5 ms·

Interesting; I ran essentially the exact same experiment a while back (June to August 2012) and had a different conclusion! -- 68 incoming consulting leads --

by jxf 13y ago

Interesting; I ran essentially the exact same experiment a while back (June to August 2012) and had a different conclusion! -- 68 incoming consulting leads -- group A: responded to 34 with "let me know how I can help" -- group B: responded to 34 with "would <date-and-time> work to discuss this further?" -- group A: 20/34 (59%) responded, 14/20 (70%) led to contract negotiation stage -- group B: 6/34 (18%) responded, 5/6 (83%) led to contract negotiation stage So "let me know how I can help" outperformed (p < 0.01) suggesting a date/time. There's a few possible explanations for the discrepancy: * The kind of clients I had are different than Robert's clients. At the time I mostly did software engineering consulting and pair programming, and my clients were small units in mid-to-large size companies. * I only ran mine on incoming leads, not outgoing (solicitation) leads. It sounds like Robert did it for everything. * Content of the e-mail matters, not just the last line. Perhaps the way I write my e-mails is such that kicking the ball back to them is better for me, whereas Rob's style means a different strategy works better than him. * Something changed about how people read e-mails in between my experiment and Rob's article.

mrfusion 13y ago
Very good analysis. I'm curious if this was a "blind" study. I.e., did you randomly assign the leads into group A and group B?
- jxf 13y ago
  I just alternated whether someone was in group A or B, because I responded to the e-mails as they came in, at the end of each day. So it wasn't truly random, no. On the other hand I didn't control when someone wrote in to me, so arguably it at least wasn't fully in my control. Of course, it wasn't double-blind because I was both writing the e-mails and conducting the experiment too.
mrfusion 13y ago
A bit offtopic, but I'm wondering if you pay a referral fee? I can never figure out if it's worth doing or not? Any insight on that?
- jxf 13y ago
  I've never accepted or offered referral fees as far as I can remember. I'm not sure I've thought about it enough to have an opinion on it.
jrs235 13y ago
Would it be possible to run another experiment using "would <date-and-time> work to discuss this further? Let me know how I can help."
- jxf 13y ago
  That's an interesting thought, although I think it's a confusing call to action. Also I'm not really in a position to do another experiment since I just started building something else now! (http://uphex.com http://uphex.com)
felideon 13y ago
I think you're mixing up two things. He's only suggesting using the <date-and-time> trick if the client actually already expressed his want/need to meet. In your case, Group B is a poor ending because you are still offloading work to the client: having them figure out what would have to be discussed (and taking up more of their time). If -you- need to discuss things further it may sound like you're the one who is confused and that does not evoke confidence. "Let me know how I can help" is probably better than what "let's discuss this further" implies. (OP calls this hand holding.)
- bradleyland 13y ago
  Exactly. The problem with the open-endedness of "let me know how I can help" is not always with respect to time. It is more often with respect to what will actually happen next. The statement "let's talk at XX:YY on the ZZth" only works if time is the primary indefinite aspect of the next step. In the case of these prospecting emails, the primary indefinite aspect of the next step is "what value will you provide".
rhino369 13y ago
Like your second to last bullet say, it's not the last line, it's the entire email. The article is really about how to frame the entire email so that you add value, take control, and provide guidance, instead of writing an email asking for guidance.
gus_massa 13y ago
Another interpretation: -- group A: 14/34 (41%) led to contract negotiation stage -- group B: 5/34 (15%) led to contract negotiation stage
- lifeisstillgood 13y ago
  Yes exactly. Its the distance down the road to forking over cash you care about - group A (the specific email line) led to a better outcome for the GP - more interested clients.
  - waterhouse 13y ago
    Now, if the number of people you interact with is so high that the cost of emailing them is significant, and you get enough work to fill your time either way, then you might want indeed want the group B approach. (However, this seems rather unlikely, and in any case the time spent emailing is probably a small fraction of the time spent on work.) Cf. "Why "Nigerian Scammers" Say They're From Nigeria", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4136016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4136016
lifeisstillgood 13y ago
I am just impressed by 68 people mailing you saying "can you quote". How ? Edit: Well, it seems that 100K on stackoverflow, a robust background across a wide variety of languages and domains and a nice smile seems how. edit edit: that seems sarcastic or otherwise trying to diminish the effort and discipline and passion needed to develop and maintain an online persona that will be attractive to clients. I do not mean to - but that is what I get from a scan of his public profiles - and frankly I would be willing to hand over many software projects to him just on those profiles. Its interesting the value I place on them, yet the small amount of attention I pay to my own.
- chc 13y ago
  Really? I'm going to have to throw my email on my Stack Overflow profile and see if it actually works like that. I didn't figure anybody actually looked at them unless they were trying to find an old answer of yours or something.
  - jxf 13y ago
    SO ranks very high on Google searches, so people Googling for my name usually find my SO profile quickly. It's definitely helped even though I don't use it much these days.
- jxf 13y ago
  I didn't track this for purposes of the experiment, but most people were referrals from past clients. I think consulting-type work benefits from this a lot, because you work with a lot of people. Your professional network gets larger much more quickly than if you were taking on 3-to-6-month projects, just because you work with more folks over time.
  - lifeisstillgood 13y ago
    That's certainly something I have not considered - short burst consulting as a means of expanding the list of people who might think kindly of me (or not !) Hard to do in practise I suspect - which is why the dry patch.
joshka 13y ago
From a purely semantic level, I'm not sure that your group B is any different to what the OP is suggesting is their problem: "If someone wanted a meeting, I’d suggest a time and instead of saying, “Let me know if this works for you.” I’d switch that out for, “If not, than X time/day also works or I’m free at X time/day.” Instead of your response, the aligned with this article statement is to state a next step as a statement and forgo the question "Let's discus this further tomorrow, otherwise I'm available on Monday at midday". It's a matter of suggestion compared to questioning, These trigger different cognitions on the part of the receiver.

by jxf 13y ago

mrfusion 13y ago

Very good analysis. I'm curious if this was a "blind" study. I.e., did you randomly assign the leads into group A and group B?

jxf 13y ago
I just alternated whether someone was in group A or B, because I responded to the e-mails as they came in, at the end of each day. So it wasn't truly random, no. On the other hand I didn't control when someone wrote in to me, so arguably it at least wasn't fully in my control. Of course, it wasn't double-blind because I was both writing the e-mails and conducting the experiment too.

mrfusion 13y ago

A bit offtopic, but I'm wondering if you pay a referral fee? I can never figure out if it's worth doing or not? Any insight on that?

jxf 13y ago
I've never accepted or offered referral fees as far as I can remember. I'm not sure I've thought about it enough to have an opinion on it.

jrs235 13y ago

Would it be possible to run another experiment using "would <date-and-time> work to discuss this further? Let me know how I can help."

jxf 13y ago
That's an interesting thought, although I think it's a confusing call to action. Also I'm not really in a position to do another experiment since I just started building something else now! (http://uphex.com http://uphex.com)

felideon 13y ago

I think you're mixing up two things. He's only suggesting using the <date-and-time> trick if the client actually already expressed his want/need to meet. In your case, Group B is a poor ending because you are still offloading work to the client: having them figure out what would have to be discussed (and taking up more of their time). If -you- need to discuss things further it may sound like you're the one who is confused and that does not evoke confidence. "Let me know how I can help" is probably better than what "let's discuss this further" implies. (OP calls this hand holding.)

bradleyland 13y ago
Exactly. The problem with the open-endedness of "let me know how I can help" is not always with respect to time. It is more often with respect to what will actually happen next. The statement "let's talk at XX:YY on the ZZth" only works if time is the primary indefinite aspect of the next step. In the case of these prospecting emails, the primary indefinite aspect of the next step is "what value will you provide".

rhino369 13y ago

Like your second to last bullet say, it's not the last line, it's the entire email. The article is really about how to frame the entire email so that you add value, take control, and provide guidance, instead of writing an email asking for guidance.

gus_massa 13y ago

Another interpretation: -- group A: 14/34 (41%) led to contract negotiation stage -- group B: 5/34 (15%) led to contract negotiation stage

lifeisstillgood 13y ago
Yes exactly. Its the distance down the road to forking over cash you care about - group A (the specific email line) led to a better outcome for the GP - more interested clients.
- waterhouse 13y ago
  Now, if the number of people you interact with is so high that the cost of emailing them is significant, and you get enough work to fill your time either way, then you might want indeed want the group B approach. (However, this seems rather unlikely, and in any case the time spent emailing is probably a small fraction of the time spent on work.) Cf. "Why "Nigerian Scammers" Say They're From Nigeria", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4136016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4136016

lifeisstillgood 13y ago

I am just impressed by 68 people mailing you saying "can you quote". How ? Edit: Well, it seems that 100K on stackoverflow, a robust background across a wide variety of languages and domains and a nice smile seems how. edit edit: that seems sarcastic or otherwise trying to diminish the effort and discipline and passion needed to develop and maintain an online persona that will be attractive to clients. I do not mean to - but that is what I get from a scan of his public profiles - and frankly I would be willing to hand over many software projects to him just on those profiles. Its interesting the value I place on them, yet the small amount of attention I pay to my own.

chc 13y ago
Really? I'm going to have to throw my email on my Stack Overflow profile and see if it actually works like that. I didn't figure anybody actually looked at them unless they were trying to find an old answer of yours or something.
- jxf 13y ago
  SO ranks very high on Google searches, so people Googling for my name usually find my SO profile quickly. It's definitely helped even though I don't use it much these days.
jxf 13y ago
I didn't track this for purposes of the experiment, but most people were referrals from past clients. I think consulting-type work benefits from this a lot, because you work with a lot of people. Your professional network gets larger much more quickly than if you were taking on 3-to-6-month projects, just because you work with more folks over time.
- lifeisstillgood 13y ago
  That's certainly something I have not considered - short burst consulting as a means of expanding the list of people who might think kindly of me (or not !) Hard to do in practise I suspect - which is why the dry patch.

joshka 13y ago

From a purely semantic level, I'm not sure that your group B is any different to what the OP is suggesting is their problem: "If someone wanted a meeting, I’d suggest a time and instead of saying, “Let me know if this works for you.” I’d switch that out for, “If not, than X time/day also works or I’m free at X time/day.” Instead of your response, the aligned with this article statement is to state a next step as a statement and forgo the question "Let's discus this further tomorrow, otherwise I'm available on Monday at midday". It's a matter of suggestion compared to questioning, These trigger different cognitions on the part of the receiver.