Guide For Effective Cold Email

Even if you have a high-quality product and excellent copywriting skills, ignoring important details like domain and inbox configuration can result in serious deliverability issues that can damage your primary domain's reputation.

This comprehensive guide will help you unlock the secrets to effective cold emailing by covering the following topics:

1. Inbox Rotation
2. Purchasing Email Domains
3. Cold Email Domains & Inboxes
4. MX Record, DKIM, SPF, & DMARC
5. Custom Tracking Domain
6. Domain Forwarding
7. Warmup Process
8. Copywriting
9. Sending Cold Emails
10. Best Practices

Whether you're a beginner or looking to improve your cold email game, this guide contains valuable insights to help you achieve better results.

Inbox Rotation

Sending cold email campaigns requires careful planning to ensure your emails are delivered and not marked as spam. One effective strategy is inbox rotation. This involves using multiple domains and inboxes for sending emails.

For example, if your primary domain is "cloudtask.com," known for its high SEO reputation and domain authority, sending cold emails from this domain could risk damaging its reputation if marked as spam.

To mitigate this risk, use domain variants like "getcloudtask.com" or "joincloudtask.com" for sending cold emails. You can also establish separate inboxes for each domain, such as "[email protected]" and "[email protected]." This ensures that if one inbox is marked as spam, it won't impact the deliverability of emails from other inboxes.

Using domain variants is generally safe, especially if you own a?.com?domain. This approach not only protects your primary domain but also allows for targeted marketing and enhances SEO efforts.

Purchasing Email Domains

Selecting the proper domains is essential for the success of your cold emailing campaign.?Consider the following when making a purchase decision:

1. Opt for Top-Tier Providers:?Choose domains from reputable providers like 谷歌 , GoDaddy , or Namecheap, Inc .
2. Incorporate Your Brand Name:?Use permutations of your brand name with prefixes like "go," "try," "get," "fix," "access," or suffixes like "emails," "HQ," etc. Avoid using characters, numbers, hyphens, or other special symbols in your domain name.
3. Stick to .com Domains: It's recommended to purchase only?.com?domains, which are the most universally recognized and trusted.

Cold Email Domains & Inboxes

To determine the number of inboxes you need for your cold email campaign, divide your daily email count by 50. To determine the number of domains, divide the daily email count by 100.

It's recommended to set up more inboxes and domains than these calculations suggest. Aim for about 20% more than your target volume to account for errors and ensure smooth email sending.

When setting up your cold email domains and inboxes, most domain providers offer similar setup services.

For inbox setup, you can use Google Workspace. The basic plan of Google Workspace costs $6 per user per month and is usually sufficient for most needs.

MX Record, DKIM, SPF, & DMARC

Successful cold emailing requires an MX record, DKIM, SPF, and DMARC. While these acronyms may appear complex, they verify your legitimacy as a sender to email service providers.

If you've purchased a domain, search for "How to set up DMARC" along with your provider's name and follow the provided instructions.

If you've bought the domain and inboxes from the same provider, the MX record, DKIM, and SPF are likely already configured. In such cases, all that remains is to set up DMARC.

Here's what each acronym stands for:

• MX record (Mail Exchanger Record) is a type of DNS record that specifies the mail server responsible for receiving email messages for a particular domain. It includes the domain name of the mail server and may also feature a priority value, which determines the order in which multiple mail servers are contacted.
• DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) is an email authentication method that allows the sender to associate a domain name with an email message through cryptographic authentication. This process involves adding a digital signature to the email, which can be validated by the receiver against the public key stored in the DKIM record. By doing so, the receiver can confirm that the email was sent by an authorized sender associated with the domain name. DKIM is an effective way to prevent email fraud and ensure that emails are legitimate and trustworthy.
• SPF (Sender Policy Framework) is an email authentication method that confirms the legitimacy of the server that sent an email by comparing its IP address with the domain's DNS records. When incoming emails are received, SPF checks are performed by mail receivers to ensure that the email has been sent from an IP address authorized by the SPF record of the sender's domain.
• DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance) is an email authentication protocol that utilizes SPF and DKIM. The DMARC record includes information such as the organization's SPF and DKIM settings, actions to be taken for non-compliant emails, and reporting preferences.

In simpler terms, the MX?record?directs emails to their destination,?DKIM?acts as a unique signature for emails,?SPF?verifies the sender's legitimacy, and?DMARC?combines?SPF?and?DKIM?to provide an extra layer of security.

Custom Tracking Domain

If you plan to send cold emails, monitoring their open rates is key to ensure they don't end up in spam. A tracking rate above 35% indicates that your emails land in recipients' inboxes. Email management platforms often use an invisible pixel embedded in each email to track its open rate. This pixel is activated when the email is loaded, and the open rate is subsequently recorded.

To enhance tracking accuracy, it's advisable to use a custom tracking domain. This is a separate domain name that aids in tracking email opens within the infrastructure of an email service provider.

Using a public tracking domain can compromise deliverability, as email list providers may blacklist links used by multiple senders, including spammers. For instance, platforms like HubSpot use a shared pixel that can tarnish your reputation if associated with spam activities.

To set up custom domain tracking, you'll need to configure your CNAME records. Navigate to your domain settings on your provider's platform, add a new CNAME, and follow the provided instructions.

Once you've confirmed that your cold email campaign is effective, consider disabling it.

Including tracking pixels can make email providers more likely to categorize your emails as promotional or spam.

Domain Forwarding

It's important to configure the forwarding of your secondary sending domains to your primary brand domain. Forwarding offers two primary benefits when it comes to cold emailing:

• Recipients investigating the source of your emails will be redirected to your main website, which helps establish legitimacy and trust.
• Forwarding creates a link between your secondary domains and primary domains, which ultimately improves deliverability.

Warmup Process

Inbox warming is the process of gradually sending more cold emails from a new domain to build its reputation before you start using it for campaigns. The longer you warm your inboxes and wait to send campaigns, the longer they'll last.

Why is this important?

When you start cold emailing from a new domain, receivers view it as an unknown entity.

If you immediately blast out cold emails in high volume, receivers may see that as suspicious behavior. This can cause spam filters to stop your messages from reaching the inbox.

Warm your inboxes for 3 weeks. Start with 5 warmup emails for the first day of warmup, and ramp up your sending by 5 emails/day, with a cap of 50 emails/day.

You should set a 25-40% response rate on your warmup emails.

Don't put it at 100% because when you start your cold email campaign, it won't be nearly that high—and the decrease won't look good.

Copywriting

The most critical factor for cold email deliverability is presenting an offer that genuinely resonates with your target audience. Even if your technical setup is less than ideal, a compelling, personalized, and relevant offer can still make it to recipients' inboxes.

The success of your cold email campaigns depends more on the quality of your content than on any tricks you might use to deliver your emails.

To improve your chances of getting your emails opened and read, consider using the name of the person in the company with the most social media presence.

If that's not possible, try using the founder's email address.

If that's not an option either, use the name of the most senior marketing person, such as the CMO.

Sending Cold Emails

Once your inboxes are warmed up, you can incrementally increase your email volume.

Start with a daily quota of 10 cold emails to keep the inboxes active, aiming for a 100% response rate. Distributing your email volume wisely across multiple warmed inboxes and domains is important for scaling your outreach efforts safely and sustainably over the long term.

If you don't have the time to warm up your inboxes, you can still start by sending 10-15 cold emails daily from your existing inboxes.

However, be aware that this approach risks your inboxes getting flagged, leading to faster attrition. As a precaution, have backup inboxes ready to take over within a few weeks.

For a safe and sustainable cold email campaign, it is recommended that you send one cold email every 8-15 minutes per inbox.

Best Practices

Now that we've covered setting up your cold email campaign, we're going to go over some best practices:

• Don't Use Spam Words

When writing subject lines and cold emails, it's important to be mindful of the words you use to avoid triggering spam filters.

• Don't Use Images Or Links

When sending cold emails, opt for a simple, plain-text format devoid of images or links. Email clients may block embedded images, negatively affecting deliverability.

Additionally, links can trigger spam filters, increasing the likelihood of your email being flagged or blocked. Using plain text not only improves deliverability but also compels you to focus on crafting a compelling message through copywriting.

• Include Opt-outs?

In some regions, such as California, it's mandatory to include unsubscribe links in cold emails. However, these links can adversely affect deliverability for several reasons:

1. They are links that can trigger spam filters.
2. They may categorize your email as spam or promotional.
3. They often signal recipients that the email is part of an automated sequence.

To circumvent these issues, consider using phrases like "If this is not relevant to you, let me know" as an alternative way for recipients to opt out without clicking a link.

• Use Valid Email Addresses

Only send cold emails to valid accounts to maintain high deliverability and protect your domain reputation.

Before launching a campaign, clean your email list using specialized tools.

ZeroBounce is a premium option, while more budget-friendly alternatives like EmailListVerify offer similar results.

Furthermore, avoid sending cold emails to catch-all domains. These domains accept all incoming emails, leading to a high rate of bounces and negatively affecting your email reputation. Catch-all domains also make it challenging to validate email addresses, compromising list quality and campaign effectiveness.?

• Use Spam Checkers Or Seed List Tests

To assess email deliverability, tools like GMass Spam Checker and GlockApps offer seed list tests, allowing you to send test emails to a sample of seed inboxes to check their filtering.

However, be cautious: seed tests can be inaccurate. They may not represent actual user behavior, and they are lagging indicators—by the time an issue is detected, you've likely been missing inboxes for some time.

If your cold email open rates fall below 30-35%, it may be more beneficial to forget seed tests and concentrate on adjusting your campaign's copy.

A 30% open rate, even without landing in spam, indicates a need for copy improvement.

Regardless of whether you're landing in spam, it's necessary to set up additional inboxes and domains, warm them up, and create better content.

• Track Blacklists

If you observe a decline in your cold email open or reply rates, ensure you're not listed on any email blacklists. Services like Spamhaus Technology Ltd or Barracuda flag senders as spammers lead to automatic email filtering.

Removal from a blacklist may require a fee or an inquiry.

• Turn Off Bad Cold Email Campaigns

If you notice a poorly performing cold email campaign—evidenced by angry replies or numerous requests to be removed from your list—immediately discontinue it.

Don't jeopardize your domain reputation by trying to salvage a failing campaign. Instead, pause and reassess your copy, product positioning, and overall email strategy.

This proactive approach will increase the likelihood of success in future campaigns and minimize the risk of additional spam reports or unsubscriptions.

In conclusion, cold emailing is more than just sending messages; it's an art that can drive real business results.

With the right tools and strategies, as highlighted in this guide, your outreach can become more effective and impactful.

So harness these insights, refine your approach, and elevate your cold email game.