By Juwaria Merchant

In the world of freelancing, cold pitching is treated as the be-all and end-all to land clients. 

We’re not here to refute this claim. In fact, we’re here to back it up. Cold pitching, if done right, can do wonders for your freelancing career.

However, it can be scary. After all, we’re a bunch of coffee-loving, phone-call-hating introverts. So, to willingly message and interact with someone to have them give you their business can be terrifying. 

We get that. But it doesn’t have to feel that way if your aim is to create genuine relationships and partner with companies you believe in. 

If that’s what brings you to this article (i.e., learning how to build genuine relationships, partnering with dream brands, and cold emailing target clients), we’re here to help out with a few tips. 

Without further ado, let’s explore some effective cold pitching strategies. 

Tips for cold pitching

If you’re ready to start sending pitches to clients you’d love to work with, take note of these cold pitching strategies.

1. Change your mindset about cold pitching

A general assumption about cold pitching is that if you’re the one doing it, you get more out of the upcoming project than the client. While that could be true, it doesn’t necessarily have to be. 

After all, you’re a self-respecting freelancer who has a lot to offer and has the ability to make your clients a lot of money. You have valuable skills. 

Once you change your mindset and focus on what your prospective client can get out of the deal, your confidence will reflect in your cold email. 

2. Research prospective clients beforehand

To increase your chances of closing a cold pitch, you must research prospective clients beforehand. We say this because different clients have different preferences and pain points. 

For example, one prospect might prefer you send them a full-fledged personalized cold email, the other might want to read a two-line pitch. 

Similarly, one might actively be looking to partner with freelancers, and the other might not. 

When you keep up with your prospects on social media, they’ll eventually end up telling you their pain points and preferences. 

For example, here’s how Stav Ziv prefers freelance writers send a cold pitch:

Source

On that note, while you’re lurking on their social pages, go ahead and interact with them — however, only participate in conversations when relevant. Don’t do it only for the sake of getting noticed (that could have the opposite effect — aka, you might get noticed, but it’ll put you in a bad light). 

Here’s Eric Doty, content lead at Dock, agreeing with our statement. 

Source

Pro tip: Ensure you send your pitches to the right person at the right company (e.g., if you want to write a piece for Metro News on lifestyle, get in touch with the lifestyle editor, not their culture editor). You can use LinkedIn or tools like Hunter, ZoomInfo, or RocketReach to find the contacts of prospects, editors, marketing managers, and more. 

3. Focus on potential clients and their pain points

What’s the one thing all winning pitches have in common? Well, of course, they’re tailored toward the potential client’s pain points. 

Say, you’ve been following a marketing manager for two months now and you’ve figured their biggest pain point is that their existing roster of freelance writers has trouble writing SEO-optimized articles and social media posts. 

So, that’s what you focus on. In this scenario, you can tell them you offer SEO writing services and share examples that showcase your success with SEO writing. 

Alternatively, you can also look at the existing services you offer and talk about how those would benefit their company. 

Let’s look at the same example as above. If the client has the same pain point and if you offer content consulting services, you can talk about how you can train their writers and share links to case studies where you’ve successfully trained freelance writers in the past.

3. Get straight to the point

Let’s face it: long letters are straight outta the Victorian era. In the 21st century, we prefer to do things quickly, and that includes reading cold pitches. 

So, one of the most popular cold pitch strategies is to make your pitch short and sweet and get straight to the point. The key is to share:

• Who you are and what you do (you can add your company name too if you operate as an LLC or Ltd company)
• How can you help them 
• Ideas on how you can improve their content effort (e.g., freelance writers can share topic ideas their blog might benefit from)
• Social proof 
• Links to the necessary pages (website, social, portfolio, etc…)

In sum: 

Source

Side note: The phrase “get straight to the point” holds true for your subject line, too. If you can create an interesting subject line, that’s all well and great. But your job is to get the message across — so go for clarity over cleverness.

4. Don’t forget important portfolio links 

Prospects live by the philosophy “show, don’t tell.” 

So, when they put out a call for “B2B SaaS freelance writers with long-form writing expertise in the e-signature niche,” they’re looking for you to share long-form samples you’ve written for that niche (or a similar niche). 

When sharing these samples, ensure you pick out a few recently published pieces (that are preferably bylined). And if that’s not possible, share a link to your portfolio instead. 

However, don’t make them hunt for samples in your portfolio. Try to make your portfolio as clutter-free as possible (that’s to say, segregate the work you’ve done by industries and niche). 

For inspiration, you can look at the portfolios of freelance writers, such as Kaleigh Moore, Elise Dopson, and Kaitlyn Arford. 

5. Talk about your value proposition

When cold pitching, the spotlight’s on you. So, make sure to shine your brightest. 

Motivational quote aside, what this means is that every cold pitch should contain a section that tells your target clients what makes you special (aka, the reason why they should choose you above others). 

So, here’s what a good cold pitch should contain: 

• Social proof (such as testimonials, client names, case studies, and awards)
• Your experience/expertise (or a small write-up that tells them how you understand their pain points). 
• Your value proposition.

And if you wish to add an extra layer of razzle-dazzle, sprinkle in some creativity, include videos, add personality (this is a big one, no one wants to read boring content!), share stuff they’d like, or hyper-personalize your pitch. 

6. End with a response–worthy call to action

After analyzing more than 330,000 CTAs, HubSpot came up with the conclusion that personalized calls to action convert 202% better. 

Surprising, isn’t it? Not. 

The fact of the matter is, if your cold pitch doesn’t have actionable CTAs, it can leave a potential client second-guessing how you want them to respond or what they could potentially get after they answer your cold email. 

So, instead of writing “look forward to hearing from you,” consider writing CTAs that look something like these:

• I’m also considering sharing my idea with XYZ publication. If you’re interested in me writing about [insert topic] for your readers, please respond by [insert date].
• If you wish to replicate the results I got for XYZ company, write back!
• If you’re interested, I’m happy to share my thoughts on XYZ topic. Simply let me know when we can arrange a call to discuss this further (use this CTA sparingly, not many prospects want to get on calls right after a cold pitch).

The common theme with these calls to action is that they either show what a prospect would get or lose by taking this conversation forward. 

7. Send a follow-up email 

Say you’ve gone through the whole nine hoops, researched the potential client, written a personalized email, developed the perfect subject line, shared social proof and case studies, told them how you understood their pain points, and created an award-worthy call to action. What’s next? 

Follow-ups. That’s what’s next. 

It’s quite likely that the person you’re pitching to receives hundreds (if not thousands) of emails in a week, and yours might have just slipped through the cracks. 

So, send follow-up emails at regular intervals (ideally 5-7 days) to share new ideas and reminders or to get updates on your existing pitch. 

And last but not least, a friendly message: pitching is a numbers game. The more you send, the more acceptance and rejections you’ll get. Rejections are just a part of the job. Better yet, rejections are redirections. So, keep at it, and don’t lose hope!

Source

Supercharge your freelancing career with warm pitches

Sending cold pitches is an art and a science, and freelancers are always on a path to improving their pitching game to find new clients. 

It’s easy to feel dejected when a pitch gets rejected (or, worse yet, ghosted). But, you can follow formulas and expert cold pitching strategies to reduce your rejection rates reduce and improve your acceptance rates. 

If you want to learn how to cold pitch like a pro, work with dream clients, get new clients from cold emailing, and have your cold pitches reviewed by an expert freelance writer, you’re going to want to join Pitch and Prosper. 

It’s the only course in the market dedicated to helping your freelance business grow by finding high-quality clients with warm pitches.