Did you know the cold email response rate is 5.1%, with the average open rate being 27.7%? Cold emailing, where you reach out to potential clients who’ve never heard of your product or service before, can feel like a gamble.

But is it possible to engage a client right from the first letter, or is it just a myth?

Read the article and learn how to write cold emails to boost email deliverability and look at examples of cold emails.

4 Key Steps to Write Cold Emails to Improve Email Deliverability

Let's discuss 4 main basic steps.

1. Identify Your Target Audience

Sending messages to uninterested people is pointless. Before writing a cold email for a mailing list, define the target audience and find out the meaningful criteria:

• Users' geolocation
• Industry in which they are building a career
• Age, gender
• Number of employees
• Corporation's products
• Favors, etc.

Identifying a target audience is necessary to write only effective words and target only the people who need them.

Prepare Email Database

Several options for gathering a database exist:

Purchase

Usually, purchased databases contain invalid addresses and incorrect data. These databases are critically spammed. You will spend money, but the mailing will not give a good result. Focus on safe and effective ways to collect email databases.

Use Tools

This option is better than the previous one, but it has flaws. Parsing programs (as such programs are called) can find invalid emails.

Using this option, check the collected list with the help of email validation services. It will help you effectively mail to active users and attract attention to your product/service.

Manual search

It requires a lot of time. You can outsource the task: only financial investments and patience will be required. It takes at least 24 hours to manually gather a list of 50 people.

Again, there is no guarantee that the emails are up to date. Perform a validity check. Otherwise, you risk blowing your budget.

Don't Overload the First Email

Writing service Essay Tigers advises: “Don't add links, attachments, PDFs, flashy animations!” They distract from the text part and make spam filters distrust you. If you apply this advice, you'll end up in Spam.

All in due time! In the future, add graphic elements and attachments. The purpose of the first touch is to connect with your audience, not to scare them with an abundance of files.

Here is the difference between a cold email and spam:

Capacity and brevity

People don't want to read a canvas from an unknown sender. Keep it short. Imagine yourself in the place of the consumer. It will help to look at the email through the eyes of the addressee. If interested in the offer - he will specify the details.

Personalization

Address by name, address exclusively to the target audience and indicate where you got their emails from. Use humor and a polite conversational style.

Don't be intrusive

Take care of the comfort of the recipients. Do not try to immediately sell a product or service. Work on building an image. The second is to send a letter of continued cooperation. The effectiveness of the subsequent campaign depends on the public's reaction to the first e-mail.

Openness

Specify the real mail and the sender's name. Anonymous messages from mysterious users increase distrust and the risk of ending up in the Gmail Spam folder. It's easy to get there, but getting out and restoring your reputation is not the easiest task.

Clarity

The topic should be clear. Study the list of spam words and avoid them in the body and subject line of the email.

Remember, your task is to avoid the Spam folder when you are doing cold mailing. Then, you will definitely increasethe click-through rate in cold emailing.

2. B2B Cold Mailing: Optimal Size for Cold Emails

Before writing the email itself, let's decide what size it should be and how many emails to send. As for the volume, the email should not be too long.

Otherwise, the recipient will simply not read it to the end. But at the same time, the volume should be sufficient to tell about your company and describe your offer. The optimal size is 1000 characters (about half a page). The maximum is 1500 characters.

Break the text into logical paragraphs. Make long enumerations in labeled lists. Thus, the text for cold mailing will not look like a continuous mess and is difficult to read.

The number of follow-up emails is 2-3. If you haven't received a reply to the first one, send an email with a reminder. If the second one remains unanswered, it is not worth sending more and disturbing the recipient. In rare cases, send a third follow-up email a week later.

Right Subject Line - Half of Cold Email Success

Despite the fact that the subject line is just one sentence, it determines whether a person will open the email or not. Therefore, clearly but concisely formulate your offer in the subject line. Also, take a few tips to heart:

• Don't use the words “reminder,” “free,” “percentage off,” or “help” as they reduce email open rates.
• Personalize the subject line, as it will increase the open rate by 26%.

It's best if the subject line is no longer than 30 characters. Although the maximum theme size for desktop devices is 70 characters, Apple devices only display 30 characters. If you want it to fully display on all devices, then don't make it longer than that.

Structure of a Cold Email That Sells

For many people, the task of writing a text becomes impossible. You open the Word - and nothing comes to mind. So, where do you start, and how do you write an effective cold email?

Everything will become much easier and clearer if you know the classic structure and just follow it. So, an email to a potential client has the following elements:

• Greeting
• About yourself or the company
• Offer (what you are offering to the person)
• Call to action
• Signature

As you can see, there is nothing complicated here. You can easily write your first cold email!

3. Call to Action - Don't Forget About It!

Without a clear call to action, your email is meaningless.

The target action could be a purchase or other type of cooperation or a call/meeting to discuss details. Don't go to the other extreme either, oversaturating the text with calls to action.

In a cold email, there can be only one.Recently, an effective trick with a call to action in the form of a question has become very popular. Examples of wording:

• When is it convenient for you to meet/call to discuss the details of cooperation?
• What will you say?
• Do you want to know more?

But you should be careful with such wording and use it only if you are sure that the person exactly falls under your target audience and your offer is really favorable. Otherwise, your self-confidence can cause, on the contrary, a negative reaction.Cold Email Design: Do You Need a Visual Part?

In cold emails, the design does not play a decisive role. On the contrary, a sales email template that is too overloaded may not have the desired effect.

Besides, the purpose of such an email is to create a feeling of personal correspondence, not a mass sales mailing. Therefore, make the design as simple as possible:

• Don't add a lot of pictures. First of all, emails with more pictures than text are more likely to go straight to spam. Secondly, some people cut off emails that are too large in size. For example, Gmail often compresses pictures in emails larger than 102 kb. Therefore, everything may not look the way you intended it to look to the recipient.
• Do not insert GIFs. First, they take a long time to load and may not display correctly at all. And secondly, they simply irritate people who receive an email from your company for the first time.

The only thing you can (and even should) add is a photo of the sender in the email signature.

In general, experiments with visuals are allowed and even necessary when sending emails to regular customers who have subscribed to your newsletter. After all, they will be bored of receiving the same text emails.

But it is better to make a standard cold email template with the simplest possible design (or even without it at all, just text and nothing extra).A/B

4. Refining Your Cold Email Strategy

Cold emailing lives on, with continuous optimization. To get better results, testing different parts of your email campaigns is necessary.

This is where A/B testing and spintax come into play:

A/B testing

Try to experiment with different subject lines, CTAs, and copies of emails to find out what really works best for your target audience. For instance, test whether a question-based subject line works better than a value-driven one or whether a shorter call-to-action increases clicks.

Smartlead’s AI Auto Adjust A/B Testing feature allows you to optimize your email outreach and drive more meetings for your business.

By running tests on email variations, you can refine your approach and identify the best-performing strategies.Before diving into A/B testing, make sure you have completed the following steps:

1. Set up your email account in the Smartlead app with SPF, DKIM, DMARC, and MX records to ensure proper email authentication.
2. Warm up your inbox for at least two weeks to prevent deliverability issues.

Now, let’s walk through the steps to perform A/B testing with Smartlead.

‍Step 1: Add a New Campaign: In the Smartlead app, click on the “Add Campaign” button to create a new campaign.

Step 2: Import Your Leads: Upload your lead list by either importing a CSV file or syncing with your CRM.

Step 3: Create Your First Variant: Compose your initial email and save it as your first variant. Then, click on the “Add Variant” button to create additional versions of the email you want to test.

For example, if you’re testing 5 variants, your setup would look like this:

‍Step 4: Choose Your A/B Testing MethodSmartlead offers three ways to distribute your variants. Here’s how to use each method:

Manual Equal Distribution

With this method, Smartlead will equally distribute your variants across all leads automatically.

How to Set Up:

• Click on the “A/B Configuration” button.
• In the “A/B Testing Settings” popup, leave the default settings as they are: Manual Distribution and Split the variant percentage equally.
• Click “Save Manual Distribution,” and you're done! Smartlead will handle the rest.

2. Manual Distribution with Variant Percentage Allocation

This option lets you manually adjust the percentage of leads that receive each variant, allowing you to control the distribution.‍

How to Set Up:

• Click on the “A/B Configuration” button after adding your variants.
• In the “A/B Testing Settings” popup, select Manual Distribution.
• Choose “Split the variant percentage equally.”
• Adjust the percentage for each variant as needed. Keep in mind that each variant needs at least 10% of your total pool for reliable results.
• Click “Save Manual Distribution” to finalize your settings.

3. AI Percentage Distribution

With AI Percentage Distribution, Smartlead automatically optimizes which variant performs best based on the metrics you choose, such as open rate, reply rate, or click rate.

How to Set Up:

• Click on the “A/B Configuration” button after adding your variants.
• In the “A/B Testing Settings” popup, select AI Percentage Distribution.
• Use the slider to choose the variation distribution percentage, from 10% to 80%.
• Under “Choose Winning Metrics,” select the metric that matters most for your campaign (e.g., reply rate, open rate, etc.).
• Click “Save AI Percentage Distribution,” and Smartlead will automatically optimize the campaign based on the chosen metrics.

Step 5: Launch Your Campaign

After selecting your A/B testing method and configuring your variants, you’re ready to launch your campaign. Keep an eye on performance metrics like reply rates, open rates, and click rates to determine which variant is performing best.

Step 6: Monitor and Optimize

Once your campaign is live, monitor the performance metrics closely. Use the insights gained from A/B testing to refine future campaigns, making data-driven decisions that boost engagement and drive more meetings.

Spintax

When you send cold emails, email service providers (ESPs) monitor patterns. Sending the exact same email to 1000 people often raises flags, making it look like a "mass" email.

However, using slightly different versions of the same email can help trick ESPs into thinking you're engaging in one-on-one conversations rather than sending bulk messages. This is where Spintax comes in.

‍Spintax in Smartlead allows you to create variations of your message with minimal effort.

This way, even though much of your email stays the same, small differences in the copy increase deliverability while helping your emails appear more personalized.

Conclusion

Sending mass cold emails makes it hard for one to keep up with efficiency yet be personal. Smartlead can help you automate essential components of email campaigns.

Crafting effective cold emails is both an art and a science. By focusing on personalization, clear subject lines, and compelling content, you can engage your recipients while boosting deliverability rates.

Remember to test your emails, maintain a clean contact list, and adhere to email marketing regulations to build trust and improve performance.

The key is to balance professionalism with a touch of humanity, ensuring your message resonates without overwhelming the recipient.

With persistence and attention to detail, cold emails can become a powerful tool to expand your network, generate leads, and drive business growth. Start optimizing your cold email strategy today!