How do you instantly tell the difference between a good cold email template and a bad one?
Look at who wrote the cold email and their average response rates.
- Depending on your company, cold email writing is commonly shared between sales reps and marketing.
- According to Campaign Monitor, a good response rate should be 10%.
Fortunately for you and me, I’ve invited a cold email expert to complement this blog post who has sent over 2.5 million cold emails. Kyle Borner has helped Fortune 500 and Inc. 5000 companies with cold email writing and improving response rates for 10 years.
Here’s what Kyle tells his clients about cold emails:
“Marketing should only offer advice on length, content, layout. Sales should own the core strategy and message, and they should never settle for a response rate below 25%.”
Kyle and I know that it’s easier said than done. What we have for you here will get you as close as possible to improving your cold outreach—five FREE proven cold email templates!
In this post, we’ll cover five cold email templates we empower our users (salespeople) with to help them increase their sends and response rates. And we’ll tell you how to use each template.
- The Holiday & Weekend Cold Email
- The Wrong Number Cold Email
- The Geo-based Cold Email
- The CEO’s Best Friend Cold Email
- The Winning Cold Email
BONUS: All of these cold email templates come included with Veloxy and Veloxy Lite
How do you instantly tell the difference between a good cold email template and a bad one?
Look at who wrote the cold email and their average response rates.
Fortunately for you and me, I’ve invited a cold email expert to complement this blog post who has sent over 2.5 million cold emails. Kyle Borner has helped Fortune 500 and Inc. 5000 companies with cold email writing and improving response rates for 10 years.
Here’s what Kyle tells his clients about cold emails:
“Marketing should only offer advice on length, content, layout. Sales should own the core strategy and message, and they should never settle for a response rate below 25%.”
Kyle and I know that it’s easier said than done. What we have for you here will get you as close as possible to improving your cold outreach—five FREE proven cold email templates!
In this post, we’ll cover five cold email templates we empower our users (salespeople) with to help them increase their sends and response rates. And we’ll tell you how to use each template.
BONUS: All of these cold email templates come included with Veloxy and Veloxy Lite
1. The Holiday & Weekend Cold Email
Stop me if you’ve heard this before. “Don’t bother sending an email, it’s Friday.” or “Don’t bother sending an email, tomorrow’s Thanksgiving.” Whatever you do, do not follow that advice. Instead, send this cold email template:
Subject: Before you leave for [the weekend OR vacation OR name of holiday]
Hi [FIRSTNAME],
Can we schedule a quick call before you leave for [the weekend OR vacation OR name of holiday]?
I only need 2 minutes, but you may want 10 or 15 when you hear what I have to share (hint: it will help you a lot when you get back to the office).
Thank you,
[YOUR NAME]
Example of this cold email
Subject: Before you leave for Thanksgiving
Hi Mike,
Can we schedule a quick call before you leave for [the weekend OR vacation OR name of holiday]?
I only need 2 minutes, but you may want 10 or 15 when you hear what I have to share (hint: it will help you a lot when you get back to the office).
Thank you,
Samir
PS. What’s your favorite Thanksgiving dish?
When is the best time to send this template?
As I mentioned earlier, most salespeople pump the brakes on outreach on Fridays and near vacation time. Get noticed in the inbox by ignoring the status quo. Start sending this high-response rate cold email template a day or two before the following:
You may be thinking, “How would I know when my lead is taking time off?” Well, if you’re focused on being a helpful consultant, improving the customer experience, and personalizing your Salesforce records–you will know when they’re taking time off.
How to use this template?
Follow the steps below:
1. Create a cold email campaign
Don’t wait until the Friday before Thanksgiving to send this email. Plan ahead! Create a list of unresponsive leads in Salesforce, add them to an email campaign, and schedule the email to be sent first thing in the morning.
2. Complement cold calling
Yes, further ignore the status quo by leading with cold calls on Fridays and before vacation time. We wouldn’t recommend calling after 2pm, especially if your lead’s office has a Kegerator or wine bar.
If you happen to land in their voicemail, be very brief and ask them to call you back. Afterwards, send them the holiday/weekend cold email and personalize it with a note about them missing your call.
3. Pay attention to email tracking alerts
While you’re getting traction from your cold email campaign and cold calling efforts, pay attention to your email tracking alerts. Customers are known for “wasting time” on Friday afternoons and the day before vacation, so it’s common for them to browse their inbox and engage with emails. When this happens, call them and or send them the holiday cold email template.
2. The Wrong Number Cold Email
You’re only as good as your Salesforce data. From time to time, you’ll have outdated contact records, from email address to title, and especially your lead’s phone number. Even your data enrichment solution may not know of your lead’s data change. But here’s the butter on the toast. Even if their data hasn’t changed, you can use the urgency tied to a specific data type to encourage a response. What better data type to focus on than one’s phone number?
Subject: [FIRSTNAME], is this your number?
Hi [FIRSTNAME],
Is this your best number?
[PHONE NUMBER]
Thank you in advance for letting me know. I can’t seem to get through.
[YOUR NAME]
Example of this Cold Email
Subject: Mike, is this your number?
Hi Mike,
Is this your best number?
716-626-0263
Thank you in advance for letting me know. I can’t seem to get through.
Samir
PS. My CEO is interested in our next conversation.
When is the best time to send this email?
Think about your personal life. Who are the people that you would share a new phone number with? Your spouse or partner, your family, friends, and key business stakeholders. Now imagine forgetting to share your number with someone important, and not realizing it until they sent you an email. Whether the number they have is correct or not doesn’t really matter. It’s the urgency to get a hold of you that matters the most.
Start sending this high-response rate cold email template when one or more of the following conditions are true:
Kyle shared the following: “While long-bodied cold emails can work, rest assured that an excessively short cold email that simply applies urgency to phone number accuracy will give you the opportunity to share the content of the long email verbally 9 times out of 10.”
How to use this template?
Follow the steps below:
1. Create a cold email campaign
It’s likely that you have hundreds of unresponsive prospects. Segment them into lists of 50 and send the campaign once a week. You’ll predictably start 5 to 10 new conversations with minimal effort, while also improving the data accuracy of your Salesforce instance.
2. Complement territory visits
When you’re planning a trip to visit clients, use your field sales mapping software to build a list of unresponsive prospects nearby. That way you can add a short sentence to this cold email template that specifies why you’re going to be in the area.
3. Pay attention to email tracking alerts
You may be thinking, “But what if it IS the right phone number?” Then be sure to have your email tracking turned on when you send this cold email template. When they open the email, and you receive the notification, immediately call that number. 9 times out of 10 they’ll be available to take your call, and you’ll be able to gauge whether or not timeliness has been a causal factor in their past lack of responsiveness.
3. The Geo-based email
Now that Covid travel restrictions are in the rear view mirror, field sales reps can once again unleash their roadwarrior side. Prior to regional travel plans, field reps would send templated emails and make calls to visit clients in the area. Don’t forget about prospects! Be sure to send your coldest prospects this cold email template:
Subject: [CITY/TOWN]
Hi [FIRSTNAME],
I’m going to be in [CITY/TOWN] [DATE RANGE]. Should I stop by with four iced caramel macchiatos?
[YOUR NAME]
Example of this Cold Email
Subject: Sonoma
Hi Mary,
I’m going to be in the San Francisco area next week. Should I stop by with four iced caramel macchiatos when I’m in Sonoma?
Samir
Notice how I lead with their town in the subject line, but highlighted the greater metro area in the first sentence. That shows the prospect just how much you’re willing to go out of your way to visit them, which is great! Plus, don’t just say “coffee”, unless you have that marked in your personalized Salesforce records. Be creative, and choose one of Starbucks’ most popular drinks.
Go here to learn how to improve your cold email copywriting!
When is the best time to send this template?
This email receives its highest response rates 2 to 3 weeks before the date of your proposed visit. Aside from your average field sales travel, you can get similar response rates for other, more creative “destinations”:
HOT TIP: Kyle has this all-too-exciting tip that you can’t ignore. “If you think some of these personalized contact data fields is over-the-top for your Salesforce records, then I’m willing to bet your Sales Org isn’t too confident in their account based selling framework. Schedule a meeting with your marketing team. Ask them to build ABS landing pages where clickable elements or forms are integrated with Salesforce. By doing that, you can progressively enhance your prospect and account intelligence—and in so doing, enhancing your cold email efforts!”
How to use this template?
Follow the steps below:
1. Create a cold email campaign
Before you hit the road to visit clients and stop-in to prospects, send this cold email template 2-3 weeks ahead of time. If you use Veloxy, we have a drip campaign built for this very reason. Our field sales users have used it hundreds of times!
2. Complement cold calling
If you cringed when you saw “iced caramel macchiato” in the cold email, be sure to reach out to your unresponsive prospects via phone.
If you land in their voicemail, run down the list of other popular, yet unique Starbucks drinks in your message. “Hey Mary, I know I specified iced caramel macchiatos in my email to you yesterday, but if you or your colleagues want something else–perhaps a pumpkin spice latte or caramel frappuccino–call me back, 510-402-6913, it’s Samir.”
3. Consider cold LinkedIn messages
Cold templates are great. But, don’t think that they’re exclusively for email. How many times have you received a cold message in LinkedIn and it was 5 paragraphs deep? I received three this week already! Copy and paste this template into LinkedIn Sales Navigator and try it on the most unresponsive prospects.
4. The CEO's Best Friend Email
When you need to send cold emails to decision makers higher up the Org Chart, you need to change the content of your templates. The best path for this is to leverage the organization’s “top dog” and the prospect’s professional aspirations. Start by sending this cold email template:
Subject: [CEO NAME]
Hi [FIRSTNAME],
What if [CEONAME] heard that you were responsible for [GOAL]?
I’ve already helped [TITLE]s at [CLIENT A], [CLIENT B] and [# of CLIENTS] gain their CEO’s praise.
I only need 10 minutes of your time.
Thank you in advance for letting me know,
[YOUR NAME]
Example of this Cold Email
Subject: Jeff Sebewaing
Hi John,
What if Jeff Sebewaing heard that you were responsible for improving productivity by 180%?
I’ve already helped Managers at Comcast, T-Mobile and 72 other companies gain their CEO’s praise.
I only need 10 minutes of your time.
Thank you in advance for letting me know,
Samir
When is the best time to send this template?
Pleasing the CEO, at the end of the day, is the most important achievement of any staff member (especially if you’re an administrator). Start sending this high-response rate cold email template near the following events:
Here’s another tip from Kyle, “The last one is key. You should never wait to get on the good side of a new CEO. Be sure to use Lead411 or ZoomInfo to get instant alerts when a new CEO is hired or promoted at your hot prospective accounts.“
How to use this template?
Follow the steps below:
1. Create a cold email campaign
First, create a list of the prospects you want to cold email. Second, add the corresponding CEO, Title and Goal fields to the same CSV file. Third, merge the list with this cold email template, and send them in scale!
2. Complement cold calling
When the CEO’s name is dropped in a voicemail message, it can magnify your email and overall message, further improving your response rates with this template.
Kyle added, “If you’re a bold salesperson, reach out to the CEO first. If you’re like 95% of the sales reps who try this, you won’t connect with the CEO, and that’s okay. You just need a proven reference point.“
3. Consider using a drip campaign, too
It might make more sense to email the CEO first, and then your prospect. Send an email to the CEO about your passion to help the company solve the “goal”. Afterwards, send the cold email template to your prospect that references the fact that you emailed the CEO first. If you have the time, forward the email sent to the CEO and then add the cold email template to your message.
5. The Winning Email
One of the biggest problems salespeople encounter when handed thousands of prospects is segmenting by goals. These can be unique to organizations and can even use executive-specific lingo. Choose to simplify all goals into the one powerful noun, WIN, by using this cold email template:
Subject: [FIRSTNAME]
Hi [FIRSTNAME],
Are you still looking for a few more wins before the end of the [TIMEFRAME]?
I can guarantee that I can get you one win… maybe two, I don’t know yet.
Should we talk for 5 minutes?
[YOUR NAME]
Example of this Cold Email
Subject: Tracy
Hi Tracy,
Are you still looking for a few more wins before the end of the year?
I can guarantee that I can get you one win… maybe two, I don’t know yet.
Should we talk for 5 minutes?
Samir
When is the best time to send this template?
More often than not, your prospects have key performance indicators to meet. If you have a solid offering, there should be something that you can guarantee. And guarantees act as the best lures for fishing responses and meetings. Start sending this high-response rate cold email template at these times:
How to use this template?
Follow the steps below:
1. Create an optimized cold email campaign
This email is best sent when you can leverage email tracking data. You want to do this so as not to let this most-valuable template slip through the cracks. Segment your prospects by realistic times and days (eg. Thursday morning), and click send.
2. Complement cold calling
Communicating empathy on a live cold call or voicemail is critical when your prospect has their back against the wall. When you balance this with the “winning” message and a sense of urgency, you’ll get a meeting 95% of the time.
3. Pay attention to progressive profiling
Using “wins” is a shortcut to getting higher response rates from your cold emails. But, if you took my advice and met with your marketing team, you should be able to shorten the sales cycle even further by replacing “wins” with super specific results. Be sure you add progressive profiling to your outbound marketing content!
Final thoughts on cold email templates
So there you have it. 5 best practice cold email templates that will drive the highest response rates you’ve ever seen! Plus, you can take them with you across your professional journey because they’re not industry dependent.
Want to up your cold email game even more? Check out our other cold email blog posts:
Lastly, if you have cold email questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to our email expert Kyle Borner on LinkedIn.