Do you know the difference between a cold email that doesn’t get any responses and one that generates more than a dozen new customers?
Which kind of emails are you writing to your prospects?
In order assess the quality of your cold emails, all you need to do is check your email response rates: If you’re sending to a targeted list and your response rate is less than 10% then you should spend more time perfecting your cold email templates.
Great Company, Crappy Cold Email Templates
Earlier this year a new B2B client came to me and asked me if I could help them with outbound cold emails. They were offering an incredible service to SaaS companies, but weren’t very successful with cold email: response rates were below 2%.
Within about a month of working together I was able to create them an email template that actually got them more than 16 new customers. That’s not bad for a single email template.
Why Their Cold Emails Were Bad Before
- Too long: No one wants to read a mini e-book in an email.
- They tried to make too many points. They have an incredible company and product/service, but highlighting too many value props was diluting their message. This in turn weakened their Call to Action.
- Too self-focused: Their emails talked way too much about why they were awesome, listing their company’s features instead of putting it in terms of value for the customer.
- Too Hipster: They were trying to seem young and modern, but all their fancy marketing automation templates made their emails seem impersonal and spammy, even with custom inserts. No one thinks they’re getting a personal email if it’s formatted with pretty design: Keep it simple.
The Winning Cold Email Template
Results:
- 57% open rate
- 21% response rate
- End Outcome: 16 new customers
Reasons Why that Cold Email Template Was So Effective
- Exciting subject line: The subject line is your gate-keeper, so you should spend 80% of your time writing cold emails just crafting different subject lines to test. You want to create a subject line so exciting (but not spammy or too salesy) that your recipient can’t help but open. Who wouldn’t want to 10x their traction?
- Enticing (Credible) offer: You need to give your prospects a reason to respond. Give them a taste of something that is highly valuable and relevant to them and they will bite. Mentioning your past success with another client makes this offer seem more realistic and obtainable.
- Personal feel: The email has the same basic format of an email you’d send to your mom or best friend. You’re using their name, company name, and mentioning a company that they know that may even be a competitor.
- Social proof: One of your biggest barriers to selling is risk. No one wants to be the first customer and work with someone without credibility or experience. By mentioning one of your customers and the results you delivered to them, you are less of a risk to start talking to.
For extra help creating great subject lines and email templates, contact Heather (at) salesfolk.com and visit this page.
