Glossary Term
Cold Email
Unsolicited outreach email sent to prospects with no prior relationship, used for sales, partnerships, or networking.
What is Cold Email?
Cold email is outreach sent to people you have no existing relationship with. Unlike spam, legitimate cold email is:
- Targeted: Sent to specific individuals who might benefit
- Personalized: Tailored to the recipient's situation
- Compliant: Follows CAN-SPAM and other regulations
- Value-focused: Offers something useful to the recipient
- Low-volume: Not mass-blasted to millions
Cold email is used for:
- B2B sales prospecting
- Partnership and business development
- Recruiting passive candidates
- Fundraising and investor outreach
- Research and expertise seeking
The key difference from spam: cold email provides value to a carefully selected recipient, while spam is mass-sent with no regard for relevance or recipient benefit.
Why It Matters
- 1Primary channel for B2B outreach at scale
- 2More controllable than paid ads or content marketing
- 3Directly reaches decision-makers
- 4When done well, builds genuine business relationships
Related Tools
Related Terms
Warm Email
Email sent to someone with whom you have some prior connection or context, resulting in higher response rates.
Email Sequence
A planned series of emails sent over time to a prospect, typically including an initial email and follow-ups.
Reply Rate
The percentage of sent emails that receive a reply from recipients.
Email Deliverability
The ability of your emails to successfully reach recipients' inboxes rather than being blocked or sent to spam.
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