How to Write a Cold Email, Line by Line, With an Example

To write a cold email, write five lines in this order. A subject that names the business, a first line with one thing you saw on their website, one sentence on what it costs them, one sentence on who you are and one question. Keep the whole email under 100 words.

This guide shows how to write a cold email one line at a time, using one made-up business from start to finish.

What do you need before you write?

You need one finding. A finding is one true, specific thing about the prospect's website that a customer would notice. Without it there is no first line and no reason for the email.

Give yourself five minutes per site, on your phone, and look in this order.

1. Does the first screen load, and how long does it take?
2. Can you call, book or ask for a quote from the first screen?
3. Do the forms and the main links work?
4. Is anything out of date, such as an offer, the opening hours or the footer year?
5. Do the reviews on Google appear anywhere on the site?

Stop at the first real problem. One is enough for one email. Our list of nine signs a business needs a new website explains each check.

How do you write a cold email, line by line?

Write the five lines in the order the reader meets them, and give each line one job.

The example builds one email to a made-up business, Maple Street Veterinary Clinic at maplestreetvet.example. The finding is that the after-hours emergency number appears only on the Contact page.

Line 1. The subject

Name the business and the thing you saw. Nothing clever is needed.

Subject: Maple Street Vet's after-hours number

That is 37 characters. Our list of cold email subject lines has more patterns and the data on length.

Line 2. The first line

The cold email first line says what you did, what you saw and where you saw it.

I looked for your after-hours number on my phone last night. It took three taps from the homepage to find it, on the Contact page.

It opens with "I" and a verb, so a person plainly did something. It holds a number and a place. The owner can repeat the test in 20 seconds.

Line 3. The cost

Say in one sentence what the finding means for a customer. Use their world and leave out statistics you cannot source.

Someone with a sick dog at 11 pm may not look that long.

Line 4. Who you are

Give your trade and your town. Awards, years in business and team size can wait for the call.

I build websites for clinics in Asheville.

Line 5. The ask

Ask one question that takes one word to answer.

Want me to send a sketch of the homepage with the number at the top?

The whole email

Subject: Maple Street Vet's after-hours number

Hi Dr. Nguyen,

I looked for your after-hours number on my phone last night. It took three taps from the homepage to find it, on the Contact page.

Someone with a sick dog at 11 pm may not look that long.

I build websites for clinics in Asheville. Want me to send a sketch of the homepage with the number at the top?

Priya Raman

From the greeting to the name, that is 65 words.

What makes a good cold email first line?

A good first line could only have been sent to one business. Swap in a competitor's name. If the line still makes sense, it is too general.

Here are six cold email opening lines, each built from a finding. The details are made up to show the pattern.

The strong lines share three habits.

1. They start with something you did or saw. I opened, I searched, I sent.
2. They hold a number or a place. Seven seconds, the About page, the second page.
3. They carry no praise and no apology. "Love your site" and "sorry to bother you" both delay the point.

What is the right cold email length?

The right cold email length is under 100 words, and nearer 60 than 100. The example email in this guide runs to 65.

Guides disagree on the exact range, and few point to data. One large data set exists. Boomerang, a maker of email productivity software, looked at over 40 million emails in 2016 and found that "the sweet spot for email length is between 50-125 words". Response rates fell slowly from 50% for 125-word messages to about 44% for 500-word messages, and a 25-word email did about as well as a 2,000-word one (Boomerang).

Read that as direction. The data is ten years old and covers email of every kind sent by Boomerang's customers. A response rate near 50% is far above cold outreach, where 8.5% of emails got a reply in the 2019 Backlinko and Pitchbox study (Backlinko). Most of Boomerang's emails probably went to people who knew the sender.

The practical test is a phone screen. If the owner has to scroll to reach your question, cut the sentence about yourself first.

What should you cut before you send?

Cut everything the reader does not need to answer your question.

• "I hope this email finds you well." It tells the reader a stranger is about to ask for something.
• "My name is" and your job title. Your name is in the From line and under the email.
• Adjectives about yourself. Award-winning, full-service, results-driven.
• A second ask. A call, a link and an attachment are three decisions.
• A second finding. Save it for the next message. Our follow-up templates open with one.

Does the wording matter as much as the list?

No. In our own test, who received the email mattered more than how it was written.

We scored 20,000 Dutch company websites and sent 3,570 cold emails. Businesses with the weakest 20% of websites replied positively 1.60% of the time to a generic email and 2.35% of the time when the email named the problem. That gap was not statistically significant, with p = 0.238. Choosing the weakest websites made a positive reply about 3.2 times more likely. The test covered Dutch companies and email only, and the numbers are in our write-up.

A specific first line is still worth writing. It did no worse in the test, and it is the honest way to write to a stranger.

It is also slow by hand. By the estimate in that study, a manual review takes about 8 minutes a website. Twip, the AI inside Leadodo, scores every website in a search across 10 domains, and its findings become the opening line of each letter and email.

What should you check before you press Send?

Run six checks. They take about two minutes, by our own estimate.

1. The finding is still true. Open the site again today.
2. The name is right. Check the spelling against the business's own website.
3. It reads well aloud. If you run out of breath, split the sentence.
4. It fits one phone screen. Send it to yourself first.
5. It has one ask.
6. Your postal address and a way to opt out sit under your name. US law requires both in commercial email (FTC). This is not legal advice.

For wording to start from, use our cold email templates. For the list, the sending setup and the follow-ups, read the complete guide to cold email.

Questions

What is the best way to start a cold email?

Start with the reader's name and one thing you saw on their website. Skip "I hope this finds you well" and skip your own introduction. Your name is already in the From line.

How long should a cold email be?

Under 100 words. A 2016 Boomerang analysis of over 40 million emails of every kind put the best range at 50 to 125 words (Boomerang). A first email to a stranger belongs at the short end of that range.

Should you introduce yourself in the first line?

No. The first line is about the reader. One sentence on your trade and town comes after the finding and its cost.

How many questions should a cold email ask?

One. A single question that takes one word to answer gives the reader one decision. Two questions give them a reason to answer later.

Can AI write the first line of a cold email?

Yes, when it reads the prospect's real website. In our test, generating 1,190 problem descriptions cost about €5. A wrong finding tells the owner nobody looked, so our advice is to read each email before it goes out. In Leadodo you choose whether to review every letter and message before it goes, review a sample such as the first 100, or let your Outbound Machine send without review.

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Next step. You now know how to write a cold email by hand. See how Twip's findings become the first line of each letter and email your Outbound Machine sends. See the Outbound Machine.