How to Boost Your Cold Email Response Rate13 min read

Let’s be fair and admit that cold outreach puts us in a very awkward situation.

It’s actually like coming up to a total stranger on the street and trying to talk to them.

OK, I’m exaggerating, but that’s the feeling that most inexperienced sales reps have when they’re about to reach out to a prospect for the first time.

But you know what’s even harder than that? 

Getting responses to your emails.

The average person will receive 121 emails per day. You can only imagine that most of them never get a response. Your goal should be to avoid landing in that pile of unread emails that the average American adult has sitting in their inbox.

However, things don’t have to be awkward, and the right approach might help you improve your response rate significantly.

What Response Rate Should I Aim For?

Fast Company conducted a survey where they sent out cold emails to 1000 business executives. Of the 707 emails that didn’t bounce, 45.5% were opened. Even more telling, only 1.7 of the emails sent received a response. 

The average response rate for cold emails for marketers and salespeople is 1%. This means that for every 100 cold emails you send, only one person responds. However, that rate can be drastically increased to 15% or 20% if cold outreach is done right.

Keep in mind that the response rate for emails varies depending on several factors.

The type of email you are sending and the industry you’re in are some of the variables to consider when thinking about this question. Other factors are things like the target audience, your offer, and the type of email list you’re using.

Don’t settle for low response rates. Instead, experiment and fine-tune your cold pitching until you find a template that works for you. Test, measure, rinse, and repeat methods until you find the best fit.

Check out this episode of The 0 to 5 Million Podcast to learn how to increase email reply rates. 

Let’s look at three unusual ways to increase the response rate from your cold outreach campaign.

Nail Your Subject Lines

OK, your subject line is probably the first time that your prospect hears about you and your company.

It’s like you’re meeting new people, and it’s only logical that you’ll remember those who make a great and memorable impression on you and not those who stand aside and barely speak a word.

Don’t be that aloof and vague person because you won’t catch your recipients’ eye.

Your subject lines have to channel your authentic and genuine intent to add value to your recipients and to offer them something that can make their lives easier.

Examples:

Why your cold email strategy sucks?

Having a hard time with your response rates?

The trouble with your cold email marketing is…

Let me help you with your cold email copy

X ways to boost your cold email response rates

Can I help you with your cold email delivery rates?

Thought you’d find this content useful

Want to talk about cold emailing challenges?

These are pretty straightforward about what the email will be about and mention one of every marketer’s worst nightmares – cold emailing and low response rates.

The email labeled like this should discuss the issues mentioned in the subject line and actually show your prospects how to overcome them.

Beating around the bush and trying to sell yourself too hard is the worst thing you can do because your prospects opened your email because you promised them help.

So, if you want them to respond, make sure to deliver big time.

Add Videos to Your Outreach

Email is a great medium for outreach. 

Unfortunately, 93% of the way we communicate is nonverbal. This is a serious stumbling block with email.

Video is a natural counterpoint to this. 

As you’re no doubt aware from watching the TV, you get a lot of nonverbal cues through video. 

There’s the tone of the presenters’ voice, their body language, gestures, and a lot more besides. All of these things can help make you more engaged in a topic and the person presenting the information.

Marketers have been aware of the value of video as a means of generating sales since, well, since the invention of the TV. And you can make use of this medium to increase your response rate for your cold outreach campaign.

To make this approach easier, Autoklose teamed up with Vidyard and integrated their GoVideo feature in our campaign editor.

In other words, you can record a personal video, edit it, and attach it to your email without having to leave our platform.

Don’t Ask for Anything in Return!

And make that a rule!

You know those annoying people who contact you on LinkedIn, and after the first Hello start pitching and asking you to buy something from them or try out their service?

Well, again, don’t be like those people because your recipients will do the same thing you do – roll their eyes and ignore you.

Instead of that, do let them know that your main goal is to help them – and put your money where your mouth is!

Don’t say it just as a way of getting their attention, and start pushing your agenda the next minute.

Your email copy has to be aligned with the message you communicated in your subject line.

Otherwise, you’ll come off as deceptive.

So, if your subject line reads

X ways of getting your prospects to respond

stick to the topic and your promise. Provide value and offer your recipients some useful tips and tricks that you know will work.

Don’t Be Misleading!

Using a catchy subject line that doesn’t have much to do with the rest of your email doesn’t differ from resorting to the clickbait approach.

That’s a cheap trick, and you know it.

It’s this sly discrepancy between the subject line and the email body that turns your recipients from responding to you.

They can easily see through your thinly disguised plot and label you as a spammer.

I know that it’s next to impossible to cut through the noise of all the email messages that your recipients get on a daily basis, but this isn’t the way to draw their attention.

Instead of that, you should be sincere and straightforward about why you’re reaching out.

Let’s say that you’ve built an awesome and really cool sales automation platform that comes with a database packed with millions of clean, verified, and regularly updated B2B leads (yup, that’s Autoklose all right.)

Your email body could say something along the lines of:

See what I did here?

Yes, I do believe that name-dropping is a good idea, especially if everything you say is true and factual.

Case studies make for excellent social proof, and if you can find an influencer to vouch for you even better.

Follow Up!

I get it that you’re sick of talking about the importance of following up, but this tactic is so crucial that it’s worth mentioning in every cold emailing discussion.

I won’t bore you with the same old story and arguments about the importance of having multiple follow-ups with your prospects – here’s where you can read more about it.

You already know – they’re busy, distracted, absent-minded, and suffering from a number of other conditions common for professionals with hectic schedules and quotas to crush (just like yourself, so you can probably relate. I know I can.)

Of course, you’re afraid that you’ll cross the line eventually.

As a matter of fact, this can be a worst-case scenario. Some of your recipients will probably unsubscribe or tell you to stop flooding their inboxes with your messages.

But that’s OK.

How?

Well, in that case, they aren’t a good fit for your company, and they practically did you a favor by disqualifying themselves.

Besides, you have nothing to lose – in the end, we only regret the chances we didn’t take.

Check out our blog post featuring the most effective, ready-to-use sales email templates that you can easily customize.

Here’s an example of a follow-up email that our sales reps use regularly:

If you want to find more examples and learn other tips and tricks about successful follow-up, download our B2B-Sales Handbook.  

Their World Now vs. Their World With Your Help

Don’t be afraid to use negative marketing.

Sure, people love those positive, heart-warming “choose happiness” campaigns that Coca-Cola does, but let’s take a walk down memory lane.

Back in 1990, the beverage giant hired then little-known Matt LeBlanc for a commercial. So, in the video, he’s waiting for a bus in the desert, sweaty and thirsty, trying to find something to drink while the sun is mercilessly beating down on him.

You can almost feel your throat getting all dry while you are watching him down a bottle of ice-cold Coke he miraculously grabs from a billboard.

Do you catch my drift?

So, this is a great example of negative marketing, and you can greatly benefit from using it in your cold emails.

Talk about how unpleasant their pain points are and how they’re ruining their business.

For example, subject lines like

How bad leads are destroying your business

Why your email marketing isn’t working

Are you experiencing a lot of unsubscribes

What you should never ever do in cold outreach

followed by similarly negative and bleak accounts of their failing business and profits under the burden of different issues they’re experiencing (and with which your product or service can help) within the email body can do wonders for attracting their attention and eliciting their responses.

Play the Numbers Game

When you first reach out to somebody, it’s a good idea to corroborate your statements and promises with relevant data provided by authoritative sources.

However, don’t stuff your email with different stats and figures because this isn’t a report, and you don’t want to overwhelm your recipients. 

Instead of that, focus on the message you’re trying to communicate, and use the data to support it. 

Another good idea is to use your internal data about your own customers and provide social proof.

This way, your email will be more trustworthy and credible because reputable sources, as well as your happy customers, will help you make a compelling argument and convince your recipients to accept your offer.

Send Emails at the Right Time

Sending emails at the right time may be the difference between high and low response rates to your cold pitches. 

Let’s start with the best day to send emails.

According to a study by Coschedule, prioritize your send days in this order:

1. Tuesday: This is hands down the #1 best day to send emails according to the majority of the data from these studies.
2. Thursday: If you send two emails a week, choose Thursday for your second day.
3. Wednesday: While no single study showed that Wednesday was the most popular, it came in second place several times.

Take a look at this study. Tuesdays and Thursdays are the highest volume days for email engagement.

Source: Wordstream

What about the best time to send emails? Omnicore did a study, and this is the result they came up with:

Clearly, the best time to send emails is during breaks: 8 am, 1 pm, and 4 pm. 

At these times, people are usually available and checking their emails. However, as more users are opening emails on their mobile phones, evenings are also an excellent time to send mails. 

Most mobile users are active during the evenings. 

While there are various suggestions on the best time to send emails, you would be better off finding out what works for you. That’s why you should have a data analytics dashboard where you can monitor the open rates and response rates to get a fair idea of what works best. 

Run test emails on various clients based on psychographics and demographics until you find out what works best for your clients. 

If necessary, you can conduct a survey or interview to find out the best times for your email campaigns.

We analyzed 683,000 emails sent using Autoklose and presented our findings in a blog post, together with specific recommendations that can help you craft better cold emails, figure out the best timing for sending them, and ultimately, get more responses. 

Over to You

Cold emailing can be unpleasant, mainly because nobody likes to be ignored or rejected. It can be extremely difficult to get your prospects to open your emails, let alone get them to actually respond.

But these extremely simple tips can set you in the right direction and help you improve your cold email response rates.