5 Tips for Emails That Cut Through The Noise
See that crowded space up there. ☝️
That’s your prospect’s inbox. And it’s getting worse by the day.
Widespread web access and connectivity has brought with it an age of informational overload. We are constantly being bombarded by messages on life, products, potential connections, events, services and everything else under the sun.
No where is this more apparent than in our online lives, with our inboxes stand at the forefront of this barrage.
This presents a very unique challenge for sales teams. In combination with outbound calling, cold emailing still represents one of the most effective ways to get through to prospects. Figures from various studies, put the average time office workers spend on email anywhere from 33% to 51% of their day.
Simply: a salesperson needs to be where their prospects are, and that place is in their inbox.
The downside is that the average email account is more congested than an LA freeway during evening rush hour.
What can be done to get through?
Assuming you have the basic style of a cold email down, let’s take a step back and look at the key elements for eliciting a person’s attention and garnering a response.
1. Watch your tone.
Two emails with the same general content and purpose can sound vastly different if the tone is off. The correct tone is able to properly match how words should “feel” and their actual meaning.
Asking a prospect “Do you value peace and quiet?!?” as the subject line reeks of tone deafness. Always check to see that your tone (in essence, your voice) matches the message being delivered, and that it remains relatively consistent between outreaches.
2. Strength in numbers.
Numbers speak to people better than almost anything else besides visuals. A number is a truth whose core, foundational meaning translates between languages and has forever remained unchanged. 1 always means 1. 5 is always 5. 786 is equal to 786.
This does not mean that figures should be falsified for the sake of sales. What it does mean is that a numerical advantage should be used wherever it exists. How much time has your product saved for customers? What cost savings can be achieved? How long until a product delivers a return?
3. Short and sweet.
Cold emails should be thought of as more of an elevator pitch and less a filibuster. No one has time to read a 300 word email. Especially from a strange person over the internet.
Keep the focus on delivering value in as succinct a manner as possible. Think of your five most salient points to get across and pare it down to two. If your solution is more complicated and requires a bit more education, consider including just one potential benefit.
4. Stay on the tracks.
Here’s the beauty of cold emails: you can send more than one! Obviously not all at once or the same day, but through a sequence of touches a broader vision can be built. Given this, there’s really no need for a single message to veer off-topic.
Staying on-topic shows to a prospect that you respect their time and your own as well. Try to centre emails on a specific goal and build backwards. Don’t hesitate to remove sections that don’t support the message or touch on ideas deserving of their own email.
5. Timing is everything.
Knowing the “pace” of your industry is crucial to delivering messages at the appropriate time. Are major developments occurring daily, weekly or monthly across your market?
Time outreach planning with the typical industry news cycle as best as possible. Relevant info that can inform the current and near-future decision-making of your prospect will have the biggest impact. Even better if you can become their go-to source for what’s important.
Our current state of informational overload won’t come to an end anytime soon. Not with a technological frontier being pushed further and problems still awaiting solutions.
This overwhelmed state that extends to the inboxes of our prospects can make email out to be lost cause. But what if a well-crafted, helpful message is exactly what is needed? What if the right message, at the right time, can be heard through the noise?
If you’re in noisy room packed with strangers, but that familiar voice that draws someone’s attention.
