How do you respond to no-show appointments? Like if you schedule a product demo or customer feedback meeting and when your prospects/existing customers don't show up, what's your first message to them? If you could share screenshots that'd be great. Thanks!

We generally just say something along the lines of “Hey, we waited for you on the call but there must have been a misunderstanding. Would you like to reschedule the call?” And then offer times for a new call, or a link to your calendly, or however you schedule things

Hey Jessie, thanks a ton for your response. One more question if you could help: if they don't want to reschedule the meeting and didn't show up on purpose what would you say then? Or to avoid this situation would you ask the reason for the no-show in your first response itself?

For existing customers, I’d re-explain the reason that we need to meet, because if we had a call scheduled, there was a very good reason and it still needs to happen. I would not ask why they didn’t show, it doesn’t really matter and most likely they just forgot. For prospective customers, if they reply to the email saying they don’t want to reschedule, yeah I’d send a very short follow up asking, basically, why - something like: “Could you tell me why you’ve decided not to go with our company? It would be really helpful for us to create a better product/service moving forward.” Something low pressure and polite. Most people won’t respond to that, but some will and you could get some good feedback

Woah! These are some great insights. Thank you so much for sharing!

I do the same as Jessie for product demos with prospects. I got a snippet that I paste into Calendly to cancel the call after 10 minutes. Can’t wait more than that 🤷 Something like:

Hi X,

Looks like you weren’t able to make it. Feel free to schedule another call here: [link]

You can also send us an email at XY, check out our help center, and watch tutorials on our YouTube channel.

Sometimes, they notice that their questions are answered in the help center and don’t book another call. Calendly also has a “mark as no-show” option, which doesn’t send reminder emails anymore.

Mine is just like @loud-doctor-98656’s. If you’re experiencing a lot of no-shows @bland-truck-75397 consider doing SMS reminders or a reminder right before (like 5 minutes) because if you do it too far ahead (like a day!) people often honestly forget. We cut no-shows by 30% by implementing SMS reminders

That’s a great point. 5 minutes is great too. I know at my company, my coworkers and I all struggle with getting notified 10 min before, but then getting distracted in that 10 min and still showing up late to the meeting

No need to get angry in such cases, only to be highly driven and practical. A good idea is to make them feel a little guilty because they missed the call so they will be more prompted to reschedule

Thanks @loud-doctor-98656, @miniature-greece-54413 ,@adamant-caravan-80909, and @fast-scientist-5529 for your insights into the matter. They are of great help to me.

Great thread. It is one of the more difficult situations to manage in this post-pandemic, mostly remote world.