How to Turn a Cold Email into a Warm Connection

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“An email without clarity is like an annoying mime: Just say what you want or get out the way!”Jordie van Rijn, Independent Email Marketing and eCRM Consultant

Think email is a dying communication method? Think again. Despite falling click-through rates, open rates continue to increase year-over-year.

Sending cold emails, however, is a much more challenging and daunting endeavor. People are not nearly as receptive to receiving a digital request from someone they have never met or heard of.

As the person making the request, it’s your job to make that email seem less like a random ask from a complete stranger, and more like an amiable hello that can easily transition into a fruitful business relationship.

If you are about to reach out to an influencer, potential PR contact, business leader, or anyone else you want to connect with and need help figuring out how to achieve that goal, get ready to take some notes.

Here are 4 steps to turning a cold email into warm introduction.

#1: It’s Not Business, It’s Personal.

In order for your message to resonate with individuals in any sort capacity, it needs to be tailored to that person; templates just won’t do in this scenario.

To highlight the importance of personalization, Statista recently uncovered that personalized email messages were opened 5.7% more  often than generic communications.

To effectively personalize your email, a bit of research is in order. There is, however, a wrong way to go about this. Don’t just make light of something you found on the first page of Google for this person; really dig into the body of their work and try to understand them as an individual. What interests them? What do they desire? What might be their pain points?

Gaining this sort of intimate understanding of the person’s mindset will allow you to craft a much more resonant message by speaking their language and highlighting more obscure parts of their work that you enjoyed.

Additionally, you should point out why you are contacting this person instead of other options. This will help the individual to feel especially capable of meeting your specific needs.

Tools like Mailshake are perfect for building relationships with others via cold email. The platform touts effective and dynamic features around personalization, automatic follow-ups and other sending controls, and a robust analytics system. This can be a massive help for gaining someone’s attention.

#2: Solve a Problem or Feed a Desire

Here’s the big question you need to address in any cold email: Why should your recipient care about what you have to say and take time out of their busy schedule to respond?

One of the most effective ways to validate your email’s existence is to provide value to the recipient before asking for anything.

If you did your research properly, there’s a good chance that you uncovered a potential pain-point for this person. Use that; highlight your ability to solve this problem in one way or another.

If you can’t solve an issue for your recipient, satiate a craving of theirs. Can you connect them to someone they want to meet? Do you have any original research that can support their existing work?

Whatever your offer is, make sure it is appropriate to their business; offering a gift card to Starbucks or The Cheesecake Factory feels generic and desperate, and it will likely backfire.

#3: Get to the Point

No one wants to read an email that resembles a memoir. If your email is filled with extraneous information or is generally long-winded, any desire the person has to help with be squelched by the time their eyes skim past the eighth paragraph.

It’s no big secret that shorter emails have higher response rates so use as few words as possible to convey your message in an effective manner.

To do this, just write your email the same way you would if you were saying it to them in-person. Then read it aloud before you send it to verify that it sounds natural.

Additionally, you want your recipient to do as little work as possible when it comes to your request. If you are trying to meet with someone, give them specific days and times that you are available instead of just saying, “Let me know when is good for you.”

An email that is short, sweet, and to the point is great, but if your recipient has to put in extra work to fulfill your request, chances are that it will go unsatisfied.

And as a little side note, don’t be afraid to add in a bit of humor at the end of your email. If you’re able to make them smile, you will stand out more and increase your chances of a prosperous reply.

Conclusion

Cold emailing is an art form. Your communication needs to be refined in conveying its message in an adequate yet brief way that makes you memorable. By sticking to these steps, you can craft a message that will achieve these goals and likely have your request met with a gratifying response.

Itai Elizur
Itai Elizur is the COO at Inbound Junction, a content marketing agency specializing in helping startups and business increase their online visibility.Prior to joining the Inbound Junction team, Itai worked as a Creative Manager at Wix.com, and as the Director of Marketing at Infolinks, the 3rd largest website network in the world.

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