The Structure Of A Winning Cold Email

Bruce Martinus | 2/11/2022 | 8 min read

Writing cold emails that intrigues your prospects, and ultimately generates more responses, can be a difficult task.

How do you structure an email that’s designed to achieve the targets you’re aiming for?

You can send cold emails for a whole host of different reasons, but the fundamentals and the structure rarely change.

Understanding Cold Emails

You can use cold emails as a marketing channel for many things, including:

To book meetings with potential clients
To promote a book
To get more podcast guests
To apply for jobs

As I said a little further up – the fundamentals of great cold emails very rarely change.

With that being said, a winning cold email consists of 6 different elements. And if you’re able to effectively optimize these sections, then you will inevitably create an appealing email that interests your prospects.

The 6 elements of a great cold email are:

Your Prospects

The Subject Line

The Introduction

The Email Body

A Call To Action

P.S Section

Your Prospects

Before you send any cold emails, you have to become clear about who you’re targeting in your campaigns.

What are your prospects struggling with? What do they want to achieve? What interests them? What language do they speak? What tone should you use – conversational or formal?

And more importantly, how can you shape your message to suit them?

The first, and most crucial, step to creating a winning cold email is fully understanding your prospects and creating a message that is intended for them specifically.

Subject Lines That Get Opened

The subject line is your first opportunity to get your foot in the door with your reader, so it must be personal to the reader and spark some interest.

If it comes across as overly ‘salesy’, your email will be disposed of before your prospect even reads what you have to say.

Sincere Introductions

The introduction (or first line of your email) should show your prospect that you’ve done some research on them specifically, and don’t be vague.

When you’re vague, it comes across as a bit fake, and the truth is that fake sincerity will hurt your credibility more than genuine sincerity that’s executed poorly.

Do your homework, find something that you can relate to, and gain a mutual connection with your prospect.

The Body Of Your Email

This section of your email is where you demonstrate your experience, authority, and knowledge.

Here you have an opportunity to share a case study, provide a solution to your prospect’s problem, tell them a story about a similar experience, etc.

It’s important for you to remember that you’re not listing all the features of your product or service here – you’re explaining the benefits, and painting a picture of the value you can provide to your prospect.

An Enticing Call To Action

Without a call to action, you’ve sent an email that’s not just worthless to your reader, but also to you.

Here is where you’re asking your prospect what they should do next if they’re interested in what you’re offering. It should be clear for them to understand, and you shouldn’t overwhelm them with more than one CTA.

You should offer just one CTA, and it could be:

A request to book a meeting
A free report
A free audit
A link to a landing page

Just to name a few.

And lastly, don’t go overboard with your CTA, and make it as long as possible. Keep it short, sweet, and straight to the point.

P.S. Section

The P.S. section is optional, but the importance of adding one shouldn’t be ignored. Normally, people will read the P.S section before reading anything else, and in some cases, it’ll be the only thing that they read.

In the P.S. section, you can add any other information that may be relevant to your prospects, you could put the CTA here instead of the main part of the email, or you can link something for your prospects to stay connected with you.

Try testing a half of your emails with P.S. sections and half without, then see if it makes a difference to the performance of your campaigns.

So, To Craft a Winning Cold Email, You Need To:

Understand Your Prospects

Create a Subject Line That Gets Your Email Opened

Write a Sincere Introduction

Tell a Story In The Email Body

Create an Enticing Call-To-Action

Add a P.S. Section