Cold Email Outreach Campaign

Although you are almost always going to have better success getting in front of people that are actively looking to buy your product or services as opposed to those that merely fit your target demographic of someone who “could” benefit from your product or service (as we’ll show you how to do via our training videos), cold email outreach (meaning you’re sending emails to people that have never heard of you) is still very popular amongst freelancers so I am going to show you how to do this in an automated way so that you can do this as efficiently as possible if you decide you want to go this route as an additional route to what you’re doing on Upwork, and your 1-on-1 outreach on Linkedin and Instagram.

Cold email outreach campaigns is not my preferred method of how to get clients as a freelancer by any means, but since a lot of freelancers still go this route as it is inexpensive to do, I am going to show you how to do this in the most automated way possible just in case you decide to go this route with your company or as a freelancer. Once again though, you are almost always going to have more success getting in front of people that are actively looking to buy services like you offer as opposed to those that merely fit your target demographic of someone who “could” benefit from your service and we’re going to get much more into this in the video trainings.

With that being said though, I want to show you how to set up an automated system of cold email outreach as this can be a very inexpensive way to get leads and potential customers. The downside is that even though we are setting this up to run in an automated way, you may still spend a decent amount of time replying to people that are unlikely to purchase your services as this outreach is directed at people that merely fit your target demographic rather than people that are actively looking to purchase services like you offer.

Nonetheless, as I already mentioned, this is still a very common method for some freelancers and you can think of this as just one of the many different revenue streams you can set up for your freelancing business if you’re trying to expand into getting clients in additional ways after you do what I stated on Upwork, and your 1-on-1 outreach on Linkedin and Instagram. For most freelancers, cold email outreach won’t be your end all be all but it can be a great way to get some additional clients as well as a good additional revenue stream but you probably just don’t want to rely solely on this method as your only way to bring in more clients as you’re going to have better success getting your company in front of people that are actively looking for services like you offer (as explained in the other guides) rather than cold messaging people that you think could benefit from your services.

So, I want you to think of this method that I’m about to show you moreso as a hack in how to get in front of your target audience if you are trying to get additional clients if for some reason you’ve tapped out what you can do on Upwork, and in your 1-on-1 outreach on Linkedin and Instagram as this is a cheap way that can help you automate the outreach process. Once you are able to start bringing in money, if you’re really trying to grow your freelance business into something much larger, try to reinvest that money into more sustainable marketing funnels such as through ads because building out an ad funnel coupled with retargeting ads and email marketing is really going to be most freelancers golden ticket to scaling their freelance business into something much larger if you’re trying to turn this into a full-fledged agency where you have employees. However, if you aren’t concerned with turning your freelancing business into a full-fledged agency, don’t worry about paying for ads as your clients will mostly come from, UpWork, 1-on-1 outreach and referrals.

Alright, so, let’s get your cold outreach automation funnel set up if you want to tack on this method to the ways you’ll get new clients.

Choosing An Email Address For Your Cold Email Outreach
1. As we’ll get into in the Email Marketing training videos, your email reputation is important because if you get too many people saying your email is spam, your email domain will get flagged so that when you send emails out in the future, they are more likely to get sent to people’s spam folder which hurts your future success.
2. Because of this, most savvy freelancers that use cold email outreach will setup a different email address with a different domain to ensure that their main email address doesn’t get negatively affected by their cold email outreach campaign and I STRONGLY RECOMMEND that if you’re going to do a cold email outreach campaign, that you do this too.
3. How To Set Up A New Email
  1. If your freelance business name is Sam’s SEO Services, your website address might be samsseoservices.com and your current email address might be Sam@samsseoservices.com. Everything after the @ symbol is your email domain.
  2. When I said you should use a different email address, I don’t just mean use a different email address with the same domain (Jim@samsseoservices.com), but rather, I mean use a different email address with a different, but similar domain. The reason why is because if that email domain gets flagged for spam enough, then all emails coming from that domain could be impacted and all people using that domain regardless of if it’s coming from Sam@samsseoservices.com or Jim@samsseoservices.com or Jerry@samsseoservices.com could have their emails deliverability impacted. This would not be good for your freelance business because once you do have clients or when you need to send an important email from your main email (Sam@samsseoservices.com), your emails might not go through properly.
  3. So, instead, you’ll want to purchase a new domain on a website such as Godaddy.com or Namecheap.com or any of their competitors.
  4. You’ll want the new domain to be very similar to your business domain of “samsseoservices.com” but at least this way, your primary email won’t be negatively affected by this type of campaign. Examples of domain names you can set up could be something like:
    1. Samsseo.com
    2. Samsseoservice.com
  5. The idea here is that you want this new domain to be as close to your original domain so that just in case someone were to look up your domain online, when they do, your website still hopefully shows up. In your email, you’ll have a link to your website as most people will click that rather than type your domain into Google, but still, you want this new domain to be as close as possible to your original domain so you don’t confuse people if at all possible.
  6. Once you purchase the domain, you can then go to whatever company you are using for email (such as Google which is the most popular) and set up that new email address there with that new domain.

Next, Warm Up Your Email
1. You don’t want to create a new email address and then all of a sudden start sending out tons of emails where a lot of people aren’t replying as this will make email service providers think your emails are spam which will hurt your deliverability in the future. Remember, this is a cold email outreach campaign which means these people, although they fit your target demographic, they aren’t looking for services like you offer at this time so you certainly won’t get them all to respond and can have low response rates depending on your messaging and your industry. When email service providers see that nobody is opening or responding to your emails, this may make them think you’re spamming people and therefore your emails in the future could be less likely to show up in someone’s inbox and instead head straight to people’s spam folder which isn’t good for you.
2. Luckily, there are solutions to help you with this. This process is called “warming up your inbox”. There are companies out there that will “warm up your email” for you by having your email address automatically send emails to their network of email addresses and those emails in their network will respond to your emails thus, warming up your newly created email so that your new email builds a healthy reputation much faster. I strongly recommend using a service like this to warm up your email for at least a few weeks otherwise a good majority of your emails could go straight to spam depending on how much cold outreach you are doing which would completely tank the possibility of success that you’d have running a cold email outreach campaign.
3. I personally used a company called warmupinbox.com in the past and I was happy with them but you can use any of their competitors as well and they will provide instructions on how to get your email set up so that they can automatically warm up your email address for you. I recommend letting this run for at least 2 weeks and then slowly ramp up your cold email outreach while this is still running because regardless of if people are responding to your emails or not, your overall response rate will still look healthy because you can guarantee that all the emails that are being sent via a company like warmupinbox are getting responses.
Next, You’ll Need To Find Email Addresses For Your Target Demographic
1. Typically speaking, you should only be emailing people that have given you their email address and you should only be calling people that have given you their phone number. However, a lot of freelancers will find people’s email addresses online, much like how you can find a person’s phone number online, and then send them an email. So, I’m going to show you the most efficient way to do this if you feel this is a good option for your freelancing business.
  1. Option #1 On How To Get Email Addresses – Via Linkedin (slower way)
    1. Lots of people have their email address on their Linkedin profile so you can simply get email addresses by going to your target’s profile and pulling it that way.
    2. However, many people won’t have their email address public for everyone to see as you’ll need to be a connection of theirs in order to see this. If this is the case, you’ll need to send them a convincing connection request so that they accept your request and then you’ll gain access to their email address.
    3. The above way can be tedious and is usually not the most automated process. To make this process faster for you if you decide to go this route, you can do 1 of 2 things
      1. 1. You can hire a Virtual Assistant to do all of this email collection and friend request process.
        
        You’ll essentially use a Tool such as Linkedin’s Sales Navigator or Linkedin Recruiter (just like I showed you in the “Reaching Out On Linkedin Guide”) and you’ll put demographic information into these platforms (such as job title, state, how many years of experience, industry, keywords that appear in their profile, etc.) that match your target demographic. Linkedin will then populate all the people on Linkedin that match the criteria you’ve inputted and you can save that list of people and give it to your VA (Virtual Assistant) along with a template script on what you want them typing for each friend request that is sent and they can then do this for you.
        
        If they accept your connection request, you can then have your Virtual Assistant go to their profile and collect whatever info you want them to get there.
      2. 2. Alternatively, you can use automation software tools for Linkedin such as Linkedfusion, Linked Helper, Dripify or any of their competitors as tools like these will send connection requests, messages, and scrape people’s email addresses and their personal Linkedin profile information for you from their profile so that you don’t need to do any of this yourself.
        
        Please note that it is against Linkedin’s rules to use automation tools on their platform so you are doing this at your own risk. Lot’s of freelancers use tools like this instead of hiring a VA but yeh, it is against Linkedin’s rules so be mindful of that as this could jeopardize your account. I recommend not using automation tools like this but I am sharing with you how to do it here just because a lot of freelancers do use them so I want you to know how to do this.
    4. If you decide to try to connect with people on Linkedin, my recommendation would be to purchase Linkedin Sales Navigator or Recruiter. This will allow you to hone in on your target demographic much more than the free version which doesn’t allow you to put in many filters so it’s next to impossible to hone in on your target demographic effectively without the paid account. Once you pay for Sales Navigator or Linkedin Recruiter, you’ll be able to put in your target demographic’s info, save the list of people that populate with your filters, then create 1 attractive connection request message to send out to all of that list. From there, you can either have all of your messaging with these prospects via Linkedin messaging, or, you can pull their email addresses from their profile and add them to your cold email outreach campaign.
    5. What should the Linkedin Connection Request message say?
      1. Although you don’t need to add any message when sending a connection request, it will drastically help your acceptance rate if you do so it’s best that you do.
      2. Additionally, make sure the person that is sending the message has a professional image, a set up profile, and a good headline that someone from your target audience would find attractive as they will see this when you send them a connection request.
        
        If your headline says, “I sell things to people”, you’re likely not going to get a lot of connection requests acceptances. However, if your headline says, “I help skincare business owners get 2x more leads in 3 months”, you’ll likely get more people accepting your connection requests for example.
      3. Your connection request message should be friendly and should not be a sales pitch. Instead, you’re going to get more connection requests accepted if you show the value you can bring to them if they accept your connection request. For instance here is an example of a message if you help skincare business owners get more sales via social media (please never copy these examples verbatim as these are just examples so you get the point as I don’t want all of our students using the same wording as that would negatively impact you):
        
        Hey First Name,
        
        Love your skincare products! I had a few comments I’d love to share via Linkedin as I actually specialize specifically in growing skincare companies like yours (I’ve grown skincare brands to 250k followers in under 4 months).
        
        Looking forward to connecting and sharing a few tips I know will really catapult your business like I’ve done with other skincare brands.
      4. As you can see, this person is much more likely to connect with me if they are looking to grow their skincare company as I’m immediately offering some value in form of some free tips. If on the other hand I said something like this:
        
        Hey First Name,
        
        Let’s connect. I am a freelancer that will help you get your paid ads set up so you can grow your company more.
      5. The above message likely wouldn’t do as well as you are immediately trying to sell them without first providing any value. People, especially business owners, get sold to all the time on Linkedin so it’s important for you to first provide value on how you can help them and then, once they accept your connection request, then you can send a short message or 2 on how you can help them with your service. Please note, in these messages, you don’t want to be talking about how great you are but instead, you want to state the ways you’ll be able to help your prospect solve their problems through the service you provide.
    6. Once they accept your Linkedin connection request, you can do 1 of 2 things:
      1. Option 1. Continue to do all your 1-on-1 outreach directly via dm on Linkedin’s platform (I advise this route) or Option 2: Collect their email address from Linkedin and then just start emailing them through your email drip campaign rather than any more messaging via LinkedIn.
      2. Let’s first discuss Option 1: Continue to do all your 1-on-1 outreach directly via dm on Linkedin’s platform (I advise this route)
        
        You can craft 2-4 follow up Linkedin DM’s that are ready to go and space these out over a few days or a few weeks (we’ll talk more about spacing these out below). You can send these out manually to people, have your VA do this for you, or use an automation software tool to do this for you as mentioned above.
        
        In these linkedin DM’s, you can keep the conversation going solely within Linkedin by providing all your helpful info there and how your service can fix their problem for them or you can ask them if it would be okay for you to email them something and add them to your email drip campaign. There isn’t a right or wrong way as each target demographic is different in what will work best for them.
        
        For example, this would be a good 2nd message
        
        Thanks for connecting, First Name.
        
        Like I mentioned in my connection request, I specialize in helping skincare brands grow on social media (I’ve grown skincare brands to 250k followers in under 4 months just like yours) and I wanted to provide a few free tips for you as I see some low hanging fruit where you can grow your brand drastically faster on social media.
        
        From my research, you have a very similar target demographic as this skincare brand I helped earlier this year where I helped them increase their sales by 20% in just 4 months and I know by making these little changes, you will get very similar results.
        
        Would you like to hop on a quick call so I can share these few optimizations you could make to grow your company much faster?
        
        This message does a good job of:
        
        1. Offering free help
        
        Framing things on how you’ll help them as opposed to just why you are great at what you do.
        
        Furthermore, it provides some stats to show them you’re the real deal which is super important if you can show this as social proof is incredibly important in getting someone to hire you.
        
        It has a CTA (Call To Action) to set up a call. Depending on their response, you’ll be able to send a follow up Linkedin message to set up a call, to try to set up a call again, or provide the tips via Linkedin so they can quickly see the value you can bring.
        
        And this would be a bad second message:
        
        Thanks for connecting, First Name.
        
        I can help you grow your skincare company through my paid services as I am a social media freelancer. I’ve been doing this a long time, I offer affordable rates, and I know I can help you grow faster.
        
        Would you like to set up a call?
        
        The above message is bad because
        
        The person abruptly starts selling immediately instead of providing any value first and getting the recipient to warm up to them first
        
        It’s way too salesy and frames things as though why the freelancer is great as opposed to how they’re going to help the target achieve their goal.
        
        Asking to set up a call like this feels very abrupt as this person went straight into a sales pitch and the recipient knows the call is going to be a sales pitch as well and most people don’t willingly just want to get on calls with a bunch of people that are just going to give them sales pitches.
        
        This is probably not going to leave a good impression in the recipient’s mouth and therefore, they will be less receptive to be open minded of any future outreach from this freelancer in the future let alone becoming a client.
      3. Option 2: Collect their email address from Linkedin and then just start emailing them through your email drip campaign rather than any more messaging via LinkedIn.
        
        Alternatively, if you don’t want to send them any additional Linkedin messages after the connection request, you can stop your messaging completely on Linkedin after the connection request and insert them to your cold email drip campaign.
        
        Please be mindful of how this can come off if you friend request them and then just start emailing them without their consent. This is not a method I personally recommend, but I am showing you this as a lot of freelancers do this so I want you to be familiar with all this just in case you decide to use this and want 1 more avenue of how to communicate with prospective clients.
  2. Option 2: On How To Get Emails – Via Email Scraping Tools rather than via Linkedin (more automated cold email outreach campaign)
    1. Alternatively, if you want to set up an automated cold email campaign and don’t want to worry about sending connection requests and interacting with people on Linkedin, then you’ll want to go the route of using an Email Finder tool. There are plenty of Email Finder softwares out there for you to choose from and the way they work is that you’ll pay the company for access to their platform and then within the platform, you’ll be able to insert your target demographic’s info such as their state, job titles, industry, company size, and things of that nature (similar but not as robust as what you’d get with Linkedin’s Sales Navigator). Each company will vary as to how much demographic information you’re able to put in the filters as well as how many email addresses they have in their database. This will by far be your quickest way in getting email addresses for a cold automated email campaign.
    2. Once you insert your target demographic in their platform, they will then give you the personal information and email addresses for those that fit the criteria you put in.
    3. From there, you’ll be to add these people to your email automation workflow right from within the platform so that you can drip these prospects with a few emails to help you raise brand awareness of your product or service and hopefully get them on a call or get them to purchase from you.
    4. Popular Email Finder tools include:
      1. Hunter.io
      2. Snov.io
      3. Aeroleads
      4. Lusha
      5. If you don’t like any of these, you can simply type in “Hunter.io alternatives” into Google to find more email finder tools to fit exactly what you’re looking for.
Next, You’ll Create Your Email Drip Campaign Within These Email Finder Platforms (or within your Email Software Platform such as Mailchimp if you decide not to use an Email Finder Tool)
1. If you got email addresses from Linkedin, you can import these into your email marketing platform such as MailChimp, HubSpot, MailerLite, or Brevo (formerly known as SendinBlue). If you use an email finder service such as Hunter.io, Snov.io, Aeroleads, Lusha, then these emails will already be in the platform and you can use their email sending service to set up your cold email outreach campaign.
2. We’re going to get into email marketing much more later in the program, but this is how you set up a cold email marketing outreach campaign. Once again, I don’t recommend that you make cold email marketing outreach your only means of getting clients as this will be very difficult to do. Think of this method as more of a way to get additional clients after you’ve done everything you can on Upwork and with your 1-on-1 outreach on Linkedin and Instagram as this can be difficult to scale since these people aren’t actively looking for services that you offer so they are going to be harder to convert than any channel where you know they are actively looking for help with this service since you’re essentially “cold calling” them via email.
3. Once you have the email addresses you want, you can set up a short cold email drip campaign where you create roughly 4-5 emails to go out to these people to try to see if you can get them interested in your service to respond to your email, visit your website, or get on a call with you.
  1. Cold Email Campaign Best Practices:
    1. Timing and intervals:
      1. Determine the timing and intervals between each email in the sequence. Remember, you will be creating this email drip campaign and when creating this email drip campaign, you’ll be able to decide how many days you want there to pass before your next email is automatically sent out as part of this email drip campaign. The time intervals can depend on factors such as the urgency of your offering, the length of your sales cycle, and the typical response rates in your industry. These time intervals between when each email goes out will be different than all your marketing emails because once again, these people that you are emailing here never opted into receiving your emails so you want to be delicate here and not bombard them day after day with another email.
      2. You want to allow enough time for the recipient to review and consider your previous email, while also maintaining momentum and staying on their radar. Here are some general guidelines for time intervals between cold email outreach emails:
      3. First follow-up: If you don’t receive a response to the initial email, a common practice is to send the first follow-up email within 4 to 5 business days. This allows enough time for the recipient to read and consider your initial message.
      4. Subsequent follow-ups: For subsequent follow-up emails, you can gradually extend the time intervals. Consider intervals of around 7 to 10 business days between each follow-up email. This allows for a reasonable amount of time while maintaining regular communication without badgering the recipients.
      5. You can also tailor the timing to how much your services cost.
        
        For instance, if your services are super expensive that usually takes your target audience months to make a decision on, then you probably don’t want to be emailing them every other day but instead, maybe 1x per week or 1x every 10 days or so so that you give them some time to think about your proposal while not completely dropping off the radar. These timeframes I’m providing here are of course for if they are not responding to your emails.
        
        If they respond to any of your emails though, then you should of course respond asap and if you don’t get a response from the recipient from your response, then the rule of thumb is to follow up with them in that email thread after 2 business days to see if they had any further questions you can help with or if they’d like to set up a call to chat. If they don’t respond to this email, then send 1 more follow up 5 business days later seeing if they had any more questions you can help with or if there is anything else you can do to help fix their problem and make their life easier and if you don’t hear back after this, then you have your answer and you should move on.
      6. Test and iterate: Every audience is different, so it’s important to test different time intervals to see what works best for your specific cold email outreach campaign. Monitor the response rates and adjust the intervals if you notice patterns or trends. To test this, you can create 2 different campaigns, one with shorter time intervals between each email and one with longer ones. If you see one working better than the other, then keep the one that is performing better and phase out the other one. You can then test this winner against new time intervals if you’d like to keep testing to figure out what your optimal time intervals are for this type of cold outreach campaign.
    2. When is the best time and day to set your emails to go out for a cold email outreach campaign?
      1. Determining the best days and times to send out cold emails to prospects can vary depending on several factors, including your target audience, industry, and geographic location. While there is no universally perfect time that guarantees success, here are some general guidelines to consider:
      2. Weekdays: Sending cold emails on weekdays tends to be more effective as people are typically more focused and engaged with work-related matters during this time.
      3. Midweek: Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday are often considered the most favorable days to send cold emails. Mondays can be hectic as people catch up on their backlog from the weekend, and Fridays may see reduced attention as people prepare for the weekend.
      4. Morning time: Mornings, particularly between 8 am and 10 am local time, can be an optimal window to send cold emails. This is when many professionals tend to check their emails and start their workday.
      5. Avoiding key holidays and vacation periods: Be mindful of holidays and vacation periods when planning your cold email outreach. During these times, people may be away or have reduced availability, which can affect response rates.
      6. Testing and analyzing: It’s crucial to test different days and times to determine what works best for your specific audience. Analyze the response rates and engagement metrics to identify patterns or trends in email open rates, click-through rates, and responses.
      7. Consider time zone differences: If you’re targeting prospects in different time zones, adjust your send times accordingly. Aim to send emails during the recipient’s local business hours to increase the chances of engagement.
      8. Remember, while these guidelines can provide a starting point, it’s important to adapt your approach based on your specific audience and industry. Every audience is unique, and what works for one may not work for another. Test different timing strategies, monitor the results, and refine your approach based on the data you gather.
    3. How long should my cold email outreach emails be?
      1. When it comes to the length of your cold email outreach emails, it’s generally recommended to keep them concise and focused. People are often busy and receive numerous emails, so a lengthy email may discourage them from reading it or lead to important information getting overlooked. Here are some guidelines:
      2. Keep it brief: Aim for an email length that can be easily scanned and read within a couple of minutes. Generally, a cold email should be no more than 3-4 short paragraphs or around 150-200 words.
      3. Grab attention in the first few lines: Start your email with a compelling introduction that immediately captures the recipient’s attention. Use a concise and impactful opening sentence to entice them to continue reading.
      4. Highlight key points: Focus on the most important aspects of your offering that are relevant to the recipient. Clearly communicate how you can help make their life easier by fixing a problem they have. Use bullet points or short sentences to make the content more digestible.
      5. Be specific and relevant: Tailor your message to the recipient’s needs, pain points, or goals. Avoid generic or vague statements. The more specific and relevant you are to their situation, the more likely they are to engage with your email.
      6. Provide a clear call to action: Clearly state the desired next step you want the recipient to take. Whether it’s scheduling a call, requesting a demo, or visiting a website, make it easy for them to understand what you’re asking and how to respond.
      7. Avoid excessive jargon or technical details: Keep your language simple and easy to understand. Avoid using industry jargon or overwhelming the recipient with technical details. Focus on conveying the value and benefits in a clear and accessible manner.
      8. Remember, the goal of a cold email is to pique the recipient’s interest and start a conversation, not to provide an exhaustive amount of information. If there’s a need for more details or a deeper discussion, it can be addressed in subsequent communications or during a scheduled call or meeting.
    4. How many emails should I create as part of my cold email outreach automation?
      1. The number of emails that should be part of a cold email outreach campaign can vary depending on various factors, including your specific goals, target audience, and industry norms. However, a common approach is to plan a sequence of multiple emails to increase your chances of engagement and response as it might take a few emails before you hear anything back so you don’t want to give up after 1 email. Typically you want to create 4-5 emails as part of this sequence but really try not to go over 5 max. Remember, these people didn’t opt in to receiving emails from you so this is very much like a straight up cold-call (however it’s more efficient since you don’t have to call all of these people and can just plug them into your cold email funnel) but less invasive since it’s via email. So, you don’t want to have your campaign send too many emails out because with each additional email that goes out, the more you may annoy people and increase the likelihood that more and more people will click that your email is spam which will hurt your sender reputation and future deliverability. If they aren’t responding after this many attempts, they are not interested so it’s best to just move on at that point.
    5. What should my cold outreach emails look like?
      1. Your subject line
        
        Your subject line is super important because if it doesn’t get the attention of your reader, they won’t open it especially since it’s coming from someone they don’t know. With cold email outreach, you’re hoping for 30-50% open rates.
        
        Keys to good subject lines for cold email outreach
        
        Personalization: Tailor your subject line to the recipient by including their name or other relevant details. Personalization grabs attention and shows that you’ve taken the time to understand their needs. When you scrape the person’s info on Linkedin or you get the person’s email address from an email finder tool such as Snov.io or Hunter.io, you’ll typically also get access to their full name, job title, company name, industry (and maybe more). You can then have your emails automatically insert these criteria into your emails so that all emails will address the person by their name, have their job title stated somewhere in there, and/or their industry. Having some of this info in your outreach makes your email feel more personalized and I recommend you insert some of this info in the subject line or throughout the body of the email.
        
        Clarity and conciseness: Keep your subject line clear, concise, and to the point. Avoid using ambiguous or vague language that might confuse the recipient. Be specific about the purpose or benefit of your email.
        
        Relevance and value: Try to highlight the value or benefit that the recipient will gain by opening your email. Focus on addressing their pain points or offering a solution to a specific problem they may have.You never want this to feel like a straight up sales pitch where you’re stating why your company is the best. Instead, your email subject lines are going to be much more effective if it’s geared toward how you can help them solve a problem or help them operate more efficiently as this is going to entice them to open your email more than if they feel you’re just another person online trying to say why your company is the best (nobody wants to read sales pitches or pick up cold calls – people on the other hand do want easy help at their fingertips so if you can frame it this way, you’ll be much more effective in getting people to open your email and take the action you want as opposed to just stating how great your company is).
        
        Curiosity and intrigue: Spark curiosity or generate intrigue to make recipients curious enough to open your email. Pose a question, use an interesting statement, or tease a valuable resource or information inside the email.
        
        Personal touch: Try to evoke an emotional response or establish a connection with the recipient. Show empathy, understanding, or a shared interest to make your subject line more relatable and engaging.
        
        Avoid spam triggers: Steer clear of words or phrases that are commonly associated with spam emails. This includes excessive use of exclamation marks, all caps, or overly promotional language.
        
        A/B testing: Conduct A/B testing by sending different subject lines to smaller segments of your audience and analyzing the open rates. This will help you identify what resonates best with your target audience and refine your approach.
        
        Remember, it’s essential to maintain honesty and relevance throughout the email’s content after capturing the recipient’s attention with an enticing subject line.
        
        Remember to customize these examples to fit your specific offering, target audience, and industry. Experiment with different subject lines and analyze their performance to optimize your cold outbound email campaign. Although you could get higher open rates with a subject line like “Left you a voicemail”, please be mindful that you don’t ever want to use subject lines that are deceiving just to get people to open your email because once they do, there is a much much much higher chance that they will mark you as spam as they’ve become annoyed with you for misleading them.
        
        Examples of subject lines for cold email outreach (these are just examples to give you an idea of what you should be striving for. Please do not copy these verbatim as you need to make them personalized for your target demographic and the pain points that you are helping them solve. Remember, when your email subject lines are centered around you providing them easy help to solve their problem, your open rates will be much higher than if your subject lines are centered around why you are the best – that’s the core takeaway you need to take from this).
        
        “Quick question about [specific pain point/industry challenge]”
        
        “I noticed a mistake on your social media page”
        
        “I noticed that you’re leaving some leads on the table with your social media page”
        
        I noticed that your social media funnel isn’t converting people as much as it could
        
        I noticed your paid ads funnel isn’t fully optimized
        
        I noticed your company isn’t ranking on page 1 of Google. I can help
        
        I noticed your SEO strategy might not be bringing you the best traffic
        
        I noticed your social media content could convert more people into customers
        
        Here are a few easy changes you should make to convert more people on Social
        
        A few quick suggestions on getting more (Industry Name) customers from an (Industry Name) Veteran
        
        A few easy tips to get more (Industry name) customers from a (Industry Name) Marketing Specialist
        
        I noticed a problem with your Paid Ads
        
        RE: Working Together
        
        “I noticed you’re {Doing something}, I can definitely make that easier for you
        
        If you’re ready to start (state something they’re looking to achieve), I can help you do that in under (x days).
        
        Are you still looking to (state something they’re likely looking to do)? I can guarantee you x in x days
        
        “Name, if you need any help, I can help you [achieve specific goal/outcome]”
        
        “Exclusive invitation to [webinar/event/resource] for [target audience]”
        
        “Boost your [specific metric/goal] just like I did for these 3 (Industry Name) brands”
        
        “If you’re struggling with [common industry problem] – I can fix this for you”
        
        “How I helped [top competitor] increase their revenue by [percentage] – I can help you too”
        
        “Achieve [specific outcome] faster just like I did with these 4 (Industry name) companies”
        
        “Are you making these [common mistakes] in [industry/aspect]?”
        
        “Get ahead of the competition: [industry trend/insight] you need to know”
        
        “Idea for [specific pain point/challenge] – let’s explore together”
        
        Just Wanted To Say Thank You, {{first_name}}
        
        Thanks so much, {{first_name}}
      2. Keys to good messaging in the body of your email
        
        Your emails for this type of campaign should have a few key components to it for the best results. Also, please don’t have any big blocks of text as you want to keep your emails short and concise. In between each paragraph, you should have a space. For the meaty paragraph, please try to keep your pitch on how you’ll help them to as few of words as possible rather than making this some big paragraph as the likelihood a cold prospect will read this dwindles the longer it is.
        
        First Paragraph: You want to have a personalized intro and be mindful of the Text Preview
        
        The first line of your email should align with the subject line but make it sound like the recipient could benefit from something you can help them with. Additionally, be mindful that without even opening the email, the recipient will be able to see the first few words of your email (Text Preview) so use this to your advantage by making this first line intriguing rather than salesy so they are more inclined to open your email.
        
        Example:
        
        Example A:
        
        Hi Name,
        
        I was on “your company”’s social media page and I noticed that your link-in bio is likely not converting people into customers as much as it should be.
        
        Example B:
        
        Hi Name,
        
        I was looking at homes in Denver and saw you were the first agent to pop up on zillow.
        
        2nd Paragraph is your reason for reaching out/ the transformation they’ll get by working with you. This is the MOST IMPORTANT part of your email
        
        Example:
        
        Example A:
        
        I can guarantee I can help you convert more social media followers into customers by making a few simple tweaks as I have made these exact same tweaks with multiple other (Industry Name) companies that had the exact same issue as your social media page which led to a lot more customers.
        
        Example B:
        
        The reason I’m reaching out is because I guarantee 2 new real estate closings a month without ever having to hop on a call with leads or set up sales funnels or your money back.
        
        3rd Paragraph (1st part) you should focus on your Risk Reversal
        
        If your company offers any type of guarantee, this is where you want to state it so that you can preemptively overcome any risk they are afraid of by going with you. Please note that you should never guarantee something you can’t produce as this will just leave a bad taste in the client’s mouth.
        
        Example
        
        Example A:
        
        I’ll make this super easy for you. If I don’t increase your social media website traffic by at least 20%, you don’t have to pay.
        
        Example B:
        
        That’s right, if I don’t get you 2-3 home closings in the first 30 days, I’ll give you your money back.
        
        3rd Paragraph (2nd part) is where you should show your Social Proof
        
        If your company has any social proof, such as Google Reviews, case studies, awards, testimonials from key people, this is a good place to share that
        
        Example
        
        Example A:
        
        I have a 4.8-star rating on UpWork and I specialize specifically on getting (Industry Name) companies more customers through Social Media just like I’ve done with 20+ other (Industry Name) companies.
        
        4th Paragraph is for your Call to Action
        
        Your call to action will depend on what your goal is. Are you hoping to strike up a conversation via email where they respond to you? Are you trying to drive them to book a call (most common for freelancers)? Are you trying to drive them to a certain webpage on your website? Decide what your goal is and then make very clear the action you want them taking.
        
        Example
        
        Example A:
        
        Would you like to hop on a quick call so I can share these few easy ways I’ll get you a lot more customers via your social media accounts?
        
        Example B:
        
        Would you like to hop on a quick call so that we can help you quickly do x, y and z?
        
        Extra: You can add right above your signature line a line with a link to Additional Assets/Resources such as
        
        Examples
        
        Case studies
        
        Stats
        
        Testimonials page
        
        If you do this, don’t use more than 1 link here. The more links you use, the higher the chances your email will look spammy which could hurt your deliverability rates.
        
        Also, if you have any, have good assets/case studies ready (make sure they can easily see this before any call). This will make it easier to convert the person into a customer as they’ll have already had a chance to see the type of work you’ve done which will make them more trusting of you and your abilities.
        
        Example:
        
        Example A:
        
        Case studies of very similar companies I’ve helped in the (Industry Name) industry.
        
        Your Signature line:
        
        Include a professional signature that includes your full name, title, contact information, and any relevant links, such as your website or social media profiles.
        
        Very bottom of your email
        
        Since this is a cold outreach email campaign where these people don’t know you and they didn’t give you their email address in exchange for an email, your response rates likely won’t be amazing and you’ll have a decent amount of people that want you to stop emailing them. Instead of them clicking spam when receiving your email (which hurts your future deliverability rates), if you provide an alternative option for them to stop receiving these emails, that would be better. Please note that you can provide an unsubscribe link (like you will with all of your marketing emails) however, that can be a bit weird since they never subscribed to this in the first place and that’s making your audience feel as though they are in an email marketing drip campaign rather than you personally reaching out to them which is what you want to make this feel like. Alternatively, you can give them an option like the below example after the 2nd email (I wouldn’t do it in the first or 2nd email as this makes it feel like this is not a personalized email to them) as this will give them an option of not receiving future emails as well as it requires them to respond to your email which helps your deliverability rates. You can even phrase this in a way that states that they won’t get this future help anymore for good measure.
        
        Example:
        
        Example A:
        
        “Reply “stop” if you don’t want to hear from me again.”
        
        Example B:
        
        “Reply “stop” if you don’t need any help converting more customers.”
        
        Full Email Example with headlines of each section (please don’t leave these headlines in your email other than possibly your Additional Assets/Resources section):
        
        Cold email
        Subject line: A Quick Thought For You About “Company Name”
        
        Personalized Intro + Text Preview
        Hi Name,
        
        I was looking at homes in Denver and saw you were the first agent to pop up on zillow.
        
        (Reason for reaching out/Transformation) MOST IMPORTANT
        The reason I’m reaching out is because I guarantee 2 new real estate closings a month without ever having to hop on a call with leads or set up sales funnels or your money back.
        
        Risk Reversal
        That’s right, if I don’t get you 2-3 closings in the first 30 days, I’ll give you your money back.
        
        Social Proof
        90% of the people I help get 2-3 closings in the first 30 days which is why my company xxxxxx has a 4.7 rating on Google as we’d love to help you too.
        
        Call to Action
        Would you like to set up a quick 10 minute chat so I can help you get 2-3 closings in the next 30 days?
        
        Additional Assets/Resources
        See our case studies of other Denver Real Estate Agents I’ve helped here
        
        Joey Blanco
        Owner ABC Real Estate
        www.abcrealestate.com
    6. Putting Your Cold Email Outreach Emails All Together with Examples
      1. Your Initial email:
        
        Start with an initial email as the first touchpoint. This email should grab the recipient’s attention with how you’re going to help them by solving one of their problems (not why you’re the best) and then try to get them to take the action you want (this may be to give you a call (most common for freelancers), to visit the website, to make a purchase or whatever your goal is). Keep it concise and focused.
        
        Example:
        
        New Email #1
        Subject: (Name), I noticed you’re leaving some leads on the table with your social media page
        
        Hi Name,
        
        I was on “your company”’s social media page and I noticed that your link-in bio is likely not converting people into customers as much as it should be.
        
        I can guarantee I can help you convert more social media followers into customers by making a few simple tweaks as I have made these exact same tweaks with multiple other (Industry Name) companies that had the exact same issue as your social media page which led to a lot more customers.
        
        I’ll make this super easy for you. If I don’t increase your social media website traffic by at least 20%, you don’t have to pay.
        
        I have a 4.8-star rating on UpWork and I specialize specifically on getting (Industry Name) companies more customers through Social Media just like I’ve done with 20+ other (Industry Name) companies.
        
        Would you like to hop on a quick call so I can share these few easy ways I’ll get you a lot more customers via your social media accounts?
      2. Follow-up emails:
        
        Plan a series of follow-up emails to stay on the recipient’s radar and increase the likelihood of a response. Use these follow up emails to show how you’re going to help the recipient solve their problem through your service but you’ll want to come at this from a different angle in each of these so that your emails aren’t saying the exact same thing over and over again. Yes, how you’ll help them solve their problem will likely be more or less the same, but you’ll want to phrase things differently as the previous email didn’t get the job done so it didn’t resonate fully with them so think of these emails as another attempt to help them realize just how good of an idea it would be to give your product or service some thought. You can do this by providing:
        
        A different stat on how effective your help is,
        
        A different case study,
        
        By stating how much better off their competitors are once they use your product or service,
        
        How much not changing to fix this problem can hurt their company,
        
        How quickly they can start seeing results,
        
        Preemptively discuss any objections or concerns,
        
        Mention any guarantees (only if you can actually produce these guarantees),
        
        Discuss the benefits in a different way such as by using bullet points or by emphasizing their importance in a different way, try a different call-to-action (CTA) where you drive them to another desired place (such as a specific landing page, a FAQ page, or a testimonial page),
        
        or things of that nature when crafting these follow up emails.
        
        Examples:
        
        New Email #2
        SUBJECT: RE: Working Together
        
        Hi Name,
        
        While going through {{company_name}}’s IG page, I noticed there’s a few super easy tweaks you can make that will help you get a lot more customers.
        
        I specialize in helping (Industry name) companies convert their followers into customers and I can guarantee I can help you convert more social media followers into customers by making a few simple tweaks as I have made these exact same tweaks with tons of other (Industry Name) companies that had the exact same issue I see on your page.
        
        If I don’t increase your social media website traffic by at least 20%, you don’t have to pay.
        
        I’ve helped 20+ other (Industry Name) companies get more customers via social media and I have a 4.8-star rating on UpWork.
        
        Would you like to get on a quick call so I can share exactly what you should do to get more customers from your IG account?
        
        New Email #3
        SUBJECT:
        
        Option A: I noticed that your social media funnel isn’t converting people as much as it could
        
        Hi Name,
        
        I was looking at {{company_name}}’s social media pages, and I strongly feel like you could probably get 2x as many customers from it than you currently are.
        
        I specifically help (Industry name) companies convert their followers into customers and I can guarantee I can help you convert more social media followers into customers by making a few simple changes on your profiles as I have made these exact same tweaks with tons of other (Industry Name) companies including (mention a few past customers in their industry that they may know that you’ve worked with) who had the exact same issue I see on your page.
        
        If I don’t increase your social media website traffic by at least 20%, you don’t have to pay.
        
        I’ve been doing this for a long time and have helped 20+ other (Industry Name) companies get more customers via social media and I’d be happy to help you too.
        
        Would you like to get on a quick call so I can share exactly how I’ll get you more customers quickly?
        
        Email #4
        
        Subject: A few quick suggestions on getting more (Industry Name) customers from an (Industry Name) Veteran
        
        Hi Name,
        
        {{company_name}}’s social media pages could be converting a lot more followers into customers than they currently are.
        
        I specialize in helping (Industry Name) companies quickly turn a lot more followers into customers by optimizing a few simple things on your pages and I’ve helped 20+ (Industry Name) companies do this quickly. A few things I’d recommend you look into are:
        
        1. The links in your link-in-bio
        2. Doing a competitor analysis again as you’re leaving customers on the table
        3. And your conversion funnel as it looks like it’s not fully optimized to convert followers into customers.
        
        If I don’t increase your social media website traffic by at least 20%, you don’t have to pay.
        
        I’ve been doing this for a long time within the (Industry Name) industry and I have a 4.8 star rating on UpWork. I’d love to help make these easy changes for your company as well so you can start getting a lot more customers.
        
        Would you like to get on a quick call so I can show you how I can grow your company just as I have with 20+ (Industry Name) companies?
      3. Final Email
        
        Don’t just all of a sudden drop off the face of the earth. Let the recipient know that this is your last email you’ll be sending them so they know, if they are at all interested in what you’re offering, this is their last chance to respond. It’s human nature that when people realize it’s their last chance at something, they are more likely to take action. So, give yourself this shot by letting them know this. In this email you’ll want to reinforce how you’ll be able to help them fix their problem, show proof that you’re able to help them (if you have proof), once again provide a CTA for what you want them to do, express gratitude for their consideration, and offer an opportunity for them to reach out if they’re interested in learning more in the future.
        
        Having your cold outreach email campaign end with a thank you email will not only help leave a more positive impression showing professionalism and courtesy, but it also encourages future engagement. By expressing thanks and leaving the door open for future communication, you invite the recipient to reach out if they have any further questions or if they become interested in your offering down the line. This encourages ongoing engagement and can lead to potential opportunities in the future.
        
        Example of a Thank You Email to end your cold outreach campaign:
        
        Email #5
        
        Subject:
        
        Option A: Just Wanted To Say Thank You, {{first_name}}
        Option B: Thanks so much, {{first_name}}
        
        Hi {{first_name}},
        
        I just wanted to say thank you so much for your time in considering a partnership with me. This will be my last email to you as it looks like you aren’t interested in getting more customers out of your social media account.
        
        If you ever change your mind, I can guarantee I can help you convert more social media followers into customers by making a few simple tweaks as I have made these exact same tweaks with multiple other (Industry Name) companies that had the exact same issue as your social media page which led to a lot more customers.
        
        If I don’t increase your social media website traffic by at least 20%, you don’t have to pay.
        
        I have a 4.8-star rating on UpWork and I specialize specifically on getting (Industry Name) companies more customers through Social Media just like I’ve done with 20+ other (Industry Name) companies.
        
        Anyways, thanks so much for your time and I hope to hear from you as I’d love to help you get more customers quickly.
        
        Do you have any last questions?
        
        That’s it. This is how you set up a cold email automated outreach campaign. Like I said at the beginning, I’m not the biggest fan of cold email campaigns as it’s always going to be easier to convert someone who is actively looking to purchase a service like you offer (like someone searching on Upwork) than someone that isn’t looking that just fits your target demographic. We of course showed you how to do this in the other guides and will get more into that in your training videos as well. However, a lot of freelancers still use cold email outreach campaigns to get clients as this can be much more automated than 1-on-1 outreach on Instagram or via Upwork so you now know how to add this method to your repertoire in ways to get new clients.
        
        But, don’t leave this section thinking this will be your primary method of getting clients/customers. Instead, think of this as just 1 way of getting yourself in front of your target audience and a way that can help you get your freelance business off the ground or bring in some additional clients. Setting up a funnel like this isn’t a bad strategy hence why a lot of freelancers still do this and due to the fact that it is very cheap to set up and it’s also the most automated out of all the outreach campaigns especially if you’re using an email finder tool as mentioned above.
        
        Side note and we’ll get into this later in the program: If you ever wanted to scale your freelance business into a full ad-agency where you have lots of employees, you’ll generally want to build an automated funnel where you can get in front of people that are actively looking for services that you offer (generally through search ads), get them to click this ad which takes them to your webpage, where you’ll collect their email address in exchange for some giveaway such as a discount coupon or a how-to guide or something of that nature, and then you’ll retarget them via more ads across various platforms that they are on (such as Instagram, Facebook, Linkedin, Google) as well as email market them so that you can gain their trust and get them back to your website so they convert into a customer. We’re going to get into this in the training videos, but at a high level, this is usually a much more effective way to bring in customers for ad agencies and the cool thing about this is, once you have it set up, it can pretty much run on it’s own with you just paying attention to how to further optimize it for even better results. This method is also putting you in front of people that are much more inclined to purchase from you as they are actively searching for services like you offer already so it will take much less convincing from you. End of side note.
        
        Like I said, there is nothing wrong with doing a cold email outreach campaign as you can make this very automated too as I showed you above by easily getting email addresses through email finder tools so it doesn’t have to take up too much of your time. Just know that this likely won’t be the strategy that makes you scale your freelance business into a full on ad agency in the fastest way possible if that is someday your goal but it can be effective in getting freelance clients. Setting up a campaign like this is definitely worth testing but these results will vary based on what your unique selling proposition is and what kind of results you can show. When growing your freelance business, you want to come up with at least 2 different streams of revenue so that you aren’t ever totally reliant on 1 just in case something happens to that revenue stream. So, this is how you can set up your email cold outreach campaign from scratch and make it as automated as possible so that you can get this up and running without it taking a ton of time each day just in case you want to keep getting more and more clients. Just don’t let building out all these different revenue streams get in the way of you providing a good service to your clients as you want to make sure you’re doing a good job for them.