10 Tips For Building a Cold Email Outreach Strategy

You might be surprised that email marketing remains one of the most effective ways of connecting with new potential customers. With an average ROI of $36 for every $1 spent, there’s a good reason it’s a tactic still used by many marketing teams. 

However, while many teams still consider email marketing to an existing mailing list as effective, others shy away from cold email outreach strategies, fearing they might be perceived as spammy and intrusive. Just what is a cold email outreach strategy and how can you build one without hitting any negative consequences?

What is cold email outreach?

Put simply, cold email outreach is when you contact potential clients you’ve never contacted before. They may be aware of your organization (it certainly makes things easier) but they’ve never purchased from you and you have never sent them any sort of marketing material. 

Your cold outreach email represents your first contact and is, in essence, a form of introduction. It’s a starting point for building a relationship that will, hopefully, lead to increased sales or bookings, and ultimately to customer loyalty.  

That first contact assumes the receiver does not know your business, so you will be introducing your brand and your products or services. 

Why are cold emails still effective?

A cold outreach campaign can be ideal for prospecting for new customers and for cold leads generation. They use few resources and can be done at a large scale by using automated email marketing tools.  

You also have to think about the data you can collect and analyze for personalization. If you are doing cold email outreach, then your target list will likely be large. That means you can quickly identify what has worked for you and what hasn’t so you can tweak any future cold email tactics. 

That’s a huge advantage over cold calling, where much less data will be generated. Using email to make contact is also less intrusive than cold calls, and leads can read or respond to an email at their leisure. 

When should you consider a cold email outreach strategy?

As with other tactics, you must first think about your target demographics and identify what their preferences are when it comes to communication.  

With 53% of the world’s population being Millennials or Gen Zs, these are two generations that have either experienced the growth of technology and digital communications or have grown up with it already in place. So if they’re your target audience, chances are they’ll be more comfortable with (and therefore more receptive to) cold emails and other forms of digital communications.  

Cold outreach may also be beneficial if you’re targeting certain customer segments such as B2B clients who are difficult to reach through other channels. If you know your company has a clear valuable proposition that meets their needs or solves their pain points, a cold email could be your ticket in. 

One exception to cold emailing is senior executives and decision-makers. As much of their inbound communication goes to a gatekeeper, there is a chance that your email will simply end up in the spam or trash folders. In scenarios such as this, networking (possibly via LinkedIn) is the best approach.

10 tips for building a cold email outreach strategy

It’s worth noting that your cold email tactics may be part of a wider strategy. The idea is that those initial contact emails build a relationship you can follow up on with more emails, phone calls, or an outbound SMS.  

If you plan on regular campaigns, it makes sense to use cold email templates. These can be adjusted as you move forward, based on the analysis and feedback from previous campaigns.  

Everything starts at the beginning, however, and knowing how to build a robust strategy and craft ideal emails filled with quality content should be the first steps to improved sales and conversions.

1.   Email subject line

Your subject line is one of the most important parts of your cold emails. Some 47% of recipients will open an email based on that subject line (and 69% will report an email as spam based on that line or even flagged by their spam filter). The first thing to think about is length. People don’t want to read a short story so aim for between six and ten words.  

Try to personalize the subject line as this increases the chance of the email being opened by a staggering 50%. Personalization should go beyond a simple ‘Dear Angus’ that uses the recipient's name or job title. If you can, add something more, such as ‘this SaaS is ideal for you.’

2.   Preview 

When people look at their emails, they will see a preview of the contents, usually just a single sentence. You also need to consider that the majority of people access their emails via a mobile device. With that number being 1.7 billion people, it almost goes without saying that your emails must be optimized for mobiles. 

Put as much thought into your opening line(s) as you do your subject line, as it’s the combination of the two that can win hearts and minds (and business). There are three general rules you can apply to those opening lines: 

• Keep your opening to around 85-100 characters.
• Do not simply repeat your subject line; build on it and add some context. 
• Create intrigue or offer an incentive to encourage the recipient to read more. 

3.   Be professional 

You may get away with textspeak, grammatical errors, or typos in an email to a friend but when it comes to cold emailing, they’re all a no-no. Proofread every email you compose as mistakes can cost you business and can negatively reflect on your brand’s reputation. An email full of errors will probably go straight to the trash no matter how enticing any offer in it is.  

You don’t have to be a professional marketer either. There are numerous digital tools to help you with composing, fine-tuning, and proofreading content. Generative AI platforms like ChatGPT and Jasper can help with copywriting – we suggest giving it a prompt and handing over the first draft to your marketing team for fine-tuning.  

You can also leverage tools like Grammarly and Hemingway to check spelling and grammar and improve the readability of your content. 

Additionally, the choice of fonts in your email should be carefully considered; using clean, professional fonts enhances readability and ensures your message is perceived as intended.

4.   Always add a call to action (CTA)

You’ve written your email, it has an eye-catching subject line, an enticing pre-header, and informative content. Job done, right? Wrong! Any cold outreach email should have a clear CTA somewhere in the email body. 

It doesn’t have to be a call to buy or book. You could seek to further nurture the lead by offering something like a free eBook on a relevant topic or signing up for a series of webinars on a particular subject. The point is to engage the recipient and draw them into your sales funnel for further nurturing. 

5.   Be personal 

Personalization goes beyond using the recipient’s name and can make a real difference to your response rate, as well as open and click-through rates (CTR). You need to find a balance between professionalism and being conversational. While you can’t customize every single email to cold email recipients, you can tailor emails to the different segments you’ve identified.  

For example, in one segment, you’ve identified managers and decision-makers as being your ideal customer profile in the call center sector. You can discuss pain points and problems they encounter and can offer solutions such as dynamic scripting tools that will help them.  

You can make a cold email personal in areas from the subject line to the body of the mail. Some areas where you can add that personal touch include: 

• Using their name and/or their position in their organization.
• Note any previous interactions with your business. (your customer relationship management (CRM) system can be ideal for this).
• Mention any of the recipient’s work you know of, including blogs, white papers, or anything relevant. 
• Highlight products or services they’ve shown interest in or where you think there might be a connection. 

6.   Don’t write a book

You’ve probably seen ‘TLDR’ (too long, didn’t read) as a comment on wordy social media posts. The same applies to your cold email outreach. While opinions may vary, it is generally agreed that the ideal length should be between 50 and 125 words. 

If a recipient sees an overly wordy email, there’s a good chance they will delete it without reading. Remember, this is your introduction so keep it short and sweet. Grab their attention, pique their interest and, if you have to, send more complex emails later in the relationship.  

If you really need more information than 150 words allows, consider adding clickable links. These can take the recipient to a related blog piece or even a product page that gives them added information. 

7.   Identify their pain point or need if you can 

If you have identified the needs of potential prospects, address them if you can. For example, if you notice an event organizer is garnering negative reviews for poor booking practices, recommend integrating a robust reservation management system that streamlines the booking processes.

It’s not always about offering a solution; in some cases, identifying what’s causing the issue without offering a service can be enough to interest ideal prospects. Again, draw them into your sales funnel, engage with them and nurture them, and then look to close a deal. 

8.   Back to that CTA 

We’ve already mentioned the importance of including a CTA but the very nature of that CTA can also be important. When you consider that the average CTR for cold emails is around 3-5%, you can see that the stronger your CTA, the better your chances of equalling or bettering that rate. 

Don’t include more than one CTA as it may confuse or put people off. Think about your CTA; what do you want to achieve from the email? At this stage of your relationship, it’s unlikely to be a sale - focus on that later. Instead, you may want to build awareness or you have them read more information. Ensure your CTA is closely related to your cold email outreach campaign goal. 

9.   Be genuine

Again, find a balance between sounding professional and being conversational. Avoid complicated language or overusing technical terms (unless your email is targeting a CTO, software engineer, or similar). You've likely received numerous emails with exaggerated claims that immediately prompt you to delete them

Never include lines such as:

• Our SEO strategy will put you at the top of Google rankings. 
• Build your Facebook following by 5,000 members every week. 
• Improve your conversion rates by 20%!  

Be genuine, be honest, and only make claims that are easily verifiable. At the same time, don’t sound forced or artificial, or the recipient might think your mail has been composed by AI. 

10.   Use social proof where relevant 

You want to establish trust and authority with the recipient. One way of doing this (either in the email or via links) is to use social proof. Make its inclusion as natural as possible and let the proof do the sales work for you, demonstrating that your products or services really do solve problems and pain points.  

You can offer social proof in several ways. Remember, you can insert links where relevant to avoid being too wordy. Some of the best examples of social proof include:

• White papers and case studies. 
• Reviews and testimonials. 
• Customer success stories. 
• Media coverage (but not advertorials).  

Case studies and success stories can be particularly effective, especially if the origin is a mutual connection. By looking at a recipient’s LinkedIn profile, you might identify some of your current customers among their connections. 

The takeaway

An effective cold outreach strategy can be a great way of generating new leads and bringing them into your email list and sales funnel with follow-up emails. You already know that for every 100 potential customers, you will only close a deal with a few of them. Your goal should be to increase your numbers and always be above average.

Remember that your first campaign may be far from perfect. To improve, you need to track and analyze data and metrics so you can make improvements. Processes such as A/B testing can also help you improve the content and any images you use in your emails.