Larry Chiang says the first approach almost never closes anything. Its only job is to earn a second one. People are guarded on a first hello. They are checking whether you want something from them and how much. The second approach lands differently because the guard is already down a notch and the context is already shared.
Larry treats the gap between the two as karma territory: what you do in between is what earns the second conversation. Larry’s own story credits a simple thank-you note with landing Nike as a sponsor, his go-to example of fast, specific follow-through paying off. The move is not a generic great meeting you message. It references something particular from the first exchange, proving you were actually listening.
This is also where PQRST’s Test step shows up: you check whether what you understood the first time still holds before you go further. Larry’s advice is to make the second approach within a day or two while the first conversation is still fresh on both sides.
Waiting a week turns a warm second approach into a cold restart, and cold restarts rarely get the same energy back. The second conversation is also where the real ask usually happens, since the first one was really just information gathering.
Larry frames it as attacking the money on the second pass, once you actually know what to ask for. Treat the first approach as reconnaissance and the second as the meeting that was the point all along.
Details: Watch Larry explain the follow-up
#Karma #FollowUp #Web12