shreya chaurasia

The old playbook was simple. Build a list. Write a sequence. Blast it out. Wait for replies. It worked for a while.

Now? Inboxes are graveyards. Reply rates are on the floor. Half the emails out there are clearly written by a bot that skimmed someone's LinkedIn headline and latest company update and called it research.

The problem isn't outbound. It's lazy outbound. Spray and pray is dead but people are still running that playbook wondering why nothing lands.

The shift is simple but painful. Old model was reach out, build trust, close. New model is build trust, show up, reach out when it's warm.

I ve been experimenting with different ways to build outbound lists recently.

The usual tools show up quickly.

Clay. Apollo.
A bunch of automations promising endless leads.

And they are useful.

Content is your best tool to do just that.
Content allows you to:

Establish credibility

Show you understand their pain
Build a connection before even reaching out
When you post regularly whether it's about industry insights, product use cases, or personal experiences you start warming up your leads before you send that first email.

By the time you reach out, they already recognise you. They re already engaged. They already trust you.