If you don’t run for the bus, you won’t catch it!
The Cold Email
101–110 of 133 posts
Re: The Cold Email
#102My biggest mistake in life was thinking too big and aiming too high. Now I absolutely hate the saying "If you want to reach the moon, aim for the stars." This belief ruined me. The people who were writing desperate emails and bending over to get a wage-slave job are much better off now. Meanwhile I was trying to raise funding for big ideas from big investors; it was a complete waste of time. Reality is "If you want t…
Do you find this to be true in romance as well?
Re: The Cold Email
#103Something I learned awhile ago is that most people that I consider "celebrities" really aren't that famous, and as such are generally pretty happy to respond to emails. In ~2014 I sent an email to Joe Armstrong (one of the creators of Erlang) asking some questions about concurrency because I still didn't fully understand why Erlang was supposed to be better for it. I expected him to just point me to an FAQ or simply…
In 2013 there was some question about the SuperCow Powers that some programs had. I took time to ask Jason Gunthorpe about it. He didn't answer my email: we make a post about it [1] that became the canonical explanation. That had a huge impact on me: how could I take so long to answer simple questions from friends when Jason Gunthorpe took time to answer mine?
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20190322061230/https://plus.goog...
Re: The Cold Email
#104I was rejected from a job interview a few years ago - wow 13 years ago now - and was honestly shocked after how well the interview went. I decided to write a letter (email) to the HR department implying they'd made a huge mistake (the head of HR was in the interview too). She (as much as I knew at the time) overruled my would-be boss and the rest is history. Best email I ever sent.
I was in a similar situation and probably sent a cringy, emotional email because when I read it back now after all these years, I am embarrassed at how desperate my tone was. It all worked out well, though; I learnt to handle rejections better, and in fact ended up with way better gig in merely 3 weeks after that.
Re: The Cold Email
#105though - I'm not as successful as Zach, but damn cold emails & cold phone calls have helped me a ton.
Thanks to the strangers that helped me out while not owing me anything.
it's the same reason - I try respond to every cold email.
Re: The Cold Email
#106This is a great read, but I wonder how effective cold messages are in the AI era. I now receive customized cold emails and LinkedIn messages. There are several tools like Clay that make AI messaging effortless. It is becoming increasingly difficult to determine if message are AI-generated or if a human actually took the time to write them and care. I see in-person networking becoming increasingly valuable. Unfortunat…
I'd suggest writing by hand as a proof of work, for now at least!
Re: The Cold Email
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
A long time ago my mother sent a short hate mail to Mark Cuban after seeing him in a TV interview. He actually responded. Then he signed her up for the Mark Cuban newsletter. She could not figure out how to unsubscribe from it. It was honestly pretty hilarious.
Sometimes I wonder how much of Russ Hannemann from HBO's "Silcon Valley" was based on real life anecdotes of people who interacted with Cuban. RADIO ON THE INTERNET!!!
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Re: The Cold Email
#108> but my dad kept saying it wouldn’t hurt to really make it clear I wanted to get into the school. My mother convinced me to do the same after I was also wait-listed at my top choice university. I sent them an email updating them on things I had done since applying (in May, two weeks before graduating), and two days later, I got my acceptance letter.
Look at it from the school's point of view. They already spent time evaluating your credentials and decided you were qualified for the "waitlist" pool of applicants. They aren't going to want to invest a lot more time in further evaluating or stack-ranking those people, so anyone who stays engaged and communicating will probably be favored over those who just passively wait.
Worst case, those applicants are already ranked by whatever metrics they use and they will just pull people from the top of the stack as they need. Your continued efforts won't help in this case, but they also won't hurt. And there's a good chance that many of those people already accepted other offers, so the school might prefer to save time and only deal with people who are obviously still interested.
Re: The Cold Email
#109I was rejected from a job interview a few years ago - wow 13 years ago now - and was honestly shocked after how well the interview went. I decided to write a letter (email) to the HR department implying they'd made a huge mistake (the head of HR was in the interview too). She (as much as I knew at the time) overruled my would-be boss and the rest is history. Best email I ever sent.
Bold move, and it clearly worked out for you! I do think it's a risky strategy, though. A respectful follow-up asking for feedback or reiterating your interest can leave a great impression, but telling a company they made a mistake could easily backfire with a different hiring team. Every situation is different, so I'd be cautious about recommending it as general advice.
Re: The Cold Email
#110I'm probably somewhat older than most here. What OP is describing is what used to be normal and should still be! In the past it was normal to write a CV (resume) and a covering letter that was mildly tailored to each target firm, either in response to a job advert or on spec. I'm not talking quill pens here - you'd do a mail merge and buy a really large book of stamps. Linked In is possibly the worst thing that ever…
In a world with LinkedIn perhaps sending a letter is a good way to bypass the hordes.
In a world of automated junk mail and spam, there are good odds that the unread message will be immediately trashed.
Most people won't take a call from an unexpected number even if the phone is already in their hand.