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How not to write a cold email — by someone who receives thousands of them
As CTO of a post-Series-A startup, I receive a lot of cold emails.
I mean, it certainly feels like a lot. Dozens every day.
Some are direct emails, and some are LinkedIn requests, but they are all uninvited.
I undertook a quick analysis this weekend over how many I had responded to over the last month or so. In just over thirty days I counted 943 unsolicited emails in my Spam (more of that later), Trash, and LinkedIn Inbox.
But guess how many I responded to?
Zero.
Beyond recognizing the wasted effort on the senders’ part, I thought I’d share why their success rate was so low and why their efforts likely caused more harm than good.
Making the wrong assumptions
I believe that a lot of authors of cold emails assume that founders of venture-backed startups are sitting on piles of cash wondering what to do with it all. ‘If only someone could help me write a big check and help shorten our runway a bit quicker’, said no company officer ever.
Founders are never short on ideas. They are nearly always short on time. A badly targeted cold sales email is a royal pain and will quickly get trashed.
