

Experiment: Cold emailing businesses - dugmartin
http://citrusy.com/blog/experiment-1-results-cold-emailing-businesses/

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nate
I highly recommend the book Nail it Then scale it.

[http://www.amazon.com/Nail-then-Scale-Entrepreneurs-
ebook/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Nail-then-Scale-Entrepreneurs-
ebook/dp/B0055D7O1U/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1330546622&sr=1-1)

There's some interesting discussion in there about cold emails and cold calls.
It proposes that you should be emailing/calling prospects about a problem you
think they have. (Do some research first instead of just saying, "I know
nothing, tell me about your day").

The rule of thumb this book recommends is 50%. If you don't get a 50% response
rate from emails or calls, you either picked the wrong or too wide of a
demographic, or the problem you think potential customers have isn't the
biggest type of problem. Iterate the demographic, or iterate the problem
statement.

I've been using a variant of the 50% rule in an online survey/Google ad, and
it's led to some very effective output. It's helped me pick headlines and
solution ideas, that get a bunch of interest from people. I created a product
the other day (just a landing page pitching people pay me X to do a specific
type of project for them) and I had sales that same day.

~~~
domodomo
I'll check it out.

Part of the trick is I don't even have a demographic or problem statement. I'm
trolling for ideas with my lure in the water, sailing in circles.
Consequently, 50% response rate would be a miracle. But maybe not for cold
calls, we'll see.

Also, the whole buy some adwords and do a landing page thing worked for you? I
have had zero luck with this approach. How niche was your idea? It seems like
a rare combination where 1) The adwords are affordable, and 2) There is enough
search traffic to generate real data.

~~~
nate
Not having a demo or problem statement is tough probably? And you might find
some great stuff using your lure like you are doing.

But I can't help feel you might have more fun and possibly better
effectiveness if go the trite "scratch your own itch" route, or at least focus
on demographics you are in or closely related to. You like tshirts? Call
tshirt companies and focus on their problems. If you're calling on plumbing
companies, great if that's what you're into. But you probably have at least a
couple hobby areas you are much more interested in than plumbing. If you like
puzzles, calling on game making/puzzle companies with something like "I love
the games you are developing!" because you actually like their stuff is likely
going to raise your response rates too.

Yeah, Adwords/Facebook/LinkedIn can work. Wasn't too niche. I targeted a
pretty wide group, and the survey just asked "What's your biggest problem.
A/B/C/D/other" and "How much of a hassel is that problem? Big, medium, small".
You want a lot of "big" answers to one of those problems.

~~~
domodomo
My deal is that I already went down the 'scratch your own itch' path, totally
ignorant of the customer development approach and got burnt bad. So now I am
going extreme opposite. My guess is there is a happy middle ground I need to
drift back towards. I'll keep your advice in mind.

All my hobbies are too nerdy, and therefor over-served btw. Except one:
sailing. Maybe I should take a harder look at that.

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joseph4521
There's another word for cold emailing, it's spam.

~~~
alaskamiller
It's spam if it's unsolicited and irrelevant.

It's opportunity if it's unsolicited and relevant.

~~~
nate
<http://www.spamhaus.org/definition.html>

Unsolicited and Bulk is usually the going definition. If's it's a targeted,
relevant, personalized email it starts to be not-spam.

And I'm definitely a proponent of cold emails. However I couldn't help also
resonate with this from Banksy today:

[https://twitter.com/#!/negativeneil/status/17468993380458496...](https://twitter.com/#!/negativeneil/status/174689933804584961/photo/1)

~~~
alaskamiller
Definitions don't change?

I'm realizing deeper into the tech world I go the more signals tossed in all
directions my way. I don't see spam though, I don't see the viagra ads or the
russian wives. That's a testament to Google, Mailchimp, and the bevy of email
marketers.

But I still have needs, wants, and requirements for work, personal, or
consumption. So rather I see relevance and irrelevance of all these things
tossed me way. That's spam's inevitability.

That Banksy item is pretty old. I'm getting a slight chuckle that an Instagram
shot of a blog post posted on Twitter is getting play. Then I remembered I saw
it on Tumblr last night.

The internet is just weird.

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leoedin
I've had summer jobs that involve cold-contacting people in the same
university that I worked in. The response rate to my initial email (sent from
a university email address internally, directly related to the jobs of these
people) was rarely above 10%. Calling them inevitably got "oh yeah, I saw that
email". That was the point that our actual relationship started.

I was never a huge fan of calling people, but I was forced to learn. It's
definitely helped in subsequent business relationships. Email just _isn't_ a
way to communicate with the wider public.

It's easy to forget that just because you spent 11 hours on something means
that the person reading it will give it anything close to that. They're going
to give you about 20 seconds. Long essays explaining everything never work. A
short, to the point email with a couple of numbered questions works, and it
means that inevitably when you call them the next day they can quickly get up
to speed with what you're contacting them about.

There's a tendency in tech-related areas to assume that everyone treats their
email the same as you do, but in my experience the less techy a person is, the
less they consider email to be important.

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zaidf
If you are getting 1 meeting from 50 emails and you're not even trying to sell
something, you are doing something wrong.

 _I have to think that cold calls convert better than emails. That’s probably
the real answer here. Get on the phone and start calling. It’s a scary
prospect for an introverted nerd like me. It comes down to this: The hustle
must overcome the nerd. And it shall._

Indeed!

~~~
dave_sullivan
I dunno, have you had much luck w/ cold calling vs email? I think e-mail is a
lot more effective as it's faster and can be automated where cold calling
simply can't be automated and no one likes getting called on the phone when
they're doing something else. Everyone works off of e-mail these days.

And I've done both, I've had way better results with cold e-mails, 1 meeting
out of 50 emails is probably about right for the first time, if he e-mails
everyone two more times that number will go up a bit. _Particularly_ if he's
not selling anything. If I'm running a business, why would I want to meet with
a guy who just wants to talk about my business? I'd rather meet with someone
that at least claims to know my business and is working on a vague new product
and wants to get my feedback on it.

~~~
domodomo
What took the longest for me wasn't the sending of the emails, but the
research that went into finding who to email. This would be the same deal if I
was cold calling. And I'm not sure how to automate this, you just have to slog
through it. You can only call or email as many people as you can find after
all. So that's the bottle neck.

So if the time investment is a wash, then it's really a question of what
converts better, not based on bulk. I have a feeling calls will...but I don't
have the personal data to prove it yet.

It's interesting you had bad experience with calls though. Were you selling
something? Maybe that's the difference.

~~~
dave_sullivan
You can automate it a good deal with a mix of scraping and mturk, but that
will result in both e-mails and phone #s, so your choice on what to do with
them.

And experience w/ calls--I wouldn't say it was bad experience, it was just
better with e-mail--tends to cut to the chase and replies are a better
indication of interest. Everyone's selling something--even if you just want to
talk to someone about their problems, you're still selling them on the
proposition that it would be a more valuable use of their time talking to you
than doing something else. And that doesn't make you a bad person, it just
doesn't make a difference whether you're asking for money or someone's time.

But yeah, would be very interested to see your results w/ cold calling vs
email, if you do two more rounds of e-mails and leave 3 vm messages on your
cold calling before giving up, I'll bet you still do better with e-mail. But
again, very interested to see your numbers, so very cool experiment!

------
Estragon
So, calling or emailing, what do you say? "I'm a smart guy looking for
problems to solve in return for money?"

~~~
pitt1980
That's probably roughly it

"I'm a software developer

I'm looking for ideas to create useful software for (whatever industry target
is in)

I would love to buy you coffee and pick you brain about what software could be
developed that would solve problems you have"

~~~
rgraham
They don't care about you. Make the conversation about them. The sooner you
are talking about them, the better.

Figure out a way to offer some value to them. <http://bit.ly/oeZDzC>
[whitetailsoftware.com]

When you are speaking with them, ask open questions like "What are your three
biggest problems in X business?"

One of the three is usually hiring quality people. Anyone got a solution?

More ideas on refining the calling approach: <http://bit.ly/vPCtuI>
[blog.asmartbear.com]

~~~
domodomo
Okay, sorry to re-reply but here are the two versions of the email I sent.
Mind skimming them and tell me what I did horribly, horribly wrong? I'd
honestly love your feedback. I think I would follow something shorter than
this but the same in spirit for cold phone calls. So maybe you can save me
some pain and anguish.

Polite Version: Dear %fill:FirstName%,

First off, sorry for this out of the blue email. I found your name
%fill:FoundYourNameSource%, and was hoping you might be able to help me.

My name is Ian Fitzpatrick, I'm the founder of a small software company in
Saint Paul. I'm investigating ideas for my next software product, and I'm
interested in creating an application that serves your industry.

I see that you're a %fill:JobRole% at %fill:CompanyName%. Are there any parts
of your job that you feel are a hassle, repetitive, or error-prone -- where if
you had the right software at work, your life might be a little easier? That's
the kind of thing I'm super interested in hearing about.

If you have just 20 minutes available any time this week, I'd love the meet
and pick your brain. I'm honestly just trying to learn, and hopefully create a
product that makes your life a little easier.

Impolite Version:

Hi %fill:FirstName%,

I’m a software developer investigating some projects ideas in the
%fill:IndustryName%. I’d like to understand the problems and successes you've
had at %fill:CompanyName% a bit better. I’m not trying to sell you anything, I
would just like to hear your thoughts on a few things related to the industry.

Do you have 20 minutes available to meet at some point in the next week? I'd
like to conduct an informal interview with you.

~~~
domodomo
Oh and if you look closely, you'll see I completely stole my copy from you.
Doh.

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yoshyosh
Honestly just get out of the building. You will be surprised how open people
are to talking about their industry and the problems they face.

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cjensen
In California, that would be $50,000 in fines. It's $1000 per commercial email
you send to someone with whom you have no prior relationship.

As it should be.

