Prospecting by email is challenging – and often unrewarding. High-level prospects receive hundreds of emails a day, so you won’t be surprised about how carefully you need to craft emails that recipients will open, read, and respond to.

Last week, we talked about writing amazing email subject lines. This week, we’re offering tactics to make people want to read and respond to your emails after they open them:

• Don’t write like a salesperson.
  • People don’t want to be called “sir” or “madam;” when you write casually, as if it’s an in-person conversation, you sound like a genuine person with something genuinely valuable to share.
• Make it easy.
  • Write emails that prospects can read and respond to in one minute or less by making them no longer than 5 sentences and making the offer and desired response/action blatantly obvious.
• Do some research.
  • Go deeper than a personalization token. Find a prospect’s job title or recent promotions/accomplishments, then reference a tidbit of personal information in each email. You can also demonstrate knowledge of their field by researching top trends in their market.

Another excellent buffer to put between writing and sending your email is this simple question: “If I were the prospect receiving this email, would I open it, read it, and respond to it?” If the answer is no, start over. If yes, send away!