If you work for a B2B company, you know how difficult it can be to generate leads using tried and true methods like advertising and email marketing. cold emailing
A more traditional lead generation approach, cold email prospecting, is often ignored in the conversation of what works. But believe it or not, if done right, cold emailing can be one of the best ways to generate leads for your business.
Let’s first discuss the difference between cold emailing and regular email marketing.
The Difference Between Cold Email Prospecting and Traditional Email Marketing
A traditional email marketing list is generated by creating ads or other marketing content and collecting emails in the process. Traditional email marketing tactics often require users to specifically opt-in.
Cold emails lists, however, are not generated by explicit opt-ins, and they are often generated using email mining services and databases.
Similarly, the objective of traditional email marketing and cold emailing is totally different. With the former, the end goal is to get users to stay engaged and usually to click, watch something, or possibly opt-in to something else. Cold emailing warrants a reply.
Because of this, cold emailing requires completely different structuring of tone, length, and usually different kinds of calls to action. But like regular email marketing, it still requires you to define your targeting.
Identify Your Audience
Like in standard email marketing, the targeting should require thoughtful consideration before embarking on a campaign.
The audience should not be too specific or too broad. “Sales pros at software companies,” for example, is not specific enough of a target.
It doesn’t underline a clear enough position within an industry that would belie a campaign that anyone would want to respond to.
Conversely, “Regional Sales Managers in Atlanta, Georgia that have used Hubspot for 2 years and recently changed jobs,” is now too specific.
This kind of targeting would not generate enough emails to run a meaningful campaign, either. Here are some questions you should consider when identifying your audience:
What industry do they work in? What is their exact title? Where are they located? Do they work for larger or smaller companies?
With this in mind, you can begin building your list for your cold email campaign.
Customize, Customize, Customize
An effective cold email list should be generated using a reputable database or mining service, and then researched extensively to refine carefully.
You can do this by using software or hiring external experts that specialize in list generation. Remember, the intent of a cold email campaign is to reach out to a specific kind of decision-maker.
Since business emails change as people change jobs, B2B marketers need to ensure the cold email lists they’re building are current and fresh. To verify this is the case, you’ll need to use services that test lists for emails that bounce.
After you’ve built a carefully curated, accurate list of decision-makers you want to reach out to, it’s time to craft emails that will encourage your audience to reply.
How to Write Winning B2B Cold Emails
As a rule of thumb, a great cold email should be three things: topical, short, and include an easy call to action for the target audience.
In other words, it should let users know: who you are, why you’re reaching out, how you can offer value, and what steps you want them to take next.
1. Stay Topical
What does it mean to be topical? In this case, it means being relevant or interesting to the person receiving the email. Why should they care that you emailed them? What’s in it for them? If your email doesn’t address a pain point or simply oversells, it is already not valuable for the audience.
The key to creating a relevant, useful email is by speaking the language of the person you’re targeting. What terms do they use? What problems do they care about? Try your best to use the terms they use, as it’ll show your audience that you can fill a need.
An excellent way to research this is by reading job descriptions or LinkedIn profiles related to the titles you are reaching out to. Take note of how they explain their day-to-day roles and challenges.
2. Keep it simple, stupid
Cold emails are not the time to be verbose! People’s inboxes are usually oversaturated and their attention spans can only accommodate a few seconds to skim an email for its main points. For this reason, you should use as few lines as possible to communicate your message and add value. Don’t use filler statements— just include things your persona will care about.
3. An easier call to action = a higher likelihood of engagement
This can’t be said enough when it comes to cold emailing: make it as simple as possible for the prospect to do what you need them to do! This means removing any of the barriers between getting them to take action after you’ve read your email. If they are busy, keep the email short and ask specific questions. Consider the following: do they have time to read an article? Or to simply forward your message? Whatever the case, your call to action should carefully consider the ins and outs of a regular day for the person you’re trying to reach.
But above all, cold emailing, like all other types of marketing, just requires testing, testing, testing.
If you follow these core steps: identify your audience, build a killer, targeted list, and create a relevant and efficient email campaign that addresses their needs and is easy to act on, you’re already one step closer to generating meaningful leads for your business.
But like anything else, testing will unveil what is most effective for your business! Every company has completely unique things they can leverage to make a campaign more likely to succeed.
If you need help developing a strategy that fits your business’s goals and needs, schedule a strategy session with us today!
