When Does Cold Email Make Sense In A GTM Strategy?

Cold email is not always the right acquisition channel.

Choosing this channel must be part of a broader reflection on your Go-to-Market strategy.

If you are new to GTM strategy, you might want to watch this 9-min video presenting the 14 main B2B acquisition channels:

Regarding cold email specifically, here are the 4 questions you need to answer:

1. Do my prospects use emails to communicate?

➡️ Many professions have little to no use for emails, making it an unsuitable channel to reach them. It's particularly hard to cold email these categories of professionals: construction workers, retail and hospitality staff, farmers and agricultural workers, healthcare professionals, craftspeople.

➡️ There is also a seniority effect: The more senior, the more solicited by emails, and thus the less responsive.

📞 If your target is not responsive to emails, you will have to go for alternative channels: cold calling, ads, SEO, PR, etc.

2. Is my value proposition strong enough?

Your product or service must have a price superior to ~50 USD. In the B2B space, items priced under 50 USD are hard to sell with cold emails: they are typically dismissed as they are often viewed as 'anecdotes,' 'gadgets,' or 'distractions.'

Between 50 and 500 USD, interest grows steep. Between 500 and 5000 USD interest evolves slightly (+/- 15%), like a flatty Bell curve. It’s the sweet spot. Beyond 5000 USD, interest falls because the product or service is perceived as too complex or too luxury to be pitched by email.

Obviously, those numbers are mere indications, based on averages. These figures should be taken with caution. They depend on the target market, the standard of living in the relevant country, and the profitability of the businesses contacted. A hair salon in Indonesia and a strategy consulting firm in Norway do not have the same price sensitivity.

3. Is my offer differentiated enough?

You will have to cut through the noise. Your offer must be innovative and unique to justify a decision-maker interrupting her/his daily work and paying attention to you.

Most founders over-estimate the differentiation level of their offer. Don’t be that person. Be honest to yourself.

If you are just “a SEO agency among thousands of clones” or “a web design freelancer identical to many others”, there is no reason to answer your cold email. The good news is: everyone can increase her/his differentiation! There are 3 main ways to do so:

• Niche down. Instead of being a “Social Media Ads Agency”, be a “TikTok Ads agency for post-Series-A Saas companies”. Instead of being a “Digital Agency”, be a “Webflow Agency for ecom stores in Western Europe”.
• Make your business model unique. Instead of being a “Design Agency”, be “The First Subscription-based Design Agency”. Instead of being a “Freelance Video Editor”, be “The Only Freelance Video Editor With Unlimited Revisions”.  
• Build a truly innovative product. Your technology will be perceived as “disruptive” if it is an order of magnitude better than its nearest substitute. Is your solution 10 times better - in a key dimension - than anything else available? If your technology is just 20% better, people simply won’t notice it. That’s a harsh truth. For a bunch of reasons. People’s attention is a function based on more than just technology: branding, distribution, etc. Then, there is a cost to change existing habits. A 20% increase of efficiency is often not enough to compensate for this cost of change.  

4. Can you realistically expect a positive ROI?

That is the ultimate test. To answer this question, we have created a quick ROI calculator available here: https://cold-email-roi-calculator-by-icypeas.lovable.app/

If you can answer “yes” to the four questions above, then yes: you should consider cold email as part of your GTM strategy.