Did you know that your cold email results are as good as your copywriting skills?
That’s why in this article I am going to share with you everything you need to know to improve your cold email copywriting skills to achieve remarkable cold email results!
What is Cold Email Copywriting?
Cold email copywriting is the art and science of crafting compelling cold emails intended to engage recipients who have not had prior interaction with senders in order to make them purchase, sign up, or take any other action.
Unlike regular promotional emails, cold emails reach out to potential leads or clients without prior consent, making copywriting crucial for first impressions.
The primary goal of cold email copywriting is to capture attention, pique interest, and prompt response, all while balancing being persuasive but not overly aggressive.
It combines psychology, marketing principles, and a deep understanding of the target audience to create concise messages that bring value quickly and effectively.
3 Key Components of an Effective Cold Email Copy
An effective cold email relies on three critical elements to engage the recipient, drive action, and improve cold email deliverability:
- Subject Line: The gateway to your cold email, the subject line, must instantly grab attention and spark curiosity. It should be concise, intriguing, and relevant to the recipient, offering a hint of the value enclosed without giving everything away. Just enough.
- Email Body: This is where you make your pitch. The body should be concise and to the point, focusing on delivering value and addressing the recipient’s needs or pain points. Use short paragraphs and clear, direct language to maintain readability and engagement. Personalization is key; showing that you understand the recipient’s business or challenges can significantly increase cold email response rates.
- Call to action (CTA): Your CTA should be clear, compelling, and easy to find. It directs the recipient on what to do next, whether it’s scheduling a meeting, answering a question, or visiting a website. Make sure the CTA is simple and actionable, minimizing effort on the part of the recipient.
Why is Cold Email Copywriting Important?
According to the latest cold email statistics, shorter cold emails around 100-120 words tend to work the best in terms of getting your recipient to read it.
Well, this is not a lot of text to provide all the information you would like to.
Therefore, knowing how to use copywriting within your cold emails helps you to provide as much information as possible while keeping the emails short and most importantly engaging.
Remember, the goal of copywriting is to get your readers to read the next sentence.
In fact, good copy can increase your cold email open rate by 300%, increase your response rate by 225%, and conversion rate by 450%!
Not only that but it makes your cold emails more professional looking.
That’s why cold email copywriting is so important!
Cold Email Copywriting Best Practices & Techniques
Now that you understand what is cold email copywriting and why is it so important, let me share with you some of the proven copywriting best practices for cold emails that I learned throughout the years, collected from the internet, and got recommended by our customers:
1. Be Clear About Your Cold Email Copy Goals
Before drafting your cold email, it’s crucial to define what you aim to achieve. Clear objectives guide the tone, structure, and content of your cold email.
Are you seeking to introduce your company, schedule a meeting, or promote a product? Perhaps your goal is to gather feedback or invite participation in a survey.
Identifying your goal not only helps tailor your message to elicit the desired response but also sets clear metrics for measuring the effectiveness of your campaign.
This focus ensures that every component of your cold email, from the subject line, and body, to the call-to-action, is optimized to drive your recipient toward the intended outcome, maximizing the impact of your outreach efforts.
It gives you the clarity of what you’re going to talk about.
2. Know Your Target Audience – Their Niche, Pain Points, Goals, and Jargon
Understanding your target audience is essential in crafting cold emails that resonate with them.
Knowing who you’re writing for, what’s giving them nightmares, and what they want to achieve gives you instant clarity about what to write about within the cold emails.
So, dive deep into the niche of your potential customers to understand their industry specifics, challenges, and ambitions.
Familiarize yourself with their pain points to tailor your message toward offering genuine solutions.
Knowing their goals allows you to align your offerings accordingly.
Additionally, incorporating industry-specific jargon can enhance credibility and show that you speak their language and it makes it more readable for them despite they don’t know why exactly making your cold email more relevant than others. (Now you know)
This tailored approach not only increases the relevance of your message but also boosts the likelihood of engagement and response, as your cold email will reflect a clear understanding of their needs and context.
3. Always Focus on Benefits and Value
Another cold email copywriting best practice is to focus on what’s in it for your audience.
Despite you’re being the one that is trying to ultimately benefit from this new “relationship”
You must understand that you must make it beneficial and valuable for your target audience!
Each sentence should underscore the benefits and value that your product, service, or proposal brings to the table.
Avoid generic descriptions and focus on specific advantages that solve problems or enhance the recipient’s business or life.
Hence, that’s why it’s so important to understand your target audience’s pain points and goals that your product or service solves!
I also recommend that you ensure that your benefits are tangible and measurable.
Such as my service bringing on average 2x ROI, or helping customers to reduce tax burden by up to 45%, etc.
If you can, tell them in numbers what they’re getting!
Write the Best Cold Email Subject Lines (Your Success Depends On It)
Another crucial cold email copywriting best practice is to focus on your subject lines more than you ever did.
If you spend on your subject lines 30 seconds to 1 minute, I urge you to 10x the time you spend on each subject line!
It will drastically improve your cold email marketing results!
The thing is, the average office worker receives 121 emails per day…
It doesn’t matter if you have the best cold email copy, the best offer, or the most personalized cold email if the prospect does not find your subject line interesting enough to open it.
That’s why your cold email subject lines matter so much!
With that here are some of the best practices for writing the best cold email subject lines:
- Personalization, Personalization, Personalization: Mention the prospect’s name, company, or specific details.
- Call Out Their Names or Company Names: Include the recipient’s name or company in the subject.
- Mutual Connection Mention: Reference shared connections to build immediate trust.
- Keep It Short: Use concise, clear, and mobile-friendly subject lines.
- Provide Clarity and Relevance: Clearly state the value or relevance offered.
- Provide Urgency or Curiosity: Use urgency or intrigue to provoke quick action.
- Avoid Spam Triggers: Steer clear of words triggering spam filters.
- Testing & Optimization: Continuously A/B test subject lines for effectiveness.
- Use Power Words & Phrases: Integrate compelling words to enhance engagement.
Write Short, Clear Sentences
In cold emailing, brevity is key.
Long, complex sentences can confuse or overwhelm your audience, leading to disinterest or disengagement.
Or it can confuse them as you punch too much information in one long strip of words.
Instead, you should focus on writing short, clear sentences that convey your message quickly and effectively.
Each sentence should be straightforward and to the point, avoiding unnecessary jargon or filler words.
And the best example of writing short, clear marketing copies, and sentences is Brian Dean.
Whether you read his Twitter, LinkedIn, and emails, or if you used to read his articles on Backlinko, you would know that Brian mastered this copywriting technique!
Thus, I really recommend reading his article on copywriting.
I also recommend anytime you write a cold email copy, read it and try your best to make it shorter, and more concise without losing any information value.
This way, you will be able to write compelling, engaging, and converting cold emails.
Create a Cold Email Sequence
The next best practice for cold email copywriting is to layer out all the information in 3-7 cold emails that are sent consequently in a span of 3-5 days apart from each other.
It’s impossible to provide all the information to your prospect within a single cold email without making it long = boring.
Thus, in order to write effective cold email copy, you need to space out your information into several cold emails.
That’s why planning your cold email sequence is essential as it gives you enough room to educate your prospects.
Remember, your prospects have no idea who you or your company are and would never buy from you unless you educate them on the things that you can help them with.
That’s why planning your cold email campaigns comes with planning out all the different information you want to share with your prospects.
And if you struggle with creating cold email sequences, you can use ProfitOutreach, our easy-to-use cold email sequence generator helps you to write the entire highly personalized cold email sequence, while applying the copywriting best practices.
Use Second Person Writing Just Like You Would Have 1-1 Conversation
When crafting cold emails, adopting a second-person perspective creates a personal and engaging tone.
Addressing the recipient directly with “you” makes your message feel more like a conversation rather than a sales pitch which is the point, it’s just two of you!
It’s akin to speaking directly to them, which can significantly increase engagement and response rates.
Personalize your email as if you’re having a one-on-one conversation, focusing on their needs, pain points, and how your offering can specifically benefit them.
This technique not only makes your cold email more relatable but also enhances its effectiveness by removing the kinda feeling of being just another person on the cold email list for your prospect.
Imagine you’re talking to your friend when you’re crafting your cold emails and it will get easier.
Keep Your All Key Components Aligned and Relevant
To craft an effective cold email, ensure that every element—from the subject line to the call to action—works cohesively towards your goal.
Start with a subject line that reflects the email’s content, sparking interest without misleading the recipient.
In the email body, maintain focus on delivering value and addressing the recipient’s needs, using clear and concise language.
While also maintaining the cold email theme. Remember you will have several cold emails within your cold email sequence, so each cold email should stick to the theme.
Your call-to-action should be a natural extension of the email’s message, getting closer to the recipient toward the desired action seamlessly.
Remember, consistency in tone, message, and purpose across all components enhances clarity and increases the likelihood of engagement, ensuring that your cold email is compelling, relevant, and effective in driving the intended response.
Leverage Social Proofing
One of my favorite ways to increase credibility, engagement, and overall quality of the copy is to cite someone else talking positively about my product or service.
I always believed in: “If you say it, they don’t trust you. If others say it, it’s true!”
Remember, third-party validation is more credible!
That’s why leveraging social proofing is crucial.
Include testimonials, case studies, or endorsements from satisfied customers to build trust and demonstrate the value of your offering.
Highlight specific results or benefits others have experienced, making your proposition more convincing and relatable.
This strategy significantly enhances your email’s persuasive power and boosts response rates.
Craft Effective & Personalized CTA
Another essential cold email copywriting best practice is to ensure you create effective and personalized CTA within your cold emails.
The thing is, if you don’t tell your readers what you want them to do, how can you expect them they do what you want them to do?
Does it make sense?
That’s why having relevant CTA’s that are personalized based on the copy, type of cold email, and preferably also the recipient information is crucial.
It will allow you to encourage your readers to do the right thing!
In fact, personalized calls to action perform 202% better than basic CTAs.
Furthermore, just one CTA within email marketing can increase sales by approximately 1,617%. (Source)
That’s why, putting a lot of effort into your cold email call to action can significantly increase your cold email results.
Be As Personalized As Possible
Another copywriting best practice for cold email is to be as personalized as possible.
Personalization is the key to successful outreach!
It will help your cold email stand out.
It definitely increases your conversion rate!
In fact, marketers report a remarkable 760% increase in revenue from adopting personalized and segmented campaigns and personalized emails deliver six times higher transaction rates.
Personalization also helps you to improve the perception of your brand, and it has a much higher engagement/response rate.
According to research, 82% of marketers have reported an increase in open rates through cold email personalization.
But creating cold email personalization at scale is extremely hard, time-consuming, and ineffective.
That’s why we created ProfitOutreach. Our tool will take all the important information about you, your business, your offer, and your prospect, and create a hyper-personalized cold email sequence!
The entire sequence, not just cold email, but the entire cold email sequence, is ready to be plugged into your cold email software and sent!
Super easy to use, highly effective, and profitable way to grow your outreach with ProfitOutreach.
Try us now!
Always Use A/B Testing to Achieve the Best Results
A/B testing is 101 conversion rate optimization and the reason for that is because it works extremely well!
In fact, A/B testing is the most used testing method for improving conversion rates and long-term A/B testing can lead to up to 400% increase in conversion rates.
According to research by Litmus, businesses that A/B test every email see 37% higher ROI than those that never do the A/B test.
So how can you run A/B testing with cold email?
Well, this is simple and there is a lot to test such as:
- Subject lines: Test different subject lines such as one having the recipient name and another one having the company name.
- Body copy: you can tweak the cold email copy, such as making it longer, shorter, or having a completely different cold email template.
- CTA: Make sure you also test different CTA variants such as having buttons, written, link anchor text, different variants, etc.
When it comes to A/B testing and cold email, you can quite literally A/B test the $#!& out of it.
So, make sure you do! 😀
Cold Email Copywriting Examples
This section showcases real-world cold email examples, illustrating effective subject lines, personalization, value propositions, and strong CTAs.
Use these insights and cold email templates to enhance your cold email campaigns, boosting engagement and conversions.
Example 1: Sales Pitch
Subject Line: Increase Your ROI with Our Proven Solution
Email Body:
Hi [Recipient’s Name],
I hope this message finds you well.
I’m [Your Name] from [Your Company], and I wanted to share how our [Product/Service] has helped companies like [Recipient’s Company] achieve a 30% increase in ROI within just six months.
Our solution is designed to address [specific pain point], ensuring you achieve [specific benefit]. I’d love to discuss how we can tailor our solution to meet your needs.
CTA: Can we schedule a quick call this week to explore this further?
Breakdown:
- Subject Line: Direct and benefit-focused, immediately piquing interest.
- Personalization: Uses the recipient’s name and company to create a connection.
- Value Proposition: Clearly states a significant benefit (30% increase in ROI).
- CTA: Simple and actionable, guiding the recipient to the next step.
Relevant Cold Email Templates:
- Hard Pitch Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Soft Pitch Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Value Proposition Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Reviews Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Exclusive Offer Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Features Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
Example 2: Partnership Request
Subject Line: Explore a Strategic Partnership Opportunity
Email Body:
Hi [Recipient’s Name],
I hope you’re doing well.
I’m [Your Name] from [Your Company]. I’m reaching out to discuss a potential partnership between [Recipient’s Company] and [Your Company].
We have [specific strength or resource], and I believe a collaboration could mutually benefit us by [specific benefit].
I’d love to explore how we can work together to achieve our common goals.
CTA: Are you available for a brief call next week to discuss this opportunity?
Breakdown:
- Subject Line: Inviting and highlights the partnership opportunity.
- Personalization: Addresses the recipient directly, building rapport.
- Value Proposition: Clearly states the mutual benefits of the partnership.
- CTA: Clear and proposes a specific next step.
Relevant Cold Email Templates:
Example 3: Event Invitation
Subject Line: Join Us at [Event Name] on [Event Date]
Email Body:
Hi [Recipient’s Name],
I hope this message finds you well. We are excited to invite you to [Event Name], happening on [Event Date] at [Event Location].
This event will feature [highlighted aspects, e.g., keynote speakers, networking opportunities, etc.], and we believe it would be a fantastic opportunity for you to [benefit, e.g., connect with industry leaders, learn about new trends, etc.].
We would be thrilled to have you join us.
CTA: Can you confirm your attendance by [RSVP Deadline]?
Breakdown:
- Subject Line: Clear, includes event name and date, creating immediate relevance.
- Personalization: Directly addresses the recipient, making the invitation more engaging.
- Value Proposition: Highlights key aspects and benefits of attending the event.
- CTA: Simple and clear, prompting a specific action.
Relevant Cold Email Templates:
- Webinar Invitation Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Event Invitation Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
Conclusion
Cold email copywriting will determine how successful your cold email campaigns will be.
And in this guide, we’ve covered essential tips and best practices to elevate your cold email strategy.
From understanding the fundamentals of cold email copywriting to mastering specific techniques like leveraging social proof, creating compelling CTAs, and personalizing your message, these insights are designed to enhance your email outreach efforts.
Remember, effective cold email copy is concise, clear, and tailored to the recipient’s needs and interests.
By implementing these strategies, you can increase open rates, boost engagement, and drive conversions, ultimately achieving your campaign goals.
For those looking to streamline this process, tools like ProfitOutreach can help automate and personalize your cold email sequences, making it easier to connect with potential clients and partners.
With the right approach, your cold emails can become a powerful tool for business growth.
How ProfitOutreach Can Help with Cold Email Copywriting?
ProfitOutreach leverages advanced AI models and industry-leading cold email best practices to create highly effective email sequences.
By analyzing data about your company, yourself, your offer, and your prospects, ProfitOutreach crafts hyper-personalized cold email sequences tailored to each individual prospect.
This approach not only saves you time but also boosts the effectiveness of your cold emails, leading to higher conversion rates and increased ROI from your outreach efforts.
FAQs about Cold Email Copywriting
In this section, we’re going to answer commonly asked questions about cold email copywriting:
Is cold email copywriting hard?
Cold email copywriting can be challenging due to the need for concise, engaging, and persuasive content that captures attention quickly. However, with practice, clear goals, and understanding of your target audience, it becomes manageable and can significantly improve your outreach effectiveness.
How do I practice cold email copywriting?
To practice cold email copywriting:
- Study Successful Examples: Analyze effective cold emails to understand their structure and techniques.
- Write Regularly: Draft emails frequently to refine your style and approach.
- Seek Feedback: Get input from peers or mentors to improve your copy.
- A/B Test: Experiment with different elements to see what works best.
- Stay Updated: Keep up with trends and best practices in copywriting.
What are the best books for copywriting?
My top picks for copywriting books are:
- “The Copywriter’s Handbook” by Robert Bly: A comprehensive guide to writing effective copy.
- “Made to Stick” by Chip Heath & Dan Heath: Insights on creating memorable and impactful messages.
- “Everybody Writes” by Ann Handley: Tips on creating compelling content.
- “The Adweek Copywriting Handbook” by Joseph Sugarman: Techniques from a renowned copywriter.
- “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion” by Robert B. Cialdini: Understanding the principles of persuasion.
How often should I follow up on a cold email?
Follow up 2-3 times after the initial email, spacing each cold email follow-up 3-5 days apart. Adjust frequency based on response rates and feedback, ensuring each follow-up provides additional value or new information.
What metrics should I track to measure the success of my cold email campaigns?
Key metrics include:
- Open Rate: Measures how many recipients opened your email.
- Response Rate: Tracks the percentage of replies received.
- Click-Through Rate (CTR): Measures how many recipients clicked on links within your email.
- Conversion Rate: Tracks the percentage of recipients who completed the desired action, such as scheduling a meeting or signing up for a service.
How can I ensure my cold emails don’t end up in spam? T
To avoid spam filters:
- Use a Professional Email Address: Avoid free email services for bulk outreach.
- Avoid Spammy Language: Refrain from using excessive exclamation marks, all caps, and trigger words like “free” or “guaranteed.”
- Personalize Emails: Tailor emails to individual recipients.
- Include an Unsubscribe Link: Ensure compliance with email marketing regulations.
- Test Deliverability: Use tools to check if your email is likely to be marked as spam.
Relevant Articles:
- Best Cold Email Opening Lines and How to Write Them
- How to Find Emails for Cold Emailing
- Cold Email vs Spam Email: How Not to Make Your Cold Email Outreach Become Spam
- How to Create a SaaS Cold Email Strategy
Relevant Cold Email Templates:
- Final Follow-Up Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Benefits Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
- Follow-Up Cold Email Template Guide: Examples, Best Practices, and Tips
