Get 100% Show Rate

The eight step process I use to get booked prospects to actually show up.

A booked meeting is a promise (of sorts). But according to published ranges that ‘promise’ gets broken about 30% of the time. Studies suggest about 3 in 10 meetings end up being rescheduled to oblivion. Or completely ghosted altogether.

Which honestly, doesn’t seem like that big a deal.

Until you do the math, and you realize it kinda sucks.

Which is why you need a replicable process to get your prospects to show up 100% of the time.

While you’re celebrating getting a meeting on the books your prospect is unconsciously re-evaluating whether the meeting is enough of a priority to attend.

Put another way, have you ever registered for a webinar but not shown up? I did it 3 times last month (sorry, I’m really sorry). The topics looked amazing and I genuinely wanted to attend. But…. you know, life happened.

Here’s the process I use to achieve a near 100% attendance rate for meetings I absolutely don’t want to lose.

Every step is designed to make my meeting too valuable to skip. And applies basic psychological triggers that subtly nudge everyone to attend.

If you follow every step below you’ll get a 100% attendance rate (or close enough to be true).

The Eight Step Show Rate Process

Step 1: Create Undeniable Meeting Value

This is the most important step because it addresses the fact that people are busy. And your meeting slowly loses importance every hour after it’s booked. Booking a call seemed like a great idea at the time, but slowly morphs into an offer to have a vague conversation with a stranger.

So the first thing we need to do is stop booking meetings. Start booking value delivery.

In other words, make sure your prospect feels like they are going to get something of meaningful value out of meeting with you.

Value can be delivered using lots of different formats. One I sometimes use is called an In-Person Lead Magnet.

An in-person lead magnet is a deliverable you create for the prospect and present in the meeting. It’s not a slide deck about your services. It’s a transformative asset that will immediately add value to their business. It’s compelling enough that real buyers would happily pay for it.

In my case: I sell lead generation. So my in-person lead magnet is a complete list of a prospect’s ideal clients, contact details included, fully cleaned. Companies pay real money for exactly this.

You might be thinking, ‘but that’s everything!’ It’s not. People need help with execution. In the case of cold email there is copy development, split testing, infrastructure, ongoing management. Sure they can do it themselves, but they know they aren’t going to. That’s the gap I fill.

I created a detailed resource for how to design your own In-Person Lead Magnet. It’s got examples of what works and what fails. You can find it at: How I Booked 34 Meetings in 51 Days → saleshigher.com/in-person-lead-magnet/

Get your meeting value proposition right and everything else is cake.

Step 2: Book Inside 5 Work Days

Interest has a half-life. The moment a prospect says yes, their reason for meeting starts to get replaced by more immediate concerns.

Last month I booked into several webinars I genuinely intended to attend. In reality I showed up for none of them – life happened.

So the rule is simple, set your calendar tool to only show a max of five days in advance. This will reduce the time prospects have to reconsider whether they can attend.

And if you’re manually booking a meeting, try to avoid booking after a weekend. A Thursday booking for Tuesday the following week crosses a weekend that potentially erodes prospect interest.

Step 3: Confirm They Accepted

Unaccepted invites don’t get added to your prospect’s calendar. And if they don’t accept, the invite email will get buried and completely forgotten.

Most booking tools show who’s accepted, who’s tentative, and who hasn’t responded. So check your invite statuses.

If they haven’t accepted within 24 hours of booking, send:

This works well because you’re troubleshooting delivery, not questioning their commitment. The moment they hit accept, they’ve re-confirmed their intention to attend.

Step 4: Set Calendar Auto Reminders

Some no-shows aren’t decisions as much as they’re just calendar failures. So you need a reminder system that works.

Most tools send a 24-hour and a 1-hour reminder by default. Depending on your calendar tool you’ll have more or less flexibility. If SMS is an option, put it on the 1-hour slot.

If you can customize the reminder text then call back the value they’ll be receiving.

This re-focuses them on the value they expect to receive.

Step 5: Reciprocity + Micro-Commitment

There may be several days between getting a yes and the actual meeting. So you want to fill that silence with a message like:

This message does two jobs:

1. I’m building your [deliverable] >> this means you’re investing in the relationship early, before they’ve given you anything. That triggers reciprocity, and the cheapest way for them to repay your effort is to show up.
2. wanted to clarify whether [relevant detail] >> Make this an easy question they can quickly answer in 8 words or fewer.

For example:

By replying they’ve re-verified your meeting without either of you mentioning it.

People don’t skip meetings where they are an active participant.

Step 6: LinkedIn Engagement

Sometimes it’s hard to remember sales people are actual humans.

Here’s where LinkedIn comes in.

Several hours before your meeting engage with something they’ve posted. A like and comment work well if they’re active on LinkedIn. Their phone lights up with your name a few hours before the call to jog their memory.

It’s a quick reminder that you’re a real person, and it’s hard to skip a meeting with a person you just communicated with.

If you’re not already connected on LinkedIn then a connection request replaces the like and comment.

Step 7: Add Reschedule Links

Reschedule links reduce the likelihood of getting ghosted. So make sure your calendar tool includes one.

In some cases you can even build it into your email communications. You can write something like:

If your prospect reschedules it’s arguably a good thing. They’re re-committing themselves to showing up – just a bit delayed.

Step 8: When They No-Show

In the unlikely event they don’t show up try and rescue the meeting without guilt.

During the first few minutes send something like:

Many no-shows are just late, lost, or stuck in a meeting running over.

If they don’t join after 15 minutes they aren’t coming.

Assume they had good intentions. Maybe their Mom got sick or something. Send a quick note like:

If you don’t hear from them after that then they’re just being rude. And no one wants to work with rude people.

Follow All Eight Steps

Step 1 does the heaviest lifting, so start there. Here is the full breakdown of how to build your own In-Person Lead Magnet.

 

Get the In-Person Lead Magnet Guide