Should you run cold email?

Your numbers, run against the real funnel math. The output is a verdict, including "no."

Your business

$
%
$
people
$
Ad spend + agency fee + your own hours, through your current channels.

The send

/mo
emails / positive

Post-reply funnel , where 90% of cost hides

%
%
%
%

Your team's time per meeting , the hidden cost

$
hrs
Total rep time per meeting that happens: prep, the call, all follow-up and closing. Average across every held meeting, including the ones that don't close.
Run it

Cold email math works for you

Return on Outbound
-
LTV gross profit ÷ your cost per customer · target ≥ 12×
Your cost / customer
-
your team's close time, before any vendor
First-deal payback
-
deal profit ÷ that cost · ≥ 1 = safe
Your cost / meeting held
-
rep hours × rep cost per hour
Meetings you can hold
-
per 90 days, at this volume

Versus what you pay for a demo today

Your channels today
-
all-in, per qualified demo
Cold email
-
your rep time, per meeting held

What 90 days at these numbers produces

Funnel benchmark: ~700 emails per positive reply is a market-average cold list; sharper lists run lower. Downstream rates (30 / 70 / 33 / 20) are cold-email norms. The 33% qualify step is the BANT tax: of people who show to a cold-sourced meeting, about 1 in 3 turn out to have real budget, authority and need. Return on Outbound (RoO) framing credit: Benjamin Reed, RevyOps.