What is your conversion rate on cold email?

If you’re emailing prospects, chances are that while cold email is essential to help you generate new customers, you struggle to convert.

Don’t get me wrong, you convert. You just don’t covert anywhere near where you feel you should. 

It’s hard to find out what works through pure experimentation.

Unless you’re sending out a hundred emails a day and using some methodical approach, it will be hard to draw any conclusions from your cold prospecting efforts. 

That’s why having effective cold prospecting email templates in your toolbox is helpful.

With email templates specifically designed for prospecting through cold email, you have a framework you can build on to find what works and what doesn’t.

Also, it gives you different ways to approach different prospects.

Maybe your last prospect was a startup in its early stages, so it was easy to get hold of the person in charge of sales, marketing, or operations. Maybe your next prospect involves conversing with a seasoned serial entrepreneur who is harder to reach. 

Having several templates gives you the flexibility necessary to appeal to different contacts in a variety of situations, instead of sending out the same old email to everyone.

Treating everyone the same is a sure way to fail at cold email prospecting. 

If you winced a bit because that’s you, then you need to up your game with these cold prospecting email templates. (And before we dive in, if you need a guide to how to adapt these cold email templates to fit your purposes, check out our article on that.)

Cold prospecting email templates: Table of Contents

• The previous results email
• The personal interest email
• The competitor email
• The helpful email
• The “one thing” hook email
• The one-sentence pitch
• The super target template

1. The previous results email

Few things speak as loud as results when you’re using cold email. 

If your product or service has been around for a while, chances are you have some kind of results you can point to in your emails. 

(Remember: the more relevant the results are to what the prospect wants, the better.)

Because it’s based on those previous results (without any other bells and whistles), this is a dependable and straightforward template you can use in pretty much any situation.

Here’s the email:

Why this email works

Hubspot ran a similar email that netted them:

• 57% open rate
• 21% response rate
• And 16 customers

Pretty nice for one email, right? 

The biggest reason this email works is because of social proof. 

Cold emails are distant. The other person knows you’re human (hopefully), and sees what you’re selling, but that’s about it. 

You want to pull in that prospect quickly, and social proof offers undeniable … well, proof, that you’re not just spouting hot air. 

When you say something like this:

Any prospect will do a double-take and pay closer attention.

This is a simple email and easy to put together, but it’s effective.

2. The personal interest email

Sometimes, all you need to do is make a connection.

What’s one way to do that? Find out what they like, such as:

• Hobbies
• Favorite shows, movies, podcasts, etc.
• Favorite sports team
• Or anything else with which they’re obsessed

Never forget that no matter how much you work to attract and convert prospects, the act of prospecting comes down to communication. 

That’s you reaching out to another human being in an attempt to communicate something to them — and hoping for a response. 

With that in mind, the best way to turn a cold conversation into a warm moment is to make a connection with your prospect by identifying with a personal interest of theirs.

You don’t even need to share that similar interest with them; you simply need to show them that you’re willing to do your homework, learn about them, and connect on a human level. 

Here’s the email:

Why this email works

Anyone who reads that email will know right away that you took your time to learn about them and craft an email that was personalized for them. There are few ways to catch someone’s attention in a cold email that work better than that. 

This email works for another reason if you craft it right: it connects something they know with your product. 

Subconsciously, this gets them to look upon you and your offer more favorably, whether they realize or not.

3. The competitor email

This is arguably the most timely of all the templates on this list if you apply it when conditions are right. 

If you can find a situation where it fits, it creates a message that’s difficult to ignore, particularly if your prospect is currently having trouble with a competitor’s service or product. 

The basic idea is this: when one of your competitors is having issues with an aspect of their product or service in an area that you’re strong, reach out to their customers to snag them during that opportune moment:

Why this email works

Again, timing is the factor of this email that can give you a big hit, because it offers a considerable advantage. But if the timing is off, then it’s a hard miss. 

However, if you make sure to time this with recently expressed frustrations with a competitor’s product, or emerging issues with their service, and you reach out quickly, this hook can net high conversion rates. 

The gist of this email is in the angle, so the structure is super straightforward:

This makes it one of the easiest emails to craft, along with being one of the best converting (when sent at the right time). 

4. The helpful email

Another direction you can go is to simply reach out with helpful information.

You could offer content on your blog, podcasts, comprehensive guides, or video content you’ve created to help answer questions or share significant value that your clients and prospects find useful.

For example:

Why this email works

Who doesn’t like free?

With this email, you’re front-loading value in that initial touchpoint to generate some goodwill. The more targeted you can be about this, the better, as the last thing you want to do is send prospects content they see as irrelevant. 

However, if you do this right, this email does a great job of building reciprocity.

This email also demonstrates that you’re an expert on your subject, which tells your prospect that you might be the right person to go to for answers to their questions. 

5. The “One Thing” hook email

This next email is a bit situational. However, if you can find the right fuel to send an email like this (and you often will), it’s super powerful. 

The premise is simple: find something (just one thing, although more is fine) they can change or improve, then offer to have a quick chat with them about how they can implement that adjustment. 

Here’s the email:

Why this email works

This email combines several things that work:

First, it’s personalized. The premise of this email means you need to have done your homework, they’ll know you did when they read it, and they’re likely to appreciate your effort, often with a reply:

Then, it promises immediate, tangible value. The value you’re delivering in this email isn’t fuzzy; it’s crystal clear:

Plus, that value leads perfectly to your ideal CTA. Not only does the value you’re offering lead seamlessly to a call-to-action, but also you’re getting exactly what you want in the process: a phone call with them: 

6. The one-sentence pitch

What if you don’t have amazing results to show, or social proof to offer, or you can’t identify any competitive issues to exploit, and you can’t find any improvements to suggest?

Even if you don’t have any of that, you’re still not out of luck. There’s a simple and straightforward cold email template for prospecting that is easy to write and gets results. 

Here it is:

Why this email works

Like the competitor email, this one has a pretty clear structure:

Your one-sentence pitch is where you sell them on your product or service in this template. Make sure it’s enticing, but keep it to no longer than one sentence.

One important addition is to mention that you’re not 100% sure they’re the right person to email.

The reality is that when you have located contacts, you’ll often be unsure of whether you’re emailing the right person. 

If you include something like this, you’re safe. If they’re the right person, your email will work fine. If not, there’s a chance they’ll forward your email, particularly if they know the right person well enough to judge whether your pitch could matter to them.  

7. The super-target template

This last one might be the simplest, but it involves one of the single most critical lessons in high-converting cold emails.

Let’s jump right into the email: 

Why this email works

This one is, admittedly, a bit of a trick. That’s because there’s nothing special about the email itself (outside of what we’ve already talked about).

What’s special is how effectively it’s targeted. 

It’s as much about targeting the right prospects as it is about writing a good cold email. 

Instead of crafting cold email templates in a vacuum, take a look at your current customers and think about what kinds of cold email would have attracted them to your service. 

Doing this will give you insights about how to position your cold emails to prospects. It will make you more likely to attract people who are actually in need of what you’re offering. 

This email is targeted at early-stage remote startup teams, who commonly have trouble with conference software:

How’s that for specific?

Sure, you won’t always have the time to send such a pointed email. However, the more targeted you can make your cold prospecting emails, the greater the results you’re likely to see.

Up your game with these cold prospecting email templates

Depending on the product or service you’re selling, prospecting through cold email can be either tough … or tougher. 

So, you need every tool you can get to catch your prospect’s attention and maximize the return from your cold prospect efforts. 

Use these cold prospecting email templates as a starting point for your own collection of prospecting emails to cover every situation and every type of prospect. 

And don’t forget to check out these cold email resources to learn more about how to craft a great cold email that converts prospects:

• The Complete Cold Email Master Guide
• Top 7 Cold Email Software in 2020 (Features + Pricing)
• 3 Clever Ways to Drastically Increase Your Cold Email Outreach ROI
• 43 Cold Email Subject Lines That Get Your Emails Opened Instantly (and When to Use Them)
• 6 Ways to Write Highly Effective Cold Emails That Get Responses

Of course, great templates for prospecting are important — but you also need cold email software where you can get the most out of them. Check out GMass — we offer some of the best personalization, automation, and cold emailing tools of any email platform. Get started for free by hitting the Chrome web store.