As Chief Officers in charge of finding the correct email addresses, we here at Findymail always keep an eye on cold email data: what works? What doesn’t? Why’s this meme increasing open rates by 341%?
So today, we’re looking at the data gathered from over 100 million emails (shout out to QuickMail and Woodpecker) to show you how to improve your 2023 cold email game.
Let’s dive in!
1. Get 50% More Cold Email Responses by Personalizing Your Outreach
Personalize your outreach to see 50% higher open rates, but don’t be corny about it.
First, do your research. Then, write a darn good subject line.
How to Personalize Your Cold Emails
Start with a carefully curated lead list. Don’t target more than 1000 prospects with a single cold email template because you’re likely casting a broad net. Instead, make it as specific as possible to personalize emails effectively.
Once you export your Sales Navigator (or Apollo) leads, find their email addresses with Findymail and scrape the data that matters:
- Their name
- Their current role
- Their previous role
- Their current company
- Bonus points: Challenges they want to solve
- Bonus points: Recent news about their company relevant to their position
The more data you have, the easier it will be to craft personalized subject lines such as:
- Hey [NAME], still want to crack [CHALLENGE]?
- Hey [NAME], great work at [PREVIOUS ROLE]! What is [BOSS’ NAME] expecting from you next?
- How’s [RECENT NEWS] going for [COMPANY NAME]?
Don’t go for generic subject lines like “Hey [NAME], an idea for [COMPANY]” or “[NAME], quick question?”
That’s not going to cut it anymore. Instead, make them feel like you have already met.
You can also use tools like Vidu to personalize gifs and videos at scale!
2. The Best Cold Email Campaigns Have a 20% Reply Rate
The top 25% of QuickMail cold email campaigns typically have a 20% reply rate. If you have to settle for 1%, you should do something differently.
How to Increase Your Cold Email Reply Rate
Create a handful of templates and test them on similar audiences. Then, analyze their performance and identify what worked well in each template.
Include personalized information: reference company news, job changes or industry trends. If you’re sourcing leads from alumni lists, show them you have common ground. Don’t be creepy about it, but make it clear that you meant to reach out to the lead.
P.S. Make sure you use spintax to increase your deliverability, especially when launching a massive cold outreach campaign.
3. 7.5% of Cold Emails Bounce
... and that’s a problem. Sometimes you’ll land in a catch-all email inbox; other times, you’ll end up with an unverified email address. Either way, your sender reputation will be affected.
How to Reduce Your Cold Email Bounce Rate
In addition to basic cold email hygiene (warm up your inbox, please!), verify email addresses before you fire off those emails.
If you use Findymail to find and verify email addresses, you have two options:
Manually Verify Email Addresses
Head to your dashboard, click “Email Verifier,” and enter the email you want to check.
Automatically Verify Email Addresses
Import your .CSV file in the Email Verifier or use the Chrome extension to verify emails in Google Sheets.
Bonus Tips
- Don’t buy lead lists. With Sales Navigator, Apollo, and a bunch of other tools that filter leads by different criteria for you, there’s no reason to buy lead lists. You can even find LinkedIn leads’ email addresses!
- Use spintax to randomize parts of your emails. For example, spintax will randomly use “Hey [NAME]” and “Hi [NAME]” (and other select parts of your email copy) to make the emails sound more natural to email providers.
4. The Riches Are in the Follow-ups: Key Cold Email Follow-up Statistics
As in telemarketing, where 95% of conversions are reached after the sixth cold or warm call, so in email sales. And in cold outreach, 55% of replies come from a follow-up email.
If your prospect list is targeted, your email addresses verified, and the emails are being opened, it’s worth following up on them. Life gets busy, a lead may be juggling different tasks (and offers) simultaneously, and in many cases, the outreach pro with the best follow-up is the one who lands the deal.
How Many Follow-ups Should You Add to Your Cold Email Sequence?
Woodpecker’s recent research found that outreach sequences with 4-7 emails see an average reply rate of 27%.
Your number will vary on your sales cycle length.
However, aim for at least 4 emails, provided the prospect is showing interest (by opening them).
What Should Your Cold Email Follow-up Look Like?
Firstly, your cold email follow-up should be relevant.
Personalization is critical, so make sure your follow-up email is valuable, whether that’s by sending:
- A relevant case study
- An industry resource other clients found helpful
- Advice pertinent to their challenge
Address objections in your follow-up emails:
- Provide social proof
- Elaborate on the value they get at your pricing
- Respond to the prospects' silent questions
Finally, don’t inundate your prospects with emails; spread them across a few weeks. Make sure your LinkedIn profile is optimized because they will Google you.
5. Include Questions to Boost Your Cold Email Response Likelihood by 50%
Use the first few lines in your cold email to present a personalized pitch, but then let the prospect take the lead by posing a question. If your emails include 1-3 questions, you could see 50% higher response rates.
Avoid rhetorical questions or the legendary “Quick question” subject line. Instead, pose a valuable question to your buyers. For example:
- Our existing customers struggled with [CHALLENGE]. Are you facing the same situation?
- I understand you’ve been using [COMPETITOR]. What does success with this tool look like for you?
- Do you think [CHALLENGE] is a problem for you?
If these questions sound too specific, narrow your prospect list further. Sometimes it’s better to have 100 leads in the list - if they’re targeted, you’ll see higher open and response rates than if you’d emailed 1000 people who fit different segments.
Let Cold Email Statistics Show You the Way!
Cold email is still incredibly effective and doesn’t require too many bells & whistles. Just remember to refine your prospect list, find the right email addresses, and personalize the templates with value.
After that, you’ll be good to go!
