When you’re sending a meeting request email to a cold prospect or existing customer, it’s helpful to get your words right. How do you ask someone to take time out of their busy day to read your email, schedule a time to meet, and mark their calendar for you?
In this article we’ll show you the best meeting invitation techniques for prospects, leads, and existing customers.
Tips for composing a Meeting Request Email (that actually work)
Here are some of the most important things to keep in mind when you’re crafting a new meeting request email, regardless of who the recipient is.
- Write an engaging email subject line for better open rates
- Make sure you’re contacting a decision maker with the right contact information. Verify their address using email verification tools.
- Always address the invitees personally
- Send your email at a convenient time of day
- Keep the meeting purpose well defined
- Communicate clear expectations in the body of your email
- Set up an email calendar for yourself (to better track your availability)
- Use an online scheduling tool to present potential meeting dates
- Improve your response rates with an offer to answer any lingering questions
Why scheduling online is so important
The first thing to be aware of when write a meeting request email is how much better it works when you use an appointment scheduler like Appointlet, Calendly, or ScheduleOnce.
An online scheduling app ensures that people can see your availability and book the time they want right away. In most cases, this will get your message answered in minutes-or even seconds! It also reduces the chance that someone else schedules a meeting for overlapping times — a common problem with old school scheduling methods.
How to prepare cold meeting request emails
As a general rule, meeting request emails require more preparation when you don’t have an existing relationship formed. They should be personalized, specific, concise, and useful. This can be time-consuming, and this is how the mail merge process comes in handy – whether you’re using Google Sheets, MS Excel, Office, or even Outlook. The best cold messages are about an event your prospect might not have heard of yet but that you think they’ll find interesting because it will benefit them in some way or help them solve a problem they’re trying to overcome.
Early prospects can come from anywhere. They might be on their mobile devices browsing your website, LinkedIn or social media pages. If you have a little bit of information about the prospect, you can use that to create a more personalized message, which leads to higher response rates. Instead of sending them to an event like a webinar, companies with decent customer LTV can invest in high touch sales demos. The same automated email scheduling solutions can be used all the way through post-sales, user onboarding meetings.
Regular meeting requests are a bit different. For existing customers or leads who need to go through several rounds of meetings, less email marketing personalization is needed.
Sometimes people prefer regular meeting request emails where you just briefly describe the purpose of your meetup and then simply ask if they want to join at whatever times make sense for both parties. You can also add a sentence or two explaining why this matter (for instance: “I’m looking forward to meeting you and getting your feedback on our new product!”).
When a customer is very warm, the email could become as simple as a single sentence. But remember that no matter who you’re connecting with, you should always:
- Summarize the purpose of your meeting.
- Provide a few locations that they can choose before picking a meeting time. This should be managed by the scheduling app, not in the email body.
- Optional: Invite them to send back their availability, so you know if it’s possible for both parties before continuing on in conversation. You can always schedule on their behalf, if that’s easier for them.
How to Write Your Message for Prospects, Leads, or Existing Customers
Since writing a message to warm customers takes much less effort, we’re going to focus on writing meeting request email templates for cold prospects and warm leads.
The Cold Prospect
Try to put yourself in the shoes of potential clients who would receive your email. If they don’t know you personally, there needs to be a strong value proposition to draw them in. Focus on solving their core pain points. Otherwise why would they set aside precious time to meet with you? It’s important that you understand beginner copywriting principles.
To create your template, you should keep these things in mind:
- Introduce yourself and mention why this is important for them. Try to customize the message by pointing out their job title, so they know that you’re tuned into them directly.
- Offer two options: Give them a link to schedule an initial meeting with you. But in case people aren’t convinced yet, follow up with an offer to answer any questions they have first. Once those have been answered, you’ll send a follow up email.
- Before sending anything off, double check the email by reading it out loud to ensure it sounds conversational and friendly, not like a sales pitch.
If you’re in doubt about how to use this content for your site or blog post, please contact us and we’ll be happy to provide more information!
What are some of the best ways I can find an initial meeting with prospects?
Focus on promising them value and creating a sense of urgency. It’s important to mention why scheduling a call is so helpful for them right away.
In order to make sure it sounds conversational and friendly, not like a sales pitch, try using phrases such as “I hope we could find some free space in our calendars” or “Could I stop by?” instead of something more direct like “Can I schedule a meeting with you next Tuesday?”
Additionally, you can mention how the meeting will be productive and helpful for them. For example: “I’m excited to show you how much time and money we can save your company with this solution.”
This may seem obvious, but it’s best not to ask too many personal questions during your first email conversation. Keep a light touch, without going into unimportant details like their favorite color or where they grew up. This could make them uncomfortable and lead in awkward conversations on future meetings. Remember, professionalism and formal language are key!
Finally, always try to conclude your cold prospect emails on a positive note. This is a great way to keep the prospect engaged and excited until the last moment, which will help convert your leads to customers, resulting in increased sales.
Meeting Request Email #1: The Warm Lead
If you’ve already met with someone previously or had a few interactions via email, then you can take a different approach to the business meeting request email. It doesn’t need to be quite as formal, but the value of the call should still be clearly stated. And just like before, you’ll want to use an online scheduling tool to speed up the actual scheduling process. This helps streamline the registration process.
Here is an email template you can literally copy and paste, though we recommend making changes as needed to fit your business model.
Dear {client-name},
It was nice speaking with you last week. After reviewing the {company-name} website, I am confident that we can help you to save time and grow your business quickly with just a few updates.
In fact, earlier this year we helped another client with a similar problem streamline their operations and increase sales by more than 250% in the first three months. We can work with you to create similar results.
Since you already have a general sense of how our services work, I’d love to get on a phone call with you next week to provide a full product demo.
Please click here to schedule a quick chat and discuss this opportunity in more detail.
If you have any other questions before we jump on a call, just let me know!
Meeting Request Email #2: The Warm Customer
The average customer already knows who you are and the value that they should be getting from your service.
The customer support meeting request email sample
Typically a meeting request email goes out when customer support has been escalated to a success manager. A brief but professional email might look something like this:
first-name,
That sounds good.
Let’s book a time to talk so we can review all the details of your request. Once we have all that information, I’ll work with our team to get this taken care of.
Please click here to schedule your meeting.
Talk soon!
Meeting Request Email #3: Existing Customer
You can also set up email automation to reach out to customers who are at risk of churning. Re-engage them by highlighting features that are underused or you can pitch a higher tier of features. It’s up to your success team to decide what’s appropriate. Once you have a clear strategy, you can use a meeting request email like this.
Hi first-name,
I hope that you’re enjoying the ____ product!
We are always looking for ways to make our customers successful, and I’ve noticed that your account could use some more help. There is an upgrade available as part of your plan which might suit what you need better than what we already have in place. Would you like me to email over details about it?
Please click here to schedule a meeting so we can talk through this together.
Talk soon!
Closing the loop on your scheduled meetings
Once you’ve successfully booked a meeting with your end user, make sure that the meeting has been scheduled on your calendar. If your online scheduling service includes Google or Microsoft calendar invites for the attendee, you can check to see whether they have RSVP’d and selected “yes”. This lets you know that the calendar event has been acknowledged and accepted by them.
Consider setting up automated email reminders for the event if it’s far in advance. They don’t need to be as detailed as your initial meeting request letter. Just make sure that the date, time, and location are clear so they know how and when to join you.
