

How My Startup Raised $1.1 Million From a Single Cold Email - bleachtree
http://ericbieller.com/post/60847881635/how-my-startup-raised-1-1-million-from-a-single-cold

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goofygrin
<queue 1million spam emails to Mark Cuban>

I've had some startup clients do this and it's not worked out well for them
(of course, we're in Dallas, not SV, so the response/pace of business is
different).

I think a lot of this sort of thing works "once in a blue moon" rather than
"do this as a formula" as your email simply happened into someone's email box
when they either felt that need and/or were receptive to something new.

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ericbieller
Thanks for the input. I agree with this not being a sure fire way to get
noticed. Again, it comes down to how you write the email, what your goal is
and what your product is. But I don't agree that this is a 'once in a blue
moon' type of thing.

We actually got quite a few responses from very influential people, not just
Naval. The reality is, a lot of them spend hours on email a day. If you give
them something worth responding to, they will respond!

~~~
jacquesm
> If you give them something worth responding to, they will respond!

The problem here is that not everybody is objective when it comes to determine
what is worth responding to. So this will be applied as a winning recipe
because it worked once for someone and that someone blogged about it.

I can see a whole pile of heavy hitters waking up to people trying this scheme
out wondering what is the cause of this inbox deluge :)

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ericbieller
I've actually gained several very valuable contacts from this method, not just
one ;) So it's actually worked out for me several times in the past, which is
why I still do it.

In either case there's no harm in sending the email. Of course your conversion
rate is going to be low. But if you can send 10 well written emails and get 1
valuable response, that certainly seems worth it to me!

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ohazi
It looks like you guys built a solid product that's clearly useful, as well as
a website that makes the value proposition immediately obvious. I would guess
that this had more to do with your funding success than your cold email
strategy.

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ericbieller
Thanks a ton! Indeed having an interesting product helps, but what good is an
interesting product if your email gets chucked straight into the trash because
it's too long, or seems too arrogant? ;)

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austenallred
Turns out the founder of AngelList is a good person to have advocating for
you.

~~~
ericbieller
Indeed he is, nice guy too ;)

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KirinDave
It's almost like making a good product that solves a real problem is a
differentiator in the Valley.

But also it further reinforces the notion that there is a ton of money to be
made facilitating other startups.

