I want to preface this guide by saying that prospecting is always evolving. In today’s business world, a sales team that relies only on one method of outreach will not last. Some prospects prefer calls, some email, and some Linkedin or direct mail. It’s your team’s job to understand how to implement an omnichannel outreach strategy.
*Separately, SalesLoft looked at 200 million interactions and found single-channel cadence response rates are:
77% lower for email-only
91% lower for call-only
Now for how to actually write a good sales email.
#1 The first thing we need to identify is our goal. If we’re going to spend time putting words to paper to elicit something, we need to first understand what that outcome is. Or we'll be a ship lost in the ocean with no destination.
There are typically 3 typically outcomes to shoot for in a cold email.
Get an intro meeting on the calendar
Get a reply relating to interest or no interest
Make the actual sale
Typically for B2B sales, a purchase that generates over 1,500 MRR or 10,000k one-time. The data shows we highly try to have the conversation first before pitching our product.
For this example let’s say we're selling IT Services to engineering leadership at a bank.
#2 Intro
The first line of your email has to hook your prospect into believing this email is personalized/relevant to them. Before sending be sure you understand their personal background, professional role, and what might be relevant to them. The goal of this first line is the earn their trust and attention to continue reading the rest of the email. Prospects want to feel that they aren’t on a massive email list getting generic messaging so this bit of personalization will go a long way.
Examples of things you could call out from someone's Linkedin.
“Hi John, noticed you went to the University of Oregon, go Ducks!”
“Hi John, noticed you’re an architect for Freddie Mac on Linkedin”
“Hi John, noticed you had MySQL listed as a skill on your Linkedin profile.”
“Hi John, congrats on the promotion to head of data!”
# 3 Tell them why you reached out/who you are.
The transition between the 1st and 2nd lines is very important. We want to tie our next line back to the initial intro. So if you’re telling someone “noticed you’re an Architect at XYZ Bank”, the next line might say something like “I’m going to be XYZ’s main contact at (Your Company). With the market moving towards the cloud, be partnering with other solutions architects in similar tier 1 banks as they migrate their on-prem workloads to the cloud”
What do the above sentences accomplish? They position the seller as an industry expert who has the privilege of having a beat on market trends (cloud adoption) and industry jargon (tier one bank). We’ve also tied back to why it was relevant for us to reach out to this prospect in particular. “We work with people in your role at similar companies and help drive simpler outcomes”
#4 Tee up the Ask
Now we’re on the home stretch. in Step #1 we determined what we’re going to ask our prospect to do (call to action). Before we ask for time or a reply, we first need to give context into why we’re asking for a particular response. If we’re going for a meeting, we need to give context into what we’re going to be discussing in the meeting and what the prospect is going to leave our conversation with. If we’re going for a response, a great way to frame it up is to list out problems other prospects have told.
Piggybacking off the copy around working with Architects.
If we’re shooting for an intro call - “I’d love to understand the outcomes you’re driving as an architect to determine if our solution has accelerated similar outcomes and is worth evaluating”
If we’re shooting for a response - “Typically their struggling either with moving a legacy applications into the cloud or they leveraged a “Lift&Shift” method are running into performance challenges post-migration.”
#5 Call to Action
Now it’s time to ask our prospect either for time or a reply.
When asking for time, don’t keep it open-ended. We want the response to seem as frictionless as possible. Suggest a specific time on a specific day or multiple days. It should look something like “Are you free at 2 pm EST on Tuesday” or “Are you free Tuesday or Thursday afternoon”
When asking for a response “Is this relevant to you” or “Has your team come across similar situations?”
We want to avoid saying things like “Let me know” or “What time works best for you?”.
#6 Sign off
The best salutation is “Best” and DO NOT INCLUDE A P.S.
Final Draft
“Hi John, noticed you’re an architect at Bank1 and used MySQL in the past.
I’m going to be Bank1’s main contact and been partnering with other architects at tier one banks as they migrate to the cloud. Partnering with them to implement the right security controls to maintain compliance and reduce the risk of data breaches. Curious to learn about the outcomes you’re driving as an architect and determine if we can partner to help de-risk any potential cloud migration. Happy to share insights for our other customers as well.
Are you free this Thursday at 2 pm EST to chat?
Best,
Dan”
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