So you’ve got a business to sell, and you can’t wait to approach lots of people to tell them about it. Here are some tips to guarantee your failure:

• Be irrelevant. Don’t do any research before writing your email, what’s the point? In fact the less research the better. Target an industry that’s got nothing to do with what you’re selling. Top tip: pitch them something they are already selling themselves, and imply you are better at it than they are. Busy professionals love to be negged.
• Be generic. Why should you bother personalizing the post? Copy and paste the same message regardless of industry, job title, and so on. ‘Dear Sirs’ as a salutation is incredibly effective, particularly with women. Top tip: make sure you add in the subject line the following: ‘Add name of contact here’.
• Be needy. If, for some reason, the two first steps don’t wield an immediate stampede in your general direction within 1-2 days, then I recommend the following. Email them again to ask why they haven’t replied. This time, be as personal as possible, aim for the general tone of ‘Hey babe, why haven’t you answered my email yet? I can’t wait to hear from you’. Allude to a phone call to them that you may or may not have made. Voice some concern about their disappearance – this irrelevant offer isn’t something they want to miss out on. Top tip: what busy professionals love even more than having their time wasted once, is having it wasted several times by the same person.
• Be nuclear. If they’ve either replied in the negative or ignored you again, then you are ready for this most advanced step. There are different styles available to you: you can either repeatedly call their office and be rude to whoever answers the phone (bonus: it could be the CEO!), or give their details to 5-10 other people in your company for them to repeat the process, or stalk them online to use details of their activity as proof that they need your services, or, for a more chilled version, simply continue emailing every so often with no means of unsubscribing.

Don’t forget that this is a long game! Should your business evolve and launch a new product or event, then do repeat these steps whether or not they were successful at the last attempt.