Follow-ups that come back on their own
Most follow-ups are missed because they live in your head. Set a reminder when you send, and the email returns on the day you chose if nobody has answered.
You send an email that needs an answer. A quote to a client, a question to a supplier, a note to someone who said they would get back to you. Then the day moves on. The thread slides down your Sent folder and out of your head. Two weeks later you remember, and the moment has passed.
The usual fix is a list somewhere else. A task in another app, a flag on the message, a note stuck to the monitor. Each one asks you to remember to look at it. The follow-up still depends on you.
Set it when you send
In Perfect Mail, the reminder is offered right after you send. Pick Remind me to follow up, then a time: three days, a week, a date of your own. Then forget about it.
If no reply arrives by then, the email comes back to the top of your inbox, marked No reply yet, with a short follow-up written for you to check and send. If a reply does arrive first, there is nothing to do. The reminder never comes.
What it looks like in a week
Priya runs a small design studio and sends three or four proposals a week. Each one gets a reminder for the following Thursday. On Thursday, the ones nobody answered come back one at a time. She reads the follow-up, changes a word or two, and sends it. The whole thing takes a few minutes, and nothing slips.
A lawyer waiting on signed documents does the same with a longer window. A restaurant owner chasing a delivery does it with a shorter one. The habit is the same: decide how long to wait while the email is still in front of you.
Why it works
The best moment to decide how long to wait is the moment you press Send. You know the person, you know what you asked, and you know what reasonable looks like. Deciding then, and letting the email carry the reminder, means you never have to hold it in your head again.
That is the whole feature. Send, pick a time, and get on with your day.