Best Practices for Cold Emailing

80% of the professionals prefer to be contacted via email.

Your cold email is the first knock on your prospect’s door – it’s your debut, the chance to make an unforgettable impression. In the sales world, a saying goes, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.  

Did you know cold emails can be remarkably effective if you follow simple cold emailing practices? Studies have shown that well-crafted cold emails can boost response rates and lead to more deal closures (sales).

So, let’s understand the cold email best practices that every salesperson should follow. 

#1 Choose a Professional Email Address

When you’re sending cold emails, it’s crucial to use a business-like email address. This helps your message look more trustworthy and dependable. If you have a business domain, consider using an address like ‘[email protected].

We do not recommend using any free email service for cold email outreach. I’m sure that your sales outreach is going to generate revenue, so if you are serious about your business, then take a business domain.

#2 Give more than you ask

Capture your readers’ interest by offering something of value in your emails without asking for anything in return. This could be as simple as sharing valuable tips, showcasing your work samples, or directing them to informative videos or infographics. 

Ensure that whatever you offer aligns with your business and your services. By demonstrating how your products or expertise can benefit them, you clarify why they should consider becoming your customers.

#3 Support Your Claim with Data

Back up your claims with evidence when you mention some stats, past performance, or achievements in your emails. This practice is crucial for building trust and showing your professionalism. 

For instance, if you’ve worked with an important client on a previous project, include a link to that project to highlight your expertise and talents. Offering proof reinforces the credibility of what you say and gives your readers confidence in your abilities.

#4 Stay persistent. 

Track your emails closely. Clients often need multiple reminders before they buy, especially in B2B sales, where you could have multiple decision-makers. So, keep following up and resend to those who haven’t opened.

A study by Belkins found that SDRs who make nine or more contact attempts perform 16% better.

Cold email software such as SmartReach.io can help with this. You don’t have to remember and manually send out follow-ups. The persistence part is taken care of by automation. The follow-ups auto-stop when your prospect or someone from the company responds.

#5 Send to the right person

If you want your emails to be opened, read, and acted upon, you must ensure you’re sending them to the right people. Sending out emails to generic company emails like info@ or contact@, etc., can often lead to bad open rates. 

Imagine you are selling HR management software, and your cold email list is filled with “VP – Sales” or “VP – Content Marketing”. What do you think they will do once they get your email? Shazzam!! Straight to spam.

As per research by Belkins, C-suite executives are 23% more likely to open and respond to cold emails than other employees. So, identifying and sending cold emails to the right decision-maker would increase the likelihood of receiving a reply. 

To get this process right, use a prospecting tool that provides verified business email addresses. You can try ProspectDaddy, a LinkedIn email finder tool that provides the email addresses of all your prospects available on LinkedIn. 

#6 Personalize your Cold Email

Personalization can significantly increase your chances of engaging with prospects. 

Misconception – Personalisation is using “First_Name” in email and subject line.

Personalization in cold email is to use specific details about the prospect or their company to make your email more relevant and engaging. It shows you’ve researched and not just sent out a generic mass email.

Example

Hi {{Name}},

With {{prospect’s_company_name}}’s remarkable revenue achievement of ${{revenue}} million last year, it’s evident that the targets for this year will be even more ambitious. So, are you looking at alternate ways to hit those sales quotas?

Show prospects that you understand their problems and that your product or service can help them solve them. For example, if you’re selling a marketing automation platform, you could talk about the prospects’s recent challenge with generating qualified leads.

SmartReach.io can help hyper-personalize your emails with the help of merge tags. 

#7 Understand your Audience

When plotting out your cold email outreach strategy, consider what your business does best and who could benefit the most. This simple practice can greatly affect your cold email response rates.

For example, you sell mobile app development services. You’d want to target businesses that don’t have a mobile app. Your message will likely resonate more with them than with people who recently updated their apps on Google Playstore.

#8 Eye-catching Subject Line

Whether your email will be opened or not depends on the subject line.  A personalized subject line can improve your email open rate by around 30%. 

Asking questions in the subject line indicates your email’s purpose and increases the chances of grabbing your prospect’s attention. 

Check out our section on the cold email subject lines

#9 Use the Right Tone

Adjusting your tone while getting in touch with the professionals is essential.  Try to add a touch of formality while keeping the conversation friendly.  You don’t have to use fancy or jazzy words to sound smart; just be respectful and keep it natural.  

It is also good to proofread your email before hitting the send button.

#10 Keep it Short

Long, wordy, cold emails are not a great idea. 

Your prospects receive tons of emails daily; to grab their attention and avoid the spam folder, keep your emails short and clear.  Start by stating your purpose right away.  Include only the essential information so they can quickly understand your offer.

#11 Clear Call-to-Action

A single call to action in your email would reduce the ambiguity and make it easier for the prospect to understand your intent. 

You can also personalize your call-to-action to make your communication more relevant and engaging. Hubspot says personalized call-to-action can perform 202% better than the basic CTAs.  

Some examples of personalized call-to-action are

“Let’s discuss strategies for your industry. Can we schedule a call?”

“Interested in [Topic]? Let’s chat about it.”

“Meet up at [Event/Conference]?”

#12 Include Email Signature

Your email signature is like your business card. It is essential to let your prospects know who you are and what your business is about. 

A basic email signature should include your name, job title, company name, website address, and social media profiles. Neglecting your email signature can harm your credibility and make you seem less professional. 

You can get detailed information on email signatures on our blog.

While I have stated that you should have a professional email signature, many industry experts are convinced that a simple text signature that seems like its manually typed gets a much better response rate. Something like 

Regards
Chris
@Smartreach

#13 Proofread your Email and make it Sound Professional

While templates can help save time, it is also important not to rely on them entirely. This would make your email sound robotic and generic. Make sure that your email sounds like you have written to your prospects.  Adjust the language and tone to match your style and the prospect’s needs.

Do not send the email right after finishing it. Mistakes like typos or leaving someone else’s name in the email can cause you to lose a potential prospect.  So take a break, return to proofread your email, and make it error-free before sending it.

#14 Avoid Focusing on Your Needs

Prospects are mainly interested in knowing how your product can benefit them. If you make the email all about you and your product, the prospects might not find value. 

It is advisable to avoid bragging about your product and instead focus on the solution that your product can offer. 

Try drafting an email without the use of “I”, “We”, and “Our”. This will make a big difference in writing emails about the prospect.

#15 Focus on a Single Topic of Discussion

Focusing on a single topic gives clarity to your prospects.  They understand why you are reaching out and what is expected of them. 

If you are covering multiple topics in a single email, then it can overwhelm your prospects. 

#16 Avoid Long Paragraphs

It is always a good idea to make your text easy to read and avoid making it long and bulking.  

Having more white space between sentences makes it easy on the eyes of your prospects.  You can also use visual content like pictures, gifs, or short videos to help explain your message.  Visuals can sometimes convey information which would be difficult via plain text. 

However, using visuals regularly or in your initial cold email is not advisable.  It is essential to strike a balance between visual and text content.  If your email has too many visuals, it has a higher chance of ending up in the spam folder.

#17 Do not use attachments

An attachment might seem a good way to provide more information, but it might irritate your prospect. 

A professional receives around 80 emails daily, so that he might prefer something quick and straightforward. Also, attachments can increase the chances of your email landing in the spam folder. 

Instead, include links in your email directing the prospect to specific web pages to find more information about your product and services.

#18 Send an email at the right time

Timing is very crucial when it comes to sending cold emails.  It ensures that your messages are relevant and on time for your prospects. 

Timing impacts email engagement, response rates, and the avoidance of inbox congestion during peak hours. It’s essential when dealing with a global audience across different time zones.

It’s worth highlighting that, as per HubSpot, 47.9% observed the highest levels of engagement occurring between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m.

#19 Mobile-Friendly Emails: Don’t Forget the Pocket Screen

Most people aren’t reading your cold email on a 27-inch monitor. They’re reading it on their phones – between meetings, during commutes, or while they’re pretending to listen in Zoom calls.

So if your email looks like a novel with no breaks, guess what? Swipe. Delete. Bye.

Keep it mobile-friendly:

• Short sentences, short paragraphs
• No chunky blocks of text
• Stick to 3–4 lines per paragraph max
• Use bullet points for easier scanning
• Subject lines under 45 characters (or they get cut off)

Always send a test email to yourself and open it on your phone. If you wouldn’t read it on mobile, neither will they.

#20 A/B Test Your Cold Emails

What works for one audience might totally flop for another. That’s where A/B testing comes in.

Instead of guessing whether a subject line or call-to-action will work, test two versions and let the data decide.

Some things you can A/B test:

• Subject lines (“Quick question” vs “{{company_name}} growth strategy”)
• First lines (compliment vs pain point)
• CTAs (“Book a time” vs “Worth exploring?”)
• Send times

Cold email platforms like SmartReach.io make this super simple – just select your variables and track what converts better.

📈 Testing = learning. Don’t skip this if you want to scale.

#21 Deliverability Hygiene: A Quick Sanity Check

Your email won’t get a reply if it never hits the inbox. So let’s talk deliverability hygiene.

It’s not glamorous. But it’s non-negotiable.

Here’s a mini checklist to keep your emails out of spam land:

• ✅ Don’t send more than 50–100 cold emails per day per inbox
• ✅ Use inbox rotation to scale outreach safely
• ✅ Avoid “spammy” subject lines (e.g., “LIMITED TIME!!!”)
• ✅ Warm up your inbox before large campaigns
• ✅ Set up SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records
• ✅ Ditch high-bounce emails – use verified lists only

SmartReach.io’s Deliverability Suite handles most of this automatically, so your team can stop worrying about tech and focus on conversations.

#22 Nail Your Email Cadence

Cold outreach isn’t one-and-done. It’s a process. And like any good process, it needs a rhythm.

Send too often and you’re annoying. Wait too long and you’re forgotten.

Here’s a sample proven cadence that works for most B2B cold email sequences:

• Day 1: First cold email (value-driven + CTA)
• Day 3: Follow-up with additional context or insight
• Day 7: Add credibility – testimonial, case study, or stat
• Day 14: Light nudge (“Should I stay or should I go?” type email)

Use your follow-ups to build a story, not repeat the same thing. Each email should move the conversation forward – even if they haven’t responded yet.

With a tool like SmartReach, you can build, automate, and adjust this cadence with zero manual effort. Just set and forget (until replies start coming in).

#23 Build your email sequences based on signals/triggers

If you’re sending cold email sequences out of the blue, chances are you may not get enough replies or opens from the prospects.

So, always set up your email outreach sequences based on signals/triggers. E.g., customer job change, webinar participation, pricing page activity, and more.

These signals are usually based on account or individual level, or sometimes both at the same time.

These buying signals will help you write personalized and super contextual emails that the prospects can at least relate to.

Because you already set up some contexts with the prospects, pitch your solution based on their current state, and the likelihood of getting replies and opens increases.

Check out the 28 B2B buying signals that you should definitely target at the time of email sequence set-up.

Cold Email Myths – Busted

Let’s bust a few outdated myths that still float around in sales Slack groups:

❌ MYTH 1: “The longer the email, the more persuasive it is.”
✅ TRUTH: Nobody’s reading a 500-word cold email. Be brief, be clear.

❌ MYTH 2: “The goal is to book a meeting in the first email.”
✅ TRUTH: The real goal? Start a conversation. The meeting comes later.

❌ MYTH 3: “You need to sound super professional to gain trust.”
✅ TRUTH: You need to sound real. Being too polished = sounds automated = ignored.

If your cold email sounds like something a robot or a marketer wrote, it’s game over. People respond to people, not pitches.