How to Turn Up the Heat on Marketing Results Using Cold Campaigns

The Odds for Your Cold Email in an Attention-Deficit Disordered World

According to MarketingProfs, the average person receives 121 emails every day and the average open rate is 20 to 40 percent, which means people read only 24 to 48 of the emails they get. What’s more, the same research raises the stakes even higher with findings that show people spend an average of nine seconds looking at an email, but that’s just the average. Of the two to four dozen emails people read:

• 30% are looked at for less than two seconds
• 41% are looked at for between two and eight seconds
• 29% are looked at for more than eight seconds

So how do you become one of the coveted 6 to 13 emails that are not only opened but read for more than eight seconds? More importantly, (since it is our topic) how in the heck do you accomplish this feat when you have not been formally introduced? You fine tune your cold email strategy.

Cold Emailing Is a Networking Opportunity, NOT a Marketing Strategy!

Instead of thinking about cold emailing as a marketing strategy, think of it as a networking opportunity. When you take this approach, it’s much easier to connect with people. After all, cold emailing is about you reaching out to someone you don’t know, via email, and introducing yourself in the hopes of establishing a conversation that leads to a business relationship. Yes, there are strategic aspects of it that rely on tech more than your EQ, but if you focus on the technical aspect at the expense of the human element, you will miss the opportunity to connect.

The Art of Forming New Acquaintances

Think about the last time you made new acquaintances at a networking event. What made you take interest in meeting each person?  What led you to smile, extend your hand for a shake, and engage in a conversation? Was the person funny, confident, sincere, a good listener, ridiculously attractive? Whose contact information did you keep? What compelled you to keep it? Conversely, think about the people that made you want to check your phone two seconds into the conversation and invent a reason for a quick exit? What was off-putting about them?

It Only Takes Seconds

We typically judge people visually within seven seconds of seeing them, which is remarkably similar (give or take a second) to how we form judgments when strangers reach out to us via email. This means your organization needs to send cold emails that demonstrate the kind of qualities people find attractive when being introduced to someone for the first time. We’ll talk more about being the kind of business you would want to get emails from throughout this post, but we’ll also share some technical details you must take care of before reaching out to anyone you don’t know.

1. PREPARE YOUR DATA TO MEET NEW PEOPLE

You know what’s a turn off? Getting a cold email from someone with my name misspelled. Honestly, if spammers from a third world country can spell my name correctly when inviting me to collect my mega-millions from the world email lottery, there is zero excuse for your business allowing a spelling error to be its cold campaign downfall.

Before you even think about sending any email, much less a cold one, you need to scrub your list like the family dog after it rolls in something odious. Every article on cold emailing sings praises about the amazing results you can achieve when you personalize content according to the sender, (full disclosure: this blog will, too) But you cannot send a high-performance cold email campaign with old, un-standardized, incomplete and just plain filthy data.

Take Control of Your Data for the Win

As we all know in marketing, the higher the quality of data you have at your disposal, the greater the results you can expect when you send cold campaigns. From reduced bounce-backs, to increased opens, responses and more, good quality data is critical to your cold email strategy. This is where data orchestration comes in, which is controlling all data that comes in, goes out, and is shared throughout the systems in your organization. It sounds like a time-consuming detailed task — and it is—but once it’s automated, you’ll wonder how you ever won a new client before without it. Of course, before you can automate the perpetual cleanliness of your data you will need to:

• Inventory all data-receiving and processing tech in your marketing technology (martech) ecosystem
• Include data sources and systems from other departments in your audit and work with the powers that be to eliminate silos
• Integrate the systems in your martech stack with data sources throughout your organization
• Automate the process of maintaining clean, complete and standardized data at all points of entry;

Pro Tip: Use Sureshot’s hybrid approach of integration experts and AI-driven data solutions to help you take (and keep) control of your data.

2. SEGMENT YOUR LISTS IN NEW AND NICHE WAYS

Personalization is the game-changing strategy behind the impressive results experienced by those who add cold email campaigns to their marketing mix. However, before you enjoy the higher open rates (14 to 23 percent) personalized emails typically deliver, you need to think about who it is you want to target and what they have in common.

The six most popular forms of B2B segments are:

1. Firmographics
2. Demographics
3. Geographics
4. Psychographics
5. Customer Needs
6. Customer Behaviors

Naturally, you will want to choose the segment options that are in alignment with your ideal customer, but feel free to experiment, too.

Combine Different Segments and Establish Niches

Many B2B marketers will create segments based on firmographics (i.e. industry, company size, annual revenue, etc.) and call it a day. However, adding variables from other data sets will help you develop a better view of your ideal customer, and produce more rewarding results. By using more variables to define your lists, you can create smaller subsets of your segments (a.k.a. niches) that enable you to step out into fresh territory and relate to potential customers on a deeper level. Creating niche segments for your cold email lists also allows new acquaintances to feel personally understood, heard and recognized.

Pro Tip: If you’ve been relying solely on firmographics, choose two other types of data sets to further define your segments, such as geography (city, region, country) and features (customer needs).

3. MAKE SUBJECT LINES SHORT, PERSONAL AND THOUGHT-PROVOKING

Did you know that 35 percent of customers open an email based on the content of the subject line? As your official introduction to a complete stranger, your subject line needs to grab their attention, pique their interest, and connect with them on a personal level. Most importantly, it needs to do all of these things in as few words as possible, ideally 10 words or less. Some statistics on the science of increasing open rates via subject lines include:

• 22% is the increase for subject lines that include the recipient’s name
• 50% is the increase for subject lines that feature a quick question
• 30% is the increase for personalized subject lines (i.e. firmographics, geographics, etc.)

Use Billboard Logic for Subject Lines

Because a subject line has so much riding on it, there’s a real temptation to overthink it or overload it with too many ideas. How often have you driven past a billboard and marveled at the waste of money someone invested in posting a novel in such a limited space? Back in the day, the rules for outdoor advertising were one idea per board conveyed in eight words or less. These same rules are relevant for cold campaign subject lines.

People in our distracted world crave simplicity, so feed that craving by honing in on one key point per subject line, and force yourself to say it in as few words as possible. Most marketers feel compelled to sell something in every piece of marketing, but no one likes to be sold to. Instead use your subject line to draw someone into a conversation. Ask a provocative question that strikes an emotional chord regarding their business. Talk to them about what they care about. Be the person at the party that leaves everyone wanting more.

4. BE THOUGHTFUL IN HOW YOU PERSONALIZE BODY COPY

It’s so refreshing when you talk to someone and that person responds in a way that lets you know they are actually listening, instead of thinking about the next thing they want to tell you. That’s the spirit of personalization that you want your cold emails to embody. You want them to sound as if you have personally considered what each recipient is interested in, and then carefully crafted an email that speaks directly to those interests.

According to Tucker Max at The Harvard Business Review, personalizing cold emails gives you a competitive advantage that is vital to your organization’s success. Some of the latest stats that showcase the amazing power of personalization in producing better marketing campaign results, include:

• 21% is the increase in response rates when subject lines and body copy are personalized
• 100% is the increase in reply rates when emails are personalized for each individual customer
• 6x is the increase in transaction amounts produced by personalized emails

Max maintains, “Personalization means that you’ve thought about who this person is, how they see the world, what interests them, and what they want — you’ve developed a “theory of mind” about the recipient. This shows them you have put work into understanding them.”

Before you become overwhelmed by the idea of personalizing cold email copy based on the individual preferences of every last single person on your contact list, remember that you’ve already laid a lot of the ground work so that you can do precisely that.

Preparing to Personalize Body Copy

When you personalize cold emails, you want to find and establish common ground. The good news is when you segment your emails, you have already done most of the work needed to identify common subjects to talk about with cold prospects. Here are three actionable examples:

• If you segmented based on industry:  Feature an image that speaks to your understanding of that industry at the top of the email and in the body copy share how you resolved an issue for a company in that industry.
• If you segmented based on geography: Talk about customers you serve in the area that are happy with your services, area knowledge, and response rates.
• If you segmented based on seasonal buying behaviors: Share events and upcoming opportunities you have planned to make their lives easier during their busy season. 

Automate the Sending of Personalized Messages

Content automation, also known as message orchestration is the secret weapon behind very braggart that ever laid claim to a high-performance ABM strategy. Automated message orchestration requires you to use an intuitive martech tool that:

• Pulls content from all connected data sources in your organization
• Plugs that data into the appropriate data fields of templates
• Sends personalized campaigns automatically or at your command

Automating the process of sending personalized emails enables the people on your list to receive information from you on the topics they are personally interested in reading about. What’s more, because these tools are adept at dynamically pulling and placing data, you can easily add names and titles to your templates and make your emails as personal as you like. In short, message orchestration is what makes ABM-style cold email campaigns scalable.

5. SHORT AND SWEET VS. LONG AND INFO-PACKED COLD CAMPAIGNS

Jazz Age icon, Louise Brooks once quipped, “Writing is one percent inspiration, and 99 percent elimination.” We couldn’t agree more. When it comes to writing cold campaigns, don’t lose a perfectly good sale by saying too much. Be like George Costanza, hit the high note, and get out quick. Challenge your writers to consider the average results produced by the email content lengths below:

• 3.5% is the response rate for copy that is 30 to 100 words
• 7.5% is the response rate for copy that is 130 to 250 words
• 8% is the response rate for copy that is 200 to 380 words

If you’ve ever read anything by Ernest Hemingway, then you know one of the reasons he is lauded as great was due to his ability to say in a few words, what takes most writers three paragraphs. Go and do likewise.

6. PRESENT COLD EMAILS RECIPIENTS WITH A PRESENT

When personalizing cold emails, sometimes it’s not enough to personalize data—sometimes you need a gift to get you in the door. Nearly 3,000 years ago, Solomon, one of the wisest people to ever live, said, “Giving a gift can open doors; it gives access to important people!” (Proverbs 18:16 NLT). Marketing research has shown Solomon knew what he was talking about:

• 24% of companies say giving gifts opened up new opportunities or leads for them
• 66% of people are able to recall a brand name a year after receiving a promotional gift
• 80% of businesses report that gifts have improved relationships with clients

According to blogger, Alicia Baucom’s research on giving, “About 50% of recipients do not like the gifts they receive. Therefore, giving useful gifts is considered the best way of winning your recipient’s affection.”

Be a Thoughtful Gift Giver

Giving gifts to folks on your cold email list does not have to be a budget buster. There are lots of practical and useful things you can give that you likely already have on-hand. Examples of gifts that are all practical and useful (especially if they address a problem or personal interest of the recipient) are:

White Papers • E-Books • Special Discounts • Use Cases • Case Studies • Free Trials

Of course, an actual physical gift can work wonders if you have the budget for it. A company I once worked for sent select prospects a nice basket of gourmet goodies, which cost around $50 per recipient. As long as the sales reps called within 24 hours of folks receiving their gift baskets, they were able to book meetings with nearly all of these tough-to-get prospects.

7. EQUIP COLD CAMPAIGNS WITH A COMPELLING CALL TO ACTION

Most people like for you to be direct when telling them what you want. At the end of every email, make sure you include (within your short word count) a very clear and concise call to action (CTA). If you want someone to download an e-book, invite them. If you want someone to book a meeting, include a scheduling button. If you want someone to simply respond to the email with a level of interest, ask them.

Always give cold email recipients something to do, because building a relationship with someone new requires give and take. If you don’t include a CTA, you run the risk that—despite liking your email and what you had to say—your prospect isn’t sure how to respond, which means they won’t respond at all.  A recent study found that emails with a single definitive CTA enjoy a 42% increase in click-through rates. This same study found that including multiple CTAs reduces click-through rates, so think one-and-done when it comes to CTAs.

8. FOLLOW-UP WITH EVERY COLD CONTACT

We’ve all had that experience where we liked a sales person and were ready to buy from them and then for some reason, we fell off their radar, which resulted in them losing our sale. Studies show that sending follow-up emails can triple your reply rate. One of the companies in that study, called Ambition.com, ran a cold email campaign with a goal of acquiring 73 new leads. They cold emailed about 600 prospects and one percent of those folks responded. However, when they sent follow up emails, they were able to increase their response rate by 12.6 percent. That’s an impressive leap.

Practice Good Follow-Up Etiquette

When sending follow-up emails, the trick to getting a good response is to be brief, polite and willing to take a hint. Your goal is to be viewed as respectful of a prospect’s time and not desperate for a meeting or a sale. We recommend sending a cold email nurture sequence that looks something like this:

• Intro — CTA usually involves a free gift (Note: If they respond to the intro, they are entered into a different sequence than the one below)
• Follow-Up — CTA asks for a response sharing level of interest
• Final Follow-Up — CTA asks if they recommend that we talk to someone else at their company

Be sure you space out the timing on sending each of these emails by three or four days, so that recipients don’t feel stalked by your company or consider your emails spam.

Key Points Recap

1. Use clean data in cold campaigns.
2. Segment lists into niches.
3. Keep subject lines provocative and >10 words.
4. Use automation to personalize campaigns.
5. Keep copy short as in 130 to 380 words.
6. Use gifts to get responses.
7. Always include a CTA.
8. Follow-up to triple your reply rate.

Sureshot has a long history of helping organizations get better results from their marketing strategies by automating data processes and message personalization, and empowering customers to create coordinated customer journeys that delight at every touchpoint. If you are ready to unlock the full potential of your cold campaigns and other marketing endeavors, start by taking our FREE Martech Assessment.