Email the Person Everyone Skips

Email the Person Everyone Skips is a cold outreach tactic for getting your first users: Use a single, well-crafted cold email to reach a high-value individual directly: an investor, a journalist, a potential acquirer, or your very first paying customer.

It's a strong fit for teams of almost any kind, and works especially well for any (fundraising, press, partnerships, validation). As a cold outreach play, plan for low effort and expect results to show up quickly, all grounded in 5 linked primary sources.

Cold outreachLow effortFast

Why does cold outreach work for this?

Decision-makers read email looking for opportunities, and a sharp, relevant message can bypass gatekeepers entirely; founders have landed major investors, national press, and first customers this way.

The exact steps (5)

The full step-by-step this founder ran, what they posted, where, and in what order, plus the watch-outs, is part of the library.

Unlock the steps · $29 oncePlus all 3,000+ tactics and the new ones we add weekly.
Works for
Any / universal

Frequently asked

How is the "Email the Person Everyone Skips" tactic verified?
It is drawn from 5 primary sources — real founder write-ups and interviews, not generic advice. They are linked in the Sources section above so you can read the original accounts yourself.
How much effort is it and how fast are results?
It is low effort, and results tend to be fast.
Where can I see the exact step-by-step?
The full step-by-step a founder ran, documented via Clipbook won Mark Cuban and This app made over $1M, is in the paid library.

Related tactics

Cold outreachMedium effort· Medium

Lead Cold Messages With One Specific Detail About Their Business

Open every cold message with a genuine, specific observation about the recipient instead of a generic compliment or pitch, including a personalized detail in the subject line.

Read the steps →
Cold outreachHigh effort· Fast

Scrape New Listings Hourly and Auto-DM to Be First in Line

Build a bot that scrapes a target source for fresh matches and instantly fires a personalized message to each new contact, so you're always the first to reach out (he used it on landlords; the technique maps to any first-contact game).

Read the steps →
Cold outreachLow effort· Fast

Use Self-Test Emails and Auto-Replies as a Spam Detector

To check whether outbound was silently landing in spam, the founder dropped his own address into the send batches and watched whether the usual out-of-office and 'left the company' auto-replies kept showing up.

Read the steps →
Cold outreachLow effort· Medium

Build a Press List by Googling Your Competitors

To find relevant outlets, they googled competitors like Duolingo and Drops, which surfaced a long list of sites that already cover the space, then logged every URL in a spreadsheet.

Read the steps →
Cold outreachMedium effort· Medium

Cold DM Experienced Indie Hackers Asking for Feedback (Not a Sale)

The founder cold-DMed and emailed seasoned indie hackers asking for product feedback, which he credits with roughly a 15% hit rate.

Read the steps →
Cold outreachHigh effort· Medium

Mass-DM Journalists and PH Makers Asking for Feedback, Not Upvotes

Pre-launch they Twitter-DM'd around 1,000 tech journalists plus the top 500 PH makers and hunters with a personalized heads-up asking for feedback — explicitly not for upvotes.

Read the steps →

Get all 3,000+ tactics in one place

Filter by your product and channel, follow the exact steps, and get the new tactics we add every week. One payment, yours for good.