With an average ROI of 3,800%, cold emailing is the most trusted and effective way to reach prospects. However, you must use the right approach to witness such incredible results. Moreover, manual emailing can take a significant chunk of your time as a sales professional. That’s where cold email software comes in.

If you are new to using automation and don’t know how to proceed, don’t worry. We’ll show you how to use tools to automate email outreach effectively.

First, look at the basics of cold emailing and the top 20 cold email software.

What Is Cold Emailing?

Cold emailing refers to the practice of sending cold emails. A cold email is an email you send to a recipient with whom you don’t have any prior contact. The recipient doesn’t even anticipate receiving an email from you. It is similar to cold calling but is not very intrusive and is a preferred contact mode for most salespeople.

Don’t confuse cold emails with spam emails. Spam emails are sent to thousands of emails at once without research and bothering about the validity of the email address. On the other hand, you do cold email outreach to qualified prospects, which means you research and make the email relevant to the recipient. Moreover, before sending cold emails, the addresses are verified. 

The clear-cut fact is that it is entirely legal to send cold emails as long as you meet the requirements of the CAN-SPAM Act. It is a regulation for sending B2B and B2C messages, including cold emails.

What Is A Cold Email Tool?

Cold email outreach tools enable you to carry out cold email outreach easily. It helps you send cold emails more effectively by automating the process. It facilitates sending follow-ups and provides features like personalization, tracking, preloaded templates, etc. Most cold email outreach tools also automate other parts of the sales process, such as finding prospects’ emails. 

Best cold email software companies also name their software as a sales engagement platform or sales automation tool, indicating that cold email is also a part of it. Also, when top cold email tools use multi-channel outreach, email is always one of the outreach channels.

17 Best Cold Email Software

Here are the 17 best cold email tools:

SalesBlink - cold email software

SalesBlink is a sales outreach automation suite that can take you from outreach to closing at lightning-fast speed. It automates the sales process and makes the most tedious tasks super easy to reduce your workload to a great extent. SalesBlink automates cold emailing and takes care of most of the other aspects of the sales cycle. It will hand-hold you throughout, from finding prospects to reaching out through campaigns to closing deals with them. Therefore, it is one of the best cold email tools.

Outreach

You can use the campaign builder or pre-built templates to create personalized outreach campaigns. You can even carry out multi-channel outreach with SalesBlink, including email and LinkedIn(manually via Task).

Closing

There is an in-built meeting scheduler for the closing stage.

Apart from all of the above, you have two free tools:

Pros –

Cons –

Nothing specific

The monthly paid plans are: 

Scale- $29/month

Growth- $99/month

Business- $199/month

You get a discount of 15% if you choose yearly billing.

Customer rating

Capterra – 4.7/5

G2 – 4.6/5

SalesBlink review

2. Folderly

Folderly - cold email software

Folderly is an all-in-one email deliverability platform that aims to locate, solve, and prevent email deliverability issues. It helps businesses build robust email infrastructure, increase email deliverability, and boost outcomes through cold email marketing. Folderly offers solutions to various business needs, from email deliverability testing to complex domain audits.

Folderly’s distinguishing feature automatically generates senders, ensuring an accelerated increase in sender score and mailbox security. Technical procedures allow you to improve and maintain your domain reputation. With Folder, you can run inbox placement tests through the most popular email service providers, monitor your domain health and blocklists, and receive insights on IP information, DNS settings, and sender score. Folderly’s email template analysis dashboard allows you to create HTML or plain text emails and instantly check them for spam triggers.

Pros –

  • Choose what you need: get your new domain ready for email outreach campaigns with Basic Email Warmup, or ensure that each of your emails lands in the Inbox with Folderly Premium
  • GDPR- & CCPA-ready solution that ensures data safety
  • Seamless integration via API and SMTP with all popular email service providers and any custom providers.

Cons –

  • No free trial 

Pricing – Folderly offers two packages based on your business goals with discounted rates for annual billing. 

  • The Basic Warmup plan is $49/mo, allowing you to get a new domain ready for successful outreach campaigns. 
  • Premium subscription costs $200/mo and includes multiple features that make each of your emails land in the Inbox.

Customer rating –

Capterra: 4.9/5

G2: 5.0/5

3. Woodpecker

Woodpecker -  cold email software

Woodpecker aims to help B2B salespeople reach out to prospects so that the messages seem to come from a human. Follow-ups can be automated and scheduled. With Woodpecker, you can detect replies and track campaigns with email open, replies, clicks, and bounces. It lets you perform A/B testing of email templates to better assess what resonates with recipients. The tool prevents collision by preventing one prospect from being contacted with different email addresses.

 

Pros –

  • Easy to set up
  • User-friendly interface
  • Offers free trial

Cons –

  • Can’t send email attachments

Pricing – This cold email software offers a 14-day free trial that lets you send up to 150 emails. The subscription plan starts at $32 per month per user.

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.5/5 

G2: 4.6

4.  Reply.io

Reply.io -  cold email software

Reply.io is a multichannel automated outreach platform aiming to fetch the best conversion rates. It facilitates drip campaigns with automated follow-ups and enables tracking of the campaigns’ open, click, reply, and email bounce rates. There are readily available email templates for you to use. A feature to validate the email list allows you to send emails only to valid addresses and keep your sender’s reputation intact. You can integrate this tool with other platforms such as Slack, Salesforce, Pipedrive, and much more. Hence, it is one of the best cold email outreach tools.

Pros –

  • Has Chrome extension
  • Multichannel outreach

Cons –

  • Targeted at advanced users
  • Expensive

Pricing – You can sign up for a free trial of 14 days with all the tool’s features. The plan starts at $70 monthly for three email addresses for this cold emailing tool.

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.6/5

G2: 4.5/5 

5. Mailshake

Mailshake - cold email software

Mailshake is a sales engagement platform that lets salespeople run personalized campaigns and reach out to prospects via email, phone, and social media. You may use dynamic variables to tailor and send emails in bulk for your campaign. It is possible to schedule follow-ups automatically based on opens, clicks, and email replies, reducing manual work considerably. Using the platform, you can perform A/B testing to get better results. You can reach prospects through other channels like phone and social media. However, you can manage everything from one dashboard. The advantage is that you can integrate Mailshake with tools like Salesforce and Pipedrive. So, it is one of the top cold email software.

Pros –

  • Easy integration
  • Intuitive interface

Cons –

  • Lacks prospecting features

Pricing – Though Mailshake doesn’t offer a free trial, it offers a 30-day money-back guarantee. Its monthly subscription plan for cold emailing software starts at $39 per user

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.7/5

G2: 4.7/5

6. Lemlist

Lemlist -  cold email software

Lemlist is another email outreach tool that helps automate and personalize cold emails in bulk with custom variables. You can personalize images and videos easily. The tool lets you insert screenshots and logos as images in your email and add dynamic landing pages. The tool also provides an email warmup feature so your new domain has high email deliverability.

This tool allows you to schedule automated follow-ups and efficiently perform A/B testing for email templates. Additionally, it is possible to measure campaign performance by tracking opens, clicks, replies, and bounces. Moreover, you can monitor recipients and validate email addresses before running the campaign.

Pros –

  • User-friendly
  • Value for money

Cons –

  • Frequent UI changes

Pricing – There is a free trial of 14 days, which includes all the features. The subscription plan for this cold emailing tool starts at $29 per month per user. 

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.6/5

G2: 4.3/5

7. Overloop

Overloop -  cold email software

Overloop aims to make cold outreach easier. It helps you with all aspects of prospecting, including finding emails, building segmented lists of prospects after research, reaching out to them using personalization, and managing them in a CRM solution of your choice. 

The tool has an email finder and an extension to verify email addresses. It also lets you easily build multi-step campaigns and set automated reminders for multi-channel outreach. You can personalize the tool with custom variables.

You can also track email opens, clicks, bounces, and replies. The tool lets you monitor the performance of your sales team and each individual. 

Pros –

  • Simple interface
  • Free trial

Cons –

  • Lack of cold calling features

Pricing – Their subscription plan starts at $39 per month per user

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.8/5

G2: 4.8 /5

8. Mixmax

Mixmax -  cold email software

Mixmax is your go-to cold email software if you are looking for an inclusive email outreach tool. There is no need for technical knowledge to use this tool as it is quite easy to set up. Scheduling emails and follow-ups is easier with Mixmax, as you can use this tool from your Gmail account, and there will be no unnecessary back and forth. There is smart personalization to make your outreach more effective. PWarmingan also books meetings with you using your calendar link based on your availability. In addition, you have email tracking software and real-time alerts for measuring the performance of your campaign. 

Pros-

  • No need for technical skills
  • Works with Gmail
  • Offers free trial

Cons- 

  • Extension slows down the browser

Pricing – The paid plan starts at $9 per user per month

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.5/5 

G2: 4.6/5

9. SmartReach.io

Smartreach.io -  cold email software

You can get emails delivered straight into the recipient’s inbox with SmartReach.io. It is a tool that meets all the email outreach requirements that you can have. The main highlights of this tool are the deliverability features. You have email verification and SPAM checks to keep the sender’s reputation and email deliverability intact. There is also a domain warm-up feature that helps build the sender reputation of your new domain. Warming up your domain can be time-consuming and long-running, so getting a tool to help you can greatly help. 

The tool enables automated email scheduling and follow-ups, along with personalization. You can track the progress of the email campaign and the open, reply, and click rates right from your dashboard. A/B testing of email sequences is another feature that further helps you improve the campaign. 

You can integrate integrations with Gmail, Office 365, and tools like Mailgun and Sendgrid.

Pros –

  • Unlimited campaigns
  • Easy to use

Cons –

  • Limited contact list filters

Pricing – The basic subscription plan starts at $24 monthly per user. You have a free trial of 14 days that lets you use all the tool’s features. 

Customer rating

Capterra – 4.7/5

G2 – 4.9/5

10. Klenty

Klenty -  cold email software

Klenty is a sales engagement platform that helps automate cold email outreach. It personalizes emails and automates follow-ups. You can auto-import prospects with CSV or Google Sheets of a CRM. Also, the email campaign features include mail merge, A/B testing, and email detection. In addition, it gets you to reports such as cadence and team reports and one with a prospect history. You can integrate Klenty with CRMs like Salesforce, Pipedrive, Hubspot, Zoho, and Freshsales.

Pros –

  • User-friendly interface
  • Easy integrations

Cons –

  • Limited email sending

Pricing –

Pricing – The subscription plan starts at $30 per month per user. The cold emailing tool offers a 14-day free trial with all its features. 

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.8/5

G2: 4.6/5

11. SalesHandy

Saleshandy -  cold email software

SalesHandy is an email tracking and outreach automation tool. Though it is a full-fledged application, you can use it as a Gmail or Outlook extension. Using the tool, you can create emails with the help of email templates and automatically schedule emails and follow-ups. The tool also offers the ability to track individual links so that you can see who clicked them and decide your strategy for the next campaign. Then, the mail merge feature is helpful for mass outreach. Overall, it works well as a cold email automation software.

Pros –

  • User-friendly interface
  • Reasonable pricing plan

Cons –

  • Supports only email outreach

Pricing – The subscription plan starts at $9 per user per month, but this has limited features to offer. As the features increase, the price of the plans also increases.

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.5/5

G2: 4.5/5

12. Autoklose

Autoklose - cold email software

Autoklose is a sales engagement platform with a B2B database having more than 28M prospects. It doesn’t limit itself to being an outreach automation tool, making it more useful for salespeople. It automates drip campaigns, schedules automated follow-ups, personalizes emails and leads, and tracks email opens, bounces, replies, and clicks to measure the campaign’s performance.

Pros –

  • Feature-loaded
  • Free trial

Cons –

  • Not so easy UI

Pricing – The subscription plan starts at $49.99 per month per user. A 14-day free trial lets users try all the features of the cold emailing tool

Customer rating

Capterra : 4.5/5

G2: 4.6/5

13. QuickMail

Quickmail - cold email software

QuickMail is an automated cold emailing tool with exceptional deliverability features. It targets sales teams that maintain high email deliverability and enables easy outreach. 

It lets you upload prospects seamlessly and carry out effective outreach by creating campaigns and follow-up sequences. With QuickMail, you can personalize emails effortlessly and ensure deliverability thanks to its features. The tool automates the whole process for you, and the entire sales cadence is on autopilot. It is also possible to integrate with other tools you use for sales. 

Pros – 

  • Offers in-depth training
  • Value for money

Cons – 

  • Difficult to set up

Pricing – The paid plan starts at $59 per month

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.8/5

G2: 4.7/5

14. Outreach

Outreach - cold email software

Outreach is cold email outreach software that enables you to reach out to prospects across multiple channels. The tool works well for sales teams using the outbound approach to selling. You can personalize outreach, get assistance for cold-calling tasks, and connect with LinkedIn prospects. Thanks to the in-depth analytics provided, outreach gives you insight into reps’ performance.

Pros – 

  • Enables prospect management
  • Offers lead scoring 

Cons – 

  • Complex user interface
  • Absence of prospecting feature

Pricing – Not disclosed on the website

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.5/5

G2: 4.3/5

15. SalesLoft

Salesloft -  cold email software

SalesLoft is the perfect tool for sales engagement. You can create email templates and save them for future use. You can track email opens, replies, and clicks to understand where your campaign is heading. 

The tool provides insight into the sales activities and the tasks the sales team has to do. This way, the team head can view the team’s performance. It also ensures that they attend to prospects on time. Additionally, it is easy to integrate SalesLoft with other CRM tools. 

Pros – 

  • Has simple user-interface
  • Easy to organize prospects

Cons – 

  • Fewer integrations
  • Poor email text formatting

Pricing – Not disclosed on the website

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.3/5

G2: 4.5/5

16. Snov.io

Snov.io - cold email software

With Snov.io, it is possible to find leads easily from the massive database, reach out to them by email, and manage them using a CRM. The cold email marketing software helps you with prospecting, outreach, and deal management using CRM. Build campaigns and automate email sending at scale using the platform. It is also possible to track performance using analytics. You can even monitor inbox engagement using the tool’s Gmail extension. 

Pros – 

  • Has an easy-to-use interface 
  • Provides versatility

Cons – 

  • Fewer native integrations
  • High pricing

Pricing – The paid plan starts at $33 per month 

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.6/5

G2: 4.5/5

17. Yesware

Yesware - cold email software

Yesware is one of the best cold email marketing tools, and it makes outreach easier. You can import prospects from CSV files and create email campaigns. Yesware offers mail merge, open and click rate tracking, reply detection, and much more, making it a go-to tool for outreach. 

It is possible to link Yesware with Gmail or Outlook to send emails straight from your official email address. You can also integrate it with Salesforce CRM to make work processes seamless. 

Pros – 

  • Offers real-time email tracking
  • Easy to use
  • Reasonably priced
  • Offers free trial plan

Cons –  

  • Complicated analytics

Pricing – Its paid plan starts at $15 per month per user. 

Customer rating

Capterra: 4.3/5

G2: 4.4/5

18. Close.io

close cold email software

Close.io is a cold outreach tool that helps reduce the time spent on manual tasks such as sending emails to prospects. The tool lets you see how you interact with prospects from one place and plan accordingly. It is a complete CRM that is extremely useful for sales teams as it helps automate the workflow with follow-up email reminders.

Pros –

  • Offers a free trial
  •  Easy to use
  •  Easy to integrate
  •  Simple setup

Cons –

  • Doesn’t work well with HTML emails

Pricing – The paid plan starts at $29 per user per month.

Customer rating –

Capterra: 4.7/5

G2: 4.6/5

19. Smartlead.ai

Smartlead cold email software

Smartlead.ai is the new entrant in the world of cold email software. Uses the power of AI to enable cold email outreach complete with personalization. Moreover, you can use it to warm up your email account automatically and improve the sender’s reputation. It is also possible to auto-rotate inboxes using the tool.

Pricing – The paid plan starts at $24 per month

Pros –

  • Offers a free trial
  •  Has plans for all kinds of sales teams and businesses
  •  Provides custom CRM
  •  Customer support is good

Cons –

  • A few bugs need fixing

Customer rating –

Capterra: Yet to be reviewed

G2: 4.9/5

20. MailRush.io

Smartlead cold email software

You can use MailRush.io for outreach. It helps automate follow-up emails and tracks email opens and replies. In addition, it warms up your email to ensure that you always land in recipients’ inboxes. There is also email validation, so you don’t send emails to invalid addresses.

Pricing – The paid plan starts at $19 per month.

Pros –

  • Easy to use
  •  Value for money
  •  Offers free trial

Cons –

  • Customer support needs improvement

Customer rating –

Capterra: 4.2/5

G2: 4.1/5

7 Best Practices Of Cold Emailing

Cold emailing aims to get emails read by targeted prospects. Though results may vary, there are certain best practices to follow while sending cold emails. Here is a list of a few of them:

1. Consider segmenting your mailing list

Instead of blasting emails to thousands of prospects, you should consider segmenting them into smaller groups. Use a few criteria and divide your list into manageable chunks to personalize emails and make them sound relevant to a particular group. For example, you can segment lists based on industry and send emails relevant to the prospects belonging to each industry. It would not be pleasant for someone in the finance industry to get emails about construction software. Therefore, segmentation is necessary to get good results from your campaign. 

2. Use a striking subject line

If you don’t want your email to end up in the trash folder, write catchy introduction email subject lines because most people open emails based on the subject line. Personalize the subject line with the name of the prospect or their company. Take a few minutes to research the person you are reaching out to. You can use that information in the subject line to make your email relevant to the recipient.

3. Keep the email short

As no one has the luxury of the time, your emails must be short and to the point. They have to be compact to retain the interest of the reader. This way, you will be able to get a higher number of responses. 

4. Personalize your email

Image Personalization in your email is essential because no one would bother to read emails that sound too generic and boring. You have to make the email relevant to the prospect, use their name a couple of times, highlight a mutual connection if you have any, compliment them, focus on their interests, use visuals like images and videos, and mention their pain points. 

5. Add a CTA

Every cold email must have a CTA. It can be anything relevant, such as requesting an in-person meeting, picking a time for a product demo, asking to accept an invite to an event or a webinar, or asking to download resources that add value to the prospect.

After reading your email, the CTA tells prospects what specific action they must take. Craft the whole email so that the reader implicitly performs the CTA. Ensure that your CTA is clear to the prospect because the recipient will only abandon your email if you make it clear. Also, ensure you don’t have more than one CTA in an email because the reader will get overwhelmed with multiple CTAs and not act on even one.

 

6. Be compliant with different regulations 

Many regulations govern email marketing, and you must comply with them. For the US prospects, you must comply with the guidelines of the CAN-SPAM Act; for Canadian prospects, there is the CASL that you must pay attention to. Per both laws, you must reveal your complete contact information and address. Additionally, recipients can opt out of your emails if they don’t wish to hear from you. If you use a 3rd party service for your email campaigns, you must follow the guidelines correctly. 

7. Be persistent with follow-ups

You must follow up and be persistent until the prospect hints you to leave the track or if you feel they are not worth pursuing. The biggest problem is that most salespeople withdraw after making 1 or 2 follow-ups, but the truth is that the prospect says a ‘Yes’ after a series of ‘No.’

How To Choose The Best Cold Email Software?

There are so many cold emailing tools that it takes time to choose. However, there are certain features that you have to look for in your cold email tools.

1. Personalization 

Personalization is a feature that all cold email software must have. Unless and until you personalize your email, it will resonate with the recipient. All cold email automation tools let you personalize emails, but the extent of personalization varies from one tool to another.

Some tools only offer text personalization, where you can add dynamic variables for the recipient’s name, company’s name, etc. Other tools offer image personalization and let you embed personalized videos into emails. The bottom line is that your email’s personalization level decides how well the recipient will engage with it. So, this is one feature that your tool should have. 

2. Ability to track emails

Email tracking is essential to measuring the performance of your email campaign. It must track the email open rates, clicks, bounces, and replies. These metrics help gauge your campaign’s fared and what changes you need to make in your future campaigns to get better results. For instance, if you notice that the bounce rate is higher than usual, you must check whether your contact list has too many invalid addresses.

Note: Email verification is another feature you should look for in your tool, as it is essential for your email deliverability and sender reputation.

3. Automation of campaigns

Ideally, cold emailing tools must reduce your workload and take care of time-consuming tasks like creating contact lists, personalizing emails, automating sending emails, and scheduling follow-ups and drip campaigns. If a tool provides you with all the desirable automation features, you should go for it. 

4. Integration with CRMs

It is tedious to keep the CRM updated with all the prospect’s data is tedious. Hence, it is best to have a tool that integrates with the CRM solution you are currently using. It would help you save a lot of time.

Choose The Best Cold Email Software For Your Team

There is no doubt that cold emailing software helps simplify reaching out to prospects through email. Though many tools are available, not all provide you with all the features you want for your outreach. After knowing what the top 20 email outreach tools offer, it is easier to pick the one that suits your needs. 

You can thank us later for making your hunt for the best cold email tool easier!

FAQs

1. What is cold emailing?

Cold emailing refers to the practice of sending cold outreach emails. A cold email is an email you send to a recipient with whom you don’t have any prior contact. The recipient doesn’t even anticipate receiving an email from you.

2. Is it legal to send cold emails?

Cold emails are completely legal. Don’t confuse them with spam emails. Spam emails are sent to thousands of emails at once without research or concern about the validity of the email address.

3. What is a cold email outreach tool?

Cold email outreach tools enable you to carry out cold email outreach easily. They help you send cold emails more effectively by automating the process.