The best cold email templates do not pitch anything. They invite the reader to something worth their time, then personalize the one line that proves you picked them on purpose. That is how Andy Milligan, founder of Columbus Marketing Organization, fills a curated in-person event from a cold list in about an hour.
When Andy recorded this session on a Monday in October, his solo marketing business had generated $394K in lifetime revenue. He was not chasing a client that day. He was inviting Columbus marketers to his second in-person event, about two weeks out, and he set himself a goal of roughly 50 emails, "all personalized, templated obviously, but personalized" (2:35). If you are still working toward how to get your first client, the same structure works for any outreach where you lead with value instead of a request.
"You have to be very careful to not just constantly check in on responses because sending messages gets more messages and you get down this rabbit hole of being less productive." Andy Milligan
Why cold email templates should lead with an invitation
Buyers are tired of being pitched by strangers. In a June 2025 Gartner survey of 632 B2B buyers, 73% said they actively avoid suppliers who send irrelevant outreach. A template is only as good as its relevance, so the job of a template is to make relevance fast, not to replace it.
An invitation is relevant by design. It gives the reader something, asks for very little, and starts a relationship that can turn into work later. It also builds the kind of trust that matters most in buying decisions: in a 2026 SurveyMonkey and Reddit study, 73% of U.S. business decision-makers named peer recommendations as their most trusted source. People who meet you at a good event become the peers who recommend you.
How Andy runs a cold email batch
Andy's process is simple enough to copy this week. Here is the sequence he followed in the video.
- Split the list by warmth. He started with 11 past attendees and 92 colder contacts (4:10). Past attendees get a short, familiar note. Colder contacts get one more line of context about who you are and why you thought of them.
- Set a target before you send. "I want to keep the confirmed invites list between 20 and 30," Andy says. A number keeps the batch focused and tells you when to stop.
- Work from your pipeline, not your inbox. Every contact lived in his CRM, so each email was a next step on a record, not a blank page.
- Template the structure, personalize the opener. Keep the body the same. Rewrite the first line for each person so it names the reason you chose them.
- Batch, then stop checking. He sent the whole batch in one block of focused time and kept his inbox closed while he did it.
The result after a little over an hour: 14 confirmed attendees, six from the first event and eight new ones, with about 30 emails and direct messages sent and 13 more people in the pipeline he expected to say yes (7:10). He also wanted 10 to 15 extras confirmed in advance, a buffer for the people who inevitably drop off.
Two cold email templates you can use today
These templates follow the structure Andy describes. Adapt the bracketed parts and keep each email short enough to read on a phone.
Template 1: Warm invite to a past contact
Subject: [Event name] is back on [date]
Hi [first name], we are hosting the next [event name] on [date] at [location]. You made the last one better, and I would love to have you back. It is a small group of about [number] people, and I plan the introductions ahead of time. Can I count you in?
Template 2: Cold invite to a new contact
Subject: Invite: [event name] for [their role] in [city]
Hi [first name], I run [community or business] for [who it serves] in [city]. [One specific line about why you chose them: their work, a post, a mutual connection.] We are hosting a small, curated [event type] on [date], and I think you would get a lot out of the room. No pitch, just good people and real introductions. Want me to save you a seat?
Both templates end with a yes-or-no question. That makes replying easy, which matters more than clever copy.
Pitfalls that sink a cold email batch
- Checking responses mid-batch. This is the trap Andy calls out directly (9:15). Replies pull you into conversations, and the batch never gets finished.
- Letting the list grow past what you can curate. Andy considered pushing his event to 35 or 40 people but was careful not to lose the curated feel. A smaller, well-matched list beats a bigger generic one.
- Personalizing the wrong part. Rewriting the whole email for every person burns time. Personalize the opener and keep everything else consistent.
- Skipping the follow-up. Many yeses come on the second touch. For timing and tone, see how Andy handles how to follow up with leads.
A note on rules: if your email promotes a product or service, the FTC's CAN-SPAM Act compliance guide for business, which also applies to business-to-business email, requires an accurate sender, a valid physical postal address, and a clear way to opt out of future marketing email. Check it before you send at volume.
Where these templates fit in your outreach
Cold email is one channel among several. Andy pairs it with a daily habit of reaching out, the same idea behind the Rule of 100, and with the broader approach in his guide to cold outreach. Invitations work especially well because they give you a reason to reach out that has nothing to do with selling.
Columbus Marketing Organization is a peer community for marketers, freelancers, and service providers in Columbus, Ohio, founded by Andy Milligan. Members share leads, introductions, and job opportunities, including the weekly Columbus Marketing Jobs newsletter. The events Andy fills with these emails are part of that community, and you can see what is coming up on the Columbus marketing events page.
Start your first batch
Good cold email templates keep the structure fixed and spend your effort on the one line that proves relevance. Pick a list, split it by warmth, set a target, and send your first batch in one focused hour with your inbox closed. Then come meet the people doing the same work inside the Columbus Marketing Organization community on Skool.
You have to be very careful to not just constantly check in on responses because sending messages gets more messages and you get down this rabbit hole of being less productive.
Frequently asked questions
What makes a good cold email template?
A good cold email template keeps the structure fixed and leaves room for one personalized opening line that shows why you chose the reader. It should be short enough to read on a phone, offer something useful, and end with an easy yes-or-no question instead of a long request.
How many cold emails should I send in one batch?
Set a target based on the outcome you need, not on volume. Andy aimed for about 50 personalized emails in a day for a 20 to 30 person event, and after a little over an hour he had 14 confirmed attendees and 13 more likely yeses in his pipeline.
Should cold emails pitch my services?
Usually not in the first message. Gartner found 73% of B2B buyers avoid suppliers who send irrelevant outreach. An invitation to an event, a useful resource, or an introduction gives the reader a reason to reply and starts a relationship that can lead to paid work later.
Do cold emails need an unsubscribe option?
If the email promotes a product or service, the FTC's CAN-SPAM Act compliance guide for business requires an accurate sender, a valid physical postal address, and a clear way to opt out of future marketing email. Personal one-to-one invitations are different, but check the guide before sending at volume.
Read the video transcript
Kind: captions Language: en Hey, what's going on guys? My name is Andy and I run a SOA marketing business that has generated 394K in lifetime revenue. And actually, I have three businesses. Uh, one is my web and SEO studio for healthcare called MMG Design. The other is the CMO, which is my job board community and mastermind for marketers here in Columbus. And the third is not pictured, but it is my podcast, which I do have a few updates to share on today. uh my podcast called Marketing by Design where we interview thought leaders in healthcare B2B and beyond. Uh added a few updates to this page, added some head shot of some thought leaders. Uh Anthony, Anthony, Jay, Ryan, Brian, and shout out to Task for being our diversity hire in the in the group here. Sorry. But um yeah, if this is your first time here, this is my daily marketing channel where I take you into the behind the scenes of my business and everything that I do that's working. You know what we usually do is we follow this three-step format here. We do a bit of live little bit of live lead genen. So I record my screen and I take you over my shoulder as I talk about the daily activities that I'm doing to grow my business. Then we're going to build and strategize in public. So I'll show you guys my plans, visions for the future, things that I'm focused on. And third, we do a little bit of updates and growth stats. So, I'll do a little bit of audience Q&A, talk to you about my stats, and log them manually to create this thing called awareness around the channels and platforms that I'm focused on growing, mostly YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, and my product. So that being said, uh it is a Monday and I feel so much better when I am recording, when I'm live, and when I have this accountability mechanism of sharing my journey with you guys because it just creates this inbuilt mechanism to where I am not performative, but I'm just accountable towards my action. You know, Joe Rogan, famous podcaster, once said this thing that you should live your life like there is a documentary crew following you around. like you only get one shot at it and that's just such a good maximum to live by. So I do find that whenever I throw on the camera and I record these videos, I'm just naturally more productive. I'm more focused on my actions and I'm more self-aware. And I have this coffee here um that I am enjoying and um I'm ready to get some work done today. We've got a full open day with no meetings today. It is a Monday, October 12th and I am going to really push myself today. I'm going to lock in. I just had breakfast. Uh, banana, Greek yogurt, and a little bit of granola. So, got some protein in. I got some cardio in this morning. I'll probably hit a late night gym session tonight after I've completely burnt myself out. But yeah, a few things that we're going to focus on today. Number one is obviously we're going to do a little bit of live here, but in terms of the mechanism that I'm focused on doing that for, uh, we're going to do email for event. So, by the time today is done, I want to have sent probably about 50 emails, all personalized, templated obviously, but uh personalized for the event that we're having here in a little over 2 weeks. So, I really need to hit the needle on making sure that these get completed and avoid myself of distractions. I have all of them set up here within my pipeline here in folk. All I have to do is basically follow up, clarify, lay out next steps, and um yeah, right now I have seven confirmed attendees. I need to do a little bit of a pulse and make sure that I have the right people attending, be curated about who I can make introductions for. Hit the nail on the head there, too. I have four meetings scheduled for tomorrow. Tomorrow is going to be a great busy day. Um but I need to clarify my schedule for tomorrow plan ahead, but this is what I'm going to be focusing on. And I'll probably run a time lapse while I send all these emails and coordinate that event. I want to make sure that I get a photographer for the event and make sure that they are registered to show up. Kind of juggling a little bit of mix [music] um juggling a few moving moving items here. I also need to register for this conference uh to help conference in Las Vegas that is a little over a month away. So need to get this done. just drop two grand on a ticket for that. And um yeah, so without further ado, let's get into these emails here. I have um 11 past attendees to reach out to and 92 colder ones that I can reach out to. Tony is attending, so that is eight total. I want to keep the confirmed invites list between 20 and 30. I find that to be the great size, perfect size [music] for, you know, a promised group event like this where it's curated onetoone introductions and I can also be conscious of who I can introduce to each other throughout there. So really looking forward to this event. I just want to make sure that I do the diligence ahead of time to make it perfect for everyone and that's kind of the that's the stress that I bear as the host and the first one went so well and now we have a bar and expectation to live up to. So without further ado, let's start codium. allighty beans. Okay, so spent a little of an hour sending emails. We now have 14 confirmed attendees. Uh, eight from last time or six from last time and eight new ones. Uh, which is great. And I already think we have 13 in the 14 in the pipeline. Um I'm very confident that almost all of these will say yes. And that'll put us right at our number. But again, I would like to have about 10 to 15 extras in advance. That being a mix between past attendees and previous ones. I still have some previous attendees to reach out to. Uh we'll invite Josh, we'll invite Tass. Um, so yeah, several sub still invite. So we're looking pretty good. Still got about 2 and 1/2 weeks to prepare, which is amazing. And for all the new attendees, obviously we'll get uh them their kind of same welcome gifts as last time. Make sure you guys check out the previous event. I did a full recap on our first inerson event. Went phenomenally. I think with this one, I might try to push the needle on making it upwards of 30, so 35 to 40. Who knows? We'll see. But things are looking well. I have a few quantifiers to put out. So, I'm going to wrap up this uh video here succinctly. But what I want to do is talk a little bit of strategy and [music] tracking brand stats. So, if we go in here into brand stats uh into our dashboard, um I did also reach out to uh Jesse to create content for the event. So, we have that covered. We'll have a photographer same way that we did last time, which I am just stoked about. And it looks like my camera is freezing here, which is not ideal, but oh well. Uh, let's go to home base here. Don't want that to be visible. Put it into retro mode here and go into brand stats. Uh, I want to X out of a few tabs here for loading and performance purposes. I also have Quad and Codeex freaking cooking in the background here. So, that's probably causing a little bit of this to happen. You guys probably noticed the thing about doing these is that when you do a type of outreach, you have to be very careful to not just constantly check in on responses because sending messages gets more messages and you get down this rabbit hole of being less productive. But I sent about 30 emails there, emails and DMs. So that's all set. Stoked with that progress. Now let's go on to have it. By the way, this is a killer playlist. ADHD hyperfocus absolutely locked in. So let's go to our channel. uh and track our brand stats. So, across past 30 days, 421 on there. Let's go to the secondary channel, LinkedIn, and podcast downloads and a newsletter. I think we have significant growth across all of these, so I'm excited to report that. Second has 56 subscribers. Last video did pretty well. Another hourong video. So, I appreciate you guys. Last retro freaking blew up. I think it's about time. I think next retro will be the last one that I keep public. I think I'm going to start putting these behind the community. A to add more value to the community, but B it's starting to get to a point to where I want these to add value to the right people. And I think it's starting to reach more of a mass market audience where in actuality all that transparent value should be a I I think it's so valued it should be valued appropriately behind a payw wall. And b I've been doing it for almost 3 years. So [music] if I get any push back on that I'm sorry guys. I don't think there's anyone else that shares as transparently and as real as I do. So [music] um that that's not set in stone. I'll ideate on that in the future. But secondary channel 56 subscribers. Let's track that. I need to code that as tab 56 increase of four. Main channel is at 425. I think it's more than that, isn't it? I posted a daily vlog last night. I was cooking on uh editing last night and posted a new daily vlog. That wasn't doing bad. I had about 40 or so views in the first couple hours. 49 views. Not bad. Bit different than the content that I usually post. why I chose to be alone with entrepreneur in my 20s. Some really good footage in that one. Love putting that together. Was a lot of fun. So, 425 subscribers on the main channel. Four up. Boom. LinkedIn. We are at 7933. 33 new ones. Hack same. Instagram same. Podcast download. Feedback. Commerce marketing jobs 249 almost at a quarterk subscribers six. One more and podcast downloads. I need to send this to the better link. So Spotify getters performance is down. Thank you. Um four five. Is that the exact same? No. Four up. [music] Trying to get this to 5k before too long. Would have increased but you know that's the name of the game. staying up for the long haul. Slow increases. Um, things that I'm excited about today. I'm going to be sending more of these emails today. I still have a measurable amount. If I could get to 50 total sent by the end of the day, I will have time later. I can also do this on kind of a um once I have some of my mover task for today done. I have definitely some client work. I have four inerson meetings up for tomorrow. It's going to be a backtoback day. I am meeting someone super new tomorrow uh in Dublin who is in the marketing space who will also be a good event attendee. So I'll be sure to run that by him. I want to be careful with the events to not get too many people because I mean um you want to same position of being a heights only. Um and you get too big you start to lose that. So I I think I can cross that bridge when I come to it but I don't think I'm there yet. Uh, I need to get on repurposing some of these playbooks or some of the YouTube videos into playbooks so that they're live on the site. SEO optimize them, really get that workflow through. I'm about five or six videos behind there. And I need to fill in my rule 100 tracker. I have Roa set on doing outreach for the newsletter. I gave her a whole list of pipelines and weeds. Um, so she'll be doing that. She's clocking in here in about an hour and a half to get that pipeline growing. hopefully grow that newsletter which serves as the top of funnel for the events things like that etc. But uh also I've been working tirelessly on our data uh that we're using for our client um for our SEO and growth clients. And this is super cool. So I've integrated I've been building this software and I made a full YouTube video about it that's going out on the main channel this Thursday. But this integrates so many different APIs. It in SE ranking, Google Analytics, Microsoft clarity and it gives such granular data into website health and it's proactiv it it has a proactive nature to it. So if you go to into this agents tab here, it daily scans the website and finds high leverage action items that then I can send to click up to create a task to create that thing. So it's monitoring the SEO the uh SE ranking for the keyword activity [music] site indexing. So if a page is an index, it creates a task to go and index those and deal with it automatically. And obviously with this lead funnel, which is my favorite part, set conversion events having to use Google Tag Manager and we can get visibility on how people are making it through our funnel. So awesome and absolutely love this. Um that's what I'm excited about. And again, today we have a meeting on Wednesday with um one of our new website build clients and that's our first site that we're actually building on Astro. So, I've been watching some Timothy Rick's tutorials to get that in place and making sure that um that is all built properly and in a great way. And I'm really enjoying the research phase of that project. Awesome. So, that's uh another update on the daily marketing channel. I appreciate you guys sticking around till the end of this. I'll probably record another video today just cuz I have a really good content idea that I'm kind of manifesting and I'm on my third cup of coffee today. So, I'm starting to starting to feel a little bit wired. I don't know why, but I have no issue drinking energy drinks, and those don't hit me nearly as hard as just black coffee does. So, maybe my brain wiring is, you know, disconfigured. But, um, yeah. Appreciate you guys watching. I'll see you tomorrow. Bye.