Gustav The habit, in one sentence: assume the deal lives in the follow-up, and be the person who actually follows through when everyone else goes quiet.
Why it matters
People are busy, distracted, and dealing with twenty things that have nothing to do with you. When they go quiet after a promising conversation, it almost never means no. It means it fell off their desk. The person who gently brings it back to the top of the desk is the one who gets the work, not because they were the best, but because they were still there.
This is the cheapest edge in business. You do not need to be the most talented; you need to be the one who does not vanish.
What it looks like in practice
The deals that go cold are rarely killed on purpose. A meeting goes well, everyone is enthusiastic, and then life happens and weeks pass. A single specific message, "here is the thing we discussed, here is the concrete next step", is often all it takes to turn a stalled conversation back into a project. The work was never lost. It was just waiting for someone to pick it back up.
How to build the habit
Keep a simple list of who you are waiting on and when you last spoke, even a spreadsheet will do. Set yourself a reminder to follow up before the trail goes cold. And make each follow-up carry something, a relevant idea, a concrete next step, a small piece of value, not just "checking in". A follow-up that gives the other person something is welcome; a hollow one is noise.
The pitfall to avoid
Two opposite mistakes. The first is giving up after one unanswered email, which is most people, and exactly why follow-up works. The second is the empty "just following up" with nothing attached, sent on repeat until you become annoying. The line between persistent and pestering is value: as long as every message gives them a reason to reply, you can follow up far more than you think.