How to Write A Cold E-mail
First came cold calls, second came cold e-mails. Cold e-mailing is the most effective and untapped form of networking, not to mention the cheapest one (no networking events or country club fees).
1. Make A Contact List
Make a list of people in
the desired profession that you respect and admire. If you could get 15 minutes
of anyone’s time, who would it be? Now write them down.
2. Find Their E-mail
Depending on who is on
the list, this may be easier said than done. If you
can’t find their email
address, start looking up people who work for them.
3. Send The Perfect Message
The biggest mistake
people make when they cold e-mail is
writing out their entire life story. Not only should you not spend time sending
long e-mails to your desired contacts, they don’t have time to read them.
Besides the
impracticality of sending everyone the same, long, sad e-mail, it
needs to be about the other person.
Here's the break down:
·
First sentence: Your name, where you’re from, what you
do/aspiring to do.
·
Second sentence: Discuss how you’ve followed the contact’s
career, how much you admire and respect them, and you’d love to hear about
their "journey."
·
Third sentence: Ask to meet with them, and make sure you
ask questions that ask them to talk about themselves and their career, and not
the other way around.
·
Fourth sentence: Give
them a time frame to meet, a week or two weeks, and ask if you can buy them a
cup of coffee or a meal. Then, sign off.
4. Follow-up
It’s been a week and they
haven’t responded- don't fuss, follow-up! Follow-up, follow-up. It’s a
commandment of cold e-mailing. It's
almost always not personal.
Mark
Zuckerberg likely gets hundreds, if not thousands of e-mails a day, so
you're likely to get buried into the abyss of their inbox. E-mail them
once a week, and always wait a week before following up.
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