Tips to Improve Email Deliverability and Close More Deals via Cold Email

Regulations regarding cold email have changed quite a bit over the past ten years. In my first sales job (back in 2016) - I could bulk email 1000 business owners at once and see meetings flow in with no problem from Google or Microsoft.

With the increase of spam emails, it’s a lot harder to cold email. Email accounts have started to be blocked by Google and others and more and more emails are ending up in Spam.

I sent an email last week to 250 people and Google blocked my account immediately.
- Paris Picard, Last Week (Unfortunately)

Before reaching out to customers or clients, it’s important to be aware of regulations and requirements based on your geography or the platforms you use.

**Regulations for Business Communications**

Make sure to review local and federal regulations regarding email communications.

TCPA (For SMS and Phone Communications)

If you’re planning on texting or cold calling people in the US, unless you give callers written consent, the TCPA states that sales callers may not do the following: call before 8 a.m. or after 9 p.m.

Google Mail

Starting in 2024, we’ll require bulk senders to authenticate their emails, allow for easy unsubscription and stay under a reported spam threshold.
Announcement from Google

GDPR - (EU Communications):

Essentially protects the personal information of individuals
Is cold email GDPR compliant? The good news for email marketers is that the GDPR does not affect cold emails, as the regulation applies specifically to how companies handle the data of individuals, not how they interact with other businesses and organizations. (Source:https://gdpr-info.eu/)

Cold Email Account Strategy

It’s not recommended to send cold emails from your primary email domain because if it gets shut down, you won’t be able to use an operationally critical account needed for your business.

Step 1

Set up additional domains similar to your primary domain.

My primary business domain is grooveconsulting.io so I purchased groovyconsulting.com and parispicard.com then set up email and domain forwarding to my primary domain.

Step 2

Next, you’ll want to set up to 5 user accounts for each domain. They should each be different aliases.

For example:

Don’t forget to set up email signatures for each email.

Step 3

Lastly, DMARC, DKIM, and SPF are three email authentication methods that you will need to complete to improve the security of the domains.

DMARC can help to successfully prevent direct domain spoofing, where attackers use an organization's exact domain name in the “from” address within an email.
Source: MimeCast

Cold Email Deliverability Strategy

To avoid getting your account shut down, it’s recommended to use a warm-up service like Instantly or Lemwarm that will help you increase the likelihood of your emails being delivered to the inbox instead of spam.

Instantly Email Warm Up — When using a service like Instantly, you will need to connect each user account to the tool.

From there, it will “Warm up” your email. Basically what this does, is it helps your domain establish authority within Google, Microsoft, etc.

Email warm up example — *Warm Up Email Example*

**It will send emails to other** **Instantly** **users so that the email provider can see varying types of emails are being sent and received by various organizations and are not being marked as spam.**
It’s recommended to wait 1-2 weeks before using the email for cold email campaigns.
During this time, you can set up email campaigns and schedule them to send.

Tips for Email Deliverability

There are several ways to improve deliverability of emails.

Formatting and Content

Avoid “spammy” words and phrases

There’s a ton of phrases that get blocked by spam that you should aim to avoid. Here’s an article explaining more from ActiveCampaigns.

Avoid formatting

Yes - this one absolutely kills me. It’s recommended to avoid using Bold, Italics, Underlining, bullet points, etc.

Avoid reaching out to more than 3 individuals within the same domain at the same time

If you have a couple of key decision makers, definitely reach out to them with personalized content

Add personalized variables in emails

First name and company name are absolutely ideal however, using tools like Open AI, Clay, and others, you can customize even further by adding things like restaurant recommendations in their cities, and more.
With personalized AI emails, each email will look different, further helping you with deliverability

Only one Call-to-Action per email

Don’t ask prospects to do 5 different things in one email

Only one Link per email

Check your signature to make sure there aren’t too many links because providers will screen for this

Other Tips

Send from the same ESP that the email is going to (E.g. Gmail to Gmail or Outlook to Outlook) (Email services like Instantly will do this for you)
Use variant emails to see which ones convert the highest (Email services like Instantly will do this for you)
Update your email templates and change the language every two weeks

IMPORTANT

DO NOT DO THIS

**Make sure you are using email throttling and** **not sending hundreds of emails at the same time or on the same day.**
Each email account should not be sending more than 50 emails per day. If you want to send more emails, create additional domains and accounts.

Here are some other interesting stats from top email marketers:

77% of B2B companies use an email marketing newsletter as part of their content marketing strategy and 79% of B2B marketers find email to be the most successful channel for content distribution (Source: OptinMonster)
59% of respondents say marketing emails influence their purchase decisions and 80% of business professionals believe that email marketing increases customer retention. (Source: OptinMonster)
99% of email users check their inbox every single day (Source: Hubspot)
Automated emails can increase revenue by 320% (Source: Campaign Monitor)
51% of marketers believe that segmenting is one of the most effective email marketing strategies (Source: Instapage)
Testing your emails can lead to a higher overall return on investment (Source: HubSpot)
63% of all businesses will reduce their level of emails based on their consumer engagement (Source: Databox)
The average unsubscribe rate in the year 2022 was only 0.1% (Source: Campaign Monitor)

Final Thoughts

Think of cold emailing like a great chat with a friend – it's all about finding the right balance of being professional and personable.

First up, let's keep it legal and respectful with a quick check on regulations like TCPA and GDPR – they're like the cool guidelines that keep our conversations honest and trustworthy.

Now, about managing those email accounts – it's like organizing different social circles. Having separate domains and accounts adds reliability and flexibility, making it easier to handle everything smoothly. And when it comes to getting those emails noticed, think of it as getting dressed for a date – warm-up services and email authentication are like your trusty sidekicks, making sure your messages land right where they should.

But the real magic happens with your content – think of it as crafting the perfect text to your crush. Personalize, keep it clear and engaging, and don't forget to sprinkle in a bit of your personality. And timing? It's like picking the perfect moment to send that message – aim for when they're most likely to be receptive. So, grab your coffee and let's make those cold emails feel warm and inviting.