Hey, it’s Ryan from The Growth Center.

If you are trying to use cold email marketing as a channel to book demos for your B2B SaaS, but you haven’t had much (or any) success…

It’s likely just a few simple things that are holding you back from seeing results.

I see SaaS marketing and sales teams make these mistakes quite often – and it’s not because they’re lazy.

It’s because they aren’t aware of everything that goes into getting results with cold email in 2025.

It’s not the same as it used to be in 2020. Or even 2024. Things are constantly changing.

Here are the 5 most common reasons why you might be struggling to see results from your outbound motion:

1. Lack of Infrastructure

The most common mistake I see B2B SaaS teams make is not setting up a proper email sending infrastructure to use for cold email campaigns.

Instead, they rely on using their CRM to send outreach emails from.

CRMs are not meant to run large-scale cold email outreach campaigns from.

CRMs are meant for communicating with warm prospects and prospects who’re in your sales funnel already.

Instead of setting up secondary domains and sending accounts, they attempt to send outreach from their main work email, inside of their CRM.

2. Emails are not Getting Delivered

Poor email deliverability is another reason why B2B SaaS teams struggle to see results from their email outreach campaigns.

This is largely due to a lack of infrastructure, as mentioned above (but is not the only reason).

Whether they know it or not, one of three things is likely happening:

• Their emails are going to spam
• Their emails are bouncing at a high rate
• Their emails aren’t getting delivered at all (not even going to spam)

This gives you a 0% chance of generating any opportunities.

3. Low Quality Lead Lists

Another big mistake I see being made is sending to low quality lead lists.

What I mean by low quality is none of the data they have has been verified.

They have a list of email addresses, but no one on their team has checked whether or not the emails are actually valid.

And another way lead lists can be low quality is if the list of prospects they have aren’t the right decision makers to contact.

I see this one all the time. They have entry level employees on their lead lists because they didn’t filter them out of the search they did in a tool like Apollo.io or Seamless.ai

If your targeting is off, you are wasting time and money.

4. Messaging is Not Effective for Cold Prospects

There is a big difference between communicating with a cold prospect (someone who has never heard of you or your company before) and a warm prospect (someone who already knows you).

Cold prospects do not know you. They do not trust you. And they are skeptical of you. 

For a good reason too. You are a complete stranger reaching out to them.

So in our outreach, we have to immediately answer the question every prospect is asking in their head when they reach a message from a stranger:

“What’s in it for me?”

If you cannot answer that question in 50-100 words or less in an email, you will have a tough time getting traction.

If your email sounds like a sales pitch of your product, instead of you genuinely trying to connect with the prospect to provide a solution to a problem they are facing, you will have a tough time getting traction.

5. No Appointment Setting Protocol

The last reason many B2B SaaS teams struggle to book qualified demo calls from cold email marketing is because they don’t have an appointment setting protocol in place.

What this means is that they don’t have a process in place to get prospects who do respond back to emails showing they’re interested (a lead) onto the phone.

Just because someone says they’re interested in learning more about what you have to offer…

Does not mean they are open to giving up 30-60 minutes of your time for a call with you.

Especially if they are a busy executive (which is likely everyone you’re reaching out to).

To get prospects to commit to a demo call, you need a standardized process you or a member of your team can follow.

You must respond back to prospects as fast as possible. And you must be able to clearly communicate a compelling reason why a call with your company is going to benefit them.

This is so important. No one is going to set aside time in their day for a call with a stranger if they don’t see a tangible benefit for themselves.

Tool of the Day

Zapmail.ai – Use Zapmail to purchase secondary sending domains and Google/Microsoft email accounts to use for cold email campaigns.

Quote of the Day

“I’m convinced that about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance” – Steve Jobs

These are 5 of the most common reasons why B2B SaaS teams are not seeing results from their cold email marketing campaigns.

Stay tuned for next week’s email, as I will be giving you 6 actionable steps you can take to start seeing results from cold email.

I will be breaking down what is working right now, in 2025, for SaaS companies who are using email marketing to drive daily lead flow and build a pipeline full of qualified prospects from their target market.

Speak soon,
Ryan

PS — If you have any specific questions or want us to create content around certain topics you need clarity on, don’t ever hesitate to reply back to these emails. 

Our goal is to give you the insights and actionable steps you need to produce the outcomes for your business that you’re looking for.