Are you keen to increase your online sales but you’re not sure what strategy is going to work best? Cold email outreach should definitely be on your radar. This strategy might not be incredibly modern, but it can certainly be incredibly effective.
In this article, we’re going to share a series of steps that will not only upscale your email outreach strategies but will increase your online sales. We’re going to share how to:
- Prepare Your Accounts with Email Warm Up
- Verify Your Email List
- Set Up a Custom Tracking Domain
- Keep Your Emails Short and Concise
- Use Mail Merge Tools to Automate Personalization
- Write Subject Lines That Drive Clicks
How to Increase Online Sales Using Cold Email Outreach in 7 Easy Steps
These 7 easy steps are going to get your email outreach campaigns set up and draw in invested leads before you know it. Positioned the right way, and by following these tips, your campaigns will begin to increase your online sales step by step.
Prepare Your Accounts with Email Warm Up
If you’re not warming up your new email accounts, then you’re putting a handicap on your campaigns before you even get started. Email warm-up slowly raises the profile and reputation of your email account with the aim of avoiding spam filters and increasing deliverability.
The process requires a slowly increasing number of emails to be sent from the account to other accounts that will accept, open, and engage with the emails. The more emails that are successfully delivered and received positively, the more likely it is that future emails within cold outreach campaigns will get delivered too.
Completing this process manually takes a whole lot of work, time, and effort. If you’re serious about working at scale, then chances are you’ll need an automated tool to complete the account warm-up process for you. Tools such as Instantly are able to offer exactly that, plus myriad other useful tools to help with cold outreach campaigns.
Verify Your Email List
Verifying the addresses on your email list can really help with cold email outreach campaigns, as you’re able to confirm that each potential recipient is an active, interested party. Removing invalid or inaccurate email addresses can lead to an increase in marketing effectiveness by reducing bounce rates and focusing only on genuine recipients.
With a clean email list, you’ll likely see an increase in open and click-through rates, more successful campaigns, and in turn, more conversions. A bonus to email verification is a reduction in the chance that your accounts will be flagged as spam. Regularly sending emails to invalid addresses seems like spam behavior and should certainly be avoided.
Set Up a Custom Tracking Domain
Custom tracking domains, when implemented, can improve the deliverability of emails, as well as give the means to provide more accurate tracking information, improving your analytical data. Custom tracking domains allow you to use your own domain name rather than the generic domain that email providers give to you. These emails, especially from businesses, look far more legitimate while increasing the chances that your email will be successfully delivered.
Keep Your Emails Short and Concise
Chances are that the people you’re sending cold are also receiving them from tens if not hundreds of other campaigns. Your time with them is going to be limited, so keeping your emails short and concise is one of the best ways to keep them engaged and potentially get a response. Get to the point quickly, keep your opening email to a few lines at best, and be clear on the next steps.
Use Mail Merge Tools to Automate Personalization
Personalization plays a huge part in successful cold email outreach campaigns. Taking the time to address the recipient by name, at least makes them feel that they’re not just another line on a spreadsheet, randomly being emailed on a whim. Include their name and their company at a minimum, you’re able to do this using mail merge tools which take all of the work out of the personalization process.
If you’re looking to take personalization to the next level then you could consider including information that is hyper-personalized to that specific recipient. Details such as a mutual connection, the name of someone who suggested you get in touch, or even the name of an event you know you both attended recently are great hooks that draw the recipient's attention. These definitely increase effectiveness, but you’re unlikely to be able to deliver this at scale.
Write Subject Lines That Drive Clicks
The subject line is your opportunity to entice the recipient to click on and open your email. Most people receive in excess of 50 emails a day. Why should they spend their hard-pressed time reading your email? Ask yourself this when writing your email subject lines, you need to encourage them to spend that time on your email, and the subject line is the hook.
There are many different ways to construct great subject lines but in general, you should:
- Keep them clear and direct.
- Don’t go over 40-50 characters or most email providers will truncate the remaining.
- Encourage the recipient to take action - but avoid spam words like free, sale, and now.
- Include personalization where appropriate.
- Use a system of A/B testing to see which subject lines receive the best open rates and are most successful.
Conclude with a Clear CTA
At the end of the email, the recipient has a few options. They could reply to you, they could simply close the email, or they could complete another action. The latter option requires some direction. There are few people who, upon finishing an email, are going to automatically head over to your website and read a specific blog post, download an eBook, or book a demo. You need to be clear on what you’d like them to do next. That means you need a clear CTA (call-to-action) that gets specific on what you’d like their next move to be.
Without a clear CTA, chances are the person is going to move on to the next email in their inbox, and that’s a potentially great lead missed.
Key Takeaways
Cold email outreach is a marketing strategy that requires multiple lines of effort and planning. You’ll need to first work on the suitability of your email accounts, then build your content strategy, followed by assessing and analyzing your metrics to search for opportunities. It sounds like a lot of work, but the payoff is worth it, it’s very worth it.
- Starting with account warm-up is going to be the best strategy, without it your campaigns are doomed to fail.
- Personalization is always worth it in cold email outreach, even if it’s as simple as their first name.
Think you’re ready to get started on email outreach but need a tool to help you get going? That’s where Instantly can help, and you can start a free trial today.
