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- The Death Of Outbound
Cold outreach is dead
Such an absurd statement, but is it true?
There’s a lot of debate around whether you should focus on building a personal brand or if you should lean toward cold outreach
I’m going to put this debate to rest today.
The topics I cover will be broken down into their most basic forms. This means even a beginner with 0 experience will be able to understand.
However, the information will also apply to those doing millions a month.
I love this debate, people are willing to die on the hill on both sides of the argument
But that's what the funny part is, they believe it's binary.
When in reality, this debate is a lot simpler to solve (It’s kind of like most wars out there, if someone came in with a different perspective, there’d be no more bloodshed ;) )
Let’s get this started.
As a business owner, we have to be ready to modify our game plans quickly,
If you stuck with fiat money your entire life, you would’ve missed out on the crypto pumps
This is all because of the concept of market sophistication
Once something is working, there is always someone ready to yell it from the top of the mountain to make some money off it
This is the essence of capitalism
This is what happened to the cold outreach industry
Something worked, someone decided to teach it to more people, and those people saw it working, 5 of them decided to teach it to others, and boom now hundreds of thousands, if not not millions, are now outreaching
All in a matter of a few years
This means the Potency of Cold Outreach is Weaker Than Ever
Why does this matter?
Well imagine the end user, the dude who was supposed to receive your cold email
3 years ago, only 3 people were reaching out to that brand owner
Today there are 30
How can one stand out from those 30 people?
Should they give up, it seems pointless to send out
Well it is if you don’t have leverage AKA one of the most important terms we will talk about in today's post
Leverage is a way to get 10x results because you have something powerful working in your favor
There are 4 forms of leverage
Money
Technology
People
Audience
The leverage you need to have here is a marriage between your technology and AUDIENCE
The beauty of the cold outreach industry is the technology created. Lead lists, cold outreach platforms, and resources to help you send quality emails
But imagine if you could use your MICRO AUTHORITY presence to stand out from every other average Joe
What if you could leverage your social proof on your social media to catch the eye of your prospect?
You will be unstoppable and get more booked calls than anyone else.
The greatest leverage is using your AUDIENCE across ALL your EVERY POINT OF INTERACTION. This includes cold emails, cold DMs, paid ad funnels, and other organic social media.
The De*th of Outbound is about the TRADITIONAL ways of outreach and acquisition are dying out, as strategies naturally do during market cycles. It’s a matter of market sophistication
So how can you take advantage of the 2 forms of leverage?
You need to first understand how the market of cold outreach has sophisticated
And how to pivot strategically
Market sophistication - Adapt or Die
Markets sophisticate every few months or years
What does this mean?
When more competition comes in and they innovate the old ways
When your audience gets desensitized to the same strategy over and over
When the expectations of your prospects change in terms of quality & results
A market gets smarter, your consumers become more empowered and they DEMAND BETTER STUFF
Apple just announced the iPhone 15, their old best features from 2 years ago are now the BASELINE version of this new announcement. If they decide to never innovate, their consumer will leave
To keep your consumers happy, enticed, and ready to buy, you need to adapt.
The same applies to the cold outreach industry. Relying on 1 outreach strategy (cold outreach) is dangerous because STRATEGIES CHANGE with time, they reach ceilings, and it's on you to transform.
If a strategy is not breathing, if it’s not innovating, then it is falling behind.
Cold outreach is always relevant, however, relying on the old ways WILL NOT WORK FOREVER whether you choose to believe it or not
If you want your outreach efforts to prosper, you need to stand out more which we will be talking about later in this post
Pivoting with LEVERAGE
My friend https://twitter.com/RyeMcKenzie Ryan McKenzie taught me one of the most powerful lessons I’ve ever learned at the end of 2023
I was onboarding him as a client onto my agency to help him become even more of a Micro-Authority on Twitter and as I interviewed him he spoke of 4 forms of leverage.
Leverage is a concept most of us think we know but we never really understand the exact meaning behind it
He explained it in the most simplistic of terms
"To me, leverage is about doing more with what you've got. It's about maximizing benefits from every resource, encompassing financial, technological, human, and audience aspects. Financial leverage is using capital wisely to fuel growth. Technological leverage, crucially, is about using technology to automate tasks, analyze data, and make smarter decisions, enhancing efficiency and insight. Human leverage involves drawing the best from your team, while audience leverage turns followers into advocates. It's not just about working harder; it's about working smarter, making each element work double-time for you. That's the entrepreneur's secret to scaling success." - Ryan McKenzie
Now this is extremely important…
He taught me the 4 forms of leverage
Money
Technology
People
Audience
The 2 we care about today, like we said above, is Audience and technology.
Your goal is simple,
As markets sophisticate, you must pivot and find new forms of leverage.
Leverage is how you scale to your next height.
What is the pivot here?
No more focusing on just 1 traffic source, whether it be cold outreach or your personal brand.
You need to leverage both which leads us perfectly to the next point:
Relying on one source of acquisition will be your downfall - Instead, create your own Acquisition Ecosystem
Here’s a lesson I want to introduce
It’s something the eCommerce world knows very well.
7 years ago, you could have one traffic source, one basic ugly store, and one simple funnel and you could succeed and scale to millions
Today if you were to follow this entire route, you’d FAIL dramatically. In 2024, you need something called a TRAFFIC AND ACQUISITION ECOSYSTEM
At scale, you need Facebook & IG ads, Google ads, Retention marketing, etc.
To scale profitably, you need to diversify.
Patterns tend to repeat themselves, the pattern here is people relied on 1 source of traffic - It worked so people began educating others, that one strategy was over-shared, and the POTENCY began to decrease
Sounds familiar?
Facebook ads NEVER DIED OUT COMPLETELY, however, the TRADITIONAL way that worked back then is no longer relevant.
What did the E-commerce stores do? They pivoted and began expanding their ecosystem
This is what is happening to the service-based industry,
Course creators, agency owners, freelancers, coaches, and consultants, pay attention to this pattern
Relying solely on one acquisition source is dangerous and will be your downfall.
You need to make a natural pivot. What is that pivot? Let’s look at the next point
Being a lighthouse in the Fog - Standing out from all the competition
To pivot, I want us to move on from solely talking about cold outreach & personal branding and open the doors to a few other client acquisition methods out there
Cold emails
Cold DMs
Paid ads
Referrals
In-person events
Every single one of these sources can get great results, but your goal is always to improve the success of them all, right?
After all, we are all business owners optimizing to revenue and profits.
To improve our success, we need to stand out from every other person out there. (Aka your competition as they’re looking to take your perfect prospect from you)
Why do we need to do this?
Because if 100 people are reaching out to the same prospect, then that one prospect will choose the person with the person with the most compelling offer & pitch & experience
What are the ways we are currently taught to stand out?
Share case studies - this is exceptional, this proves you are better than 95% of people
Name-dropping other people that your prospect may know too
Compelling copywriting to build curiosity
Personalization within the content
These work, but as more competition floods in, you need STRONGER ways to stand out. Ways that act as a MOAT, something that is more difficult for others to copy
This is where becoming an AUTHORITY is important
Remember this, people will always choose to hire someone who’s an Authority vs a random person who cold outreached them. If the outreacher had his/her name out there with a presence, closing becomes 10x simpler because trust is built quicker.
Becoming that Authority is like being a lighthouse in the Fog. All your cold outreach becomes easier, all your ads become easier, and all your acquisitions become easier.
People TRUST you, which is one of the biggest barriers prospects face when hiring.
Your online presence is the NUCLEUS of your acquisition ecosystem
Your online presence is the ultimate leverage.
Every acquisition source you have will prosper greater when you have this presence
It’s not Cold outreach vs Building an Authority
It’s Cold outreach is better when you are an Authority.
Building your online presence needs to be done in parallel to all your other acquisition efforts so they can all feed off the name you are building.
This is all without mentioning the powerful results you will have with the inbound aspects of your online presence which can be a post of it’s own
The Real De*th Of Outbound
There is no winner of the debate, instead, you have a new light that is shed on the situation.
The industry is sophisticating, and the potency of your old outreach strategies is losing their effect
Relying on outbound your entire life will be your downfall
Relying on any ONE acquisition source your entire life is not enough
You need to create an acquisition ecosystem. The life force of this ecosystem is your online presence
Your online presence fuels your other acquisition efforts all while generating more leads inbound
The De*th of Outbound is happening
Now if you want help becoming a force to be reckoned with as a Micro Authority, then you can work directly with me. Just click this and we can chat!