Cold email

Cold email to investors

Write a cold email that earns a reply by being short, specific, and obviously researched. The bar: the investor should feel you wrote it for them, it should be skimmable in 15 seconds, and the ask should be trivially easy to say yes to.

Read shared/references/outreach-ethics.md first. If you can't ground the email in something true and specific about this investor, it isn't ready — go research (use the investor-targeting skill) before drafting.

Gather before drafting

Ask the founder for whatever is missing:

1. Who you're emailing — name, firm, and the specific reason they fit (a recent deal, a stated thesis, a portfolio company like yours). This is the personalization hook; without it, stop.
2. One-liner — what you do, for whom.
3. Traction — the 1–2 hardest, truest proof points (revenue, growth, users, notable design partners/LOIs). Use the founder's numbers verbatim.
4. The ask & the raise — stage, how much, and what you want from this email (usually a 20–30 min call, not "let's talk").
5. Credibility — anything that de-risks the founder (relevant background, notable existing investors/advisors — only if real).

The anatomy (keep it ~75–125 words)

See references/email-anatomy.md for the deep version. The shape:

1. Subject line — 3–6 words, concrete, no hype. Offer two A/B options. Good: "Seed round — <category> for <customer>" / "<Mutual context> + our <metric>". Bad: "Game-changing opportunity!!!"
2. The hook (1 sentence) — the specific, true reason you're emailing them. "I saw you led <company>'s seed — we're building the <X> version for <Y>."
3. What you do (1 sentence) — crisp, jargon-free, the wedge.
4. Traction (1–2 sentences) — the proof that you're worth 20 minutes. Numbers > adjectives.
5. The ask (1 sentence) — one specific, low-friction request. "Open to a 20-min call next week?" Optionally offer the deck/data instead of attaching.
6. Signature — name, role, company, one link (site or deck). No giant attachments on a cold email.

Hard rules

• One specific personalization per email. No find-and-replace {{firstName}} mail merge. If you're drafting for several investors, write a distinct hook for each; share only the middle.
• Truthful traction. Never inflate. Don't imply investors/customers you don't have.
• Short. If it doesn't fit on a phone screen without scrolling, cut.
• One ask. Multiple asks = no reply.
• Plain text feel. No images, no heavy formatting, no tracking-pixel theater.

Follow-up sequence

Most replies come from follow-ups, not the first email. Draft a polite, value-adding sequence (see references/email-anatomy.md for templates):

• Follow-up 1 (after ~4–5 business days): brief bump + one new piece of info (a fresh metric, a new customer, a milestone). Not "just checking in."
• Follow-up 2 (after ~7 days): shorter still; restate the one ask, add a graceful out ("if it's not a fit, no worries — a pointer to who might be right would mean a lot").
• Then stop. Two or three touches total. More is harassment and hurts your name. Honor any "not now / not a fit" immediately.

Output format

Deliver:

• 2 subject-line options
• The email body (ready to paste)
• Follow-up 1 and Follow-up 2 drafts
• A one-line personalization checklist: the specific true fact you used, and a reminder to re-verify it before sending.

Bilingual / China market (中文)

If the founder is raising in the China market or asks for Chinese output, use references/zh-talk-tracks.md and first read shared/references/china-market-playbook.md. Don't just translate the English — China's primary channel is WeChat (微信), not email, etiquette and forms of address differ, and a warm path matters even more. The zh file gives WeChat opener + email versions, follow-ups, and a personalization checklist in Chinese.

Refuse / push back when

• The user wants one generic email to blast to a list → offer instead to write a reusable frame plus per-investor hooks, and point them to the volume note in the ethics file.
• The traction described seems inflated or fabricated → ask for the real numbers.
• There's a warm path available → suggest the warm-intro skill instead; a warm intro beats the best cold email.