5 Secrets of Writing Effective Cold Recruiting Emails

Sending a cold recruiting email is like knocking on a candidate's door and asking them to join your company. Cold pitching is the art of approaching individuals who you haven’t approached yet, with the purpose of introducing them to your concepts, ideas, products, and services.

Writing cold recruiting emails

When it comes to recruiting, effective cold emails can make the entire difference between successful recruiters and mediocre ones.

As Mark Parson, HR manager at Careers Booster said:

“You only got one shot. A few seconds, and then the attention is gone. There’s no way between – you either “win” or “lose”, and it all depends on your cold recruiting strategies.”

Well, in today’s post, I’m sharing 5 powerful hints that will help you develop effective cold recruiting emails that convert at first sight.

Don’t let this information pass by – start taking action immediately, ditch the strategies that don’t work and focus on the ones that flourish. Let’s begin.

1.Do your research

First of all, start by researching potential great candidates. There are many effective strategies you can use to find high quality leads on LinkedIn.

When you send a cold email, you’re basically sending an email to a person who:

1. You don’t know
2. You haven’t talked to before
3. Has no idea who you are
4. May have specific problems/trouble at this moment in life
5. May be already involved with one of your competitors

Therefore, you should carefully organize and strategize your approach. You get one shot to draw attention. Depending on the individual/company you want to reach, you should use different keywords and triggers that would signal the fact that you did your research before reaching.

You must research the client/brand you will approach and understand what they value most, understand the culture of the individual/organization, and identify the benefits that you can provide to them.

Make sure that you also present yourself in an adequate way. Remeber, you're sending an email to a person who doesn't know you. This is why it is crucial that you have a great, professional email signature.

Without acquiring the necessary knowledge, your cold emails won’t be effective because there will be no strong rapport between you and your readers.

2.Make it about the candidate

When you cold pitch, you shouldn’t base your value proposition entirely on yourself or on your company. What do I mean by this?

Most of the people are used to talk about themselves. Their stories, their feelings, their ideas and thoughts, and their NEEDS, of course. If you send a cold email that features mostly your NEEDS instead of your candidate persona ’s NEEDS, you are missing the point.

When you receive an email message, you automatically suppose that this is meant for YOU. Well, imagine how it would be like to receive a cold email from a company who keeps praising their work, their employees, and their achievements, while totally forgetting about YOU – your needs, your wants, your perspective.

The way we recruit has changed dramatically, the focus is on the candidates with the main goal to improve the candidate experience.

3.Establish your EVP (Employee Value Proposition)

Why should your future employees choose your company over your biggest competitors’?

The concept of EVP (employee value proposition) suggests the unique value proposition that the company offers to those who are considering joining.

For example, some companies offer the best salary in the niche, a strategy that positions them as the “best payers” in the market. Other company may have the best team comprised of the best professionals in a specific field.

Here are the 5 main blocks of your EVP:

Anyways, if you want to draw attention, you should be and look different than your competitors. Differentiate your brand and you’ll differentiate your recruiting success in no time!

4.Use effective headlines

Headlines, headlines, headlines! Writing catchy headlines is so important!

The concept of cold calling implies the initial drawing of attention, which would be necessary to “open-up” an individual to an idea, proposal, or request. When you recruit, you want people to join your company for different purposes.

The headline you use should be carefully crafted and personalized according to the person/company who receives it. That’s why you should always do your research first. Your headlines can contain “insides” that only those individuals may understand – something that will generate amazing rapport between you two and will attract the necessary attention for the email to be opened and read.

5.Follow up but don’t annoy

In case someone hasn’t answered, or they’ve answered but haven’t replied to your second email, you should consider following up.

This means that you’re asking (again) for their attention, only that this time you’ll do better to convince them. Following up with a second or third or fourth email after a person is reticent is very risky. Don’t exaggerate with the emails because you may just annoy the person/company and that’s exactly what you’re trying to avoid in the first place!

Importance of cold recruiting emails

Having a well-set cold recruiting email strategy is necessary for effective candidate sourcing. Recruiting trends have changed, and it is not enough to post jobs on job boards and wait for candidates come to you.

You can always enhance your recruiting results by only paying attention to the thoughts, actions, and decisions you make in the past. That’s the best way to observe what you’re doing wrong and what you’re doing right.

Test your recruiting campaigns over and over again and keep optimizing ass you go. There’s no great success without a great deal of hustle, trial-n-error, and failure. After all, most of the successful brands have worked their way up through lots of challenges. Up your game now!

About the author

Eva Wislow is a career coach and HR expert from Pittsburgh. She is focusing on helping people break down their limits, find a dream job and achieve life and career success. Eva maintains a strong interest in bringing the digital revolution into human resources. Find Eva on Twitter.