It is a known fact that many job openings don´t get advertised at all. Regardless, it doesn´t hurt to contact companies voluntarily. It shows initiative and gives one the opportunity to differentiate themselves from everybody else during the job hunt. A good way to do this is to write cold emails…

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Landing jobs with cold emails
02.02.2015 info@freelancermap.com
FREELANCER TIPS

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Landing jobs with cold emails
Cold emails can be an extremely good ways to find new gigs. As
a freelancer, you might often get the feeling that people are
getting jobs out of the blue without you even having had the
chance to compete with them. And you’re right – many
openings don’t get advertised at all. The best professionals in
any line of work know that they have to take the initiative and
differentiate themselves from everybody else. Writing emails
out of the blue allows you to do just that.
It’s no easy undertaking though. The majority of cold mails will
get ignored for various reasons. This article is here to assist
you in writing better cold emails and increase your chances of
getting noticed in five steps.

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1) Identify the right recipient
The very first thing you have to do when considering a cold
email is to find the person who will have the time to read it
and the power to actually help you. It is hard to make a
general statement about who that person is, but you can
exclude a few options pretty easily. It is most definitely not
the @info address, neither is it the HR department which
gets buried by hundreds of emails each day. It may not be
the CEO either, as he or she likely has enough on their plate
as it is. Finding the middle ground between those will
require you to some investigation on Google, but it is more
than worth it. If you don’t send your email to the right
recipient, you might as well not send it at all.

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2) Subject lines done right
After you identify the decision maker, you can start thinking
about your email. The first of the pitfalls lies in the subject
line. Never, ever forget to fill it out and think carefully
about how you do it. Avoid being generic at all costs. Some
people like to make very personal subject lines like “John,
I’d like to help you with SEO”. This personal approach
won’t always work, but it illustrates the most important
thing about the subject line of cold emails – saying what
you can do for the client.

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3) Make a good opening or land in the
spam folder in 5 seconds
Once you are certain you can make it through the first stages
and your email is actually likely to get open, think about
how you start. Again, people don’t really have time to read
through a whole email, most just skim it, especially clients
who are likely to get similar offers many times a day. That’s
why the beginning is crucial. In the best case scenario it
answers two questions: a) how you heard of your client
and b) what you can do to solve a specific problem.

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4) Sweet, short and precise
Your email should be about as long as any paragraph in this
article. Five to six sentences, this is all the space you have.
Don’t waste it. After the opening, the things left to mention
are the experience in the field you’re pitching for and your
call to action. Get straight to those points and keep them
short.

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5) Never forget a call to action
There is only one last thing you need for a good cold email. A
good call of action looks something like this: “I would like
to discuss the details sometime next week in case you’re
interested. Let me know at [contact details]” or “Could I
send you a few idea?” Ideally, the answer to those
questions will be yes or an appointment to meet up.
If your cold emails go unanswered, don’t despair. Follow up
with a new one after a week or two, since it is likely that
your pitch just got buried. Try different things out and
make your own conclusions about what works and what
doesn’t for the field and clients you’re after.

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