Design Better Email Cadences: Sprint > Marathon

When we published our email guide in late 2020, our perspectives on cadences were a bit taboo.

The SalesLofts and Outreaches of the industry had sold the world on the idea that each cadence needed to be a marathon.

You need to keep hitting them. Fifteen touches, 25 touches, 30 touches...

They won't respond unless you're persistent.

But your prospects will tell you, "it's annoying."

Email Cadences Are a Sprint

Our thinking on this is clear: stop treating cadences like a marathon. Treat them like a sprint.

When we brought in Kristina Finseth as an advisor, she agreed with this approach. She put together a four-step cadence: 4 emails, 12 days. Over a 10% meetings booked rate.

Take that, marathon runners!

Not sure what your 10-30 day sprint should look like?

Some examples:

It's short. There are only two emails where I'm even coming close to "pitching" what we do. If you've read my content, you know that's barely a pitch.

It's:

• A cold email.
• An interesting 3rd party blog.
• A rephrasing of the original cold email.
• A targeted ask to see if there's a better person to talk to within the org.
• Then... I'm out. (and not a cheesy breakup)

You can also loop in multiple threads:

or

This double thread can be used to accomplish a couple of things:

You can bring in a new topic (like a third-party blog) without distracting from the purpose of the first thread.

You can also use the double thread to cover two potential reasons for reaching out.

The referral bump also gives you a logical path of who you should contact at the sprint's end.

If they don't bite, come back when you have a new reason to reach out.