There is a problem with outreach.
Actually, there’s more than one. In fact, the whole approach to it is completely wrong.
Yes, you heard me, wrong.
And by far, the biggest problem is the assumption that by sending your outreach email you are going to close a deal. Straight away. With one mail. No other actions needed. Just that mail and the link is yours.
What?
Well, here’s the news, it doesn’t work like that. Getting your way, getting others to do what you want them to do is a bit more complicated than that. There are more steps involved, from research to making initial contact to cutting the deal.
And, who’s better to learn it from than sales people.
Why Sales People
Sales people outreach for a living. Their salaries, standard of living and the food they bring to the table greatly depend on one thing – how good they are at reaching out to people who ultimately don’t want to hear from them.
And, how great they are with getting those people to listen.
No one wants to be sold to. We cringe at the idea of a salesman, of being cold called in our offices, getting email cold calls trying to sell us someone’s services and so on. Yet, these people do get their way. We buy. We order that new printer cartridge or appoint some companies to clear our offices.
Of course it doesn’t happen every time, there needs to be a problem that the product or service will solve but if there is, sales people do get their way.
How do they do it?
They follow a sales process. A number of steps that need to be taken in order to qualify someone as a prospect, reach out to them and lead through other stages of the process until they buy.
Simplified, the system looks more or less like this:
- Research prospects
- Qualify
- Establish connection, initial outreach
- Outreach follow up
- Proposal
- Negotiate
- Closing the deal
- Follow up
Now compare it with the one usually practiced by SEOs and link builders:
- Research link opportunities
- Send outreach email
- Cut the deal
See the difference? The sales approach is long, probably intimidatingly long. But it works. It understands that in order to make a sale you need to do some work, before you reach out and after. And that it will take some efforts to build enough trust in yourself in order to get your way. Simply.
But Hold On, We’re Not Sales!
That’s not entirely true. Perhaps your job description or title doesn’t say so but every time you want to get your way, you are selling. Every time you want to gain something, you sell. And every time you want people to do what you want them to do, you have to sell too.
And you can achieve this by following some of the things that sales people do.
The sales process is a lengthy procedure, with too many steps to cram into one post. But there is one aspect of it that is highly crucial, the outreach. And that’s what I want to focus on in here.
7 Characteristics Of A Great Outreach Email
Before we begin. I am assuming that you have done your homework, have a list of potential link opportunities along with contact details of the person you want to approach and also have researched them as well (this will come in handy soon).
If not, go do it and then come back to follow those steps below.
- Start with the recipient’s name. Anyone else dislikes those “Dear Webmaster” emails? A lack of personalization is by far the first pitfall of the outreach email. In fact, the only way to get the person to carry on reading your email is to make it personal to them in the first place.
- Build rapport in the first sentence. This one I am yet to see in those outreach emails I get. Sure, many claim that my site and content is amazing beyond description but starting off with a blunt statement like that is far from building any raport. Do it like sales people do, by showing what you have in common with the recipient. Perhaps you two know the same people, have common connections or have published for the same site? (See how important it is to research your prospects beforehand?). Sales people use this technique all the time. When they reach out to prospects, they try to sound as if the prospect had known them already, even if that’s not the case. And it always works.
- Be Personal As tempted as it might be to write and use a generic template in your outreach, a personal email, one that includes at least one reference to the recipient will bring a much better result. It is also a good idea to first introduce yourself to the prospect before hand, perhaps by leaving a comment on their blog and then referencing it in the email. It can be a way to build rapport too.
- State the benefits of your proposal early in the email. People buy into benefits. They are also super busy so you need to communicate the benefit of what you propose early in the email. I usually have it in a 3rd or 4th sentence, no later.
- Make your email intriguing. Yes, most sales emails are boring. By making it a bit more intriguing (hint: it’s in what you propose), you can once again, increase your chances of getting your way.
- Keep your email short, 2–3 paragraphs at most. If you can make it shorter, even better. We are all a busy bunch and the last thing we need is to spend time reading through a sales email.
- End with a request but here is a catch. It has to be a request that can be responded to with either yes or no. This is the trick that will make your email a success. When you write to a prospect you have a goal in mind, state it in the email but do it in a way that responding to it will be effortless. Why? Becuase by doing so you increase your chances of getting a reply. If your prospects needs to stop and think about what to answer to you, they won’t do it. However, if all she needs to do is to type yes or no, your chances of getting a reply back increase by a mile.
Conclusion
Outreach isn’t easy. And part of the problem is a completely wrong attitude towards it which usually results in low conversions and a need to send a multitude of emails to get even a small amount of links.
By following a slightly different approach, one practiced by sales people, you can increase your chances of having your email acted upon, reduce the number of emails you have to send and generally, get better results.
And tell me, who wouldn’t like that?
Your Turn
How about you? How do you outreach and what techniques you think make the difference between an email that gets acted upon and one that gets ignored?
