Aleksi
August 5, 2024
How to get high response rates in your B2B cold emailing activities?
In this article, you’ll understand the different concepts and strategies of B2B cold emailing. You can learn about the various templates and factors you can apply to your emailing activities.
What is a Cold Email?
A cold email is a type of email that’s sent to a recipient with whom the sender has no prior relationship or connection. The goal is to introduce a product or service the receiver might need for their business.
Cold emails are commonly used in sales and marketing to reach prospects for potential business relationships. A cold email’s success depends on the email’s quality, the offer’s relevance, and the ability to establish trust and credibility.
B2B Cold Emailing Strategies
Build an Email Cadence
An email cadence is a schedule or sequence sent to a prospect over time. It’s a strategic approach to outreach that aims to engage and nurture leads to drive a specific goal.
Furthermore, you need to develop a follow-up strategy to create repetition and familiarity with your leads. This can create different touchpoints of potential interactions for your prospects. According to a 2023 Belkins study, a cold email outreach campaign with 3 email rounds tends to have the highest reply rate at 9.2 percent.
Here’s an example of an email cadence.
Research High-Quality Leads
High-quality leads are crucial for cold emailing because they allow you to personalize your outreach to cater to their needs and preferences. Researching for high-quality leads involves identifying prospects who are likely interested in your products or services.
Here’s a list of things that you can do to get high-quality leads:
Create a Buyer’s Persona: Developing a buyer’s persona helps you get an idea of your target customer. You define their industry, company size, and pain points they may have.
Lead Generation Tools: These tools can help you identify and gather leads from various data points. You can use tools like Leadfeeder or Reply to automate this task.
Ask for Referrals: Word-of-mouth recommendations can be a powerful source of high-quality leads. According to data, salespeople who seek out referrals earn 4 to 5 times more than those who don’t.
How to Write B2B Cold Emails?
Subject Line
The subject line is an important part of the email because it sets the overall tone of the message. It’s the first thing that people get to read before opening your email. You have to make sure that the subject line is eye-catching and personal.
According to a 2023 SuperOffice research, 33% of email recipients open an email based on the subject line. It’s better to write a succinct subject line that’s easy to read and understand. Here are some examples of a cold email subject line:
Hello [Prospect’s Name], let’s talk about [topic].
Can I help you with reaching [specific goal]?
Here’s a [business solution] for your [pain point].
Introduction and Body
The introduction and body of the email have to be personal and direct to the point. It should provide context through pain points and goals then give solutions like your product or service.
You can discuss past achievements with previous clients or offer a goal you can reach if you collaborate with your prospect. Furthermore, you should discuss the prospect’s needs and how you can fill the gaps with your product or service. Here’s a sample introduction and body.
Value Proposition
The value proposition is a short statement in the email that provides a unique benefit or advantage in using your product. It can also be valuable information like research data, free reports, or the latest industry trends.
Moreover, in your follow-ups, you can offer discounts or special offers as value propositions to entice your prospects. These value-based offers are important to provide credibility and trust. In the previous example above, here’s the value proposition in the email template.
Call-to-Action (CTA)
The call-to-action is a key element that allows prospects to easily reply to your cold email. A CTA is usually a question that nudges prospects into making a decision. It’s a touchpoint that potentially allows prospects to move through the next step of the sales cycle.
Additionally, you can create CTAs by offering free trials, subscribing to newsletters, or downloading an ebook. Here’s a sample CTA question from the email template.
Best B2B Cold Emailing Templates
The best B2B cold emailing templates are the AIDA template, BAB template, and PAS template. These templates are useful for making high-converting emails. The templates were derived from the 2023 Cold Emailing Guide by GMass.
AIDA Template
The AIDA template (Attention-Interest-Desire-Action) is a useful framework for cold emailing because it follows a top-down approach when writing your copy. It’s useful for creating engaging and effective content for your emails.
Additionally, it’s a funnel that guides your prospects through different stages. Here are ways to understand its different parts:
Attention:
Start your email with a strong subject line that grabs the recipient’s attention.
Interest:
Build interest by highlighting the benefits of your product or service and how it can solve the recipient’s problem.
Provide relevant examples or case studies to demonstrate the value of your offering.
Desire:
Create desire by emphasizing unique features or advantages of your product or service.
Use testimonials or social proof to build credibility and show how your product has helped other businesses.
Action:
End your email with a clear and compelling CTA that prompts the recipient to take the next step.
Provide specific instructions on what you want the recipient to do, such as scheduling a call, requesting a demo, or visiting your website.
Here’s a sample email template for your guidance.
BAB Template
The BAB template (Before-After-Bridge) is a framework that focuses on connecting your product to your prospect’s current situation. You highlight that your solution bridges the before and after scenario for your prospect.
Here’s an abstract outline of the BAB Template:
Before (Identify the Problem):
Start by addressing a specific pain point or challenge.
Describe the current situation or challenges your prospect is experiencing.
After (Present the Solution):
Introduce your product or service as the solution to your recipient’s problem.
Highlight the benefits and advantages of using your product.
Bridge (Connect the Before and After):
Explain how your product or service can bridge the gap between your recipient’s current situation and the desired outcome.
Provide specific examples or case studies that demonstrate the effectiveness of your solution.
Lastly, here’s a sample BAB template for your reference.
PAS Template
The PAS template (Problem-Agitation-Solution) focuses on three ideas. You identify the problem, emphasize its importance, and then present your product or service as the solution.
Here’s how you can apply the PAS template to a cold email:
Problem (Identify the Problem):
Start by identifying a specific problem or pain point that the recipient may be experiencing.
Describe the problem in a way that resonates with the prospect’s situation.
Agitation (Emphasize the Problem):
Agitate the problem by highlighting the negative consequences or challenges associated with it.
Use language that evokes emotion and emphasizes the urgency of addressing the problem.
Solution (Present the Solution):
Introduce your product or service as the solution to the recipient’s problem.
Explain how your product can address the problem and provide specific benefits or advantages.
Here’s an email template using the PAS method.
3×3 Cold Email Sequence
The 3×3 cold email sequence is designed to be a gentle and persistent approach that gives your prospect multiple opportunities to respond. By spacing out the emails over three weeks, you give them time to consider your offer and increase the chances of a positive response.
Each email serves a specific purpose and builds on the previous one to increase the likelihood of a response. Here’s how the 3×3 cold email sequence typically works:
Introduction and Value Proposition (Email 1): It briefly mentions a specific benefit or value proposition that’s relevant to the recipient.
Follow-Up and Additional Information (Email 2): You provide additional information about your product or service, such as a case study, testimonial, or demo video. It reinforces the value proposition and encourages further engagement.
Final Follow-Up and Closing (Email 3): It acknowledges that you haven’t heard back and expresses understanding of their busy schedule. You can reiterate the value proposition and include a final CTA like a request for a brief meeting.
Here’s a sample template for the 3×3 cold email sequence. This was derived from Christian Krause’s 3×3 prospecting sequence.
B2B Cold Emailing Factors
The B2B cold emailing factors you need to take into account are email deliverability, bounce rates, and various engagement metrics.
Email Deliverability
Email deliverability is the ability of an email to reach a receiver’s inbox. Cold emails undergo various filters and authentications. These are affected by factors like the sender’s reputation, the quality of content, and the receiver’s email settings.
According to 2023 data from Sponge.io, a good B2B email deliverability rate is around 90% and above. This is dependent on your email list and the cold email tools you use.
Email Bounce Rates
Email bounce rates are the number of emails that are not delivered to the prospect’s inbox. This is caused by full inboxes or invalid emails. A good way to prevent this is to regularly clean and update your email lists to ensure they’re all active.
Furthermore, the two types of bounce rates are called soft bounce and hard bounce. Soft bounces occur because of minor nuisances such as a full inbox. A hard bounce occurs when the email is invalid or the domain doesn’t exist. According to data, a normal bounce rate should be less than 10% of all the emails you send.
Email Engagement
Email engagement metrics measure various interaction points with your prospects. They measure the effectiveness of your email outreach campaigns.
Here are the email engagement metrics that you need to know about:
Open Rate: The number of leads who open your email. This measures subject line and sender name engagement.
Click-Through Rate (CTR): The percentage of prospects who click on a link in your email. CTR indicates the effectiveness of your CTA and email content.
Conversion Rate: The total number of receivers who complete a desired action. These actions include making a purchase, filling out a form, or clicking a link.
Unsubscribe Rate: The percentage of recipients who unsubscribe from your list after receiving an email. This metric helps you gauge the relevance and value of your email content to subscribers.
Forward Rate: The percentage of recipients who forward your email to others. This metric indicates how your content is shareable and valuable.
How Long Should a Cold Email Be?
A cold email should have a subject line of around 7 words and a body of roughly 144 words. According to Regie.ai’s 2023 Sales Email Benchmark Report, these word counts had the highest open and reply rates with 46.2% and 2.7% respectively.
Why B2B Cold Emailing is Important
B2B cold emailing is important for lead generation and sales prospecting. You can succeed in your email outreach by following the tips and concepts above. Cold emailing offers consistent revenue generation for your sales teams.
Surprisingly, according to a 2022 SuperOffice study, 59% of B2B companies don’t use email marketing. With this in mind, you must capitalize on this lead-generation activity to achieve your sales goals.
