Problem-first opener

Subject lines

• Weekly reporting at {{company}}(used in the template)
• Weekly reports at {{company}}
• A question about reporting

Follow-ups reply in the same thread, so they’re sent as “Re:” the first subject.

The sequence: 2 emails

1. Email 1 · day 1

   Weekly reporting at {{company}}

   Hi {{first_name}}, In most operations teams I talk to, someone loses half a day each week pulling numbers from three tools into one spreadsheet, and the spreadsheet is out of date by Tuesday. Is that true at {{company}}, or have you already solved it? If it is, we build live reporting dashboards that replace that weekly export. Happy to explain how in a few lines. {{sender_first_name}}

2. Email 2 · day 5 (4 days after the previous one, if there’s no reply)

   Re: Weekly reporting at {{company}}

   Hi {{first_name}}, {% if title contains "director" or title contains "head" %} For someone running the team, the usual cost isn't the hours, it's making decisions on last week's numbers. {% else %} For the person doing the export, the usual cost is the Monday you never get back. {% endif %} If neither sounds familiar, I'll take that as a no and leave it there. {{sender_first_name}}

{{first_name}} and similar are filled from each lead; after a “|” is the text used when the field is empty. {% if %} blocks choose text based on a lead field. Written for a company that builds internal reporting dashboards, writing to operations leads.

When to use it

When you can name a specific, common problem for the role you're writing to, and you're not sure yet whether this company has it.

Why it works

• It opens with their world, not yours. The first sentence is about something they deal with.
• It asks instead of asserting. You haven't seen inside their company, so you don't pretend to know.
• The ask is a yes or no, which is the easiest kind of reply to write.

How to adapt it

• Replace the reporting problem in the first paragraph with the problem your product solves, described the way the reader would say it.
• Rewrite the one line about what you do. Keep it to a single sentence.
• If the role varies across your list, use the {% if title … %} pattern from the follow-up to tailor one line.