Two Habits That Create Deal Momentum

Hello Predictable Revenue community,

Book update: we crossed 200 pre-orders and have 4 weeks to go, a big thanks to everyone that’s helped make it happen. Check the pre-sale benefits doc later today for the Hubspot next actions walkthrough. I also have a GPT for writing follow up emails that I’ll be adding shortly. Send me a pic of your pre-order to get access to everything.

Community update: I’m in SF for Apollo’s conference next week and am going to host a happy hour for anyone that wants come join - I’ll bring a few books to sign if anyone wants a pre-release copy. Hit me back and let me know, it’ll be Friday afternoon downtown somewhere.

Onto the newsletter…

You know follow-up matters. You also know that by Friday, you've been buried in fires and context-switching all week, and those "nurture" blocks you put in your calendar never happened.

Here's the thing about founder-led sales: it's not the big strategic stuff that kills deals. It's the tiny operational stuff. The follow-ups you forget. The next steps you don't schedule. The momentum that dies because you got busy putting out other fires.

I see this all the time. Founders who can pitch their product beautifully, who understand their market deeply, who can close deals when they're in front of the right person—but they lose opportunities because they don't have a system for staying on top of their pipeline.

Here's the fix: two stupidly simple habits that take 10 minutes a day plus one extra 10-minute Friday block. That's an hour a week (impressive math, right?). No fancy tooling. No elaborate sequences. Just consistent momentum on deals that actually matter.

Daily Disco and Follow Up Fridays.

Note - today's post builds on my post from last week about why you're not using your CRM correctly and my post from May about how to organize your different pipelines. We cover similar ground but zoom right in on how.

The Monkey Bars

Remember monkey bars when you were a kid? The secret wasn't strength—it was momentum. You had to maintain your momentum from one rung to the next, get stuck with two hands on the same bar and you're hooped.

Sales works exactly the same way.

Here's what most founders do wrong: They have a great discovery call. Perfect chemistry, good questions, real pain identified. Then, as the call winds down, they say "this sounds really interesting, let me put together some information and I'll send it over."

Click. Call ends.

You just let go of the bar without grabbing the next one.

While you're spending three days crafting the perfect follow-up email, your prospect gets pulled into budget meetings, fires they need to put out, and that other vendor who called them Tuesday morning with a concrete next step already scheduled.

The momentum you had during that call—their full attention, the context you built together, their engagement with the problem—that's your grip on the current bar. The moment you hang up without booking the next conversation, you've released your grip and hoped they'll catch you later.

They won't.

Here's the brutal truth: every deal you're working on, someone else is working on too. The founder who keeps momentum by booking the next step while they're still in the conversation is the one who moves forward.

Not because they're pushier. Because they understand that deals die in the gaps between conversations.

Daily Disco

Your objective: everyone in your Discovery pipeline has a next call booked.

This is the thing you do first when you sit at your desk in the morning. Before Slack (definitely before Slack), before email, before LinkedIn. I'd say before coffee, but let's be realistic here.

Here's the process:

1. Set a 10-minute timer. This keeps you from getting sucked into a rabbit hole. You can also do more if you happen to have the time. 

2. Pull up your Discovery pipeline, sorted by next action date. Overdue and today's tasks at the top.

3. For each contact, follow The Ladder:

• Call them first. If they answer, book the next step before you hang up.

• No answer? Leave a voicemail: "Hey [Name], quick question about [specific thing you discussed]. Call me back—[your number]."

• Optional text (only if you have good rapport): Reference the voicemail, ask them to call back.

• Email only if call/voicemail fail within 24 hours: Under 75 words, focus on their problem, include a binary question.

• If you've reached out 5 times in the last month with no response: Move them to nurture.

4. When the timer goes off, stop. This isn't about perfection; it's about building a sustainable habit.

The rule: nothing stays in Discovery without a scheduled next action.

Here's what actually happens when you start doing this: you realize half your "active" deals aren't actually active. People who've been sitting in your pipeline for months suddenly tell you they're not moving forward. That's not failure—that's clarity.

Follow Up Fridays

Your objective: 5 nurture touches every Friday.

The math: 5 touches × 50 weeks = 250 reopened conversations per year.

This isn't about being pushy. It's about being present when priorities shift. Most of the people in your pipeline aren't ready to buy when you first talk to them—but circumstances change. Companies get funding. Projects get approved. Competitors screw up. Your job is to be there when the timing finally aligns.

Two types of follow-ups:

High-context follow-ups (2-3 per week) — Personal touches that prove you remember the conversation:

• "Saw you raised that Series A you were working on—is now a good time to pick up our conversation about scaling your sales team?"

• "How did the project to rework your ICP go this summer? Still dealing with those lead quality issues we discussed?"

Theme-based emails (2-3 per week) — Tied to what's happening in their world: Think about what's happening in your buyers' world right now. Is it budget planning season? Conference season? Pick one theme for the month and run with it.

Structure: Under 100 words, lead with their pain, end with a question about priority.

Example: "Most [role] I talk to are struggling with [specific problem] heading into Q4. Is this top of mind for you right now?"

Your Friday ritual:

• Block 10 minutes

• Open your nurture pipeline

• Pick 5 people

• Send something (alternating between high-context and theme-based)

• Update their next action dates

I use two nurture cadences: monthly or quarterly. Everyone gets 3 months of monthly nurture, then drops to quarterly if they don't reply. I wrote a custom GPT for my clients to use to quickly generate these emails, reply with a screenshot of your pre-order receipt and I’ll send it your way.

Why This Actually Works

Consistency beats volume. Over the course of a year, buyers' priorities change constantly. The startup that couldn't afford you in Q1 might have just raised funding in Q3. The prospect who wasn't interested in January might be desperate for your solution in June when their current vendor screws up.

If your pipeline comes from outbound (like most of ours), 95% of people you meet aren't ready to buy when you first talk to them. But staying consistently in touch means you're much more likely to contact them right when your solution becomes relevant.

That 250 annual touches compounds in ways you can't predict: deals reopen when priorities shift, referrals come from people who remember you stayed in touch professionally, past customers re-engage when they change companies.

The system is self-correcting. Daily Disco forces pipeline cleanliness—deals that are truly moving forward stay in Discovery because you're constantly booking next steps. Deals that have cooled off naturally move to nurture when people stop responding.

I can’t help but notice that it’s Friday… Why not start today?

Don't let your deals die because you trusted your memory instead of building a system.

Collin

PS - If you found this helpful, forward it to someone who's tired of deals dying in their pipeline. And if someone forwarded this to you, I have a book coming out that’s packed with good stuff like this, you can pre-order it here.

PPS - the current pre-order benefits include a list of VCs (with category, cheque size, and lead/follow pref), a LinkedIn mini-course, a Hubspot mini-course (adding today), a GPT to write follow ups for your nurture deals, and more. You also get an invite to our monthly Q&A.