A Beginner’s Guide To Making A Cold Email Outreach

Cold emails are considered to be the best time-efficient way to gain contact with prospects and customers.

With the right cold email, you can get valuable prospect data, grab their attention and entice them to engage with you. If you’re new to cold emails, then you’re in luck. Keep on reading this cold email prospecting guide for all there is to know about making winning cold emails.

This guide will explain what a cold email is, its many different uses, and tactics to make successful ones. By finishing this guide, you will be well on your way to developing a superb cold email outreach campaign.

A person in a brown garment typing on a laptop computer
A person in a brown garment typing on a laptop computer

What is a Cold Email?

Cold emails are unsolicited emails that are sent without prior contact. They’re usually sent to people hoping to find potential clients and sales leads. Different types of cold emails can also be used for:

  • Lead generation: The most common reason for cold emailing is lead generation. Lead generation is the primary channel for 89% of marketers. All you need are the email addresses of prospects in your target market.
  • Sales: Cold emailing is often used by sales representatives as the first step in sales outreach to build contact with potential customers.
  • Invitation: Whether you’re doing a podcast, holding a workshop, or presenting a webinar, you can bring people in through cold emailing.
  • Market research: You might want to identify the pain points of your target market or validate your idea. And cold emailing is one of the best ways to conduct research.

The goal of a cold email is to connect you with valuable potential partners and begin conversations.

Cold Email Prospecting Guide

Validate your prospect list

First things first, you’ll need to validate your email list. Check if the prospects on your email list share some similarities. You also need to ensure that you have the correct emails. An email sent to the wrong person will not give you the result you want. It may even cause unnecessary problems.

Add extra attention to your subject line.

This is the factor that determines whether a prospect will open your email or not. Your subject is your email’s first impression, so you must make it count. 

Try looking at the two subject line examples below:

Subject Line 1: New Product Demo

Subject Line 2: Hey [Name of Recipient], you’re invited! 

The first subject line gives the impression of just another marketing email selling you something. But the second subject line has a certain intrigue that can make you want to open it.

Try always to add a catchy theme to your subject line. If your subject line captures your recipient’s attention, they will surely open it.

Keep your email body concise and interesting.

The human attention span is diminishing at the same rate as technology has altered our daily consumption habits. With this in mind, it’s best to keep your email concise. Mention only relevant details about the event, blog post product, webinar, or anything you’re promoting.

Your cold email should contain three main parts:

  • Introduction– Contains the email greeting and a quick self-introduction
  • Purpose– The email’s intent
  • Salutation – A closing clause containing your call-to-action and your “Thank you” message for their time.

Make your email prospect-friendly by adding these three points that fit your approach.

Personalize it to build genuine connections

You tend to feel good whenever someone remembers your name after you’ve been away for a long time. This same psychology also applies to cold emails.

For example, if someone sends you an email that reads “Hey, Prospect,” would you feel any connection with that person? Probably not. But if someone calls you by your name in an email, you’ll feel like they’re less of a stranger.

This is why personalizing your cold emails before sending them is very important. You can also include your business card with your email. It will leave a more lasting impression on your recipient.

Make sure to follow up

Chances are, you won’t be able to close a deal by sending just one cold email. On average, you’ll need to send at least five follow-up emails to land a new prospect.

Be persistent and consistent in your outreach efforts so your cold emails can materialize into a sale. To make your task easier, you can use modern cold emailing tools that allow automatic email follow-ups to recipients.

Know the best times to send your email

A study conducted on billions of email addresses found the best time to send emails out was around 10 AM. That’s when people most people open emails anyway, so your chances of your emails getting opened are very high.

Avoid sending your email before this hour in the morning if you don’t have a good reason for doing so. You should also never send emails at 3 or 4 AM, as those will appear strange in the prospect’s inbox. They may mark it as spam!

Target and connect with the right audience

Design your emails to appeal to an audience that will enjoy them. Don’t forget to target the most likely audience members to show interest and take action in your cold email outreach. You can also segment your target audience to adjust the message accordingly. Some sample segments are:

  • Companies- IT companies, SAAS-based companies, and so on.
  • Position – CEO, Vice president, Program Leader, Board member, and so on.

You can also divide them by team size, organization size, and so on, depending entirely on what you want to accomplish.

Make sure you write a customized cold email copy for each segment. Your message, tone, structure, and format should fit the audience. This will make your email more relatable and recipients more likely to follow your call to action.

Conclusion

Cold emailing is a simple and effective way to reach out to prospects. However, it can be tricky for beginners. Hopefully, this cold email prospecting guide has helped you navigate the process and find the strategies to get results from your cold emails.

Abir is a data analyst and researcher. Among her interests are artificial intelligence, machine learning, and natural language processing. As a humanitarian and educator, she actively supports women in tech and promotes diversity.

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