Cold email marketing is the practice of emailing an audience who didn’t subscribe to your mailing list – contrary to warm email marketing. Cold emails are meant to be personalized with the little information you have on the contact. They’re supposed to slowly begin developing a relationship with people you’ve never contacted before, so that they begin to recognize who you are and what you do. This approach could be one of the most viable options if you are looking for efficient marketing with little cost, and it is much less invasive and uncomfortable than cold calling. Over the years, cold email marketing has quickly become one of the most useful tactics in generating more leads for companies. This guide will go over what you need to know about it, how to approach it, and how your business can benefit from it.
What To Know Before Jumping In
Getting Blacklisted
Very simply put, getting blacklisted is essentially getting put on the naughty list. Getting blacklisted is what separates legitimate emails from spam emails. According to LeadFuze, “An email blacklist is a real-time database that uses criteria to determine if an IP is sending email it considers to be spam. There are several blacklists… Each list [has] a unique way of accepting inbound mail and determining if email is considered SPAM. They can all impact deliverability for your emails.”
Uploading A Purchased List To Your Email SaaS
You should also keep in mind that uploading a list of purchased leads to your Mailchimp, Constant Contact, etc. is not allowed, and actually illegal for that matter. If you want to send emails to a purchased list of cold contacts, you have to go through one of the few email sending companies that’s willing to put their IP address on the line for you. One of those companies is us – US Data Corporation.
How To Approach Cold Email Marketing
Custom Tailored Content
One of the main reasons you should consider cold emailing potential customers is because you have the capability to curate the content for the intended recipient. For instance, if you’re a clothing store, you probably wouldn’t send the same email to customers who are aged 18-26 that you’d send to those who are 50+. The content of your email will most likely differ depending on what particular set of individuals you’re targeting.
Avoid Looking Like Spam
Cold emails, if done right, shouldn’t give the user any idea that the email is spam. A great cold email, matched with a precisely targeted audience, i.e. a BMW dealership emailing local BMW owners, should return exceptional results. In order to differentiate your emails from spam, avoid this list of keywords that set off spam traps:
Avoid Fines And Stay Compliant With CAN-SPAM
In order to avoid legal action and the fines associated with spam email, you will need to follow the specific set of rules laid out by the Federal Trade Commission.
Building/Obtaining Lists
The first and most vital thing you should do before you start sending emails is obtain a list of potential marketing prospects. You must make sure that this list consists of prospects that correlate with your target audience. The more in line your list is with your targeted group of people and/or businesses, the more likely you are to succeed in converting marketing qualified leads into sales qualified leads.
There are a variety of ways in which you could go about getting a list of contacts. Technically speaking, you could manually find prospects through social media. Although this method is free of charge, it’s extremely time consuming. Purchasing a list of qualified leads is far more time efficient and cost effective. US Data Corporation provides business lists, consumer lists, mailing lists or email lists. We can also send your emails for you, in order to protect your online reputation (see above – Getting Blacklisted).
Starting Off
While there are numerous styles and tactics to sending your first email, one of the most common and effective approaches would be to start off with an introductory email. The name says it all. You want to first introduce yourself and genuinely explain why you are sending the email. It should be noted that this is more of a soft approach rather than a hard approach. This type of approach works toward establishing a relationship with potential customers so they will remember you in the future.
Unlike cold calling, most contacts will not be able to reject the email you send them. If anything, they are forced to at least get an impression of the email and of your business. More often than not, your business name and branding will be subconsciously ingrained in their mind, and it can be further ingrained depending on the consistency of your email sends. Everyone has a tendency to check their email on a regular basis. To support this, a study done by Forbes Magazine reveals that the average person checks their email about 15 times a day.
On the other hand, if you’re trying to ramp up the sales process and get straight to the point, you may want to consider sending a hard sell email. This approach is known as “Problem-Agitate-Solve”. The content of the email should immediately identify the problem your potential customer may be experiencing, followed by offering a solution to that much agitated problem of theirs.
Lastly, you shouldn’t continuously bombard your customers with product / service promotion. You should develop alternative methods to deliver valuable content to your audience. This could be things such as monthly newsletters, helpful consumer tips, white papers, and contextual information about your product.
How Your Businesses Can Benefit From Cold Email Marketing
Not only can cold email marketing be cost effective, but it only becomes more and more potent the more you do it. According to Email Marketing & Marketing Excellence Automation, a survey of the all top marketers across the nation revealed that cold emailing is the preferred approach of over 50% of marketers. Furthermore, approximately 19% of marketers have claimed that it has increased their sales, and 23% say that they’ve generated more leads whilst using it.
Although you may not see improved sales numbers instantaneously, it’s important to remember that cold emailing works over time with consistency. That being said, cold emails will still benefit your business in various other ways. Not all leads will want to buy your product or service right away, but staying in touch and cultivating a relationship with the customer can have promising results. In the meantime, these emails can increase traffic to your website, helping with authority and SEO.
Leads & Website Traffic
Whether you’re selling chocolate or providing cleaning services, every business could use more traffic to their website. As I mentioned earlier, this ultimately places your product/service in the back of your potential customer’s mind. The more consistent you are with emailing, the more likely you will increase traffic to your site, and the closer you’ll be to closing a sale. What this does is build credibility with your potential customer over time. This gives you the ability to form a sense of validity with your target audience because people like to do business with people they know, like, and trust.