Cold Email Tips That Will Increase Response Rate
I spent the better part of a decade emailing hundreds of
thousands of cold prospects, trying different tactics and strategies to see
what resonated. Here’s what I
found:
Increase Response Rates
1. Stop Talking About
Yourself
The last thing you want to do is ruin your chances right
off the bat by writing paragraphs about yourself and how great your company is.
There’s a difference between logically introducing yourself and giving someone
who has no idea who you are the entire spiel you give all your
SQLs.
Remember that these people probably have no idea who you
are. If they don’t see any value in you contacting them, chances are they aren’t
going to reply. Introduce yourself politely and then start talking about them.
2. Don’t Come Off Too Sales
It’s natural to want to drop the ball right away and ask to
set a meeting—after all, that’s the whole goal of cold emailing. But remember
what they say: “Slow and steady wins the race.” That is also true for
successful cold emailing.
Think about the solicitors who ring your doorbell, fake a
two-minute conversation, and then immediately slam you with a sales pitch about
a product you’ve never heard of. Whether or not it could benefit you, you’re
put off by the experience.
3. The Subject Line Is Just as Important as the Message Itself
Your email is only as good as your subject line, and there
are literally thousands of articles and “science-backed” evidence of subject
lines that work. But the best data is what you can pull from your own past
email sends.
There are so many different industries, so many different
products, and so many different people that following the footsteps of someone
else’s success just won’t necessarily work.
4. Do Your Research
It is actually crazy how many cold emails I’ve received
with my name spelled wrong, calling me “Mr.”, not knowing my job title when
it’s public information, and so on and so forth. If you were face-to-face with
someone, you wouldn’t call them the wrong name or mistake them for the opposite
gender without feeling like a total fool.
5. Be Respectful
Let’s say a person replies to one of your emails and you
get really enthusiastic and are ready
to book that meeting and close that deal, so you
rush to reply, but then they all of a sudden go cold again.
You decide to reply again in a few hours—maybe they didn’t
get your first email. They don’t reply to that, so you wait until the next day
(it’s been 12 hours!) and email again.
See where I’m going here? As with any relationship, rushing
into things and not allowing space for the other person to critically think
about the situation will most likely result in the person running away,
quickly.
Give them time to breathe between each touch. Would you be
annoyed if the same solicitor you ignored the first time kept on ringing your
doorbell during dinner for a week straight? Let the conversations
flow naturally and give it time before you reach
out again.
6. Make It Personal
Even if you have built the perfect cold email template,
you’ll want to personalize it for each prospect, and I’m not just talking about
“[[INSERT FIRST NAME]] here” personalization. Do your research and use it to
your advantage.
One of their interests is college basketball? Perfect
starter conversation. Their company just made the news for XYZ? Even better
starter conversation.
7. Add Value
One of my all-time favorite marketing
and sales professionals, Tim Riesterer of Corporate Visions,
really helped me to transform the way I crafted our sales pitch for my sales
team.
Too often, I see companies so excited about their product
or solution that they forget that no matter how good your product/service is,
unless you can get people to buy in and realize their need, your amazing
product won’t make it far.
Cold emailing has been around forever and it’s
not going away as long as email addresses exist. Whether you take these tips
into consideration or not, remember that you’re emailing real people. We are
inundated with email, yet somehow we pick out the ones that matter. Why?
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