Discovery Recap: the follow-up email after a discovery call
A Discovery Recap is written from one call you have reviewed. It lists the facts you accepted from that call, the people whose position changed and the questions it left open, and it drafts the follow-up email: six sentences at most, closing on one next step.
Updated
What should a follow-up email after a discovery call say?
What they told you, in their own words, and one next step. Six sentences or fewer, to the people who were on the call, with nothing in it they did not say.
A follow-up has two jobs: show them you heard it, and ask for one thing. Everything else in the email competes with those two. A feature recap, a case study or an agenda for a meeting nobody agreed to makes the reply harder, not easier.
Use their words, not your summary of them. “Your current contract auto-renews at the end of January, with what you think is ninety days' notice required to make a change” is something the reader recognises; “we discussed stakeholder alignment” is something they have to translate. If they didn't name a time for the next step, ask them to pick one. Don't propose a slot they never agreed to.
What do I leave out of a follow-up email?
Everything they didn't say, and every question but one. This call left one question open, and the email doesn't ask it; its one question is the next step. The recap's “Questions the call left open” block keeps it.
What is the quantified business impact or cost of the night desk exception chasing (e.g., labor costs, delayed shipments, SLA penalties)?
Understanding baseline figures and targeted outcomes is necessary to build a compelling business case.
Discovery call with Marta · 14 May
The questions for the next call are the Discovery Brief's job.
Discovery call follow-up email template
Copy this and fill the brackets from the call. Keep their words, cut any line they didn't give you, and stop at six sentences.
[First names of everyone on the call],
Thank you for the time today. You told me [the problem, in the words they used].
You said [why it matters now, in their words].
[One more thing they said that the next step depends on. Cut this line if there isn't one.]
Would you [the one next step]? Suggest a time that works for you and I'll fit around it.
[Your name]
Discovery call recap template
A discovery call recap says what one call settled, who it added or changed and what it left open, then gives your next moves, the follow-up email and the CRM lines. The template below is the Discovery Recap's seven blocks, in order.
Download the blank template: Markdown.
These are the sections SalesWolf's Discovery Recap is built from. Most are written from one call you have reviewed and the facts you accepted from it; “Your next two or three moves” and “Your CRM paste” also read where the whole deal stands. A section with nothing to stand on says what it's missing instead.
One of them is written out in full below, on the sample deal.
What came out of the call
Two or three sentences for someone who wasn't on the call: what it was, and the one thing that moved the deal. If nothing moved it, say so.
What went onto the deal
What this call put on the deal, one line each, against its letter: only what you accepted, nothing added.
Who's new, and who changed
Everyone this call added or changed: what changed about them, and the part they play in this deal.
Questions the call left open
The questions the call raised and didn't settle, each with why it matters.
Your next two or three moves
Two or three moves, each naming who you go to and what you need from them. Weakest letter first, and a move that settles a question this call left open beats a generic follow-up.
The follow-up email, ready to send
Six sentences at most, to the people who were on the call: what they told you, in their words, and one next step.
Your CRM paste
Where the whole deal stands now, not only what this call changed: one line per field, for you to paste into your CRM.
Customer Email Draft
DraftHi Marta, Thanks for the time today. Two people on your night desk spend their shifts chasing carrier exceptions and phoning carriers when updates arrive late or go missing. Updates are not checked automatically against the shipment plan. That falls under Owen Blake's systems area. Your current contract auto-renews at the end of January, with what you think is ninety days' notice required to make a change. What time works for you next week to connect with Owen and walk through how this fits into your operations?
When you reach for it
Monday, while the call is still in your head and before the next one starts.
This is what comes out.
What goes in is the call you already had.
Your file is read in your browser and never uploaded. The text stays with the deal until you delete the deal, and is removed from the database 90 days after that.
14 days free, no card, no call.