How to write a cold email that wins freelance clients?

Like it or not, freelancing is a combination of creativity and logic. You can be a great designer, but you'll go broke if you don't know how to run your independent business.

There are a lot of nuances to running an independent business, but there's one point we're talking a lot about in this newsletter. That is getting freelance clients. We spoke in detail about its aspects in the Dream Clients series.

There are two ways to find your clients fast. Today we'll focus on cold outreach, specifically how to write a cold email that wins freelance clients.

Writing effective cold emails and doing it fast can make it easier to find new leads. Unless you're a freelancer overflowing with referrals, sending cold emails will probably be an excellent addition to your client-finding process.

A cold email is when you contact someone you don't know with a specific purpose in mind. The objective is to clarify if the lead can be a potential client in our case.

Before we dive into how to write a cold email, let's outline a few principles that will help us guide the conversation.

Principles of cold email

Keep it short

When sending a cold email to someone, the first thing to remember is that they probably receive a lot of these and are busy. Value their time and energy, and don't write 1,000 words emails. No one would read it. I would recommend keeping the email under 150 words.

• Keep it short and simple
• Break down large paragraphs into smaller chunks
• Use lists to point important things

Always personalize

I think it's already a cliche, but you should never send an automated email. It gets deleted 99.9% of the time.

A few days ago, someone asked me which software I use to send cold emails on Twitter. The only software I use is the Apple Mail app. No auto-sending software. All manual work.

How to personalize a message:

• Research the person on LinkedIn and Google
• Check their working experience, education, hobbies, books, places, etc.
• Find common topics to discuss (dogs, skiing, cooking, etc.)
• Compliment their work