Personalization isn’t the same as relevance. And relevance is ultimately what keeps outbound emails from getting sent to spam.
Here’s what go-to-market experts from HubSpot, Shape & Scale, and Wistia have to say about making sure your outbound messaging hits the mark.
HubSpot’s Daniel Huang on giving reasons to respond
Name-dropping a prospect’s alma mater might net an open, but it won’t net a response. Not if the rest of your message follows the standard cold email script.
“A lot of sellers conflate personalization with relevance,” said HubSpot AE Daniel Huang.
Daniel’s advice? Make sure your subject line and preview snippet are impactful enough to get someone to stop. Then make sure your email is compelling enough to keep someone reading.
And nothing is quite as compelling as solving real pain.
“What’s really compelling is if there’s been something that’s just been really grinding their gears, and you happen to have come forward with a problem hypothesis that actually hits the mark and sounds exactly like their world,” Daniel said.
Don’t waste personalization tokens on references to regional sports teams. Instead, focus on observations about a prospect and their organization that will give them a reason to respond.
This is an area where AI can be hugely helpful. AI agents allow you to automate manual research and turn disparate data points into instant insights.
Data and signal capture agentRoomieAI Capture automatically captures, synthesizes, and analyzes account-level insights from the public web and your internal data sources, all based on your custom configuration. This information is then summarized and delivered to reps in Common Room’s sales workbench.
You should show that you did your homework—and that what you have to say is worth exploring.
Shape & Scale’s Pasha Irshad on connecting intent to impetus
Simply commenting on a prospect’s actions across digital channels—think things like web visits and LinkedIn engagements—isn’t enough either.
If anything, it can come off as creepy or disingenuous.
“What’s missing in it, honestly, is context and timing….,” said Shape & Scale co-founder Pasha Irshad. “Not really knowing just who to contact, but when and why, is really important. So that could be like, again, recent company events. It could be like an industry-specific challenge based upon a ruling.”
The signal may indicate intent, but it's up to the rep to connect the dots between intent and impetus.
Job listings, 10-K releases, regional expansions, recent exec interviews—there’s no shortage of data and signals out there to help you go a level deeper. The trick is making sure you can get your hands on this information and action on it fast.
AI-powered signal captureCommon Room’s AI-powered signal capture automatically fetches contact, account, and activity data from your first-, second-, and third-party data sources. Our machine learning algorithms process this data and turn it into structured outputs for team members to access, analyze, and action on.
“Nobody’s going to open an email because [they] commented on someone’s post, but they are going to open that email if [they’re] dealing with a situation and [you] have a way of solving that situation,” Pasha said.
Wistia’s Genevieve Alas on making messaging precise
It’s tempting to apply an industry- or persona-based messaging framework to every prospect that fits the bill.
But it’s a mistake. Messaging shouldn’t just be relevant for a certain job title or vertical, it should be highly specific to that exact person and their company.
“I’m not going to read your email if I think that you’re just mass emailing a bunch of people,” said Wistia Senior Demand Generation Manager Genevieve Alas. “It’s got to be something that is relevant to me.”
Getting hyper-personalized and hyper-relevant for each prospect comes with an added bonus—it prevents you from making assumptions that can come back to bite you.
It’s hard enough to get a sales email delivered and opened. You don’t want to squander the opportunity with inaccuracies.
“With sales, when it is hard to get people to read […] your email in general, you better have it be hard-hitting and correct,” Genevieve said.
This is another area where AI can be a game changer. AI agents can help you make sure each message you send is tailored to a specific prospect and their specific challenges at scale and at speed.
Data and signal activation agentRoomieAI Activate crafts highly personalized, highly relevant messaging for every contact in real time using retrieval augmented generation. Send or sequence messaging with a single click or automate outreach from end to end.
Personalization can help you stand out, but it’s only step one.
It’s what you say once you grab a prospect's attention that makes all the difference.
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