Welcome to the GTM Launchpad newsletter! Each week I will share a sales play to help you grow your business, level up your sales game and succeed in the trenches

Monday check-in

If I’m being honest… I’m tired of hearing about cold email too

Every week there’s another post about “the new framework,” “AI rewriting everything” or “this one subject line got me 90% replies”

It’s noise

But after three years, forty clients plus and easily six figures worth of cold emails sent across The SD Lab and my own outreach… I can tell you firsthand most of what’s being shared out there isn’t what actually moves the needle

I’ve rebuilt sequences that were dead on arrival
I’ve tested every cadence under the sun

and I’ve watched teams go from inbox ghosts to booking consistent meetings without gimmicks or magic words

So instead of giving you another “hack” I want to show you what’s really working right now…

the kind of stuff that’s still driving real replies and conversations across dozens of different GTM teams 👇

Sponsor of the Week - Smartlead

Now quick shoutout to the tool that’s helped me pull a lot of this testing off lately Smartlead

If you’ve been following me for a bit you know I’m not out here just pushing software but I’ve been using Smartlead across multiple client accounts and my own campaigns and it’s quietly become one of the most important tools in my stack

Here’s why it’s different

✅ Unlimited inboxes → rotate safely, send smarter and protect your domain reputation
✅ Auto-warmups + AI inbox rotation → your sender rep stays clean even as you scale
✅ Smart scheduling → delivers based on time zones and open-rate patterns
✅ Reply detection + sentiment tracking → filters out the noise so you only focus on humans

If your team’s still blasting from one inbox and praying for deliverability… this is the upgrade

No gimmicks, no burnout just better systems and more conversations

👉 Check out Smartlead it’s what I use to keep my own and my clients cold email engines running smooth

What’s Actually Working in Cold Email (and what’s not)

If you lead a team right now you already know the inbox game’s messy….
Your reps are sending hundreds of emails a week and most of them sound… the same

No edge
No direction
Just noise in a crowded feed

I’ve seen this movie 40+ times across clients from early-stage SaaS to enterprise teams.
In the last three years alone we’ve tested six figures worth of emails at The SD Lab and the truth? The problem isn’t that cold email “doesn’t work.” It’s that most teams never slow down to fix the fundamentals

So here’s what’s actually working right now and what you can take back to your reps this week 👇

1️⃣ Subject lines that blend in not stand out

Forget clever
Forget catchy

The best performing subject lines right now look like internal updates not campaigns

Three words
Lowercase.
Feels like something a peer would send

“site safety update”
“quick idea”
“team ramp check”

When everyone else is fighting for attention your edge is looking normal

2️⃣ Open with relevance not a resume

If your rep’s first sentence starts with “I” they’ve already lost the reader. Teach them to start in the buyer’s world. What changed, what challenge surfaced, what trigger makes the email relevant today

The goal isn’t to prove they wrote a “personalized email”
It’s to prove they understand the moment

3️⃣ Value before validation

Don’t start by asking for time
Start by earning it

Instead of “we’d love to show you a demo” lead with a quick peer story or stat that makes the reader think “that’s actually relevant to us”

Here’s a recent example we ran in a client campaign 👇

Example — Maintenance Leader (Distran Campaign)

Subject: site safety update

noticed your team’s expanding maintenance coverage guessing keeping visibility across multiple sites is getting tougher

one of our partners rolled out Distran ultrasonic cameras to catch leaks before they caused downtime

it cut unplanned outages by ~25% in month one. Saved them $40K in lost production + overtime labor

happy to show how that worked if it’s relevant or just want me to send over the quick breakdown instead?

That’s not “creative”
It’s clear, specific and easy to reply to

It earns attention by speaking to a problem the reader already knows exists

Example — VP of Sales

Subject: team ramp update

noticed your SDR headcount jumped this quarter guessing enablement and ramp are eating up a lot of cycles

a client of ours hit the same wall and built an outbound playbook that cut ramp from 90 days → 45 without adding managers

happy to walk you through how we structured it if that’s useful or want me to send the 1 page outline?

Both emails follow the same framework

Trigger → Proof → Low-friction CTA

That’s the entire playbook
Simple. Scalable. Human

🚫 Where Teams Fall Apart

Most reps don’t send “bad” emails they send forgettable ones
They write what everyone else writes
They focus on volume not velocity

Here’s where the breakdown happens 👇

⚠️ Trying too hard to be clever
If it sounds like clickbait it’s already lost. Keep it boring that’s what buyers open

⚠️ Personalization that’s creepy or irrelevant
No one cares you saw their post from 2019. Stay business relevant

⚠️ Pitching too soon
The moment a rep starts selling before earning curiosity they sound desperate

⚠️ Weak CTAs
“Let me know what you think” isn’t a call to action it’s an exit ramp
Teach them to close with a clear, human next step “want me to send it over?”

The Move This Week

Here’s what I’d tell any VP or founder running an outbound team right now

Pull 5 cold emails your reps sent last week
Read them out loud

If they sound like robots talking at prospects rewrite them
If they sound like humans starting conversations replicate them

Here’s the checklist I use with every client

✅ 3-word, lowercase subject line
✅ First sentence about them not you
✅ Peer proof not a pitch
✅ One clear low-friction CTA

That’s it
That’s how you turn cold outreach into actual conversations again

Explore. Engage. Evolve.

Alright so we just unpacked what’s actually working in cold email. If you want to double down this week I’ve got two pieces that’ll sharpen the blade even more 👇

🎥 Video of the Week: I Studied 1,000,000 Cold Emails, Here’s What Works in 2025

This one’s pure gold if you lead SDRs or oversee outbound. They break down what changed in email performance over the last year… structure, tone, length, even time of day sends all with data behind it

It’s not another “guru breakdown.” It’s proof of what’s landing across millions of sends.
Watch the segment around the 4-minute mark they call out exactly why reply rates dropped for most teams and how the best ones adapted fast

Send this video to your team and have them pick one thing to test this week. Just one. That’s how real improvements compound

📚 Book of the Week: Cold Email Manifesto by Alex Berman & Robert Indries

I’ll be real this book’s not flashy but it’s tactical as hell. Alex and Robert built agencies and outbound programs from scratch and this reads like their playbook

The part I love? They don’t overcomplicate it

They cover writing psychology, tonality, follow-up logic and reply triggers in plain English. The stuff you can actually implement tomorrow

If you’re coaching reps this is one to keep on your desk and mark up

Pick one framework, test it and make it your team’s own

Bonus Sales Tactics 🤑

Alright three quick wins for your inbox game this week. Nothing fluffy just real plays you can test with your team before Friday

1️⃣ The 2-Minute Rewrite Drill
Pull one cold email your team sent last week
Now without overthinking rewrite it in two minutes using this checklist

• 3 words or less subject line (boring + blends in)

• No “I” in the first line

• One clear, low-friction CTA

Then compare both versions side by side
90% of the time the 2-minute version wins
Because it sounds human

2️⃣ The Reply Audit
Ask your reps to screenshot their last 5 replies from prospects good or bad
Drop them in a Slack thread

Then ask “what made this reply happen?”

Was it tone? Timing? Relevance? Curiosity?
That exercise teaches more than any training deck ever could

3️⃣ The Follow-Up Filter
Before hitting send on any follow-up ask

“Am I adding something new or just reminding them I exist?”

If it’s the latter kill it or rewrite it. Every touch should move the convo forward not sideways

That’s it three simple ways to make sure your team’s not just sending they’re earning

Inside the Outbound Underground

Quick community update for those who’ve been peeking at what we’re building 👀

We just wrapped another stacked week inside The Outbound Underground. Malak and Justin came through strong in office hours we tore apart real cold emails, rebuilt sequences from scratch and even ran a few live call role plays that had everyone taking notes

The Slack’s been buzzing too members sharing screenshots of wins, open rates and call recordings that would make you proud if you lead a team

We’ve now crossed 116 members and counting. Funders, SDR leaders, reps even enablement folks and the best part? Every week we’re sharpening together: email, calls, messaging, brand

If you’ve got reps who could use that kind of hands-on dojo or just wanna see what we’re doing yourself come through

It’s free to join the community and hang in the weekly sessions. Paid tiers open up coaching, templates and our enablement stack (ConnectandSell, Apollo, Sendspark, Sybill, Expandi... the works)

👉 Join The Outbound Underground come hang with us, sharpen your reps or just steal a few plays

Final Thought

If your team’s emails aren’t getting replies it’s probably not effort… it’s execution

Most reps don’t wake up thinking “I’m gonna send bad outreach today”

They’re doing what they were taught, using what they were given
That’s where you come in

This week pull five emails your team sent
Read them like a buyer, not a manager
If they sound like templates, fix them
If they sound like humans, double down

Your job isn’t to rewrite every message. It’s to raise the standard. To remind your reps that cold email isn’t about chasing clicks it’s about earning conversations

Because when you teach a team to write for the reader instead of at them…
you don’t just lift reply rates you lift confidence

and that’s what wins

Go lead that charge this week

— Tom

Thanks for reading. See you again next week at 8 am MST!

- Tom Slocum ✌️

How can The SD Lab help you?

If your outbound pipeline is stuck we fix that

The SD Lab works with founders, sales leaders and enablement pros to install outbound systems that actually generate pipeline

Here’s how we help teams level up fast 👇

🚀 The Revenue Accelerator

2 to 12 week outbound consulting sprints for B2B orgs with 10–20+ reps

✅ Lift SQLs by 20–30%
✅ Coach reps with real call reviews + AI scorecards
✅ Rebuild outbound messaging + targeting
✅ Deliver a scalable system your team can own

👉 Best for: Series A-B SaaS orgs, new SDR teams, stalled pipeline

📓 Custom Sales Playbooks

4 to 8 week builds of cold call flows, email copy, objection handling and targeting strategy

You bring the ICP, we build the message and motion
Final asset = plug-and-play playbook your team can use or scale

👉 Best for: founders, enablement leaders, agencies building outbound

🎯 Targeted Workshops + Power Hours

Live tactical sessions for your team. No fluff, just results

💥 Cold call clinics
💥 Email teardown sessions
💥 Social selling & DM strategy
💥 SDR workflow optimization

👉 Best for: fast enablement, rep upskilling, team offsites or new hire ramp

🧠 Outbound Underground

Our private Slack community for reps & rising sellers

🔓 Weekly office hours
🔓 Tech tool perks
🔓 Peer feedback, templates and real talk

🎟️ Join here » — free & paid options available

Curious what this could look like for your org?
Book a 20 min strategy chat no pitch just clarity 👇

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