6 Networking Email Tips That Tripled My Hit Rate

May 11, 2025

In my first month of networking, only 15% of bankers responded to my emails.

By month two, that number grew to 53%.

As a non-target you won’t get invited to interview if a banker doesn’t “push” your resume to HR.

AKA a “referral” / “recommendation”.

Only the ivy league target school kids can get first rounds without a referral.

The first step in landing a referral is figuring out how to get bankers to respond to your emails.

Otherwise, you don’t even get the chance to wow them over the phone.

I was tired of getting ghosted so I reached out to my SR mentor to see what worked for him SO year.

Here are the six tips he shared and examples of how I used each of them.

TIP 1 - DIG THROUGH LINKEDIN

My goal was to make bankers see me as a younger version of themselves.

You have to realize most are only willing to help out kids they have stuff in common with.

So - you have to specifically target bankers with shared commonalities if you want them to respond.

Ivy league kids have it easy and just filter LinkedIn for alumni -

But as a non-target you don’t have that luxury, so you have to get creative to find commonalities.

After setting broader filters for bank, city & job title - I would always go to the search bar and put in whatever extra keywords I thought might be a good angle.

Here were six of the angles I tried that worked best for me.

  • Hockey Players - I played competitive AAA hockey growing up was also on our team at school. Under “Activities & Societies” in each banker’s profile, I looked for anything hockey related for both high school & college. Worked like a charm

  • Geography - Being from a small town in Central IL made me a huge minority in the NYC finance scene. Even just being from the “Midwest” in general makes you a minority. I dug for where each banker went to high school & college and got as specific as I could in scope with trying to relate by location (i.e. Central Illinois, Illinois, Midwest, Chicagoland, etc)

  • College Athletes - Anyone who played varsity or club sports in college understands the grind of being a student athlete and was always more willing to help me out

  • Big Ten - I ended up talking to lots of bankers that went to Indiana, Michigan & Wisconsin. They loved talking Big Ten sports

  • Business Fraternity - I was in Beta Alpha Psi and found some bankers that were in chapters at other schools

  • Non-Target - Anyone that went to a “no-name” school understands all the extra effort that goes into breaking in. This one isn’t as close of a connection but can still work

TIP 2 - MAKE SUBJECT LINE OBVIOUS

They won’t even open your email if that commonality isn’t LOUD & CLEAR in the subject line.

Use the format - [Connection(s)] + “Reaching Out - ” + [First Name] + [Last Name]

I always tried to get as specific as I could with the connection(s) in the subject line.

It’s all about trying different combinations and seeing what works.

Here were some variations I used.

  • Hockey Players

    • Illinois Hockey Player Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • Former AAA Hockey Player Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • College Hockey Player Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • Hockey Player Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

  • Geography

    • Midwest Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • Central IL Native Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • Chicagoland Native Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • Illinois Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

  • College Athletes

    • College Hockey Player Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • College Athlete Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • Fellow College Athlete Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

  • Big Ten

    • Big Ten Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • University of Illinois Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

  • Business Fraternity

    • Beta Alpha Psi Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • Beta Alpha Psi Active Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • BAP Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • BAP Alpha Chapter Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

  • Non-Target

    • Fellow Non-Target Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

    • University of Illinois Student Reaching Out - [First Name] [Last Name]

TIP 3 - KEEP EMAIL SHORT & SWEET

No banker will respond if you write them a novel.

They’ll take one look at your email - realize how much effort it would take to read the whole thing -

Then hit delete right away.

Your email needs to follow the “Credit Card Rule”.

If you hold your credit card up to your computer, the length shouldn't exceed the height of the card.

All you need is four short sections, each separated with a blank line.

  • Section 1 - Greeting + Sentence or two on your background. Make the CONNECTION obvious once again with a bit more detail this time

  • Section 2 - Transition explaining why interested in bank + You'd love to hop on the phone to ask about their experience in XYZ group

  • Section 3 - "The Ask" - POLITELY bring up the possibility of hopping on the phone at a time most convenient for them. Wait to send your availability

  • Section 4 - Say you look forward to hearing back and have attached your resume for their reference

TIP 4 - PERSONALIZE YOUR TEMPLATE

If they think you didn’t make the effort to type out a fully personalized email -

They’ll have no inclination to help you out and hit delete right away.

There’re two main ways to do this.

  • (1) Vary Greeting - Never use the cookie cutter “I hope this email finds you well”. A few examples I used - “I hope you enjoyed some of the exciting Super Bowl action last night…”, “I hope you survived the snowstorm this weekend up in Chicago…”, “Hope your Wednesday morning is off to a great start…”

  • (2) Re-Emphasize Connection - That first “section” should repeat the connection from the subject line with an additional layer of detail. For example when I emailed "College Athletes", I’d add this to my background sentences - "...and I'm also a forward on our school's division one ice hockey team..."

TIP 5 - LEVERAGE GOOD CALLS

If you do it right, a good call should automatically land you three or four more calls.

After a good call - ask the banker if they’d recommend “anyone in particular to reach out to next”.

Some people say to do this over the phone, but I always felt that came across as being a bit pushy.

So - I always did it in my thank you email.

If they also thought it was a good call - they’ll do one of two things.

  • (A) Give you a few names / emails of their peers

  • (B) CC one or two of their friends on that same chain to put you in touch

If they CC the next contact - your job is easy.

First just follow up on the same chain to both saying you appreciate being put in touch.

Then send a second email following up on the same chain but only to the new banker.

If you’re only given names / emails - your job is a bit tougher.

Don’t just send those next contacts a typical cold email.

Leverage the fact you got the “stamp of approval” from the banker you had the initial convo with.

I always put “(Referred by [Name of First Banker])” at the end of each subject line.

It should look something like this.

This flywheel of turning good calls into a series of more calls was my bread and butter.

One of my best even CC’d me to his high school friends that worked at other banks.

TIP 6 - USE A TRACKER

I stayed organized and tracked all of my emails & calls in an excel spreadsheet.

This helped me out in four main ways.

  • Assessing Traction - I had formulas that automatically calculated my hit rate for each bank. If you get momentum with 2 – 3 analysts / associates at a bank, it’s then appropriate to contact SR bankers there

  • Spreading It Out - NEVER send two emails to the same group at the same bank on the same day. They’ll talk about you in-person and neither will respond. My tracker had a column for industry / division to avoid this

  • Follow Up Timing - I had a column with “most recent contact date”. You should send a follow up email to bankers who ghost you 1.5 – 2 weeks later with a 3 sentence “wanted to follow up quickly…” note to show persistence

  • Thank You Emails - The “conversation details” column helped me write thank you emails. I’d write 2 – 3 bullets on my main takeaways from the call and drop them in the thank you

Cheers 🥂

- Jack