The Conversion-Funnel Cold Email
Treat a cold email like a growth funnel: open, then read, then reply — optimize each stage separately
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~days to results
- Steps
- 4
- Confidence
- 90%
Amol landed his Anthropic role by cold-emailing the CPO — the only PM Mike Krieger ever hired from a cold email. He treats cold outreach as a conversion funnel with distinct optimization points: a tested subject line that maximizes open rate, an under-saturated delivery channel, a ruthlessly short body, and relentless follow-up. The through-line is that a talented growth person's cold email doubles as an interview: if the recipient wanted to read it, you've proven the skill.
Origin
Amol Avasare's personal method, honed during his years as a startup founder sending high-volume outreach; used to cold-email Anthropic CPO Mike Krieger with no growth roles posted.
Core principles
- 01Each stage of the email is a separate conversion problem — open rate, read-through, and reply are optimized independently
- 02The subject line's only job is to earn the click; test it until open rate is high
- 03Deliverability beats volume — reach people where they aren't already drowning in outreach
- 04Brevity signals respect and competence; long emails lose
- 05Persistence is a feature, not a nuisance, when you genuinely care
How to run it
- 1
Engineer the subject line for open rate
Before anything else, the recipient must click. Write and A/B-refine subject-line copy over time until it reliably produces a high open rate. This is the first and most important conversion gate.
Pro tip Reuse a subject line you've already validated across many sends rather than inventing a fresh one each time.
Watch out A brilliant body is worthless if the email is never opened — do not skip this stage.
- 2
Pick an under-saturated channel
Map where your target already gets hammered with outreach (LinkedIn, work email) and deliberately avoid it. Find and use a less-contested channel such as their personal email, where your message stands out.
Pro tip Response rate is inversely related to how much outreach a channel already receives.
- 3
Keep the body ruthlessly short
State only three things: who I am, why I'd be a good fit, and that we should chat. Cut everything else. The shorter the ask, the lower the friction to reply.
- 4
Follow up until told to stop
Most first attempts fail. If you truly care about the outcome, keep following up on a cadence until the person either responds or explicitly asks you to stop.
Pro tip Frame persistence to yourself as a rule of thumb: only stop when they say 'please stop.'
Watch out Reserve this intensity for opportunities you genuinely care about — indiscriminate persistence burns reputation.
In the wild
As a heavy Claude user, Amol noticed Anthropic had a great product but obviously no growth team. With no growth roles listed, he sent Mike Krieger a short cold email: love the product, you badly need a growth team, want to chat. He didn't expect a reply.
→ Krieger responded on the first try and Amol became the only PM Krieger has ever hired from a cold email — landing the head-of-growth role at the fastest-growing company in history.
Common mistakes
Leading with your pitch instead of the click
Founders obsess over the body copy while ignoring the subject line. If open rate is low, nothing else matters — the funnel dies at stage one.
Emailing everyone in the same saturated inbox
Sending to LinkedIn or work email where the target already gets flooded guarantees a low response rate; failing to find a quieter channel wastes an otherwise good message.
Is it for you?
Best for
Founders, growth operators, and job-seekers trying to reach a specific high-value person (an executive, investor, or hiring manager) who isn't actively looking for them
Not ideal for
Mass cold-outreach campaigns where you can't tailor channel and copy per recipient, or reaching people who have explicitly asked not to be contacted
From the transcript
“from a conversion standpoint, someone sees the email, they need to click on it.”
“keeping it very short on here's who I am, here's why I'd be a good fit, and and we should chat.”
“if I really care about it, I should just keep keep reaching out to them and until they tell me like, "Please stop."”
From the episode
Head of Growth (Anthropic): “Claude is growing itself at this point”
Amol Avasare