Any tips for sending outbound emails?

[Cojo]

Any tips on increasing my open and conversion rate with emails?

 

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[Angler]

Keep it personalized and short as possible. You're not really selling anything in the first email, as you're just screening. If a business ghost you or leave you on open just because of an inquiry then it's probably not a business you want to work with.

On another note, people can smell a sleazy salesman from miles away, you experience this personally I'm sure(your spam folder). You probably also hate receiving mass-produced low quality emails and waste time just as much as these business! So think about what would get you to open an email and reply to it.

Ex.

Title: Can You help Me?
Body:

Hey xyz,

My name is ___. I live nearby and thought I'd shoot you an email. I recently came across your business through(GMB, a google listing, etc.) and had a few questions about your service. It's a quick business inquiry that I'd think you will find quite useful. Is there a number I can give you a call at soon? And if so when will you be available to receive a quick 2 minute call?

Looking forward to hear from you soon,

Your name.

 

[Itizn]

A sequence is more important than the initial email

 

[Sully1994]

@Clinton7 I'm a top performer in business development and send cold emails all day everyday.

3 questions.

1. Who is your target prospect?
2. What do they care about?
3. What do you sell?

Having the answers to these questions will help the forum give you more solid advice.

Like @Angler said, short and personalized is the name of the game. You don't have to do a ton of research, just enough to make it clear that:

A. The email was 100% intended for them, and them only.
B. You understand their job description

Make it benefit driven. How is your product or service going to help them save time / money, mitigate risk, increase revenue etc ?

As for subject lines with high open rates - that will depend on what you are selling / who you are selling it to.

Personally, I sell social media management software to enterprise level businesses. I target social media managers / marketing directors and part of my strategy is creating FOMO ( fear of missing out) and intrigue.

If the prospect account was Nike and I knew we already work with sports apparel companies like GymShark, Under Armor and Lululemon, my subject line would probably be:

"Why Gymshark, Under Armour and Lululemon use Product Name".

If the prospect company was in an industry in which our company had zero traction, I'd have to get more creative. I'd probably look at recent news articles, earnings statements, interviews with one of their c-suite executives etc. to find something to call out and put that in the subject line.

 

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[Cojo]

1. Who is your target prospect?
2. What do they care about?
3. What do you sell

1. Construction companies
2. Don't really know
3. Websites

 

[hatedsalesrep]

What are you selling and what are you trying to get out of the outreach?

Based on your posting history, it seems like web design. Disregard if not, but If I was selling web-design, here are a few things to keep in mind...

1. Who are you selling to? Are you selling your services to other organization's design department, are you selling to mom & pop businesses, tech companies, etc.
2. What are you selling? Are you selling an improvement in conversion rates, are you selling a SEO optimized web-page for increased organic clicks, etc. No-one has a website just to have a website.
3. How do you sell a client - is it discovery/fact finding call, do you offer a proof of concept, etc. Think through the steps to the close so that you can create a repeatable process.

Hyperpersonalization is over-valued. Keep it short and relevant. Also, drop the niceties or add it to the bottom. I always start my emails with most important topic FIRST, and leave the "hope you're well, etc" at the very end. Chris Voss, an ex FBI negotiator recommends this for all communication.

Example:

How's the 'Join INSIDERS' CTA converting for your forum, MJ?

We've noticed similar forums get a lot of traffic, but have trouble with converting that traffic into paid subscribers. Worse yet, we've found that while they can get folks subscribed, they tend to churn at about 30% which can make it difficult to keep consistent revenue coming in.

Not sure if this is relevant, but can I share more information with you on reasons that may be happening to your site?

All the best,


Lead with a problem and it makes the call higher importance/relevance. Now you quantify the problem and position your solution in accordance with the magnitude of the problem. Instead of I sell sites for "$39 a month"- "For me to help you increase your CTA conversions from 3% to 7%, which will increase your revenue by $25k p/month, it's going to cost you $6,500".

Also, I agree with Angler and Ltizin and Sully. Short and a sequence. Most folks won't reply to your first email. 50 words or less. Also - pick up the phone.

Good luck!

 

[Sully1994]

@Clinton7

Do you have any website re-design case studies with construction companies?

Like @hatedsalesrep mentioned, you're going to want a tangible hook, like "We increased Construction Company A's CTA conversions from 3-7% and helped them increase revenue by X%"

Once you have case studies, scaling your outreach is going to be a lot easier.

If you don't have case studies yet, your time is probably better spent hyper personalizing, include screenshots of their website pages, mark up where you see issues, what you would change, and why you believe it would lead to better business results.

Basically, provide so much value that they would lose sleep from guilt over ignoring your email and not giving you a shot to potentially help them.

 

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[Voracity]

Learn to optimize your subject lines to increase opens.

Learn to optimize your content to increase CTR.

I’ve read Plenty of good advice above on both issues. I’d add that you should read the free reports put out by the big email companies. MailCheat(Chimp) and others have published tons of useful data on the topic

 

[Cojo]

Do you have any website re-design case studies with construction companies?

I don't.

Basically, provide so much value that they would lose sleep from guilt over ignoring your email and not giving you a shot to potentially help them.

I have provided value but still didn't get any response

 

[ethan34]

1. Construction companies
2. Don't really know
3. Websites

Doesn't sound like you're too keen on helping these companies if you don't know what they care about. Find that out.

I have provided value but still didn't get any response

In what way did you provide value? Was the value really valuable?

 

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[Cojo]

Doesn't sound like you're too keen on helping these companies if you don't know what they care about. Find that out

Ohk

In what way did you provide value? Was the value really valuable?

Well, I did this -

include screenshots of their website pages, mark up where you see issues, what you would change, and why you believe it would lead to better business results

But didn't get any response. @Itizn said a sequence would be better and I'm doing that now

 

[Kevin88660]

1. Construction companies
2. Don't really know
3. Websites

Any tips on increasing my open and conversion rate with emails?

Sell to people who have a track record of paying to website services.

You don’t want to self to non-believers.

 

[Sully1994]

Ohk


Well, I did this -


But didn't get any response. @Itizn said a sequence would be better and I'm doing that now

If you are comfortable sharing the emails you sent ( you can DM as well if you want to keep it private) would be happy to provide feedback. A sequence with multiple templated emails is great for scaling outreach, but like what is the hook?

Do you at least have a portfolio you can send them to?

If some random person hit me up saying that they do web design and can improve my website, but gave me zero proof of their results or at least body of work, I don't think I would be compelled to respond to that email.

 

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[doster.zach]

Any tips on increasing my open and conversion rate with emails?

Be more upfront about the fact it is a cold email. You want to DQ as many people as possible as fast as possible.

Your goal is not to get as many people to the next step, your goal is to get as many qualified leads to sign up.

Also do not make the email centric around you. If the email uses me/I more than twice, NGMI.

Other than that, best way to figure it out is to be sending plenty of emails every day and recording your results, and then tweaking from there. Make sure you are using a large enough sample size.

 

[Cojo]

Sell to people who have a track record of paying to website services.

You don’t want to self to non-believers.

How do I find those people?

 

[Cojo]

If you are comfortable sharing the emails you sent ( you can DM as well if you want to keep it private) would be happy to provide feedback.

Ohk

Do you at least have a portfolio you can send them to?

I don't

 

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[ethan34]

Ohk


Well, I did this -


But didn't get any response. @Itizn said a sequence would be better and I'm doing that now

It could also be you just need to do more outreach. You may really be able to help, some people simply won't respond.

 

[Cojo]

So I finally got a response

He asked me I was based in ottawa which I am not. I am not even based in Canada or even the continent......

I hope that won't be a problem. If he learns I am from Nigeria, he might not be interested due to the online fraud

 

[FIFL]

As a framework, I like the Basho approach - which really is a fancy way of saying B2B sales cold email technique.

I can't do a better job of describing it than this link:

8 Brilliant BASHO Cold Emails for Sales Outreach | ZoomInfo

A BASHO email is a very personalized B2B cold email to a potential client, usually at a high-value account. Here are our winning examples.

pipeline.zoominfo.com

This is most appropriately utilised when you can justify the time investment in researching your target. That is how you personalise it to maximise your conversion odds.

Unfortunately, based on your replies, I'm not sure you understand what is valuable to them...

Well, I did this -

But didn't get any response. @Itizn said a sequence would be better and I'm doing that now

You may also need volume. Prospecting like dating. It's hard and requires repetitions to get your approach refined and to reach enough people to find the right one. My guys working for me would smash out large volumes per week (hundreds) just to find a single spark that could turn into a firework.

Background: I've worked at a bunch of the biggest B2B software companies in various sales roles and most recently I was COO of a fast growing tech startup overseeing business development, sales and marketing.

 

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[Albert KOUADJA]

What are you selling and what are you trying to get out of the outreach?

Based on your posting history, it seems like web design. Disregard if not, but If I was selling web-design, here are a few things to keep in mind...

1. Who are you selling to? Are you selling your services to other organization's design department, are you selling to mom & pop businesses, tech companies, etc.
2. What are you selling? Are you selling an improvement in conversion rates, are you selling a SEO optimized web-page for increased organic clicks, etc. No-one has a website just to have a website.
3. How do you sell a client - is it discovery/fact finding call, do you offer a proof of concept, etc. Think through the steps to the close so that you can create a repeatable process.

Hyperpersonalization is over-valued. Keep it short and relevant. Also, drop the niceties or add it to the bottom. I always start my emails with most important topic FIRST, and leave the "hope you're well, etc" at the very end. Chris Voss, an ex FBI negotiator recommends this for all communication.

Example:

How's the 'Join INSIDERS' CTA converting for your forum, MJ?

We've noticed similar forums get a lot of traffic, but have trouble with converting that traffic into paid subscribers. Worse yet, we've found that while they can get folks subscribed, they tend to churn at about 30% which can make it difficult to keep consistent revenue coming in.

Not sure if this is relevant, but can I share more information with you on reasons that may be happening to your site?

All the best,


Lead with a problem and it makes the call higher importance/relevance. Now you quantify the problem and position your solution in accordance with the magnitude of the problem. Instead of I sell sites for "$39 a month"- "For me to help you increase your CTA conversions from 3% to 7%, which will increase your revenue by $25k p/month, it's going to cost you $6,500".

Also, I agree with Angler and Ltizin and Sully. Short and a sequence. Most folks won't reply to your first email. 50 words or less. Also - pick up the phone.

Good luck!

 

[Albert KOUADJA]

...

1. . Chris Voss, an ex FBI negotiator recommends this for all communication.

'' Never cut the pear in half'' by Chris Voss . this is a great trading book