Email Marketing Books Review
Cold Email Manifesto by Alex Berman & Robert Indries

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For somebody who has written millions of words of copy, this book flows really well and there is a lot of white space that makes it easy to read, I think I read through it in a couple of hours.

This book focuses on business-to-business sales and Alex recommends that if you don't have a product that is at least $2000 or more to sell, cold emailing will probably be a waste of your time.

The sales strategies that are covered in this book are primarily for selling high ticket products or services.

Alex talks about the importance of being specific in your offers and not trying to appeal to everyone.

I can relate to this because over the years I've got a lot of cold emails from people asking me to buy web development services, copy writing, email marketing, you name it.

Some of them have been OK but many of them should have read this book before they started cold emailing people because they literally had a template and pulled information from my website and plugged it into a couple of different places. 

In fact, one that I just received recently said "based on your location from your ZIP Code it's supposed to be cloudy in your area, stay warm" at the bottom.

And I thought, what does this have to do with anything if you are trying to solicit business from me.

It was pretty cringey.

There is very little information on copywriting and the type of content that should be in your email in this book.

It doesn't tell you how to write persuasive sales copy that will get people to take action to visit your website and buy products at your online store.

Alex uses a four part cold email series follow up that is less than basic, but it does follow specific personalization strategies.

He shares really great examples and stories of his successes and failures that he has had.

I like that part of it because it was relatable to me as an entrepreneur and probably will be to you as well.

Knowing that we all make mistakes and we all mess up, and it's OK and you can keep moving forward even when you make mistakes, is a great lesson to learn.

He talks a lot about building the right team how to handle individual tasks, his criteria for assembling those teams, what their roles are, what he pays them, what their job descriptions are, and how he makes them all focus on one specific thing so that they can do it really well.

He gives great examples of offers that he has used in the past and the importance of framing them to directly make more sales.

The email examples he gives in the book are case study driven, straightforward and to the point, and they have a call to action at the end.

But his primary strategy, because this is more business to business, is getting to the right person and getting that person to book an appointment so he can get on a call with them.

When this happens he can tell them about all the features and benefits, how his products solve their problems, and what their companies transformation will will look like if they buy his product.

He does not try to make the sale through the emails he sends.

In his opinion, the strategies in the book should replace cold calling. 

Now you might be thinking, Luke, you tell me that if you send email to someone who doesn't know you and hasn't signed up to your list that you are spamming.

And you’re right, if you are talking about sending email to thousands of people.

But just reaching out on a one to one basis to someone who doesn't know you, is not technically spamming, OR is not defined as spamming.

Sending email to a large amount of people who don't know you...is.

Alex also gives great managing a business advice at the end.

A lot of it was very inspiring and he shared some really great quotes about perseverance and sticking with entrepreneurship and continuing when you have failures and road blocks that you come up against.

He makes a bold claim with this book by saying that with its principles you will always have the ability to make money.

I definitely believe that and I will share that with you in my story in just a second.

The last thing is that this book provides steps to take and then challenges you to go use them.

I think is a sign of a really great book when it says "here are some things to follow now go do them" instead of "read this information and now you're smarter for it.

If you stuck with me this long, let me tell you my story:

A few months ago I started reaching out to school districts, specifically, Special Education Directors for the online speech therapy company I've been working on.

I was having no luck calling.

I was calling and calling and getting voicemails and getting secretaries and people saying "I will give a message to them" and no one was calling me back.

For weeks and hours of calling I got maybe two people to call me back and then I remembered...

...I can send people cold emails.

I decided to give it a try. 

So I started sending cold emails.

It took a little time because I was sending different emails to the same people over a few weeks.

I have a 3 to 4 part email series that I developed based on the strategies I learned from this book.

The first email introduces me it introduces my business, and says "do you have any need for speech therapy for your students".

Then the next email says "I'm just bumping this to the top of your email inbox because I know that you're busy".

Then the third email says "I'm following up on my previous two emails to see if you still have a need for speech therapy for your students".

The third email has had a 50-75% response rate, not open rate, response rate.

Saying I have already emailed you two times and you haven't responded somehow creates a sense of urgency for the recipient to reply because I’ve reminded them that they haven’t responded to me twice.

Now of course, some people would respond after the first and second emails, but the majority of responses I received were after the third email. 

It's been really fun to try out some of the strategies in this book and have them work almost immediately or within a few days.

If you're doing any kind of business to business sales I encourage you to read and implement the information in this book because if you're anything like me, I hate being on the phone.

I can't stand it, in fact.

But using email is much less intrusive, people can answer it on their own time, and the stars don't have to align in order for you to get somebody on the phone.

I strongly recommend this book and conclude that it is a great, great resource.

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