Mistakes You Might Be Making with Cold Emails

by Paiton McDuffie | Jun 13, 2023

If you’re using ABM (Account Based Marketing) tactics, chances are you’re utilizing cold emails as part of your strategy. But how do you know that your cold emails are written and set up to be as effective as possible? We’ll review common mistakes made in ABM cold email strategies and how to utilize them more effectively.

Your cold emails aren’t personalized.

Personalization is a buzzword thrown around a lot in the marketing world. But personalization is more than just using your contact’s first name in the content of your email – it’s taking time to get to know them and their problems before reaching out or requesting something from them. Use LinkedIn to do background research on members of your ABM list. What college did they attend? What sports teams do they support? How long have they been in their current position? What are common issues they might be facing in their industry right now? How do you uniquely solve that problem for them? The more personalized your initial outreach, the more your emails will stick out in a prospect’s inbox.

Your cold emails are too long.

Think about the last time you received a cold email from someone you didn’t know. How long did it take you to click into the next email in your inbox, or move it to the trash? Probably mere seconds right? You only have a few seconds to grab your prospect’s attention. That is, in part, why personalization is so important – but so is the length of your email. Keep your message short and sweet, make your solution to their problem clear and concise, and offer a clear call to action. Large blocks of text or rambling sentences are a surefire way to have your cold email skipped over and ignored.

You’re not following up.

55% of all cold email replies come from a follow-up email. Let me repeat that – Over HALF of all replies to a cold email came because a follow-up was sent after the initial email. Sometimes prospects do just miss your email, or perhaps it was an especially busy week for them. Not to mention, it now takes 12-14 touchpoints before your prospect will ever agree to talk to someone. Following up with a short reminder (referring back to your initial email is a great tactic here) of who you are, and what solution you’re offering, and a clear call to action is absolutely necessary when utilizing cold email tactics for ABM. Follow-up cadence can vary depending on your target industry, target audience profile, and your internal team’s capabilities, but this is a great element to test!

Your cold emails are going to the wrong people.

Having a targeted and focused audience is crucial to ensuring the maximum effectiveness of your cold emails. Use key data points like geographical location, job title, industry, company size, or annual company revenue to build your target list and then enrich it (Morgan talks more about building a list here). Get the key contact information you need to reach out and plan your approach. If you’re sending mass cold emails to thousands of people, you’re likely sending them to the wrong audience. Keep in mind job changes, role changes, etc. Plus, your messages aren’t going to be personalized enough, and fielding warm and hot leads will be difficult for you and your sales team.

You’re not A/B testing your cold emails.

You are already A/B testing your marketing emails (you are, right?), so why aren’t you testing your cold emails? The same elements you test in newsletter-style emails can and should be tested in cold emails. Test send days of the week or times. When are you getting the most responses from your prospects? Test subject lines. Do they prefer when you ask a question or make a statement? Test your follow-up cadence. Does waiting three days or a week elicit more responses? Your cold emails won’t get better without testing something. Keep testing and refining. Use what you learn from your tests to improve your content, your cadence, and your process.