Are cold emails still effective when reaching out to potential investors?
After reading Jason’s latest blog post where he made mention of preferably having all or most communications via IM esp when he travels(and trust me dis guy travels alot)…
“Anyone who knows me knows I rarely make or take phone calls. A couple of years ago, because of my rapid travels and the fact I have over a dozen different sims for countries I frequent (US, UK, France, SA, Kenya and Ghana), I just stopped bothering with the actual phone numbers and used Whatsapp to communicate. Anywhere I am in the world. As long as I have Whatsapp / Messenger and Slack I can run Iroko. I don’t even respond to emails internally in Iroko and the entire company runs off Slack.”
I got reminded of a previous post he did on Andrew of Ogavenue
There was me minding my own business. 9th July. 1am on a Saturday morning. Mrs Njoku was fast asleep, no noise from the kids, the world was at peace. I finally had time to wade through hundreds of unread Spark emails. I happened across an email from Andrew. Firstly, it was the best intro email I have ever read before. Except I actually didn’t read this email. I starred it, a month earlier and forgot about it. Then he sent me the June Update.
Considering Andrews’ intro mail was one of the best Jason had ever read and not forgetting Marks’ really great email pitch to Rocket that was never responded to. I can only but ask How effective are cold emails when reaching out to potential investors and what do you consider the best/more effective approach to reaching out to investors?
Cold Mail is a 50-50, Might never be read, might be starred for Q4, Might be responded immediately( Depends on how busy or a fast reader the investor is).
Tech and Finance Events where they will attend is best, meet them BEFORE event begins proper, get an appointment set and send a reminder before he LEAVES.
Use DHL, No really i am serious, print a physical letter/intro/pitch and use DHL to send to his desk( Secretary can spoil your plans sha, so pray)
Ask your network and friends of a friend
Ask a fellow Founder.
if all Fails:
TEXT, WHATSAPP, FACEBOOK MESSAGE AND LINKEDIN MESSAGE THE HELL OUT OF THE GUY BUT JUST IN CASE, I TAKE JESUS NAME BEG U, MAKE SURE YOUR PITCH IS GOOD.
Subject: Just hit 30m users in last 4 months. Raising first capital
Hi Pierre,
My company - best.im - has gone from 0 users to 30m users in last 4 months. From 0 revenue to >$105k MRR (also in last 4 months). Team size is 3 people.
We’re looking to raise capital to solve the growth pains (hire, pay for infrastructure). Perhaps your firm would be interested in working with us?
Thanks,
Daniel.
Founder: best.im
Your reply rate on the above will be 90%. The reasons cold emails typically don’t work is that the company has nothing interesting to show. If you have some crazy numbers, put them on a blog/email and people will rush you.
Meaning if you just have a few traction it wont be advisable to use this model when considering your startup might not be doing the revenues expected to get heads turning but you would agree Mark that there are still need to allow for Startups whose numbers may not be impressive yet but have a good idea that might need help in process or mentoring, what happens then, whats the best approach?
The best thing to do is to search for first traction. That’s a lonely job, and the people who will support you are family and friends that know you and believe in you. Once you have some form of initial traction, then get in touch with the people who can do you the introductions to the investors who have money. There are a lot of tier 2 people, who may not be able to invest, but have contact to investors. E.g if your target investor is Venture Garden Group, then get one of their investees to believe in you and trust you. When they are comfortable, they will ultimately intro you up.
But bear something in mind - the search for initial traction is just you.
Thanks mark for that template, sure would serve. Talking about Traction and revenue i believe both comes after product development(i stand to be corrected). In a case where a founder has only a validated idea and a couple of numbers(by numbers i mean a few interested users who are ready to pay for product once ready) but actual cost of building product may be far fetched for founder. What do you consider best approach for such, does @Jason_Igwe_Njoku and Spark fund ideas? Even with good enough validated learning.
lol, Ama Call him a Nigger like he my brother. Don’t sweat it bro we know Nigerians and how we do all them stuff(esp Yoruba men). When i first spoke to Jason back in 2014, i was like goodafternoon Sir, Jason be like please call me Jason, you calling me Sir makes me feel Old. Come try am where Otuba Alabi dey make i hear.
Back to the matter, thanks bro ama shoot you a mail asap, hope to connect then procced…
Akin is nice Guy, I mailed him sometime ago. His advises were valuable. I text him then, but he advice me to get in touch via email. I did and he responded.
Perhaps your numbers were far less interesting than what’s on the template. As an example, 5k users in 5 months might sound good to a founder who has toiled hard to convert each individual user and grow a community that has the potential of going viral in another two months. The investor however, might see the value as mediocre and without other metrics like month on month growth rate, daily active users, monthly active users, etc, that email is getting archived ASAP.
Basically, put your best foot forward - in the hypothetical scenario above, you’ll want to put your month on month growth rate in the subject instead.
Come try am where Otuba Alabi dey make i hear.