200 cold emails sent, zero paying customers. Did I pick the wrong vertical?
Shipped BestReply 10 days ago. Chrome extension that drafts AI replies for Google Business Profile reviews. Live on the Web Store.
Revenue: $0. One organic signup who hasn't tried it yet.
Tried cold email through Instantly. Built a list of ~1,000 deduped restaurant leads across Philly and Austin, 198 sent so far. Reply rate is awful, no conversions.
One thing I'm learning: personalization doesn't beat a bad ICP fit. Standard cold email baseline is 0.5 to 1 percent reply rate. I went heavier than typical, personalized each email with the lead's first name plus a specific note about their Google profile so it reads warm not cold. Reply rate is still below that baseline. Tells me the bottleneck isn't the copy or the targeting, it's that restaurant. owners get bombarded with cold pitches and don't have bandwidth to engage with new tools.
Considering pivoting to dentists or med spas where the buyer is more sophisticated and LTV is higher.
Anyone here sold to small business owners? What channel actually worked for you?
The risk here is pivoting verticals before knowing what actually failed.
Restaurants might be wrong, but 200 cold emails can also fail because the offer is framed as “AI replies” instead of a revenue/reputation problem they already feel.
Dentists or med spas may be better buyers, but if the message still feels like another small tool, the same thing can happen again.
I’d diagnose this before sending the next batch: ICP, pain trigger, offer angle, and whether Google review replies are urgent enough for that buyer.
Happy to map the tighter version if useful. The key is avoiding another 200-email test that gives you activity but no clear learning.
Solid point.
On framing, I intentionally avoided "AI" anywhere in the pitch. The angle I leaned on was the pain side, specifically replying to low-rating reviews. Complaints are mentally exhausting to deal with, and one bad reply can make things worse.
Do you think I should push harder on that angle? Negative reviews feel like the strongest pain point to me, more than the generic "save time on replies" framing.
Yes, but I would not push harder on “negative reviews” blindly.
That angle can work, but only if the email makes the business cost clear enough. Otherwise it still sounds like reply assistance, just with a more painful use case.
The real decision is whether the next test should be restaurants with a sharper trigger, or a buyer like dentists/med spas where one bad review has more revenue impact.
That is exactly the part I’d map before another 200-email batch.
Drop your email and I’ll send over the tighter version.
That's the one common trap I keep seeing with founders like you having a high value tool that people can't fully understand. Look, your headline currently says "You run the business.
We'll handle the replies." which I have noticed while having a look at your app, the headline is still not fully clear like what value proposition it actually gives to your users, it's abstract and unclear instead of directly articulating the actual value that your tool gives, hmm I have something in mind should I write it to you here or what? just give me the green light and ill be happy to.
Sure, drop it here. Always open to suggestions.
Since I've seen you just updated the headline right now "Google review replies
that don't sound like a bot."
that still sounds like a feature, you have to lead with direct benefit when a headline is written like that it doesn't give a reason for the customer to use your tool.
Instead ill write it like this: "You get Google review replies without sounding like a bot" this is direct benefit driven and yes each word impact dramatically in conversion rates.
Wanna see how I rewrite the sub headline as well so you get the full stack, ill send it here in comments how about it?
This looks like a great product! I used to work a company trying to help small businesses with this - it is a big need. What's your competition look like? Is the pain big enough for the people you called? If they are getting by without software, that could be the problem. Maybe look for slightly larger businesses.
Last idea if you haven't tried - find the restaurants that are not replying to their google reviews.
Thanks! Some of those are more enterprise focused so I don't really think of them as direct competitors. My selling point is just helping with replies. There are some other extensions doing similar things.
When you were at that company, what was the actual pain signal that converted? Was it "I'm getting bad reviews and I don't know what to do" or "I have too many to keep up with" or something else? What was the company, if you're open to sharing?
They struggled to reply in google in a timely manner. The app was called Perch. Company was ThriveHive. The company was part of a larger company that eventually went through M&A with Gannett. This was 6 years ago. I don't think the app still exists.