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Spam VS Cold Mail

What's the difference between spam and cold mail. I often send to those who are potentially using my app with why you need this on Twitter, email, and any media directly. I don't want to be a spammer.

But cold mail is so effective way for early-stage indie makers and startups. What do you think?

  1. 3

    Spam to me is poorly targeted bulk sending with no relevant to me.

    A cold email is someone who has reached out to me that I've never met before but is reaching out for a specific reason because there may be a mutual opportunity.

    Cold emailing does work, despite what a lot of people seem to think. Anyone just starting out in business is operating from a 100% cold positon.

  2. 3

    Just to share my experiences about cep2p.com: I see posts where people ask how to sell leftover foreign cash after a trip abroad. But as soon as I post on a forum that cep2p.com can help solve this headache, my account gets banned. :) I think, this is done by people who are never able to make anything of their own, but want to feel own significance and importance. They are the only ones who need to be banned for the rest of the people to breathe better. :)
    I also noticed that such forums sometimes spam me more than anybody else about their services. So...... make your own conclusions :)

    1. 2

      This x1000... so true. I've tried this in reddit/forums/etc. you'll sometimes be successful but more often the mods powertrip and ban/delete your posts... even tho it is fully relevant to the thread discussion!

    2. 2

      Thank you so much for thoughtful opinion from your own experience. I need to rethink how to sell this more.

    3. 1

      The reason you get banned is because your account looks, smells, and sounds like 100% spam. That could be for two reasons:

      1. Because you are a spammer.
      2. You have horrible judgement and every word you type screams "I'm spamming the shit out of you right now"

      If you can't convince people you are a normal person, you should be working on improving a different set of priorities.

  3. 2

    From a technical point of view there is no difference...

    The weird this is it depends on the POV of the receiver.
    And you can't know the POV of a reciver you know nothing about.

    But most people look at the relevancy and your homework prior to sending to them as a big filter.
    The more you know about them/what interests them and demonstrate that, the more they consider it legit.

    If I send you an email:
    " You got to checkout my new product http://example.com"
    It's super spammy
    But if I say
    "Hi Shun, found you on IH and I've seen your working on product X and asked about Y and I've built this product which might help and I'd love some feedback from a fellow IH that actually has some project under his belt"
    You'd probably consider it <1% spam and have a 40%-60% likelihood of responding.
    Why?

    1. Personal name, while poor by it's own it's a start that's almost a must.
    2. Place/group of interest and in common...
    3. Relevance established.
    4. Complements don't hurt and super personalised, possibly could specifically comment on the X product challenge and open room session..
    5. Clear what the ask is, not too long, no extra steps...
      ...

    They could both be technically unsolicited spam, but the difference in spam scores would be night and day

    Using a common aquintance is also a big step to the door.

    Ads are spam yet we accept them

    I guess it's about your level of confidence it would interest the other person and your ability to demonstrate it.
    (vs the everyone would 100% want and use this mentality)

  4. 1

    Will quickly classify in this way:

    High-quality cold mail: Sufficient research, personalized, specific call-to-action, indicate where the email comes from

    Spam: Zero personalization, email bought from bulk list, asking for: loan, ad, call, you won a prize etc

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