By Henry Su, Jen Yip, and Robby Huang
Part 1 of this 2-part series covers why an email blurb is so important, what you’re trying to accomplish with a blurb, and some important do’s and don’ts for writing them.
In Part 2 below, we propose blurb structures that we’ve seen to be effective for Renaissance Collective community members. Keep in mind that the most effective blurbs aren’t one-size-fits-all and should be carefully tailored to provide a strong incentive for the reader to take some action on your behalf.
We propose a 3-part blurb format: 1. Introduction, 2. Body, 3. Conclusion
1. Introduction
The introduction should succinctly summarize the opportunity and why you are excited to learn more about it.
Good:
Thank you for offering to connect me with John Doe at Company X regarding this role <link>. I’m very excited by the vision of Company X to connect communities by providing convenient, cost-effective, and eco-friendly modes of micromobility.
Better, more personal:
I appreciate your connecting me with XXX for a potential role in [TEAM NAME] at [COMPANY]. When my fiancée and I moved in together a few years ago, we chose an empty Parisian flat, as we wanted to furnish it ourselves and make it truly our own. But that meant investing in costly staples: a bed, a sofa, and a table. As we were just entering our first jobs, we had to ask our bank to get consumer credit. We faced a long and painful process - as a result, we did not get our bed until several weeks later! If [COMPANY] were in France, I’m sure moving in would have been a more seamless experience. I’m enthused by [COMPANY]’s mission to enable people to buy any costly item immediately, with reasonable credit terms. It’s a real step forward in people’s day-to-day lives, and I want to contribute to it.
Better, more succinct:
As an endocrinologist and digital health enthusiast, I’m very excited about XXX’s analytics-driven approach to chronic disease management.
Comments:
These three examples demonstrate that, to some extent, how you introduce yourself and your interest in the company is a matter of taste. All of these blurbs demonstrate a strong understanding of the vision and mission of the companies to which they’re directed.
In the ‘more personal’ example, the blurb demonstrates a well-researched enthusiasm for the product and the value it creates -- which can make the recipient more excited to meet you. More personalized examples can also be more memorable.
In the ‘succinct’ example, the member introduces herself and her background and displays her understanding of what the company does all in a single sentence.
2. Body
The body of the blurb should accomplish two things:
Identify the opportunities to add value to the company or individual.
Given your experiences, prove how you are positioned to add value.
It’s important not to get hung up on specific titles (this is especially true when applying for early stage startups, where roles are less clearly defined). Instead, the focus should be on “what pockets of opportunity exist where I can add value”.
Good:
I saw roles open in Business Operations and Product Management in which my toolkit of strengths could play into. As Company X grows, I suspect you may be facing growing pains such as ___. At ___, I led project ___ to success metric ___. Through this experience, I strengthened my abilities ___. I’d love to help Company X scale its efforts in ___ through ___.
Better Example 1:
I saw roles open in product management and business operations and have strengths that could play into each [VALUE TO THE COMPANY STATEMENT 1]. I think I could help [COMPANY] work on projects with diverse stakeholders—politicians, citizens, technologists, developers, etc. I could also build partnerships (e.g., with companies whose tech could benefit future car-free cities) and communicate [COMPANY’s] story to gain grassroots support [VALUE TO THE COMPANY STATEMENT 2]. I’ve conceptualized and managed several multi-stakeholder projects, including a global nonprofit, a web startup, a sustainable university food co-op, and university academic programs. Each involved earning allies’ trust, making collective decisions, anticipating/addressing frictions, and communicating our vision to the public [EXPERIENCE STATEMENT THAT DIRECTLY RELATES TO THE VALUE YOU PROPOSE TO CREATE FOR NEW COMPANY].
Better Example 2:
I could see myself operating very effectively as connective tissue between different parts of the business at [COMPANY] and ensuring alignment between company strategy and execution. Business ops is certainty appealing to me. I would also be open to some kind of program management for cross-functional strategic initiatives. [VALUE TO THE COMPANY STATEMENT]
I've been with [XXXX, name of current employer] from Series A to Series C, and I have implemented a number of process and product improvements. Two quick examples: (1) As we started to outgrow our original process, I initiated and owned process improvement across Sales, Success, Support and Product to implement better product feedback loops which has had strong adoption. (2) I also gathered data and presented to our Chief Customer Officer on the bottlenecks affecting on-boarding and supporting our largest customer segment; those efforts resulted in re-prioritizing our product roadmap, decreasing on-boarding time by 30%, and freeing up significant internal resources to operate more effectively at scale. [EXPERIENCE STATEMENTS THAT DIRECTLY RELATE TO THE VALUE YOU PROPOSE TO CREATE FOR NEW COMPANY].
Comments:
Both of the ‘better’ examples work because:
a. They highlight what the person believes their strengths are and ties those into how he/she may help the company achieve its goals.
b. The writers have clearly researched the teams and open roles ahead of time -- this is great in connecting the dots for the receiver. The founders can now forward this blurb to the hiring managers of the appropriate teams.
c. The writers don’t just claim they can do those things they proposed -- they show how they have done them in other roles held in the past.
3. Conclusion
Make a specific ask to meet a key stakeholder in the company.
Example: I would love to chat with Jane Doe about her vision for Company X and discuss areas where I may be able to contribute.
Blurb Bonus Points:
Selectively incorporating the following pointers could make for an even more compelling blurb:
Add a short, relevant personal anecdote that ties directly to the company and/or its industry. This is an effective way to show why the opportunity has personal significance to you.
If you’ve written about the topic that the company works on, link to the public work (tweet, blogpost, etc.). This shows sincere interest in the topic and gives the company another data point on which to evaluate you. If you haven’t written such a piece, now might be a good time to consider developing more of a public body of work to showcase your thinking.
You may want to include some general context about yourself that highlights your proudest accomplishments and demonstrates general aptitude and intelligence. Keep in mind that content that is less relevant to the opportunity should be deprioritized, kept short, and moved to the end of the blurb. Avoid reiterating your CV in your blurb. Your resume will have your other experiences listed if you want to dive into them in an interview.
Choose 1-2 experiences to describe with specifics to land your points. Being more specific gives the reader more context and allows them to more fully understand the impact you have made. Giving just a bit more color/nuance will help you stand out from others who exaggerate their individual contributions.
At Renaissance Collective, we make dozens of intros every day to help our members connect with interesting opportunities. The advice that we share with you here is a culmination of our community’s learnings over hundreds of email introductions that we’ve made. If you’d like to accelerate the development of your professional network, consider learning more about Renaissance Collective by signing up for our newsletter below.
Thanks to David King, Marisa Cruz, Pierre-Loup Lelasseux, Vidushi Sharma, Nadia Eldeib, and Kali Borkoski for contributing thinking, writing, and editing to this piece. As with all our work at Renaissance Collective, every contributor brought his or her own unique insights and sharp thinking to this subject, making this piece stronger than any one of us could have written on our own.