Scalable email templates that feel like personalized one-on-one messages

Why Presumptuous Emails Are Complete Turn-Offs

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Hall of Shame Award: The Cold-Email Dictator

presumptuous cold email

Why This Cold Email Won The Hall of Shame:

Talk about forceful! This email is the definition of a turn-off— who wants to be vaguely coerced into an interview without any details of the product?

It begins with a promise, a classic promise that this email will truly be the last email. That’s BS. Rambling on, it assumes a condescending approach coupled with strange formatting and the “heart stopping” dot dot dots- as if the reader and sender had been meddling over a deal for quite some time.

Aggressive much?

Although the sender guarantees a seemingly swift process (the reader simply responds with a specific date/time), it is clear that the reader is dealing with a stranger.

Who would want to follow up and trust someone who a stranger who has provided no social proof or value that is presumptuously dictating an exact interview time after we already haven’t responded to their previous emails?

Stop shoving words down the reader’s throat: Give the reader some breathing room.

Why this email fails and got on “The Hall of Shame”:

· From the start, the tone is obnoxious, “turning off” the reader
· Gives a regurgitated way to respond, as if the reader was interested in responding in the first place
· No detail or reminder about the sender’s product/service and the benefits their business offers

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How to Fix This Cold Email:

The hook is everything, and this one suffered miserably. Instead, focus on an opening that targets the reader’s desires (perhaps a catchy sentence or an intriguing question).

Scratch the whole “I’ll do all the work, you sit back and relax” approach. Instead, invite the reader into a rapport that would eventually lead into scheduling an interview, rather than arranging one right off the bat.

Have bad cold emails in your inbox? Send them to us!
Help us fight the thoughtless spammers, one crappy cold email at a time by sending us the worst cold emails you’ve ever received.

We’ll put them up anonymously on the “Hall of Shame,” and shoot you an email when they go live.

Please send all submissions to “[email protected]”

(And feel free to suggest what you want to nominate the “bad cold email for!”)

This Ironic Email Demonstrates the Dangers of Not Researching

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Are you skipping your product research?

Hall of Shame Award: The Ironic Email that Lacks Research

This crappy cold email is amazingly ironic — it’s from a B2B lead generation company that is trying to convey how they can “Identify and hand pick highly targeted leads that match your idea customer bio,” and yet it is reaching out to Salesfolk (we write cold emails as an alternative to working with outsourced lead gen companies in case you didn’t know) as a potential client.  

Talk about a lack of research?

They definitely didn’t “hand pick” their potential target list, and Salesfolk definitely doesn’t match their ideal customer profile.  The only truth to their pitch is how they “automate email outreach,”  which they are definitely doing at scale.

Why this email fails and got on “The Hall of Shame”:

  • Lacks research for the prospect (we’re the wrong target for their product/service)
  • Lacks a  strong value proposition, and instead relies on a very lazy list of “features”
  • Also needs a captivating hook to catch my attention and stand out from the noise

Are you skipping your product research?

How to Fix This Bad Cold Email:

The best fix for this email would be to go back to the drawing board and look carefully at their own prospecting list. They should plan their list more carefully and ask themselves questions such as “Who are we contacting and how does this product add value to them?”  

A highly targeted list is far better than blasting out mass emails to people who have no benefit from your product, who will only mark you as spam (or put you on our “Hall of Shame”).  This kind of “mass-blasting” will only result in low response rates, and even worse, can damage your company’s name or IP’s reputation.

So please, research your prospects when sending cold emails!

Have bad cold emails in your inbox? Send them to us!

Help us fight the thoughtless spammers, one crappy cold email at a time by sending us the worst cold emails you’ve ever received.

We’ll put them up anonymously on the “Hall of Shame,” and shoot you an email when they go live.

Please send all submissions to “[email protected].”
(And feel free to suggest what you want to nominate the “bad cold email for!”)

Why Selfish Emails Never Work

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Hall of Shame Award: The Selfish Email That Lacks a Value Proposition

Why Self Centered Emails Dont Work

Above we have an email that is truly self-absorbed — it completely fails to captivate the interest of the reader, and instead focuses its message on finding someone to sell the product to with the classic “who’s the right person” approach.

The problem with that approach is that it’s not the 90’s anymore, and so when you attempt this method, people usually just think you’re lazy and just sending untargeted “mass-blasts.”

At the bare minimum, you at least need to tailor your cold emails to a specific buyer persona. Adding additional personalization beyond that will usually increase your odds of getting a response even more.

But no matter how personalized your cold emails are, they still won’t work if there’s no benefit or reason for the reader to respond.

The above email asks for a meeting, either with the reader or another associate of the company, three times, without ever taking into account the needs or priorities of the reader even once.  The sender fails to address “What’s in it for the recipient”, and instead focuses only on  “What’s in it for me.”

Why this email fails and got on “The Hall of Shame”:

  • Pretty self-centered
  • Not personable or tailored to buyer persona (even admits to “taking a stab in the dark here,” wow!)
  • A lot of features, but no strong benefits for the reader
  • Bullet points! These make the email feel like mass marketing instead of a conversation. (Bullet points always perform worse on cold emails!)
  • This email is all over the place, with no focus on a single benefit or idea.

Why Self-Centered Emails Don't Work

How to Fix This Bad Cold Email:

Start by scrapping the vague, impersonal opener. Instead, start with a captivating sentence or thoughtful question that is targeted to the reader’s needs or pain points.  

Adding more personalization would also go a long ways too. This doesn’t necessarily mean having a lot of different “custom inserts” for every prospect, but at least they could try to focus their message on the prospect more instead of being all about “Koalified Leads.”

This email also needs to focus on one clear benefit so it can be more compelling and effective.  

Have bad cold emails in your inbox? Send them to us!

Help us fight the thoughtless spammers, one crappy cold email at a time by sending us the worst cold emails you’ve ever received.

We’ll put them up anonymously on the “Hall of Shame,” and shoot you an email when they go live.

Please send all submissions to “[email protected].”

(And feel free to suggest what you want to nominate the “bad cold email for!”)

Why Cramming Features Into An Email Gets You Nowhere

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Cold Email Hall of Shame Award: “The Feature Paragraph Crammer”

Are you boring your readers with paragraphs crammed with features?

This email goes on forever about “Clip features” without ever establishing rapport with the recipient in the first place.

In fact, the sender sent three cold emails repeating the entire paragraph on “Clip features” and the same call to action.

Talk about “mad recycling!”

They shove every single feature of “Clip” down the reader’s throat in hopes of converting a new user. If you were the reader, you might feel that the sender doesn’t care or understand how you can specifically benefit from using Clip. The sender automatically assumes you are on board with signing up….whether you actually want to or not.

Why this email fails and got on “The Hall of Shame”:

  • the intro joke is cheesy (sorry, didn’t like the joke!)
  • focuses way too much on the features
  • the call to action comes off as a desperate and non-genuine attempt to get readers to sign up

Are you boring your readers with paragraphs crammed with features?

How to Fix This Bad Cold Email:

This email could be a lot better if it rambled less about all the features and picked one major benefit to focus on. That would make the email twice as concise and easier to digest for the reader.

Have bad cold emails in your inbox? Send them to us!

Help us fight the thoughtless spammers, one crappy cold email at a time by sending us the worst cold emails you’ve ever received.

We’ll put them up anonymously on the “Hall of Shame,” and shoot you an email when they go live.

Please send all submissions to “[email protected].”

(And feel free to suggest what you want to nominate the “bad cold email for!”)

Be a goat, not a sheep!

We always strive to create captivating copy that is unique, actionable and adds value to prospects’ lives.

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