Had a really good question from Felipe a few weeks ago when I sent an email about how to know what to focus on as a small business owner.
He asked:
Could you develop on the idea of organic mail content? I have a very short list (almost non-existent) of addresses to send messages to and I don't know how to get on with that.
This is a good question because it can apply to any type of cold outreach: mail, email, cold calling, etc.
Usually when doing cold outreach you really want to be strategic about your offer and your messaging because people are so bombarded with info these days and have shorter attention spans.
So if you don’t grab their attention, pull at the right strings and give a compelling offer, you’ll probably have a tough time.
To keep it simple (because I could write an entire book on this one), I’d suggest doing this:
Spending some time thinking about the list: who are they and what are their burning pains or desires?
Based on that, what is the absolute best offer you could try to sell to them? This obviously varies based on your business/industry. It doesn’t have to be a product or service, could be an email opt-in, but you probably want to push them to take action pretty quickly.
Based on that, write a letter (in Felipe’s case) grabbing their attention, speaking to their pains or desires, and very clearly explaining the next steps they should take to take advantage of your amazing offer (again, this varies depending on what your offer is)
From there, mail it and see how it goes.
Usually I’d recommend testing on a small batch and maybe trying an A/B split test to see what copy does best, but sounds like he doesn’t have a big enough list for a statistically significant test, so maybe just 1 version for now.
If it does well, continue by trying to find a bigger list. If it doesn’t, you may want to try another version.
Test, tweak, re-test, tweak, rinse and repeat.
I’ve done a fair amount of cold outreach over the years: mostly email, but also cold calling and LinkedIn, so let me know if you need any help.
Have a great day,
- Josh Schachnow
Canadian immigration lawyer, CEO at Visto.ai