HOW TO: Cold Email!

Hey everyone!

I'm back with another blog post about networking.  This week's topic is about cold emailing because this is something that I just recently did for the first time.  A cold email is a an initial email that is sent in order to benefit from it.  Cold emails are useful because they can get you in contact with someone within the industry that you are interested in.  Usually what you want to accomplish with a cold email is to set up an informational interview to learn about what they do, how they got there, and opportunities that they may have for you.  

When cold emailing someone, make sure to come off as polite as possible.  Start with saying I hope all is well!, I hope you are doing well., etc. This is a good way to start your email and then you can introduce yourself.  In your introduction, put your name, major, year in college, and what college that you go to.  I also included what field I was interested in.  After introducing yourself, you can then go in and ask to meet with them to learn more about them and their industry.  Remember this is just an "informational interview", not a job interview.  This is just to meet someone within the industry.  When putting a subject for this email I would go with something along the lines of: Hello, Inquiry, etc.  I did Hello for my most recent cold email and it worked perfectly!

It is very scary to be randomly emailing people that are in the industry that you are interested in, but this is a great way to build your network!  My first "informational interview" is next week and I am very excited for it.  Now that I have secured this interview from cold emailing, I now need to apply research about the person interviewing and the company that they work out.  I am trying to maximize the most opportunity from this informational interview and I think it is best if I come in knowing what types of questions I ask.

This can be said for any informational interview that anybody would participate it.  To prepare, first look into the company that they work for.  Look at the companies values, code of ethics, and work that they have put out.  What type of presence on do they have on social media? I think this is a great way to have a better understanding of the type of company you could potentially be working for whether that be for an internship or a job.  Next, look at the interviewers LinkedIn.  What type of experience do they have? Have they also worked at this company? Where did they go to school? Something that I highly recommend is trying to find something that you have in common with the person you are interviewing.  This way, you could be more memorable in your interview rather than just being another college student looking for a job/internship.  Having this type of insight will make you overly prepared for your "informational interview" (which is what you want!).  Good luck with cold emailing!