

Ask HN: How receptive would you be to cold emails? - totmore1254

What are some guidelines you guys think should be followed for sending out cold emails? Say I have a product and know who my potential customers are is it ok to send out cold emails or cold call them?
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jeffmould
For the first time in my career I used a cold-email to solicit potential
customers a couple months ago. I sent out over 5000 emails in groups of about
200-300 a day. Each day I would change the email ever so slightly. Once I
started seeing decent results I started tweaking that email until finally I
was pretty much getting a 20-25% response rate on each group of emails I sent.
To be fair, the majority of these conversions were for our freemium service,
but still a signup is a signup and we can use that to market to them down the
road. Here is what I learned:

1\. Use the recipient's first name to address them. Make the email personal
and not "spammy".

2\. The shorter the email the better. Give the recipient just enough
information to make them want to click on your link or respond.

3\. I tracked everyone I sent an email to, by that I mean their name, their
company name, their phone number, their email, and their address. I used this
to my advantage by offering the recipient's the ability to simply respond to
the email with "add me" and I would put them into our system and send a
welcome email.

4\. Remove the hesitation for the recipient and do your best to tell them what
to do next. For example, if you want to set up a call with them, say something
like "I will contact you tomorrow at 1pm to discuss further." Now the burden
is on them to get out of talking to you.

5\. Give your full name, company details, and contact information. Don't just
sign the email with your first/last name.

I did find this article fairly helpful in structuring my email:

[http://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/how-to-write-a-killer-
sale...](http://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/how-to-write-a-killer-sales-
email.html)

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hamoperator
I on occasion respond to cold emails and on occasion send them. My guidelines:

1\. Non click-baity descriptive subject line 2\. The person should add their
full name and contact information 3\. The email should address the recipient
by name 4\. There must be something in the email that is genuinely
personalized

As a recipient, I won't respond unless these 4 conditions are met. As a
sender, I won't send unless these 4 conditions are met AND I genuinely
understand the customers likely problem and have a relevant solution.

