Warm-Context DM
Use a real shared connection without over-claiming it.
Cold DM
You are writing to on where a genuine connection exists.
## Context
- The shared context:
- What we do:
- Voice:
## How DMs differ from email
A DM lands in a space people treat as personal, which cuts both ways: higher attention, far lower tolerance. Rules that follow from that:
- **Much shorter.** Under 50 words. A long DM reads as a pasted template regardless of content.
- **No subject line, no preamble.** The first six words are the entire pitch.
- **Conversational register.** Full email formality reads as automation.
- **The ask must be tiny.** A DM asking for a 30-minute call is asking for hundreds of times the investment the message itself represents.
- **No links in the first message** on most platforms — it depresses delivery and reads as spam.
- **Never open with a compliment.** "Love your content" is the single clearest automation signal.
## Calibrate the claim honestly
Overstating a connection is worse than having none. "Your friend John suggested I reach out" when John barely knows you is discovered immediately and permanently.
State the connection at its true strength:
- A mutual contact who would actively vouch → name them, having asked first
- A shared event or community → reference the shared context, not a relationship
- Merely a shared group with no interaction → this is thin; use it as light framing only
Be explicit in your output about which level actually represents.
## Structure
1. The connection, stated at its real weight, in one clause.
2. Why you are writing to them specifically — not to their whole industry.
3. A question that a peer would ask a peer.
## Deliver
Two versions — one that leads with the connection, one that leads with the reason and mentions the connection second. Note which is stronger here and why.
## Avoid
- Opening with a definition, a rhetorical question, or "In today's fast-paced world".
- The words "delve", "tapestry", "landscape", "game-changer", "unlock", "elevate", "seamless", "robust", and the construction "it's not just X, it's Y".
- Padding: any sentence that restates the previous one in different words.
- Evenly-weighted sections. Real arguments have a centre of gravity.
- Hedging every claim into meaninglessness. Take a position.
From the Public Template Directory