Key Highlights
- 3X ARR with Smartlead in 2.5 years
- 2X increase in meetings booked per client.
- >5% positive response rates for influencer clients.
- Tripling their business with the same team of eight SDRs.
- Over 4 million emails are sent every month.
Company Overview
David Borman, head of Vice President of Operations at Key Outreach, is an outsourced lead generation firm specializing in influencer marketing, SaaS, and agency services. They work with enterprise clients generating over $50M in annual revenue and small to medium-sized businesses, helping them generate high-quality leads and book sales meetings.
With a team of eight dedicated Sales Development Representatives (SDRs), Key Outreach uses a variety of outbound strategies, with cold email being their most profitable method for securing meetings and driving business growth. Over the years, the company has refined its processes to ensure maximum efficiency, leveraging advanced tools and automating key functions to scale its operations.
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The Challenge
Before integrating Smartlead into their outbound strategy, Key Outreach faced several challenges in their lead generation process:
Scalability Issues
Managing multiple client accounts and campaigns without a cohesive system.
Deliverability Concerns
Struggling to ensure emails reached decision-makers primary inboxes amidst increasing spam filters and restrictions.
Time-Consuming Processes
Managing responses, lead categorization, and workflows manually drained time and resources.
Lack of Flexibility
Existing tools did not offer the flexibility to automate key tasks or tailor campaigns to specific client needs.
With these challenges, Key Outreach needed a platform to automate manual tasks, improve email deliverability, and scale operations without increasing team size.
Why Smartlead?
After trying multiple cold email platforms in the market in the last 5 years, they transitioned to Smartlead. The decision was driven by Smartlead’s ability to address their challenges and provide flexibility, automation, and superior customer support.
“The cold email industry is changing rapidly, and I think tools like Smartlead and the community at Smartlead are imperative for us to stay up to date.”
Key Reasons for Choosing Smartlead
Master Inbox & Client Access
Allowed Key Outreach to easily manage multiple accounts and offer clients real-time transparency into campaign progress.
Superior Deliverability
SmartDelivery and custom email servers ensured high inbox placement rates, overcoming deliverability issues.
API Flexibility
Enabled deep customization, automating processes like lead categorization and response handling.
Scalable Automation
Features like subsequences allowed Key Outreach to automate follow-ups and improve the workflow for SDRs.
The Solution: Scaling Lead Generation with Smartlead
Key Outreach integrated Smartlead into all their lead generation campaigns, leveraging the following features:
- Custom APIs to integrate their lead generation and CRM systems, improving reporting and automating key tasks.
- Master Inbox to streamline inbox management, giving SDRs a clearer view of client accounts and responses.
- SmartDelivery to test email copy and ensure inbox placement, improving email deliverability.
- SmartServers, which they recently started using, has already shown an increase in positive reply rates.
- Lead Categorization API to automate the categorization of positive and negative replies, allowing SDRs to focus on high-quality leads.
“The client access features have provided excellent visibility for our clients as they check everything when needed, and being able to white label gives Key Outreach an elevated view.”
Results Achieved
Since adopting Smartlead, Key Outreach has seen a significant increase in efficiency, meeting bookings, and overall business growth:
- Key Outeach achieved 3X in ARR since they started using Smartlead.
- 2X increase in meetings booked per client – From 1-2 demos per week to 3-4 demos per week.
- >5% positive response rates for influencer clients using targeted campaigns, especially for clients traveling and engaging with local prospects.
- Improved workflow efficiency – Tripling their business with the same team of eight SDRs.
- Over 4 million emails are sent monthly, focusing on reply rates and positive reply rates as the key success metric.
- Improve client trust with real-time visibility into lead handling and responses.
Things To Look Forward In Smartlead
While Smartlead has significantly improved Key Outreach’s lead-generation efforts, David is looking forward to a few more features from Smartlead.
A feature allowing Key Outreach to track positive and negative replies by email account for better decision-making during campaign optimization.
Final Thoughts
With Smartlead, Key Outreach has successfully scaled its operations and 3X its ARR and doubled the number of meetings booked per client. By automating key processes and ensuring top-tier deliverability, they have consistently exceeded client expectations and grown their business remarkably.
David Borman, VP of Operations at Key Outreach, says: "Smartlead has been instrumental in scaling our lead generation efforts. API integration has helped us automate our workflows seamlessly. The customer service is stellar, and the community provides invaluable support to keep us ahead of the game."
By using Smartlead’s features like SmartDelivery, Master Inbox, and API integrations, Key Outreach continues to drive success for its clients in highly competitive industries.
Here's your chance to do the same. Try our 14-day free trial and see how it transforms your deliverability.
Wajahat Ali
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What our customers say
Founder, Lambda Group
“The best outbound email marketing software. Customer support - they are so responsive and helpful Features - you can add multiple email doma”
Senior Account Executive, Key Outreach
"Intuitive. Game-Changing. POWERFUL. Analytics, spintax, A/B testing, quick personalization. This is a game changer if you send cold email ca"
Account Executive, B.I.G. Charity Law Group Professional Corporation
“Hands down the best cold email software. Smartlead is amazing, this is the best tool if you want to cold email at scale and land in the inbo”
Co-founder, Pitchlane
“Innovative, reliable, and Suitable For Technical and Non-Technical Users. SmartLead's ability to help me land in the primary inbox and autom”
Co-Founder, Five Element
“Smartlead is an absolute game-changer! With its exceptional features and support from the Smartlead team, I've experienced remarkable succes”
Sales Director - Financial Institution Solutions Saggezza, Inc.
“Smartlead is an innovative cold email platform that helps me reach out to potential clients. There are easy-to-use templates, powerful autom”
Founder, Leadbird.io
“I've personally built a sales engagement platform similar to Smartlead, and I am genuinely blown away by the scalability, functionality and”
CEO, Yell Cut
"I can upload hundreds of email accounts, send thousands of cold emails per day, and still have an organized master inbox. This is unseen wit"
Founder, Office Optim
“Smartlead has been extremely helpful with seamlessly onboarding clients, warming up their accounts, and prepping campaigns to send at high v”
CEO, Rock Solid Lead Generation
“Smartlead is absolutely amazing! The software is easy to understand I am not a techie but directly understand everything and if you really h”
Founder, WindGrowth
“Smartlead is simply amazing. They constantly improve their product and bring new features that make the cold email software even more comple”
Outbound Lead & Partner, Peakora
“Our campaigns weren't just about reaching out, but reaching out right, and Smartlead helped us achieve this. It has added immense value to o”
Co-Founder, Five Element
“Smartlead is an absolute game-changer! With its exceptional features and support from the Smartlead team, I've experienced remarkable succes”
CEO, Acquisizioneclienti.it
“Best cold outbound email software out there. Everything, is fast, reliable, scalable, you can also white-label, amazing analytics and never”
Owner, Storydriven.video
“I just ended my 2 year search for the right cold emailing platform with Smartlead. A stand alone tool for cold emailing unlike anything else”
Senior Account Executive, Key Outreach
“Intuitive. Game-Changing. POWERFUL. Analytics, spintax, A/B testing, quick personalization. This is a game changer if you send cold email campaign. Grateful to this team for building a product that has changed our day to day. 🚀”
Powerful automated workflows that drive sales.
Frequently asked questions
What is Smartlead's cold email outreach software?
Smartlead's cold email outreach tool helps businesses scale their outreach efforts seamlessly. With unlimited mailboxes, fully automated email warmup functionality, a multi-channel infrastructure, and a user-friendly unibox, it empowers users to manage their entire revenue cycle in one place. Whether you're looking to streamline cold email campaigns with automated email warmups, personalization fields, automated mailbox rotation, easy integrations, and spintax, improve productivity, or enhance scalability with subsequences based on lead’s intentions, automated replies, and full white-label experience, our cold email tool implifies it in a single solution.
How does Smartlead's unlimited mailboxes feature benefit me?
Our "unlimited mailboxes" feature allows you to expand your email communications without restrictions imposed by a mailbox limit. This means you won't be constrained by artificial caps on the number of mailboxes you can connect and use. This feature makes Smartlead the best cold email software and empowers you to reach a wider audience, engage with more potential customers, and manage diverse email campaigns effectively.
What do you mean by "unibox to handle your entire revenue cycle"?
The "unibox" is one of the unique features of Smartlead cold email outreach tool, and it's a game-changer when it comes to managing your revenue cycle. The master inbox or the unibox consolidates all your outreach channels, responses, sales follow-ups, and conversions into one centralized, user-friendly mailbox.
With the "unibox," you gain the ability to:
1. Focus on closing deals: You can now say goodbye to the hassle of logging into multiple mailboxes to search for replies. The "unibox" streamlines your sales communication, allowing you to focus on what matters most—closing deals.
2. Centralized lead management: All your leads are managed from one central location, simplifying lead tracking and response management. This ensures you take advantage of every opportunity and efficiently engage with your prospects.
3. Maintain context: The "unibox" provides a 360-degree view of all your customer messages, allowing you to maintain context and deliver more personalized and effective responses.
Can Smartlead help improve my email deliverability rates?
Yes, our cold emailing software is designed to significantly improve your email deliverability rates. It enhances email deliverability through AI-powered email warmups across providers, unique IP rotating for each campaign, and dynamic ESP matching.
Real-time AI learning refines strategies based on performance, optimizing deliverability without manual adjustments. Smartlead's advanced features and strategies are designed to improve email deliverability rates, making it a robust choice for enhancing cold email campaign success.
Can I integrate Smartlead with other tools I'm using?
Certainly, Smartlead cold email tool is designed for seamless integration with a wide range of tools and platforms. Smartlead offers integration with HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Clay, Listkit, and more. You can leverage webhooks and APIs to integrate the tools you use. Try Now!
What is Smartlead, and how can it enhance my cold email campaigns?
Smartlead is a robust cold emailing software designed to transform cold emails into reliable revenue streams. Trusted by over 31,000 businesses, Smartlead excels in email deliverability, lead generation, cold email automation, and sales outreach. A unified master inbox streamlines communication management, while built-in email verification reduces bounce rates.Additionally, Smartlead offers essential tools such as CNAME, SPF Checker, DMARC Checker, Email Verifier, Blacklist Check Tool, and Email Bounce Rate Calculator for optimizing email performance.
How does Smartlead, as a cold emailing tool, automate the cold email process?
Smartlead’s robust cold email API and automation infrastructure streamline outbound communication by transforming the campaign creation and management processes. It seamlessly integrates data across software systems using APIs and webhooks, adjusts settings, and leverages AI for personalised content.
The cold emailing tool categorises lead intent, offers comprehensive email management with automated notifications, and integrates smoothly with CRMs like Zapier, Make, N8N, HubSpot, Salesforce, and Pipedrive. Smartlead supports scalable outreach by rapidly adding mailboxes and drip-feeding leads into active campaigns Sign Up Now!
How does Smartlead ensure my emails don't land in the spam folder?
Smartlead, the best cold email marketing tool, ensures your emails reach the intended recipients' primary inbox rather than the spam folder.
Here's how it works:
1. Our "unlimited warmups" feature is designed to build and maintain a healthy sending reputation for your cold email outreach. Instead of sending a large volume of emails all at once, which can trigger spam filters, we gradually ramp up your sending volume. This gradual approach, combined with positive email interactions, helps boost your email deliverability rates.
2. We deploy high-deliverability IP servers specific to each campaign.
3. The ‘Warmup’ feature replicates humanized email sending patterns, spintax, and smart replies.
4. By establishing a positive sender reputation and gradually increasing the number of sent emails, Smartlead minimizes the risk of your emails being flagged as spam. This way, you can be confident that your messages will consistently land in the primary inbox, increasing the likelihood of engagement and successful communication with your recipients.
What features does Smartlead offer for cold email personalisation?
Smartlead enhances cold email personalisation through advanced AI-driven capabilities and strategic integrations. Partnered with Clay, The cold remaining software facilitates efficient lead list building, enrichment from over 50 data providers, and real-time scraping for precise targeting. Hyper-personalised cold emails crafted in Clay seamlessly integrate with Smartlead campaigns.
Moreover, Smartlead employs humanised, natural email interactions and smart replies to boost engagement and response rates. Additionally, the SmartAI Bot creates persona-specific, high-converting sales copy. Also you can create persona-specific, high-converting sales copy using SmartAI Bot. You can train the AI bot to achieve 100% categorisation accuracy, optimising engagement and conversion rates.
Is Smartlead suitable for both small businesses and large enterprises?
Smartlead accommodates both small businesses and large enterprises with flexible pricing and comprehensive features. The Basic Plan at $39/month suits small businesses and solopreneurs, offering 2000 active leads and 6000 monthly emails, alongside essential tools like unlimited email warm-up and detailed analytics.
Marketers and growing businesses benefit from the Pro Plan ($94/month), with 30000 active leads and 150000 monthly emails, plus a custom CRM and active support. Lead generation agencies and large enterprises can opt for the Custom Plan ($174/month), providing up to 12 million active lead credits and 60 million emails, with advanced CRM integration and customisation options.