Cold Email Playbook

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Deliverability 

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Before launching a cold emailing campaign, you need to prepare and set up the email so that it doesn't end up in spam. Email deliverability, i.e. the fact that emails sent arrive directly in the inbox, not in spam or promotions, is crucial to the success of a campaign, because emails need to be read to generate appointments. 

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Create a new domain name 

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Rule 1: you mustn't use your main domain name for prospecting. Otherwise, internal emails could end up as spam and customers would no longer see your emails, and your site could be penalized in terms of SEO. This would affect the reputation of your domain name. Once you've been penalized, it's virtually impossible to go back and your communication will be dead. So it's essential to buy a new secondary alias domain name (.co or .net) and set up an automatic redirect to the real domain name. Instead of using nomentreprise.com, you can also create a getnomentreprise.com or trynomentreprise.com domain name. 

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DKIM, SPF and DMARC settings 

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Next, you need to make sure you have DKIM, SPF and DMARC settings registered on your Google DNS server, as they increase deliverability by authenticating your email addresses with the server. SPF and DKIM are automatically set on Google Workspace domains, so we'll just look at how to add DMARC: 

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1. Go to Google Domains https://domains.google.com/

2. Go to "DNS" > "Default Name Servers" > "Custom Records" > "Manage Custom Records"
3. In "Host Name" put _dmarc.yourdomain.com , in type put TXT , in TTL put 3600 and in Data put "v=DMARC1; p=quarantine; rua=mailto:yourname@yourdomain.com; pct=90; sp=none"
4. Check if it's OK with https://dmarcian.com/dmarc-inspector/ 

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Create email address(es) 

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Now create one or more e-mail addresses, which must be nominative (e.g. john.pommier@samsung.com and not contact@samsung.com). Each domain should have a maximum of 3 to 5 prospecting emails. 

Using Cold Emailing software 

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It is essential to use a paid prospecting tool prospecting tool to be able to measure the performance of your campaigns (open rate, bounce rate, response rate...) and be effective (personalization, deliverability, analytics). The best solutions on the market are Lemlist, Mailshake, Woodpecker, Emelia... Email marketing solutions such as MailChimp, Sendinblue, Mailjet, Hubspot... should be avoided as they destroy your deliverability. 

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Custom Tracking Domain 

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In addition, there's the DNS custom tracking domain, essential for deliverability. It also enables you to track prospects who open your e-mails and click on your links, which is essential for analyzing campaigns (open rate and click rate). Each cold emailing tool has its own custom tracking domain, which are lines to be added to the DNS, so you need to follow the steps requested by the tool. 

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Warm UP 

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Once the emails have been created and configured (DKIM, SPF, DMARC), they need to be warmed up. Email warm-up consists of sending dozens of emails a day automatically to internal servers, mimicking human behavior in order to simulate normal email address use. 

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You have to do a minimum of 7 days of Warm Up before starting a campaign. If we didn't do this and sent out more than 50 emails a day at once, we'd quickly go spam. What's more, new e-mails are considered suspicious within the first 5 days, so we have to be very careful. It's also important to extend the Warm Up period during campaigns, to ensure stable sending volumes, as strong variations in volume are classified as malicious behavior. Warmup solutions are integrated into most cold emailing tools. Otherwise, it is always possible to use paid Warmup solutions. 

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One of the biggest mistakes in cold emailing is not having clear personas (ICPs); it's absolutely essential to know your ideal customer. Trying to sell anything and everything to anyone and everyone just doesn't work. However, when you prospect an ultra-specific ICP, it's much easier to pass yourself off as an expert in your niche, because your copywriting will be tailored and designed around it. This leads to many more conversions and facilitates the message creation process. 

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For targeting companies 

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You need to select a specific industry, a precise range of employees and sales, a geolocation and/or the technologies they use. 

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Examples:
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• SEO marketing agencies in France that work with construction companies and generate between 100K and 500K in sales per year.
• Fashion e-tailers in France who have installed the Klaviyo extension and generate over 1M euros in annual sales
  
• Companies in the pharmaceutical sector in France generating between 50 and 200 million euros and with between 1,000 and 2,000 employees. 

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For prospect targeting 

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You need to precisely define their role in the company and target the decision-makers (as high up the hierarchy as possible): CFO, VP, Director/Head Of and managers. You also need to know their Tech Awareness, as copywriting will differ according to their web knowledge. 

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{{chap3}}

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Once we've set up the email and defined its ICPs, we need to create our database with the emails, first names and surnames of our prospects. How do I find prospects' direct professional emails? There are a number of methods and resources, most of them paying: 

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1) Databases made in France: These databases allow you to filter companies according to specific criteria: location, workforce, sales, industry, etc., and to find prospects' emails directly according to their roles within the company. The 2 best B2B databases in our opinion for the French market are Pharow, and SocieteInfo.

2) Manual Scraping from Sales Navigator: Linkedin is the world's largest B2B database, and Linkedin Sales Navigator lets you exploit it. To scrape emails from the network, follow these steps: perform a Linkedin Sales Navigator search, copy the search link to Phantombuster, export the search as a CSV file, then import it into a new Sheets document, filtered by First Name, Last Name and Company categories only, and finally upload the file to an email enrichment solution such as Dropcontact or Datagma. 

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3) More specific scraping:

- E-commerce: Builtwith and Wappalyzer
- By web technology: Builtwith and Wappalyzer.
- Scraping email addresses from Instagram profiles: Phantombuster
- Scraping Google Maps: Phantombuster.
- Yellow Pages / Trip Advisor / Indeed / BODACC: Captain Data
- Scrap startups: Dealroom 

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{{chap4}}

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Once we've set up the e-mail and created our list with ICPs, we need to create the e-mail prospecting cycles and take care of the copywriting, which is an essential part of our strategy. 

An email is divided into 5 parts: 

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1. Subject Line 

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The sole aim of the email subject is to get the email opened. The subject line should be between 1 and 3 words maximum, keep it simple to arouse curiosity, not appear as spam or advertising, if possible be personalized with the name of the company or prospect and, finally, be similar to the type of email the prospect receives and opens every day to maximize our chances of opening it. 

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2. First Line (catchphrase) 

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The catchphrase is the first sentence of the e-mail, commonly known as the icebreaker. Its role: to break the ice, to initiate the relationship and make people want to read the rest of the e-mail. It also has an impact on the open rate, as the catchphrase can be seen even without opening an e-mail, which is why it's so important to personalize it as much as possible. There are 3 types that work:
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• Icebreaker in the form of a compliment: a compliment inspired by the prospect's Linkedin profile (career, introduction, posts, relationships in common, interests in common...) or company website (customer cases, testimonials, press coverage...).
• Niche-specific Icebreaker: a catchphrase specific to the prospect's niche that will sound personalized.
• Icebreaker in the form of a rhetorical question: a question that is necessarily answered in the affirmative, identify the prospect's main "pain" and ask a question like "Are you looking to solve your (pain 1) for (benefit 1)?" 

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3. Angle (value proposition) 

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The angle is our company's value proposition and the offer we're proposing, which must be a no brainer: irresistible and irrefusable, it will induce the reason why the prospect should be interested in our services. Useful points to know before writing your angle :

• What is my value proposition in 1 sentence? 
• What are the prospect's 3 main breads?
• How do we solve these 3 problems? What are the benefits?
• How quickly do we deliver results?
• What case studies do I have that are relevant to the prospect?
• What references do I have in the prospecting industry?
• How quickly can I deliver results?
• What guarantees can I offer him to minimize his risk?
• What keywords should be included that are specific to the prospect's jargon? 

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The angle is 1 or 2 sentences long at most, it must be specific, as clear and simple as possible, and speak directly to the prospect's affect: inlcure more about YOU, YOUR... than about I, ME... 

Sample angle for a Google Ads agency: "I'm Benjamin from Adsgency, we help language training centers like yours increase their sales by positioning you in the top Google search results for keywords in your market, thanks to paid advertising. We recently helped Institut Des Langues generate 27 qualified appointments last month, and I'd like to offer you the same 100% performance-based support to boost your registrations next month."

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Why it's a good value proposition: 

• Specialized: we support language training centers like yours
• 100% performance guarantee, no barrier to entry 
• Specific: 27 qualified appointments 
• Temporality: 27 appointments in 1 month
• Case studies: reassuring and authoritative proof that you're an expert
• Functionality: easy to understand, they are positioned in the top 1 on Google 
• Profit: clear, increase in sales in 1 month 
• More YOU than I 

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There are hundreds of possible angles for 1 single offer, so it's up to you to find the right formula based on the elements you have available. 

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4. CTA (call to action) 

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The objective of the CTA (Call To Action) is simple: to get an appointment. The CTA must be a precise question that can be answered with YES or NO. The prospect doesn't have to think too hard to answer the question. The question should be a direct request for a telephone or videoconference appointment, or a question about whether the prospect is interested in the subject. Do not use Calendly or links, as they appear to be automated. 

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5. Signature 

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It must include the following elements: 

• Your first and last name | Your role in the company
• Your company name
• Your company address
• Your telephone number
• ur professional email address | Your website URL

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{{chap5}}

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The optimal prospecting cadence consists of an initial email and 2-3 follow-ups. Why is follow-up so important? Many prospects will be busy by the time you send an email, or will forget to reply. This doesn't mean they're not interested, it's just that they didn't have the time to devote to you. What's more, re-sending allows you to present your value proposition in a new light and provide new information if the first email wasn't enough, so you can bring even more value to your target. Here's an example of a campaign structure that works: 

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Email 1: Day 0

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Subject Line
Hello (First Name), 

First Line,
Angle,
CTA.
Signature

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Relaunch 1: 3 days after email 1

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Subject Line 

Hello (First Name), did you get a chance to read my last email? ‍

Angle,
CTA.
Signature

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Relaunch 2: 4 days after relaunch 1
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Subject Line

Hello (First Name), I don't know if you've read my last two emails, but we've just completed (Cas Client study)...

‍CTA.
Signature

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Dunning 3: 5 days after Dunning 2

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Subject Line

Hello (First Name), here are 2 ideas specific to (prospect's market) to help you achieve (desired outcome)...
Maybe (profit) is not your priority right now, I'm available to exchange if your needs evolve, this is my last email.‍

Signature

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OPTIMIZATION

Generally speaking, a good cold emailing campaign should achieve the following performance levels:

• Open rate > 70%, otherwise change email subject or first line or check deliverability
• Response rate > 10%, otherwise poor CTA or value proposition
• Conversion rate > 1.5%, otherwise poor targeting or value proposition
• Taux de bounce < 5%, sinon utiliser un vérificateur d’email

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Why is deliverability bad?

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Start by checking your deliverability score with Mail Tester (+ if you're in blacklists, with MXToolBox). If it's high, the problem is copywriting (subject line, first line), if it's low, the problem is technical. Here are the steps to follow to increase deliverability:

• Check that DKIM, DMARC and SPF settings have been set correctly
• Check that email heating (warming) has been performed before launching the campaign, and that it is still active during the campaign.
• Reduce your bounce rate: review your email enrichment process and use solutions such as Zerobounce and Neverbounce to verify your emails.
• Remove all HTML text (bold, italics, dotted lines...), files in PJ and images in signature... This makes the email heavier.
• Personalize your first lines, because if you always send the same mass emails, Google's algorithms will flag you as spam.
• Don't send more than 100 e-mails per day per e-mail address: if you send too many e-mails per day, you could be flagged as spam by Google.
• Remove spammy words from e-mail subject lines: urgent, promotion, discount, fast... these keywords automatically alert Google's algorithms, which classify the sender as spam.