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When you’re a freelancer, you have to be very proactive about finding work. You have to seek out opportunities, put yourself out there, and sell your capabilities to strangers. It’s somewhat rare that a company is specifically looking for a freelancer, so if you wait around for explicit job postings, you’ll struggle to make ends meet.
One strategy I’ve developed to actively seek out work opportunities is to master the art of the cold email. A cold email is an email sent to a stranger, usually asking them for something like an opportunity to connect or a job. (You should also make it clear why they should want to help you, but more on that later.)
In this post, I’ll explain how I write my cold emails, from the preparatory steps to the follow up. I’ll use real life examples of how I landed gigs because, as always, the proof is in the pudding.
Step 1: Find a company you’re interested in.
The first step when you’re getting ready to get out there and find work is to figure out exactly what kind of job you’d like and be good at. Instead of thinking in abstract terms, it’s a great strategy to target specific companies that you’d like to work for.
I was working one ongoing gig as a recruiting operations consultant when I started having a hankering for more work. A co-worker of mine mentioned in passing a company, let’s call them Salo Inc., that was doing some cool work in the recruiting technology space. I looked up Salo Inc., found out what they did exactly, and realized that (1) I was really excited by their mission and (2) felt I could bring something to the table. That’s when I decided to reach out and see if anything could come out of it.
Step 2: Find someone to talk to.
Next comes the stalking. Start by searching for the company on LinkedIn and looking at their “People” page. Scroll through their listed employees and try to get a sense of the departments and areas of work. Decide which area of the company you’d slot into best, and find a reasonably senior person (e.g. a manager) to learn more about and connect with.
With Salo, Inc., it became clear to me that the company was very much a startup and the best person to reach out to was the CEO herself. I looked into her profile and found out that she and I both graduated from the same school with very similar degrees—so there was an automatic connection there.
At this point, I try to find the person’s personal or work email. I use a tool called Contact Out for my recruiting work, so I use that for these purposes. (They also offer a free trial.) There are plenty of other tools out there that allow you to search for someone’s email though. Don’t worry, it’s not creepy. 🙃If you absolutely cannot find the person’s email, reaching out on LinkedIn is better than nothing.
Step 3: Write your cold email.
This is probably the most important part—and the most difficult one. You have to write an engaging email while being brief, or you’ll probably never get a response. Each email will probably be different, as it depends on who you’re contacting and what you’re looking to get out of the correspondence.
Here are some best practices to help boost your response rate to cold emails:
Be clear about why you’re reaching out and what you’re looking for. Try to imagine what it’s like getting an email from a total stranger. Make your intentions clear.
Introduce yourself succinctly with relevant information to your correspondence. If you have a mutual connection or found out about them through another person, mention it here.
Make the connection between what you do and what the person you’re targeting is doing. Walk them through your line of thought—remember, you’re a stranger! Again, be succinct.
Clearly state why they should want to talk to you. Don’t just talk about why you want to talk to them!
Repeat your ask before closing out. You don’t want to make them have to figure out what you’re looking for.
Here’s an example of an email I wrote to Salo Inc. that got a positive response and led to a contract:
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Dear Ms. Jones,
I'm writing to introduce myself and inquire about any potential work opportunities at Salo Inc., as I am very excited about Salo's mission and believe I can contribute a unique perspective. I found out about your company from a coworker and was immediately excited by your mission to revolutionize the recruiting tech space.
To give you some context, I am a product manager with a background in development, and I'm currently bringing my PM eye to bear on recruiting tech as a recruiting/people operations consultant. I also do a good amount of data analytics to make the recruiting process more efficient. I graduated from MIT in 2016 with a degree in Computer Science and Molecular Biology—I started the year you graduated :]
I'd be happy to expand on my work and background, but for now, please find my resumé attached. I’d love to contribute to your mission and help Salo expand in the recruiting tech space, but even if the timing isn't right for a potential opportunity to work together, I'd love to connect and learn more about your work. Thank you for taking the time to read my email, and I hope to hear from you soon!
Best, Nicole Seo
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Step 4: Prepare to be interviewed.
After your write your cold email and (hopefully) get a response, you’ll probably connect with the person you wrote to over phone or video conference. I made this mistake three times before before learning my lesson (🤦🏻♀️)… this first call will always be an interview even if it’s “packaged” as a meet-and-greet! (Luckily, it was okay. Each of those three times, I started getting the sneaking suspicion I was being interviewed about 5 minutes in but tried to keep my cool and carry on as normal.) The person will be scoping you out, evaluating whether or not you’re a crazy person, and determining whether it’s worth it to keep talking to you. I don’t think any serious preparation is necessary—just mental preparation. If you’re not so good on your feet, you might want to prepare some talking points.
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Finding work as a freelancer can be tricky—you have to be extremely proactive and generally know what you’re about. I use these four steps to find and land new gigs, so hopefully they will be useful to anyone tackling the freelance game for the first time. Good luck! 💪