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Month: October 2017

We’ve discovered that in certain situations, Gmail doesn’t save the addresses in the To field as part of a Draft, when invalid characters are present in the list of email addresses in the To field. For example:

There’s an invalid character, a parentheses, in the second email address, which causes Gmail to think the To field is blank.

GMass works by examining all the parts of a Gmail Draft, and then using that Draft as the basis a mail merge campaign. In a case where there is an invalid character, like a parentheses, in an email address, the Gmail Draft doesn’t save any of the addresses, which results in GMass thinking the To field is blank, even though it isn’t.

If you get an error telling you that you don’t have any To addresses, but you clearly do, please check your To field for invalid characters.

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I just deployed some improvements to the “Just create Drafts” feature. As a reminder, this is the feature that allows you to create individual Gmail Drafts for your mail merge campaign, so you can review them first, and then click a link to send them (or delete them).

Using the “Just Create Drafts” setting.

1. No more delays. Recently, several users have been frustrated at the lengthy delays between clicking the link to send the Drafts and when the Drafts were actually sent. This is now fixed, and Drafts should begin sending within 60 seconds of clicking the link, no matter how busy the system is. This is because I’ve changed how this works from a sequential processing system to a parallel processing system.

2. Throttling works now. A while back I introduced a throttling feature that inserted a few seconds of pause in between emails. If you used the “Just create Drafts” feature, along with the throttling feature, then that throttling would apply to the creation of the Drafts instead of the sending of the Drafts. This is now corrected. If you check the throttling checkbox, your Drafts will be created without the pause, but if you click the link to send them, then that pause will kick into effect.

3. Checking for over-limit bounces. Previously, if you clicked the link to send your Drafts, GMass never checked to see if your account was over limit. If it was, Drafts would continue to try sending, and they would bounce back. Now, just like when you normally send a campaign (without creating Drafts first), GMass will monitor for those pesky “You have exceeded your limit” bounces and if found, the Drafts will pause sending for 24 hours so your account quota can reset.

4. Suppression lists. The “Just create Drafts” feature can be used to create a manual Suppression List, but there was always a flaw in that if you wanted to create a 5,000 address suppression list, for example, you couldn’t do it all at once, because GMass would spread out a campaign over multiple days to avoid your account hitting Gmail’s sending limits. Now, if you use the “Just create Drafts” checkbox, and the Subject of your campaign has the word “suppress” in it, then GMass will create all the Drafts at once, without regard to your account limits. This will allow you to create manual suppression lists as big as you want without waiting.

5. SMTP-based sending. You might have seen my recent announcements about how you can now hook your GMass account up to a third party SMTP server like Sendgrid, to send unlimited emails and exceed Gmail’s sending limits. Now this capability applies to the “Just create Drafts” feature as well. Meaning, you can launch a campaign to 10,000 people by having the 10,000 Drafts created first, and then clicking a link to send those 10,000 Drafts via the SMTP server.

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You can now send virtually unlimited emails in Gmail.  It works by connecting a third party SMTP service like SendGrid, Mailgun, or Mailjet to your GMass account.

The advantages of this setup are:

  • The ability to send virtually unlimited emails in Gmail and avoid Gmail’s sending limits.
  • No risk of a Gmail account being suspended by Google.

The disadvantages of this setup are potentially:

  • A slight decrease in deliverability, although from our testing, we’ve found the open and reply rates using SendGrid as the SMTP server to usually be just as high as sending natively from Google. See our deliverability database to do real-time comparisons.

How can you send unlimited mail merge emails from your Gmail account?

First, you need a GMass account. Then, you connect your GMass account to any external SMTP server. This will make it so your emails are sent from that server and not from your actual Gmail account, although everything will look as normal inside your Gmail account. Meaning, each email message will still show up in your Sent Mail folder, and GMass will still be able to track replies, bounces, and everything that happens after you send an email campaign.

When you do this, you can:

  • Choose SMTP sending on a per-campaign basis. Meaning, you can selectively choose which campaigns are sent with SMTP and which are sent with your Gmail account.
  • If you don’t want to set up your own SMTP account, you might be able to use our internal SMTP service. Now there is a process to request to use our SMTP service if you don’t want to set up your own.
  • Use the SMTP setting with the Preview as Drafts feature to first create Drafts, and then send the Drafts with the SMTP server.

The most popular SMTP servers amongst my users

Here is a live list of the top 10 most popular SMTP servers used by our users. This does not include users who we assign to our own internal SendGrid account.

This list was last updated on April 25 and udpates daily at midnight GMT.

SMTP ServerNumber of Users
smtp.sendgrid.net13,233
smtp.mailgun.org946
in-v3.mailjet.com889
smtp.gmail.com704
s1.smtpgm.net635
smtp.sparkpostmail.com609
smtp-relay.sendinblue.com492
email-smtp.us-east-1.amazonaws.com356
send.smtp.com276
smtp-relay.brevo.com227

Step 1: Setting up your SMTP service

Option A: Getting your own SMTP service

An SMTP server is simply an email sending server. There are many well-known SMTP service providers, including SendGrid, JangoSMTP, Mailgun, Mailjet, and others. Pricing for SMTP services range from free plans which let you send a few hundred emails/day to around $20 USD/month for thousands of emails/month. Each service has its own advantages and disadvantages, and you’re free to use any SMTP service you like.

In our testing, we’ve found that SendGrid and JangoSMTP are the two SMTP services that are most compatible with GMass, because of their flexibility in not requiring domain-based verification in order to start relaying email through them. This is especially important if you’re connecting a [email protected] GMass account to an SMTP service.

If you choose SendGrid, here is a detailed guide to configuring your SendGrid account for GMass use.

Option B: Request to use our SendGrid SMTP account

If you’re sending strictly opt-in email, you might be eligible to use our SendGrid account.

Step 2: Linking your GMass account to the SMTP service

New way

As of November 2020, you can easily set your SMTP server in your GMass account dashboard. You can use this direct link to your SMTP settings.

unlimited mail merge

If you have any trouble with the dashboard, you can still set your SMTP server the old way.

Old way

If you set up your own SMTP service, this is how to link the SMTP service to your GMass account. Note that if you’ve been approved to use our SMTP service, you will skip this step.

set Sendgrid SMTP server
Configure your GMass account to send via an external SMTP server instead of your Google account. The SendGrid credentials show above are not real.

  1. First, reload Gmail in your Chrome browser to make sure you have the latest version of GMass.
  2. Click Compose to launch a new window.
  3. Set the To field to [email protected].
  4. Set the Subject to the word set. Wait a second for the form to appear in the Message area.
  5. Enter the SMTP server, port, username, and password after the colons. If your server does not require authentication, set the Username to “noauth” (without the quotes) and leave the Password blank.
  6. Hit the GMass button. Do not hit the Send button.

GMass will relay a test email through the server to yourself. If successful, the SMTP server will be set for your account and you will now see that setting appear in the Settings box.

To clear out the SMTP settings, set the Subject to “clear” and hit the GMass button. To view the SMTP setting currently on your account, set the Subject to “status” and hit the GMass button.

Step 3: Sending through the SMTP server

Sending with an external SMTP

You’ll notice an option in the GMass Settings box that allows you to set, on a per-campaign basis, whether the emails should be routed through the SMTP server for unlimited sending, or through your Google account, in which case you’d be subject to Gmail’s sending limits.

Note: This option will only appear if you have connected an SMTP account to GMass.

Note that sending over SMTP is subject to usage-based billing, outlined here.

You’ll also be able to quick reference whether you’re sending your campaign through Gmail or your third-party SMTP server if you collapse the Action settings.

External SMTP settings

Choosing an SMTP server

You have three choices to connect your GMass account to an SMTP server:

  1. If your email sending meets certain criteria, you can use my SMTP server, which is a high volume server with SendGrid. Your email sends must be either a) non-commercial in nature (like school groups, membership clubs, social causes, churches) or b) completely organically developed. So, your emails can be of a commercial nature if your list is completely organic. If that’s the case, you’re welcome to use the SMTP service I have with my SendGrid account.
  2. If your email does not match this criteria, or you just want to use your own SMTP service, then feel free to set up an account on your own with SendGrid, JangoSMTP, Mailjet, or any other SMTP service provider. Your company may even have its own SMTP server that you can use. In a future post, I’ll be analyzing the popular SMTP providers, also known as transactional email services, and explaining which ones I think are the best and worst. Once you set up an account with an SMTP service provider, you’ll have to configure the account in certain ways.
  3. If you’re technically inclined, you can set up your own SMTP server on your own server. If you’re running Linux, here’s how to set up an SMTP service from scratch on a Linux server.

Configuring your SMTP service account

  1. GMass will connect without TLS/SSL to the SMTP server on the port of your choice. Most SMTP services allow you to connect on ports 25 and 2525 at a minimum.
  2. Ensure that open and click tracking are turned OFF with the SMTP server service. In fact, the SMTP server shouldn’t alter the message at all. It should just pass it through. This is because GMass will add the tracking for you if you set your tracking this way, and we don’t want the emails to be “double” tracked. Screenshot from SendGrid:
    Sendgrid Tracking
  3. Ensure there are no quota restrictions on your SMTP account, or if there are, that they are sufficient to handle your GMass campaigns.
  4. Check to see what Envelope From, also known as MAIL-FROM or RETURN-PATH address your SMTP service will use when relaying your email. Most transactional email services like SendGrid use a sendgrid.net domain by default, which makes it so you don’t necessarily have to alter your SPF records. Some SMTP services require domain verification, because the domain in your From Address will be the domain in the MAIL-FROM. Just be aware of this. You may need to alter your SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records.
  5. Ensure that Bounce Notifications are on. Set them to go to the From Address. This will allow GMass to process your bounces, just like normal. Not all SMTP services have this capability. SendGrid and JangoSMTP do. Mailgun and Mailjet do not. Screenshot from SendGrid:
    Sendgrid Bounce Settings

FAQ

Q: What’s going on here? How do I use an external SMTP server and send unlimited emails from my Gmail account?

A: You simply set up an SMTP account with a popular provider like SendGrid, Mailgun, Mailjet, or JangoSMTP. Then, you link your SMTP account to your Gmail account. Finally, for each campaign you send with GMass, you can choose whether to send the campaign through Gmail or through the SMTP server. If you send through Gmail, you’ll be constrained by Gmail’s limits, but if you send through the SMTP server, you’ll be able to send virtually unlimited emails.

Q: I’m so confused. I would love to be able to send unlimited emails from my Gmail account, but I’m not very technical and I know nothing about SMTP.

A: If you’re sending low-volume, non-commercial, email campaigns, you can apply to use our SendGrid account. Otherwise, please consult your organization’s IT person for further help. Setting up an SMTP account and linking it to GMass can be accomplished by any IT person with a basic knowledge of how email works.

Q: Doesn’t sending through an SMTP service eliminate the deliverability advantage GMass “normally” has, since normally GMass sends email through Google’s servers, which are the highest deliverability email servers in the world?

A: Theoretically, your deliverability may drop slightly if you switch from sending via Gmail to sending via an SMTP server. In our testing with several hundred users though, we have not seen a noticeable difference in deliverability, as measured by open and click rates. You should monitor your own campaign statistics though once you switch to SMTP sending, to ensure this is the case for you.

Q: It sounds like you’re getting around Google’s rules by sending this way. Won’t Google get upset with me if I use my Gmail account in this manner?

A: Sending email campaigns like this doesn’t violate any of Google’s terms. Additionally, thousands of users have set this up and found success. What we are offering here is simply a way to use the Gmail user interface to create, launch, and track an email campaign, while the emails are actually sent by a non-Gmail server.

Q: Do you charge more for sending via SMTP?

A: As of November 15, 2021, we bill for usage of SMTP-based message sending. There is a generous monthly allowance for sent messages before billing begins, and after that, a usage charge is assessed. The details for SMTP-based billing are here. Additionally, you’ll have the cost with the SMTP service provider, which may be an additional $10+/month USD, based on what kind of account you get. For your low-volume campaigns, you could still elect to send natively through your G Suite account, allowing for another 1,500-2,000 emails/day, which would not incur SMTP usage-based billing.

Q: Is the SMTP option available for free GMass accounts, or do I need to be subscribed to GMass?

A: It will work with a free GMass account as well, but using this option with a free GMass account defeats the purpose. GMass already limits free accounts to sending 50 emails per 24 hours, which is well under Gmail’s own limits, so connecting to an SMTP server to send high volume campaigns wouldn’t solve anything, since a GMass free account will already limit you to 50 emails per rolling 24 hours.

Q: Why should I use two services, yours and an external SMTP provider, when I could use one service like SendGrid, which also supports sending newsletters?

A: You are free to use any service you like, but we think that GMass with an external SMTP service makes for a powerful combination for email marketing and email automation. The ease and familiarity of the Gmail interface makes sending an email campaign a time efficient process. Additionally, by combining GMass and an external SMTP service, you can send virtually unlimited emails with the auto follow-up feature, a feat that would be impossible without GMass, since GMass integrates with your Gmail Inbox. Using just SendGrid in a standalone fashion won’t accomplish that.

Q: I’ve read that Gmail doesn’t allow its users to send “from” their Gmail accounts using outside servers. So how are you getting away with this?

A: It was thought that in early 2017, Gmail was going to update their DMARC policy to reject emails that are “from” a gmail.com address and sent by a non-Gmail server. Here’s some more detail on that prediction. That change hasn’t happened yet though. Here is Gmail’s DMARC record as of September 2017:

Gmail’s DMARC policy in 2017

And here it is in January of 2021:

Gmail’s DMARC policy as of January 2021. It hasn’t changed yet to reject emails sent “from” gmail.com from a non-Gmail server. Once they change it, p=none will become p=reject.

The only difference from 2017 to 2021 is the addition of the “sp” tag, which is basically irrelevant, since nobody sends from a subdomain of “gmail.com”.

If you are sending campaigns from your @gmail.com address rather than your organization’s G Suite address, then this policy is relevant to you, and we’ll be monitoring it for changes. In our testing so far though, we’ve only found one email provider, AOL, that routes emails that match this criteria to the Spam folder. Even Gmail doesn’t reject email that is sent from an @gmail.com address by a non-Gmail server. For example, in my testing, I sent email “from” [email protected] through smtp.sendgrid.net to my [email protected] account, and the email arrived in the Inbox at my [email protected] account. If you are sending from your G Suite address, then you don’t need to worry about this policy at all, because you get to set your own policy for your domain!

See also: real-time stats of campaigns sent “from” a gmail.com address but routed through an external SMTP server.

Q: In my Gmail Settings under “Send mail as”, I can add another From Address to use, and then Gmail asks me to specify an SMTP server. How is that different from specifying an SMTP server this way?

A: When you set up a new From Address in your Gmail account, if the From Address is a non-Gmail address, then yes, you are asked to set an SMTP server. However, even in that case, the Gmail sending limits still apply because it is still Gmail that is relaying the emails through your SMTP server. With this new method of linking the SMTP account to your GMass account, Gmail isn’t “handling” any of the email sending and isn’t “aware” of what’s being sent, so the limits won’t apply.

Q: I want to send a 100,000 email campaign using GMass and SendGrid. How long will it take my campaign to send?

A: Admittedly, because of how we are sending these emails, we have not optimized this process for speed. If you need to send 100,000 emails in an hour, then this isn’t the right solution. The rate of sending will be around 3,500 emails/hour. Why so slow? Because the processing power of both sending the email through an external SMTP service AND making sure your Gmail account knows about it is a “costly” procedure, from a computing perspective. So, if you need to send 25,000 emails throughout the course of the day, then this could work well for you. But if you need to send 25,000 emails in the next ten minutes, this is not the solution for you.

Q: Do I need to worry about SPF, DKIM, and DMARC?

A: It depends on which SMTP service you choose and whether you’re sending from an @gmail.com address or a G Suite address.

If sending from an @gmail.com account, you don’t need to worry about any of this, because Gmail handles it for you.

If sending from a Google Workspace account, then it depends on the SMTP service you choose.

The default setup with SendGrid is such that you do NOT have to worry about SPF, DKIM, and DMARC. This is because in the default setup the MAIL-FROM used in email sending is a sendgrid.net address, so the SPF and DKIM signing is taken care of by SendGrid’s DNS records and infrastructure.

If you opt for SendGrid’s “whitelabel” option though, then the MAIL-FROM can be based on your own domain, and then you would need to ensure that SPF is set up to allow sending from your domain through SendGrid, and you can then have emails DKIM-signed by your own domain as well. For other providers, like Mailgun, for example, you have to “whitelabel” your domain from the outset, and handle SPF/DKIM from the outset. Therefore we can conclude that getting set up on SendGrid is easier because they don’t require this setup.

Q: Do you recommend certain SMTP services over others?

A: There are many SMTP services to choose from, including SendGrid, JangoSMTP, Mailgun, Mailjet, SparkPost, Amazon SES, and others. Each has its strengths and weaknesses, and I’ll be detailing all of these in a future blog post. I’ve been testing extensively with SendGrid, and so far, I’ve found it to be a good fit for this solution, because it doesn’t require any domain verification to get started and it sends bounces back to you. That’s not to say that another service wouldn’t fit you just as well. Personally, I’m most familiar with SendGrid and JangoSMTP. Full disclosure: I created JangoSMTP back in the early 2000s, and it was acquired in 2013, but I’m still close to the JangoSMTP team.

Common Scenarios

When you link an SMTP account to your GMass account, you may encounter these common scenarios.

  1. You are sending a campaign with Gmail when before your campaign finishes sending, you start to get “You’ve exceeded your limit” bounces and GMass pauses the sending of your campaign. If you then link an SMTP account to your GMass account, GMass will switch any pending campaigns to SMTP sending so that you don’t get these bounces anymore.
  2. You’ve just linked your SMTP account, or we’ve just approved you to use ours. When you compose your next campaign, the option in the Settings box will default to SMTP sending. You can of course switch it to Gmail sending. The Gmail vs SMTP option in the Settings box will remember whatever you last set it to.
  3. You set your campaign to just create Drafts rather than send right away. When you then click the link to send the Drafts, you’ll be given a choice of whether to send them via Gmail or via the SMTP server linked to your account.

More Resources

If you’d like to dive deeper into Gmail, SMTP sending, and the correct configuration for an SMTP account, you might be interested in:

Using SendGrid? The recommended SendGrid configuration.

If you’re setting up an SMTP account, we generally recommend against getting a dedicated IP. Here’s why.

What is an SMTP server? Here’s the Wikipedia article on SMTP.

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We recently announced the official launch of unlimited sending in Gmail. It works by allowing you to connect your GMass account to an external SMTP service like Sendgrid or JangoSMTP. You can read all about it here.

If you’re used to using the Just create Drafts feature, which allows you to preview each individual email in your campaign as a Gmail Draft first, and then click a link to send all the Drafts, then hooking up your account to an SMTP service has special implications for you, because of the timing of the creation of the Drafts.

Normally, when you don’t have your account linked to an SMTP service, the creation of Drafts operates on the same limits as Gmail’s sending limits. Meaning, if you launch a campaign to 5,000 people from a G Suite account (G Suite has a limit of 2,000 emails/day), and choose the Just create Drafts option, then the Drafts will be created at 1,950 Drafts the first day, another 1,950 Drafts the second day, and the final 1,100 Drafts on the third day.

If, however, you have linked an SMTP service to your GMass account, you may want all the Drafts created now, so that you can send all the Drafts now via the SMTP service.

Therefore, we have modified the interface such that if you have an SMTP service linked to your account, and you choose the “Just create Drafts” option, you will now be presented with a choice as to whether all the Drafts should be created now, or whether they should be created according to your Gmail account’s sending limits.

The idea is that if you intend to send the Drafts natively through Gmail, you probably want the Drafts created daily according to Gmail’s limits. But, if you intend to send the Drafts through the SMTP service, you probably want the all the Drafts created now.

After the Drafts are created, you are emailed a notification with a link to either SEND the Drafts or DELETE the Drafts. If you click the link to SEND the Drafts, you’ll be presented with two options: send via Gmail or send via the SMTP server.

After your Drafts are created, you have a choice of sending them through Gmail or with your account’s linked SMTP server.

 

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If you’re using the GMass unlimited sending option by connecting an SMTP service to GMass, you may have chosen Sendgrid as your SMTP service provider. If so, here is how you we recommend that you configure your Sendgrid account.

  1. If you created your SendGrid account after 9/17/2020… Accounts created after this date are required to have set up domain authentication before they can upgrade their free plan. More information on SendGrid’s website here: https://docs.sendgrid.com/ui/account-and-settings/upgrading-your-plan#upgrade-your-sendgrid-plan. This also means you cannot use a free Gmail account with a paid SendGrid account unless that SendGrid account predates 9/17/2020 — because, as a gmail.com account, you cannot set up domain authentication. (It’s Google’s domain.) As soon as you log in to your SendGrid account, you’ll be directed to verify a sender, so proceed with that before the rest of this setup. If your SendGrid account was created before September 17th, 2020, then you can skip ahead to step 2.
  2. GMass will connect without TLS/SSL to the SMTP server on the port of your choice. Sendgrid allows you to connect on ports 25 or 587. As of October 2020, you must authenticate into the Sendgrid SMTP relay with the username “apikey” (this is the same for everyone) and then your actual API key that you create from inside the SendGrid interface. Note that you cannot use the username/password that you use to log in to the SendGrid website. See below for an example. Remember: the SMTP username is always “apikey.” The SMTP server is smtp.sendgrid.net.
    This is how you will set the Sendgrid server to be used in GMass.set Sendgrid SMTP server
    Configure your GMass account to send with Sendgrid. You must set the username and password to be “apikey” and your actual API key. Do not enter the username/password you use to log in to SendGrid.
  3. Ensure that open and click tracking are turned OFF. This is because GMass will add the tracking for you if you check the box for open and click tracking under Settings, and we don’t want the emails to be double tracked. Here is how the “Tracking” section of Sendgrid should look:
    Sendgrid Tracking
  4. Ensure that Bounce Notifications are on. Set them to go to the From Address. This will allow GMass to process your bounces, just like normal. Not all SMTP services have this capability. Sendgrid and JangoSMTP do. Mailgun and Mailjet do not. Therefore this is what your Mail Settings screen in Sendgrid should look like:
  5. We generally recommend users do NOT get a dedicated IP address with Sendgrid. We’ve spoken to high level staff at Sendgrid who have explained that dedicated IPs start off as cold IP addresses with no sending reputation. That means that initially, with a dedicated IP you’re likely to see more deliverability issues than if you use an IP address from Sendgrid’s shared pool. Here’s an article explaining the pitfalls of dedicated IPs.
    Sendgrid Dedicated IP Addresses
    We recommend that you do not get a dedicated IP with Sendgrid.

     

  6. Similarly, we recommend that you do NOT whitelabel your domain either. Sendgrid highlights the deliverability advantages of a whitelisted domain, but because they force you to create a sub-domain of your domain, and don’t let you use your actual domain for the sending and signing of emails, your sub-domain will start off with no reputation and will likely cause delivery issues. Note: Some Sendgrid accounts require you to whitelabel your domain. Here’s how to get around that.

    Since our beta launch a few weeks ago, several users who set up a domain whitelabel have had spam and deliverability issues, specifically where Gmail highlights the white-labeled sub-domain as the source of the spam problem.

    Sendgrid Domain Whitelabel
    We recommend that you do NOT set up a domain whitelabel in your Sendgrid account.

     

  7. Lastly, do not set up an white-label email link either. This is equivalent to the branded tracking domain feature of GMass. Since we previously turned OFF Sendgrid’s open and click tracking in to avoid double-tracking, there’s no need to customize email links with Sendgrid.

    Sendgrid Link Whitelabel
    Setting up link whitelabels is irrelevant because you should have turned OFF open and click tracking in Sendgrid, since this will be handled by GMass.
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Email outreach is one of the most important steps in any marketing strategy.

Whether it’s prospecting for new clients, promoting content, or conducting cold email outreach.

But when push comes to shove, the hardest part is often overlooked.

Most cold email tactics tell you to conduct lead research and compile a list of prospects to cold email.

But more often than not, simply researching a lead won’t result in a perfect list of emails.

Finding someone’s email has become harder than ever.

Most people won’t put their email on a public forum for fear of spam.

And sometimes, you can’t just ask them.

But you need their emails if you have any hope of conducting an effective outreach campaign.

Thankfully, there are several different options that you can try.

Here are six sneaky ways to find a prospect’s email address in no time.

1. How to find emails: Start with a basic LinkedIn search

One of the most overlooked ways to find an email address is probably staring you right in the face.

Don’t worry. You’re not the only one.

I’m guilty of this too.

I never thought that LinkedIn prospecting could provide the emails of cold prospects.

But one day, I was browsing LinkedIn and compiling a few targets for a segmented cold outreach campaign.

I was solely researching their interests and pain points when I noticed that dozens of them put their emails on public display on LinkedIn.

As you could probably guess, this came as a shock to me.

But it’s true: Some prospects will put their emails directly on LinkedIn.

To find emails, head to LinkedIn and search for your target prospect in the search bar:

Once you locate their profile, expand the contact info drop-down in the top-right corner:

You should see a dedicated email section within the social media profiles.

This tactic can be hit or miss, but it’s worth a shot.

It’s one of the fastest ways to pull up a verified, legitimate email address.

If you don’t see an email address, don’t fret.

We have you covered with a few more guaranteed ways to find your prospects’ emails.

Even another one directly on LinkedIn…

2. How to find emails: Use this sneaky plugin directly on LinkedIn

Can’t find your prospect’s email address on their LinkedIn profile?

Don’t worry about it.

It’s time to get down to business.

Finding the best prospecting tools is the name of the game when it comes to hunting down email addresses.

Basic LinkedIn searches can net quick, easy emails.

But that doesn’t always happen.

And when it doesn’t, you can’t simply give up and move on to the next one.

LinkedIn inMail isn’t going to cut it for outreach.

You need an email address.

A great next step is using one of the coolest Google Chrome plugins to date:

ContactOut.

It’s a free, Chrome-based extension that allows you to find anyone’s email address based on their social profiles.

30% of recruiters in Fortune 500 companies use ContactOut.

And according to ContactOut, you can generate 2x the responses in 85% less time with their tool.

Plus, they claim to be the best tool on the market, finding emails 61% of the time:

All of their emails are vetted, too. They’re triple-verified and are 97% accurate.

That’s pretty amazing for a free prospecting tool.

Once you’ve prospected, you can even download a list of all of the emails you collected:

 

You can export that information directly into a Google Sheet for later reference and automation.

To get started, head to ContactOut and download the plugin.

Install it on your Chrome browser and head to a prospect’s profile on LinkedIn.

From here you can click on the Chrome extension, and it will automatically get to work for you:

Once you click this, a box will pop up and show you the email address of your prospect:

If you click “Find more emails,” you can do a second search beyond just their personal email.

This search will automatically detect the user’s current company for an email address associated with it:

This is one of the best email prospecting tools on the web today.

Plus, it’s free.

Once you’ve conducted your email prospecting, you can click “View pipeline” on the plugin to head back to your dashboard.

This is where you can download your lead list and export it:

Simply hit “Export leads,” and you have a perfect list of contacts ready for you to email.

3. How to find emails: Use Voila Norbert with only a name and website

What if you have almost no information on a prospect?

All you know is their company website and name.

This is a common occurrence in email outreach.

You’re browsing a company website, and you scroll to the “About” page.

You notice that there’s a list of every individual in the company, including C-suite executives.

But you can’t find them on LinkedIn.

Maybe they don’t have accounts. Maybe they’re private.

But you need their emails. Fast.

I have some good news for you:

Using Voila Norbert, all you need is a full name and company website.

It’s that simple.

Voila Norbert isn’t free, which is the only downside. But signing up for a free trial can get you 50 free lead searches:

To get started, create your free account and get 50 free lead searches.

Once you create a login, all you need is a prospect’s name and website:

Enter their first and last name into the first search bar. Next, type in their company website.

When you’re ready, hit the “Go Ahead, Norbert!” button, and it will find a verified email address for you.

But Voila Norbert is more than just an email prospecting tool. It has lots of other great features, too.

If you want more information about a newly-found email, you can click on it to pull up location and social information:

It will add each new email prospect as a “Lead” in your funnel.

You can even create segmented lists based on your goals.

For example, is this prospect for content promotion?

Create a separate list and add them to it.

Then use that list to automate email campaigns.

4. How to find emails: Subscribe to their newsletter for insights (and a real email)

One of the lesser known tricks in the industry is subscribing to a prospect’s newsletter.

Not only will you get their email address, but you’ll also gain valuable insights to leverage.

Plus, they’ll probably check to see if you actually follow them.

Being genuine is critical in email outreach.

If you’re lying to prospects and being disingenuous, you’re setting yourself up for a disaster.

Personalization works best when it’s sincere.

For example, telling a prospect that you liked their latest blog post and used it to improve your own business.

That’s not something to lie about. It’s something that you should want to achieve.

And you can directly accomplish that by tapping into a prospect’s newsletter.

Now, this tactic obviously won’t work for everyone on your list.

And it’s not supposed to.

This tactic is best served for your highest-value prospects.

The ones that could send your business to new heights.

To implement this tactic, head to your prospect’s site and sign up for their newsletter or input your email anywhere you can.

That could be for anything, such as an e-book, a newsletter, or any form of lead magnet.

Now, you simply play the waiting game.

For example, I recently signed up for a checklist lead magnet on AdEspresso.

Not long after, I got an email directly from the founder of the company:

This is an effective way to collect emails from your high-value targets while also gathering insights.

Leverage the lead magnet you downloaded to genuinely email your prospect and use it as an introductory talking point.

By doing so, you’re showing that you actually care about the prospect and the content or offerings they create.

It’s an effective one-two punch to get your prospect to respond fast.

5. How to find emails: Conduct a detailed Google search

Ah, Google.

Arguably the best search engine in existence.

Most people neglect it when it comes to email outreach.

But it’s actually one of the best tools around.

If someone’s email is listed online, you can find it quickly with a Google search.

This obvious and simple method is seriously underrated and forgotten.

Google knows our website content. Meaning if an email is out there on the world wide web, it’ll find it.

To get started, you’ll need a specific Google search.

One that I’ve used countless times with great success is the following:

[full name] + [company] + “email”

Adding their company name will help you narrow down the search results dramatically.

If that doesn’t work, try replacing “email” with the “@” symbol.  

Keep tweaking your searches until you find the email you’re looking for. And if you don’t find your particular prospect’s email but you do find their company always uses a standard email structure (for example, [email protected]), you can try that out for your prospect.

Remember that if you can’t find it, you have other tools at your disposal.

You can also use this tactic as a verification tool.

Search your prospect’s email on Google to see what comes up.

If their email and company show up, you’re on the right track to perfecting your outreach list.

6. How to find emails: Just ask

Sometimes that’s all you have to do.

Prospects aren’t these scary, mythical beings that you can’t approach.

Most people are genuinely eager to learn more about you and your business.

If you focus on building relationships, all you have to do is politely ask for their email.

Whether on a social media direct message or over the phone, just asking can often net amazing results.

And more often than not, it’s actually more natural. You aren’t intimidating or scaring the prospect by sending them an email out of the blue.

Here’s a specific outreach message that I’ve used many times to get the conversation started and collect emails by just asking.

This is best used on social media platforms like LinkedIn or Twitter. Simply send them this direct message, and you’ll be on your way to collecting emails naturally:

Hey [first name],

We’ve been connected on [social media platform] for a while now.

Your content is always top notch! Loved that last post on [post topic].

I actually just covered something similar, so it was great to get your take on it too.

Any chance that I could email you about it more? I’d love to connect on [pain point / topic].

Cheers,

[your name]

This template excels at showing genuine and sincere interest in the prospect and their content.

Give it a shot today to collect emails that you simply can’t find with other methods.

Or, use it as a conversation starter instead of a cold email that can be awkward or annoying.

How to Find Emails: Final thoughts

Email outreach is amazing.

You can use it to promote new content, capture new leads, and drive more sales.

But it has one huge flaw:

You often need an email address that you haven’t collected and isn’t currently accessible to you.

And without an email, you don’t have a cold outreach strategy.

Thankfully, there are a few sneaky ways to find your prospects’ emails.

Start with a basic LinkedIn search. While it may not be the be-all and end-all of your email collection strategy, it’s a great place to start.

Next, download the ContactOut plugin for Google Chrome. It’s a free, reliable prospecting tool that gets the job done fast.

If that doesn’t work, give Voila Norbert a shot. All you need is a name and company website to generate emails.

You can even directly search on Google or direct message someone on social media.

Implement these sneaky email prospecting tactics to get a perfect list of emails fast.

And one more note: After you find the prospects’ emails and bring them into GMass (you are using GMass for your cold email, right???), GMass can automatically detect their first names just from their email addresses. And if you do have their name, make sure to personalize your cold email To header for an extra little detail that can make a big difference.

Now go out and hunt down some emails.

Ready to transform Gmail into an email marketing/cold email/mail merge tool?


Only GMass packs every email app into one tool — and brings it all into Gmail for you. Better emails. Tons of power. Easy to use.


TRY GMASS FOR FREE
Download Chrome extension - 30 second install!
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Personalization is the name of the game when it comes to email outreach.

If you aren’t personalizing, your results are going to be subpar.

Personalized emails deliver a 6x higher transaction rate than non-personalized emails.

According to a study done by Aberdeen, personalized email messages can improve your click-through rates by 14% and your conversions by 10%.

But what is real personalization?

Beyond just [first name] and [company name]?

Most personalization aspects are the norm now.

Meaning they aren’t even a tactic. They’re commonplace.

But that also means that most real personalization tactics take too long.

They take copious amounts of research. And research takes time.

Time that you simply don’t have to waste.

Personalization can be tedious work, too. It feels like busywork that never ends.

Here are a few ways to fully personalize your email outreach while doing the minimum amount of busywork.

What real personalization looks like

Have you ever gotten an outreach email that referenced your latest article?

Or maybe one that said:

I loved your latest [blog post, social post, etc.].

That’s one of the most common personalization tactics in the book.

And while it’s a great start, it’s too common to generate abnormally high conversion rates.

It’s the easy route that many take to save as much time and effort as possible.

But the truth is:

Personalization takes a bit of time.

The only thing you can do is minimize that time with tools of the trade that are scaleable.

Real personalization comes in the form of small-talk-style conversation that would happen in the real world.

For example, talking about sports teams or life events.

Things that people actually care deeply about rather than their latest blog post.

Or talking about a book that was moving and inspirational.

These are some of the toughest things to personalize at scale, but doing so is what separates you from the rest.

For example, check out this personalization email from Yesware:

In that example, you can see deep personalization in a couple of spots:

  1. The reference to the recipient’s own guide to structure the email
  2. The reference to the event

It excels because it contains real, scalable personalization.

While this may seem overwhelming and time-consuming, it’s not.

With specific tools and tactics on GMass, you can personalize these efforts fast.

Meaning you don’t have to spend all day doing busywork or much research at all.

GMass has powerful, custom parameters that allow you to create any insert, similar to standard [firstname] parameters.

With GMass, you aren’t limited to basic customization of [firstname] and [lastname].

With the integration of Google Sheets, you can create any new personalization parameter you desire.

Are you ready to take your personalization to the next level with the minimum amount of busywork?

Here’s how to get started.

Step 1. Start with a Google Sheet

To get started with full personalization, you need a Google Sheet.

GMass allows you to do personalize at scale in any way that you want.

For example, you can set custom parameters like [favorite sports team] that GMass will utilize in the personalization process of your email.

All you have to do is set this up, and GMass takes care of the rest.

To get started, you need to develop a comprehensive spreadsheet.

The spreadsheet will contain everything from your prospects email to their first and last name, company, and any further personalization you want.

Open up a new spreadsheet and enter the basic information first:

Once you’ve done this, populate your leads into the spreadsheet.

Add in all of their basic contact and name information that would go in a standard outreach list.

From here you can add serious personalization efforts that you can really scale.

Meaning you don’t have to sit on the computer all day typing in new emails to send.

First, you just have to figure what personalization style you’re going for.

For example, do you want to tap into their favorite TV show? Their favorite book? Sports teams?

It all depends on what you’re going for with this campaign.

But I won’t leave you empty-handed.

One of the best personalization tactics follows a popular writing style called PAS:

Problem, agitate, solution.

Here’s a perfect example of PAS in action that you might recognize from reading blogs posts:

Problem: Personalization takes too long.

Agitate: But it generates higher conversion rates. You need it, but you can’t afford to spend all day on it.

Solution: Using XX tools will help you personalize in less time.

PAS is an old-school format that still applies today.

Sales Hacker published one of the best email templates of all time that follows this similar style:

Hi John,

I’m guessing your roof got hit by the hail storm over the weekend. [Situation/Problem]

Jess, our roofing engineer, just completed a repair audit of the building next to yours (Joe’s Plumbing) and found a way to cut repair cost by 50%. [3rd party success]

Do you want me to ask Jess to drop by and take a look at your roof? [Offer]

Best,
Dan

By leading with a problem, you’re tapping into your potential customer’s pain points perfectly.

Showing that you know, care, and can help alleviate that stress from their daily lives.

Next, you showcase social proof in the form of third-party success.

You show that you’ve been able to solve that problem for others.

Lastly, you close with an offer that doesn’t require them to pay you anything up-front.

This effectively eliminates any and all risk from the equation.

And thankfully, this is highly scalable in just minutes.

To get started scaling this template, you need to outline three major things:

1. The recipient’s pain point/situation/problem

2. An example of social proof (i.e., third-party success)

3. Your offer

The great part about these three things is how scalable they are.

When you’re developing a list for outreach, you likely have the same goal in mind:

Driving them to a sale, a signup, or something of that nature.

Now analyze the problem that you’re solving with your product.

For example, if you’re selling or attempting to get signups for an SEO e-book, you’re solving the problem of low traffic numbers.

As your situation/problem, you can write:

Getting sustainable organic traffic is nearly impossible in today’s online landscape.

Next, write out your example of success. You can even draw from case studies for this:

We recently helped a company grow their organic traffic by 30% in just one month.

Lastly, outline your offer:

We crafted this amazing, free e-book to help your business get more traffic. Would you like me to send it over?

And just like that, you’ve personalized on a whole new, scaleable level.

Head back to your Google Sheet and input those three main factors. Customize each pain point to your specific lead so that no two emails are the same:

Repeat this process until you’ve filled out each lead on your Google Sheet.

Remember that you should adjust these values for each lead, too.

If you have differentiated members on your list, simply enter new problems, success examples, and offers.

The goal here is to personalize, not mass produce.

Meaning that you should tailor each problem, success example, and offer.

You can also customize this for almost any personalized topic!

For example, you can tap into your prospect’s favorite sports teams:

Hi [first name],

I noticed that you’re a fan of the [sports team]. You must be excited about their recent [win, event, etc.], I know I am.

Now you can tie that back into your problem, success examples, and offers.

The options are limitless.

Once you’ve done that, it’s time to integrate it directly into GMass to save you tons of time and effort.

Step 2. Integrate your Google Sheet with GMass

After you’ve compiled your scaleable outreach document, head to your Gmail account and click on the Google Sheet integration:

Select the spreadsheet of your leads that you just created and upload that into GMass.

From here, navigate to the personalization settings and make sure that your custom parameters loaded properly:

You should see “Problem,” “SuccessExample,” and “Offer,” or whatever custom parameters you chose to create.

Now, use these new parameters and craft a perfectly personalized email for each member of your list.

Insert those custom parameters amongst your text to differentiate each email.

Step 3. Schedule out your campaign

The next step is to schedule out your campaigns for the best success.

On GMass, click the settings arrow to pull up your dashboard.

From here, select to schedule out your emails for a specific date and time.

According to CoSchedule, the best time and date to send an email is Tuesday at 10 a.m.

Be sure to schedule your email campaign in advance for the best performance possible.

I personally recommend cutting your email list into two separate Google Sheets.

This will allow you to test two different times to see which performs best.

It’s a small scale A/B test that can give you some powerful insight into how timing will impact your success with your targets.

Lastly, you need to automate if you want to reduce busywork.

Here’s how.

Step 4. Set up auto responses

Drip email campaigns are the bread and butter of automation and time-saving tools.

Personalization takes a long time.

Especially when it’s genuine.

And we know that genuine content and messaging get the best results.

But sending multiple campaigns is busywork.

It’s boring, tedious, and takes hours of manual labor.

Thankfully, you can automate your campaigns with GMass to keep sending emails if certain targets aren’t responding.

Unfortunately, not all leads will respond to the first contact email.

Meaning you need an automated system to send multiple emails until they do respond.

In GMass, you can quickly set this up for your new personalization-based campaign.

Before you send your next campaign, head to the GMass settings and enable the auto follow-up feature:

This will allow you to create multiple “Stages” of emails directed at targets who aren’t responding:

Customize each stage with the goal of getting them to come back and respond.

This should save you tons of time and money that you would otherwise spend writing replies to all your leads.

Final thoughts…

Personalization is necessary.

We all know that.

But it takes far too long to implement in a scalable way.

It takes real research to personalize beyond typical [first name] parameters.

And research takes time that you simply don’t have to waste or offer.

You need to focus on a few personalization tactics that will net you the majority of your results with the least amount of busywork.

The way to start is by creating a customized spreadsheet with all of your lead contacts.

In this spreadsheet, focus on detailed personalization parameters that you can customize.

For example, you can add favorite sports teams, tv shows, books, or anything you can think of.

Try combining that with a formulaic approach that focuses on solving the user’s problem.

Implement this into a new, schedule-based campaign that incorporates drip emails.

It should only take you an hour to set up for hundreds of leads, leaving you the entire day to sit back and watch the responses flood in.

Personalization is changing daily, and keeping up is stressful. Put these tips to use and develop better personalization that lands clients in less time.

Ready to transform Gmail into an email marketing/cold email/mail merge tool?


Only GMass packs every email app into one tool — and brings it all into Gmail for you. Better emails. Tons of power. Easy to use.


TRY GMASS FOR FREE
Download Chrome extension - 30 second install!
No credit card required
Love what you're reading? Get the latest email strategy and tips & stay in touch.
   

 

Email open rates aren’t amazing. We all know that.

Especially when it comes to cold emails or reaching someone for the first time.

But all of that is about to change.

Gmail recently released native, mail-based ads directly into AdWords after beta testing them for a few years.

Now you can deliver display-network-style ads directly into a user’s Gmail inbox.

It allows businesses to interact and engage with users like we’ve never seen before.

When you want to reach someone that you normally can’t, these ads are a perfect way to do it.

They stand out from typical emails in an inbox, so if your prospect isn’t responding, these ads are a great way to drive engagement.

In this post, I’ll walk you through what Gmail ads are, how to set them up, and most importantly:

How to run a Gmail ad campaign that generates a massive return on investment.

Let’s jump in!

What are Gmail ads?

Gmail has more than one billion monthly active users, making it an email haven for countless companies and users around the world.

And now, the platform has gotten even better for advertisers.

In September of 2015, Gmail introduced native ads for all AdWords advertisers on the Display Network.

They worked in beta testing for multiple years with advertisers to figure out how to extend their email marketing and advertising strategies.

Now they’re available for any advertiser to use, which is fantastic.

Gmail ads are targeted ads based on account activity, and they appear within the promotions tab of a given inbox:

These promotions tab ads come in one standard format that Gmail claims is the best in performance.

From beta testing, they’ve reduced the number of ads. So, to increase your open rates, they’ll show fewer ads but make sure that they are more specifically targeted.

Currently, you can set up one format of Gmail ads directly within AdWords, called the “collapsed ad” that contains an “expanded ad unit.”

The collapsed ad is what users see initially in their promotions inbox, mimicking the traditional look of an email:

The Gmail ad will display at the top of the inbox with a yellow “Ad” label to distinguish it from the rest of the content.

When a user clicks on the ad, it expands directly within the inbox:


Advertisers looking to take advantage of these ads can choose from multiple customizable templates for the expanded portion.

Gmail allows users to use single images, highlight promotions, use a CTA button, and even showcase multiple products or offers with the use of a single ad.

For tech-savvy users, the custom HTML format offers flexibility to control your assets and create a rich experience using videos, forms, multiple links, and more.

For example, here’s a sample expanded ad unit based on Gmail’s current templated offerings:

It includes multiple products and CTAs along with promotions.

So, how does the audience targeting work?

It taps into the already-existing display network tools like keywords, affinity audiences, demographics, and more.

Do you sell SEO services? You can target specific topics like “content marketing” or “search engine optimization” to show your ads to relevant customers.

Gmail ads are already proving to have big impacts. Renaissance Hotels has seen a 25% longer time on site and an 18% increase in pageviews per visit from their first few campaigns.

Are you ready to run a high ROI Gmail ad campaign?

Here’s how to set yourself up for success.

How to set up Gmail ads

Gmail ads are extremely easy to set up right within your existing AdWords account.

To get started, all you need is an active AdWords account with your credit card or payment system linked.

Head to the campaigns section and create a new one.

Be sure to select the display network, as this is the only network that is currently compatible with Gmail-based ads.

Clicking the display network as your campaign type will bring up a few different objectives and goals.

Currently, only three of the five goals on the display network will support Gmail ads.

Those include sales, leads, and website traffic:

Choose one of these three ads, and you’ll notice that your campaign subtype options will change.

Be sure to select “Gmail campaign” from the subtype list rather than a standard display network campaign:

From here, you can customize your audience just like you’d do for a standard display campaign.

Select specific keywords or audience functions like affinity groups or intent and life events.

You can even choose remarketing if that’s your goal:

Next, scroll down to the bottom after inputting your bidding and budget information.

Under the ad creation section, click “+ New Ad”:

From the drop-down list, select “+ Gmail ad”:

Now you can start to create a beautiful ad directly on AdWords that is optimized for both mobile and desktop experiences on Gmail.

You can add your business name, a headline, a description, your landing page, and your valuable assets like images and video content.

Clicking “More Options” will allow you to add a custom teaser, create call to actions, and even adjust the color options:

The “Custom teaser” option enables you to add more headline content including a custom offer or discount:

This is the main hub where you can create and edit your Gmail ads.

Now that you know the basics of getting your Gmail ads going, it’s time to dive into specific ways you can produce a sky-high return on investment with this ad format.

Tips for a higher ROI with Gmail Ads

Setting up Gmail ads is the easy part.

But producing a high return on investment in new mediums is tricky.

Flying blind will require you to test the waters for weeks (if not months) all while draining your budget on mostly failed tactics.

Here are a few ways to guarantee yourself a high ROI with Gmail ads.

Improve your open rates for cheaper ad costs

One of the best ways to reduce your ad spend on any platform is to improve the quality score of your ads.

That’s true of the AdWords search network, display network, Facebook, and Twitter.

Each platform sees a massive boost in performance with simultaneous decreases in costs when you optimize your quality score.

Unfortunately for Gmail-based ads, you currently can’t see the quality score of your ads.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t infer if it’s high or not.

Instead, start by looking at your open rates.

It’s the click-through rate from unexpanded ad to expanded ad.

If it’s low, you’ll want to improve it.

Larry Kim of WordStream conducted a study on the relationship between cost per click and click-through rate (open rate) on Gmail-based ads.

He found a strong correlation between the two:

The higher the click-through/open rates were, the lower the cost per click.

Bad open rates? Your costs will be through the roof.

Advertisers with an open rate less than 5% were seeing costs approaching or surpassing a dollar.

Meanwhile, the top advertisers were paying less than 20 cents per click.

The difference is shocking and can lead to huge increases or decreases in return on investment.

So, what does this all mean?

It means that audience targeting and optimizing your offer for that audience is crucial for a high ROI.

You can’t risk targeting an audience who doesn’t want what you have to offer.

That’s only going to sink your ROI and deplete your budget.

To combat this, dial in all of your audience targeting features within each ad setup on Gmail ads.

For example, make sure that each audience you target gets their own customized offer that’s guaranteed to resonate with them.

To do this, start by targeting keywords related to your offer:

For each different ad, you’ll want to target different keyword sets.

This way you can get as specific as possible with each offer rather than just targeting a broad group of “marketing” related users.

Next, specify that audience in more detail by including affinity groups:

Affinity groups will narrow down your audience to only include users who have dedicated interests.

If you combine this approach with intent and life-event targeting, you can narrow your pool a bit more, creating a hyper-specific audience:


Lastly, cap your audience off with demographic-based targeting:

With Gmail ads, you can target by gender, age, parental status, and household income.

For example, if you sell a product geared toward parents, you can eliminate tons of non-parents with a simple click.

Household income allows you to only target audiences who are most likely (or able) to buy from you.

Remember: bigger isn’t always better.

Having a massive 1,000,000-user audience might sound amazing, but if your product is specific, it’s not.

You want a smaller, targeted list of users who will open your ads at high rates and drive your cost per click down.

Boost your open rate more with your own best practices

Chances are, you’ve already conducted some form of email marketing.

So even if you haven’t created a specific Gmail ad before, you likely have experience with email-based campaigns.

MarketingProfs found that email is ranked the best in terms of channels that drive leads for marketers:

Odds are, email marketing is a commonplace tactic for you.

Meaning you have an idea of what works and what gets you a 0.001% open rate.

A great way to increase your open rate is to follow those same practices.

Depending on which analytics software you use, you can analyze which email campaigns have performed best.

Maybe you even recall what they were.

Simply take those existing subject lines and the content within the body of those emails and use them for your next Gmail ad!

You can place the subject line as your new headline to grab attention from users fast.

What worked for you on regular email marketing campaigns can carry over well to Gmail ads.

Test constantly

With any new advertising platform comes confusion.

What works? What doesn’t?

The truth is:

You’ll never know what works for your audience until you try it.

Thankfully, cost per clicks on Gmail are relatively cheap in comparison to typical search network costs.

Most advertisers aren’t paying 20 or 30 bucks a click.

Most are paying just a few bucks or less.

Meaning you can run a few small-scale tests and double down on the ones that show promise early on.

On the display network, create multiple ads for each campaign that you run:

Simply add a new ad to your ad group and see which ad performs best.

Remember: keep the audience targeting the same here. All you want to test is specific variables like headlines and offers.

See which headlines produce a better open rate.

Or, conduct a test to see if coupons and sales-based offers resonate better with your audience.

Always be sure to test one specific variable at a time to pinpoint what changes are causing increases or decreases in your sales.

Testing is the key to producing a high performing, ROI-generating Gmail ad campaign.

Final thoughts…

Reaching customers via email is becoming harder and harder.

Inboxes are more cluttered than ever, and people are getting more emails than ever before.

But you still need to reach those prospects if you have any hopes of growing your business.

With new Gmail-based ads, you can now target your ideal customers with ads directly in their inboxes.

Instead of getting lost in the sea of emails, your ad will display at the top of the inbox, giving you diverse options for converting traffic.

You can include diverse elements like video, product sales and customizable calls to action.

When implementing Gmail ads, work to improve your ROI by refining your audience targeting and boosting your open rate.

Take what you’ve learned from your previous successful email marketing campaigns and put it into practice here. To produce the best ROI possible with Gmail ads, you need to focus on driving your open rates higher.

If you put these pointers into practice, you can run a successful Gmail ad campaign that yields a high ROI.

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Cold outreach is a fantastic way to build new relationships or secure new leads.

But sometimes, cold outreach alone isn’t enough anymore.

Sure, it might help you land a few new leads or build some new relationships, but using it as a closed loop can be a bad idea.

It can limit your potential. Limit your return on investment and the revenue you could have generated from it.

User behavior isn’t always meant for a single touchpoint in the modern world.

Consumers often bounce from social media to emails to webinars and e-books before even considering buying from you.

Simply expecting a cold outreach target to jump on the phone and give you their hard-earned money is a limiting strategy.

You need something to pair with your high-level cold email tactics take your outreach strategy to the next level.

To keep those cold outreach targets interested and coming back for more.

Educating them is the key.

Answering the fundamental question that cold outreach alone often can’t answer:

What’s in it for me?

Today I’ll show you how to integrate paid cold outreach ads to skyrocket the success of your campaigns.

Paid cold outreach ads: Turn your cold outreach leads into a custom audience

Once you’ve performed the first step in the cold email process, you need some ammo to keep adding fuel to the fire.

Odds are, you won’t land a call with your outreach target after the first or even second email.

Why? Because they don’t know you yet. (Especially if they are true cold leads and you used one of our tricky “how to find emails” techniques to get their address.)

They aren’t brand aware, meaning they have no clue what your company does and how you can benefit them.

The critical factor of any businesses success is solving a pain point.

But you can’t solve that pain point for a user if they aren’t clear on what your business does.

This leaves one specific goal that you need to accomplish before your cold outreach can turn ROI positive:

Educating the potential customer by building brand awareness.

The customer needs to know what your company does, how they do it, and most importantly, what’s in it for them.

What do they get from the experience?

That’s where typical cold outreach falls short. You don’t have enough time or space to explain it all.

And getting them on the phone before they’ve become brand aware or educated on your business is a crap shoot.

It likely isn’t going to happen.

But that doesn’t mean it’s off the table.

There are a few sneaky ways to use paid ads to accomplish this goal on the side without forcing them or bombarding them with content from your email campaigns.

One of the best ways to do it is by turning your email list into a custom audience on Facebook.

This will allow you to deliver ads to your cold outreach targets to educate and build brand awareness during the outreach process.

Meaning you can drive them down the funnel faster and more effectively.

To get started, head to the Facebook Business Manager and navigate to the audiences section:

From here, you want to create a new custom audience.

You’ll base the custom audience on your cold outreach email target list.

Select the custom audience function and then choose “Customer File” from the list:

Here you can upload a customer list from Google Sheets or Excel, or you can even paste them in:

In your file, you can tap into a bunch of different modifiers:

If you have emails, phone numbers, zip codes and more, feel free to throw those in.

Once you’ve saved your list, Facebook will match your list to the existing Facebook accounts of your targets.

Now, it’s time to create the ad.

Remember that this entire stage of the buying journey is focused on building awareness of your brand and educating the lead on how they will benefit from working with you.

One of the best content types for this exact goal is case studies.

A case study can effectively showcase a few major things:

  1. It shows what your company does, what processes and methods you took, and what common problems you solve.
  2. It works as a form of social proof by showcasing how other real clients have benefited from working with you.
  3. It puts hard numbers in the mind of the potential customer.

To put this example into practice, check out this Unbounce ad:

This is the perfect form of educational content that builds brand awareness.

It’s effective because there is absolutely no downside to the lead downloading it. Unbounce eliminates the risk by offering it for free, no questions asked.

Users at this stage of your cold outreach campaign aren’t going to buy from you.

People make a big mistake when they go for the sale too early.

The key here is education and getting the customer to realize that they need your services.

This ad is a great example to tailor your own case study ads to.

They used cold, hard numbers in the image to grab attention:

10.8%.

The headline is also very powerful: How Leading Brands Succeed With Unbounce.

It’s simple and gets straight to the point: Unbounce can help you.

Once a user clicks, the ad directs them straight to a landing page that covers the case study in depth:

No need to submit emails or fill out forms because you already have their email.

This would only reduce your visits/click-throughs.

There is virtually no risk, and this type of content can really help a user grasp the impact your company has.

At the end of your case study landing page, add more case studies for them to view:


This will show them that it wasn’t a one-off, lucky case. And it will come in handy for remarketing these users later.

To make this tactic more impactful, send another follow-up email to your list that talks about the case study.

Reinforce it with the email to generate even more traffic to the study.

Once you’ve done this, it’s time for the next piece of the pie.

Remarket those interested leads

We all know that the buyer’s journey is painfully long.

Leads take weeks and even months to convert to a real sale.

But it works.

The typical funnel process is proven. Users simply won’t convert if they aren’t ready.

And a large part of that perceived “readiness” involves education and engagement with your brand.

When was the last time you walked into a store you’d never heard of and bought the first item you saw without reading about the company or understanding what they do?

Probably never.

Now that you’ve taken the first step and delivered ads for a case study to your outreach list, it’s time to bring back those interested leads for more content.

This time, we’re going to create a remarketing list.

To get started, head to Facebook again and create a new custom audience:

This time, choose the website traffic method from the list:

This will allow us to remarket engaged visitors from those specific landing pages in the first ad.

On your website traffic remarketing audience, start by choosing “People who visited specific web pages” and enter the landing page URL of your case study:

This will be the same URL you directed people to in the first ad.

This audience in and of itself will be great, but if you want, you can always get more specific.

Try creating multiple audiences from this point. Keep the existing audience based on landing page visits, but now create a separate audience of more engaged users by targeting visits to multiple pages:

Remember how Unbounce had multiple case studies at the end for users to read as well?

That’s perfect for remarketing.

You can now target users who were so interested that they took their own time to read another case study!

Save both of these custom audiences. Now let’s head to LinkedIn to create another audience.

LinkedIn is great for switching it up.

Users might get burnt out on Facebook. They might get sick of your ads.

LinkedIn is yet another amazing medium for reaching your targets.

Head to your Campaign Manager and create a new website audience:

From here, follow the same steps by entering your case study landing pages into the URL section:


Save your new custom website audience on LinkedIn, and now it’s time for the ads.

But before we jump into the ads, let’s recap on where in the funnel these audiences are likely to be.

This will help you decide what ad style to go with for maximum ROI.

The first audience you created consisted of users who visited your first case study landing page by clicking on your initial Facebook Ad.

These users didn’t visit any other pages, so they’re likely a little less warm.

Meaning they aren’t as brand aware or interested as the second group you created that visited multiple pages.

So your offer needs to be less demanding.

For the single landing page audience, focus on creating an ad with video content.

The video content can be anything from a business explainer to a case study in video form.

The goal with the first audience is to educate them more.

For example, here is a perfect business explainer-style video from HubSpot:

Video content performs very well on Facebook, which will help you drive more visits and engage your least engaged audience.

Now, for the second audience you created – the one where you targeted visitors who hit your original landing page and another case study page – we can get more actionable.

These users are hot. They’re engaged. Eager to learn more about you.

For this audience, you want to drive them to sign up for a free webinar.

A webinar will help to educate them further but focus more heavily on the transition from lead to sale.

For inspiration, check out this amazing ad from Microsoft Project. This might be the best webinar-based ad that I’ve ever seen:

It’s video-based and focuses on the goal of driving webinar visits.

Plus, they tailored the text-based content of the ad to perfection.

It perfectly taps into customer pain points with the first question-based statement:

Does your team find it difficult to deliver projects on-time and within budget?

Next, they offer a solution:

Discover how to easily set up and manage new projects by watching this webinar.

Simple, yet effective.

They address the pain point and deliver a swift solution that still has a relatively low threat or commitment level.

They don’t have to pay anything or give anything up.

These remarketing audiences will help you turn cold outreach prospects into sales faster than you could have imagined.

You don’t need to sit there emailing back and forth waiting for them to take action.

Bring the action directly to the outreach target with education-based ads that focus on building brand awareness.

These ads will help the outreach target understand how your business can help them without the threat of a phone call or giving up information.

Want to increase your cold outreach ROI?

Tap into Facebook and LinkedIn ads and remarketing to keep them in your funnel and interested in your company.

Paid Cold Outreach: Final Thoughts

Cold outreach is an amazing way to land new leads.

Countless companies and entrepreneurs have found massive success from hitting the grindstone and simply contacting new leads.

But nowadays, consumer behavior is different.

People go through an extended buyer’s journey that doesn’t allow for fast conversions after a few emails.

They want more. More information, more experiences.

Meaning you can’t sit back and hope that your cold outreach email converts a user.

Instead, start thinking of your cold outreach strategy as a funnel.

Draw them in with cold outreach, and then tailor your ads to their pain points.

Be sure to create low-risk ads that direct users on your cold list to case studies with the goal of educating them.

Next, remarket the interested users and bring them back to your site for another video or webinar based on their behavior.

Finally, move in for the close after you’ve educated your leads, and watch your cold outreach ROI skyrocket.

Cold outreach is great, but producing a high ROI from your cold outreach requires multiple touchpoints and a combination of strategies for optimum success.

Email marketing, cold email, and mail merge inside Gmail


Send incredible emails & automations and avoid the spam folder — all in one powerful but easy-to-learn tool


TRY GMASS FOR FREE
Download Chrome extension - 30 second install!
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Love what you're reading? Get the latest email strategy and tips & stay in touch.
   

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