This short report explains how we use A/B testing for cold email outreach, why email is a good channel for a B2B product like WastePilot, and what makes a strong cold email. It uses our two WastePilot emails as concrete examples designed to make restaurant owners realise there is a hidden cost problem in their kitchens and click through to learn more.
A/B testing (or split testing) means sending two versions of the same email to similar audiences, changing only one key element such as the subject line, opening sentence, or call to action. We then compare open rate, click‑through rate, and replies to see which version performs better. This approach replaces guesswork with data: instead of debating which copy “sounds better”, we let real prospects vote with their clicks.
For an early‑stage project like WastePilot, A/B testing is especially useful because we still need to discover which angles resonate most: emotional loss, curiosity around a number, or regulatory pressure. A few simple tests can quickly show which ideas actually move restaurant owners to take action.
Email is still one of the most effective B2B channels because it goes directly to decision‑makers, is cheap at scale, and provides clear performance data. It works particularly well when we have a clear target (for example, restaurant owners in Barcelona) and a problem that is expensive or painful, such as thousands of euros in wasted food each year.
Cold outreach emails are best for us when we want to:
Create awareness of a hidden problem (food waste cost)
Drive traffic to a specific landing page or website
Generate demo requests or conversations for our sales pipeline
They are less effective if the audience is very broad, the offer is vague, or we cannot explain the value in a few clear sentences.
Our cold emails need to be short, specific and focused on the reader’s world, not on our product features. Strong emails share a few common traits.
Short, question‑based subjects often get better open rates than long or salesy ones. Our two subjects are:
“Are you okay with this loss?”
“If 9 000€ was on the table, would you walk away?”
Both create curiosity and emotion without sounding like spam.
We start from a real business problem, not from a technical description. Restaurant owners care more about disappearing margin than about dashboards or SaaS. Our first lines do this:
“You work too hard for your money to disappear in the bin.”
“Every year, part of your food budget never turns into sales.”
These sentences are easy to understand and immediately relevant to any operator.
Specific figures make the problem feel real and urgent. The reference to “around 9 000€ a year” gives a clear order of magnitude that helps managers imagine the impact on their P&L. Vague claims like “a lot of money lost in waste” are much easier to ignore.
A good cold email can follow a three‑step structure: problem, number, action. Both of our emails do this in under 80 words, which is ideal for busy inboxes.
Below are the final versions we plan to test.
Subject: [Token with the name of the mail receiver], Are you okay with this loss?
Hi, [Token with the name of the mail receiver]
You work too hard for your money to disappear in the bin.
Did you know on average, restaurants in Barcelona throw away around 9 000€ worth of food per year.
If you could turn that loss into profit, would you take a look ?
👉 Take a journey on WastePilot
Subject: If 9 000€ was on the table, would you walk away?
Hi, [Token with the name of the mail receiver]
Every year, part of your food budget never turns into sales.
On average, restaurants in Barcelona lose around 9 000€ a year in food that ends up in the trash.
If you could see that number and reduce it, would you take a minute to look?
👉Check here
To compare these two emails, we will send Email 1 to half of a similar list of restaurants and Email 2 to the other half, ideally at the same time and day. After a few days, we will measure:
Open rate (which subject wins)
Click‑through rate (which body and CTA work better)
Replies or demo requests (which email generates real interest)
The winning version becomes our new baseline for future campaigns, and we can test a new element next time (for example, a different CTA or a mention of regulation pressure). This cycle of testing and improving is how we build a reliable, scalable outreach engine without making the emails long or boring.