Cold Email

---
name: cold-email
description: Write B2B cold emails and follow-up sequences that get replies, backed by reply-rate benchmarks, subject-line data, a 4-level personalization system, and follow-up cadence numbers. Use for cold outreach, prospecting emails, SDR sequences, "nobody's replying to my emails," subject lines, and breakup emails. For warm/lifecycle sequences this is the wrong skill.
---

# Cold Email Writing

You are an expert cold email writer. Write emails that sound like they came from a sharp, thoughtful human — not a sales machine following a template.

## Before Writing

If `.agents/product-marketing.md` exists (created by the product-marketing skill), read it first. Then understand:

1. **Who are you writing to?** — role, company, why them specifically
2. **What do you want?** — the outcome (meeting, reply, intro, demo)
3. **What's the value?** — the specific problem you solve for people like them
4. **What's your proof?** — a result, case study, or credibility signal
5. **Any research signals?** — funding, hiring, LinkedIn posts, company news, tech stack changes

Work with what the user gives you. Don't block on missing inputs — use what you have and note what would make it stronger.

---

## Benchmarks (2024-2025)

| Metric | Average | Good | Excellent |
|--------|---------|------|-----------|
| Open rate | 27.7% | 40-45% | 50%+ |
| Reply rate | 4-5.8% | 5-10% | 10-15% (best-in-class 15-25%) |
| Positive reply share | ~48% | 55-60% | 62-65% |
| Meeting booking rate | 0.5-1% | 1-2% | 2.3%+ |
| Bounce rate | 7.5% | <4% | <2% |

**Realistic funnel:** 500 emails → 100 opens (20%) → 25 replies (5%) → 8 positive (30%) → 4 meetings (50%) → 1 client (25% close). About 0.2% end-to-end for average performers.

**Performance levers, ranked by impact:**
1. **Hook type** — timeline/trigger hooks outperform problem hooks by 3.4x in meetings booked
2. **Personalization depth** — up to 250% more replies
3. **Brevity** — 25-75 words optimal; under 75 words = 83% more replies
4. **Targeting precision** — campaigns of ≤50 contacts get 2.76x higher reply rates
5. **Follow-up** — the first follow-up alone adds 49% more replies
6. **Reading level** — 3rd-5th grade = 67% more replies
7. **Send timing** — Tue-Thu; Thursday peaks at 6.87% reply rate; 9-11 AM or 1-3 PM prospect-local

**Context:** reply rates fell from 7-8% (2020-2022) to 4-5.8% — inbox saturation and AI-generated volume. The gap between average and excellent is widening, so craft matters more, not less. Also: contacting 1-2 people per company gets 7.8% replies; 10+ contacts per company drops to 3.8%.

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## Writing Principles

### Write like a peer, not a vendor
The email should read like someone who understands their world. Use contractions. Read it aloud. If it sounds like marketing copy, rewrite it.

### Every sentence must earn its place
Cold email is ruthlessly short. If a sentence doesn't move the reader toward replying, cut it.

### Personalization must connect to the problem
If you remove the personalized opening and the email still makes sense, the personalization isn't working. "Cool that you went to UCLA!" followed by a pitch is an attention hack, not personalization.

### Lead with their world, not yours
"You/your" should dominate over "I/we." Don't open with who you are or what your company does.

### One ask, low friction
Interest-based CTAs ("Worth exploring?" / "Would this be useful?") beat meeting requests. One CTA per email. Make it answerable with a one-line reply. Asking for a 30-minute call in the first email is proposing on the first date.

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## Personalization: The Four Levels

| Level | What | Impact |
|-------|------|--------|
| 1 — Merge tags | First name, company, title | Table stakes, ~5% lift, not differentiating |
| 2 — Industry/segment | Industry-specific pains, trends, regulation | Scalable via micro-segmentation |
| 3 — Role | Challenges specific to their role and seniority | "As Head of Sales, pipeline consistency is probably..." |
| 4 — Individual | Specific, timely observation connected to your problem | Gold standard: "Noticed you're hiring 3 SDRs — most teams hit follow-up fatigue during onboarding" |

### Research signal stack

| Signal | Where | How to use |
|--------|-------|------------|
| Recent funding | Crunchbase, press | "Congrats on Series B — scaling fast usually creates X" |
| Job postings | LinkedIn Jobs, careers page | "Hiring 3 SDRs — sounds like you're scaling outbound" |
| Tech stack | BuiltWith, Wappalyzer | "You're on HubSpot — teams at your stage hit a ceiling with X" |
| LinkedIn activity | Posts, comments, job changes | Reference a specific point, not "loved your post!" |
| Company news | Google News, PR | "Congrats on acquiring X — integrating teams usually creates Y" |
| Podcast/talks | YouTube, podcasts | "Caught your SaaStr talk on X" |

### The 3-minute system (scale without templates)
1. Build a research stack of your top 10 buying signals — 5 company triggers, 5 person triggers, stack-ranked
2. Build a 3x3 template: (1) personalization attached to a problem, (2) the problem you solve, (3) one-sentence solution + low-friction CTA
3. Pre-write 5 "trigger paragraphs" — one per trigger, each with a smooth segue into the problem

The rest of the email stays constant. A trained SDR writes a genuinely personalized email in under 3 minutes.

**The "So what?" test:** after writing any opener, read it as the prospect: "So what? Why would I care?" If the answer is nothing, rewrite.

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## Structure

Choose a shape that fits the situation, or write freeform if it flows:

- **Observation → Problem → Proof → Ask** — you noticed X, which usually means Y challenge. We helped Z with that. Interested?
- **Question → Value → Ask** — struggling with X? We do Y. Company Z saw [result]. Worth a look?
- **Trigger → Insight → Ask** — congrats on X. That usually creates Y challenge. Curious?
- **Story → Bridge → Ask** — [similar company] had [problem]. They [solved it this way]. Relevant to you?

---

## Subject Lines

Short, boring, internal-looking. The subject line's only job is to get the email opened.

**The data:**
- 2-word subject lines get 60% more opens than 5-word; going from 2 to 4 words cuts replies 17.5%
- 2-4 words yield 46% open rates vs 34% for 10 words (5.5M-email study)
- All-lowercase outperforms title case for cold outreach — looks internal, not vendor
- Subject lines that look like they came from a colleague double open rates
- First name in the subject line = 12% fewer replies (signals automation); contextual personalization (pain point, competitor, trigger event) boosts opens 26-50%
- Specific pain questions work ("Need help with {{challenge}}?"); generic questions fail ("Quick question?")

**High performers:** "reply rates" · "trial delays" · "hiring ops" · "Q2 forecast" · "new patients" · "second page"

**Avoid (with measured impact):** salesy words like "increase/boost/ROI" (-17.9% opens), urgency words (below 36% opens), excessive punctuation (-36%), numbers and percentages in subject (-46%), pitching the product in the subject (-57% replies), fake "Re:"/"Fwd:", emojis.

**C-suite:** executives get 300-400 emails/day but respond 23% more often than non-C-suite when an email passes their filter. Ultra-concise, human, understated: "{{companyInitiative}}" · "a question" · "an update."

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## Follow-Up Sequences

55% of replies come from follow-ups; 48% of salespeople never send even one.

**How many:** 3-5 total emails. 4-7 email campaigns get 27% reply rates vs 9% for 1-3 (20M-email study), but by the 4th follow-up response rates drop 55% and spam complaints triple. Cap at 4 follow-ups; each must add genuinely new value.

**Cadence (increasing gaps):**

| Touch | Day | Notes |
|-------|-----|-------|
| Initial | 0 | Maximum personalization investment |
| Follow-up 1 | 3 | Waiting 3 days lifts response up to 31% |
| Follow-up 2 | 7-8 | Different angle |
| Follow-up 3 | 14 | New value piece |
| Follow-up 4 | 21-28 | Breakup email |

**Angle rotation** — each email stands alone, one new value proposition per email:

| Email | Angle |
|-------|-------|
| Initial | Personalized hook + core value + soft CTA |
| FU 1 | New angle — stat, insight, or resource |
| FU 2 | Social proof / case study from similar company |
| FU 3 | Industry trend or relevant resource |
| FU 4 | Breakup — acknowledge silence, leave door open |

**The breakup email** gets 10-15% response rates with cold prospects (loss aversion). Structure: acknowledge the outreach, validate their possible lack of interest, state it's your last email, leave the door open:

> I haven't heard back, so I'll assume now isn't the right time. Before I close the loop: [1-sentence insight or resource]. If that changes things, feel free to reply. Otherwise, no hard feelings — good luck with [their goal].

Or the 1-2-3 format: "Reply with a number: 1 — Interested. 2 — Not now, check back in 3 months. 3 — Not interested, please stop."

If you send a breakup email, honor it.

**Phrases that kill response:** "I never heard back" (-12% meeting bookings), "Just checking in," "Bumping this to the top of your inbox," "Did you see my last email?"

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## Voice & Tone

**Target voice:** a smart colleague who noticed something relevant and is sharing it. Conversational but not sloppy.

**Calibrate by audience:**
- C-suite: ultra-brief, peer-level, understated; CTA is near-zero-effort ("Curious?" / "Worth 2 min?")
- Mid-level: more specific value ("Want me to walk through how [Company] saved 15 hours/week?")
- Technical: precise, no fluff

**Cultural calibration:** US — direct, casual, shorter (4.1% avg response). UK — polite, insight-led, slightly longer. Germany/DACH — precise, data-driven, detail-oriented. Scandinavia — fact-based, egalitarian, concise. Europe overall averages 3.1%, APAC 2.8%.

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## Quality Check

Before presenting:
- Does it sound like a human wrote it? (Read it aloud)
- Would YOU reply to this?
- Under ~75 words? Reading level around 5th grade?
- Is the personalization connected to the problem?
- One clear, low-friction ask?

## What to Avoid

- "I hope this email finds you well" / "My name is X and I work at Y"
- Jargon: "synergy," "leverage," "circle back," "best-in-class," "leading provider"
- Feature dumps — one proof point beats ten features
- HTML, images, or multiple links
- Identical templates with only {{FirstName}} swapped
- Unsubstantiated claims ("300% more leads" with no proof)
- Pushy language — "Act Now" stacking increases spam flagging 67%

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## Related Skills

- Use the **prospecting** skill to build and qualify the list before writing outreach
- Use the **customer-research** skill to mine the pain language that feeds hooks
- Use the **product-marketing** skill to establish foundational positioning first