This question came in today from one of the beta students in my Inbox Detonator coaching program:
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Hi Daniel,
I’m so excited to get started! I’m working for a client who offers B2B Lead Generation. He offers guaranteed free leads (with an upsell afterwards).
His traffic source is Cold Email and LinkedIn out reach.
I would like to ask about subject lines (uuuggghh) for the cold outreach emails.
Option 1 = I’m sorry <First Name>, that person no longer works here.
Option 2 = Hey <First Name> are you tired of crappy leads?
The initial email copy talks about contacts no longer working at the company, email addresses bouncing, and wrong numbers and the frustration that causes. I quickly introduce my client and how he has a better way. Quick CTA for the free leads. I’ve found with cold email, I gotta keep it short.
I think both of the subject lines are underwhelming. I jotted down 25 and these were the ones I felt connected to pain point of “most B2B leads suck….they are inaccurate or incomplete”.
So I guess this is more of a general question. How do I connect the dots between subject lines and copy?
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My answer?
She was asking me the wrong question.
With cold emails, you can’t start with body copy and then write a compelling subject.
There’s a huge reason (unique to cold emails) why that doesn’t work — even with the best subject line in the world.
And so I suggested an entirely different approach to the problem, along with a few subject lines I would try, and a couple suggested openings to the email, which she is free to go and use on her job and look amazing.
Of course, that’s because she was smart enough to express early interest in my coaching several weeks back, and thus got a beta invitation to Inbox Detonator.
The program’s still closed to new entrants while we give it a test run. But I hope to open it up to the next round of students within the next few weeks.
It’s especially useful if, like the heroine of our piece today, you have client work and would love to bounce some ideas off someone like me.
If that sounds useful to you, you can jump on the waitlist via my email list …
… and I’ll send you a cold email when there’s a spot.
(Ugh, I know — that one was just awful, even by my standards.)
(So not cool of me.)
(Cool … get it?)
(😁)
Daniel Throssell