it. Profound’s real value is in nagging you (or your team) when things slip.
1. Set Up Reminders
- For each follow-up task, add a reminder: email, in-app, or even Slack.
- Stagger reminders—one before the due date, one after if it’s still not done.
2. Use Escalations (But Don’t Overdo It)
If a high-value lead isn’t getting attention, set up an escalation rule: - Manager gets pinged if a follow-up is overdue by 2+ days. - Or, auto-reassign the task to someone else.
Don’t escalate everything. Save it for deals that actually matter, or your managers will just tune out the noise.
Step 4: Automate the Actual Outreach (Carefully)
Profound integrates with email and sometimes SMS. You can send automated emails as part of your workflow.
What works: - Sending a first-touch email automatically can save time. - Canned “bump” emails for no-reply situations are fine.
What doesn’t: - Over-automating later-stage follow-ups. People can smell a template a mile away. - Using the same message for everyone—personalization still matters.
How to set it up: - In your workflow template, add email steps. - Use merge fields (like name, company) so they don’t feel robotic. - Always review before letting Profound send anything on your behalf. Test it with your own address first.
Pro Tip:
Automate the routine stuff, but leave manual steps for high-value touches. A human-sent email is still worth more than a bot-blast.
Step 5: Review and Tune
Once your automation is live, don’t assume it’s perfect.
- Check your dashboard: Are tasks getting skipped? Are people ignoring reminders?
- Ask your team: What feels helpful? What’s just noise?
- Look at your deal cycle time. Did it get faster—or are you just getting more automated pings?
Trim what’s not working. There’s no prize for the most intricate workflow. If a step isn’t helping close deals, get rid of it.
What to Skip (Seriously)
It’s easy to get sucked into adding every possible automation Profound offers. Here’s what you can safely ignore (at least at first):
- Automating every single email: Not worth it. Focus on the first couple of touches.
- Complex conditional logic: Unless you have hundreds of leads a week, simple beats clever.
- Scoring/ranking automations: They sound cool, but unless you have tons of data, they mostly add noise.
- Over-customization: If you’re spending more time tweaking workflows than talking to leads, you’ve missed the point.
A Few Real-World Gotchas
- Notifications Fatigue: If your team gets pinged too much, they’ll tune out all reminders—including the important ones.
- Out-of-date Templates: If your process changes, revisit your templates. Nothing’s worse than an automated email referencing last quarter’s promo.
- “Set and Forget” Trap: Automation is not autopilot. Keep an eye on what’s actually happening.
Keep It Simple, Iterate Often
The best automation is invisible—it just works, and you barely think about it. Start with a basic follow-up sequence in Profound, automate the boring parts, and leave room for the human side where it counts.
Don’t try to build the perfect system on day one. Ship something simple, see what breaks, and keep improving. That’s how you actually close deals faster—and keep your sanity.