I've gone through your NAT tutorials to create workflows, but my budget is tight—I can't subscribe to every tool. Which workflow should I prioritize learning before pitching on Upwork and doing cold emails?

#173 · best AI automation agency leads (2025)

I've gone through your NAT tutorials to create workflows, but my budget is tight—I can't subscribe to every tool. Which workflow should I prioritize learning before pitching on Upwork and doing cold emails?

Great idea. I think you should probably get a naden subscription—make sure it's naden cloud—and get Appy. The reason you get Appy is because if you have Appy and Google Sheets, you can do a million things. Then get one of the AI model families, like Claude from Anthropic, load it up with some credits, or get ChatGPT, or the GPT suite via the OpenAI API. That should get you about 80% of the way there, and you can do a lot with that. For the rest, any mail finder or Phantom Buster—just add a few credits and you'll have email enrichment flows capable as well. The mic I'm using is the Samsung Q2U. Thanks, Ahmed.

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Related answers

youtube ↗Cold Email

I want to start a cold‑email outreach but only have manual tools—what should I do?

I’ve been in the same spot. I started by rotating a handful of Gmail accounts—sometimes five—sending about ten cold emails a day from each. It’s not ideal, but it works to get started as long as your emails are well‑researched and the approach is solid. Gmail accounts have lower deliverability, especially new ones, so they need to warm up. You can also buy cheap inboxes (e.g., three Instantly airmail inboxes for around $4 each per month plus a domain) which gives you roughly 90 emails a day. Build a quick lead list, template your messages, and spend the first hour‑and‑a‑half each day sending them. You can also DM prospects. The key is to keep sending, refine your copy, and don’t worry too much about the tools at the start.

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youtube ↗Cold Email

My cold‑email reply rate is 0 % and I lack case studies for my inbound AI voice solutions. How should I sell these offers and improve cold‑email performance?

First, revisit your cold‑email fundamentals. Make sure your emails actually land in the inbox, get opened, and are compelling enough to earn a reply. Test deliverability, subject lines, and copy. A good cold‑email sequence should: 1) land in the primary inbox, 2) achieve a decent open rate, 3) get clicks, and 4) provoke a reply. If you’re not seeing any replies, you likely have a problem at one of those earlier steps. Start by creating a simple campaign that feels personal—e.g., “Hey [Name], how’s it going? I’m working on …”—and iterate until you see engagement. Once you have a working email framework, you can begin gathering case studies by offering free or low‑cost pilots, which will later strengthen your outreach.

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youtube ↗Lead Generation

What BD strategy would you recommend for an AI automation business? Should I rely on cold calling and cold email, or are there other lead‑generation avenues I’m missing?

Cold calling is extremely time‑inefficient: spending an hour on the phone typically yields only 10–15 minutes of actual conversation unless you use a power dialer, and most people don’t use even basic tools like Clearbit. This means you operate at about 25% efficiency—the opposite of leverage. Instead of cold calling, devote that time to sending high‑quality cold emails and direct messages. The outcome is similar: prospects get a high‑quality interaction, you can appear on video, and you gain the ability to automate follow‑ups, cut through gatekeepers, and eliminate dial and connect times. Essentially, a well‑crafted cold email functions as a high‑quality voicemail that scales far better than phone calls.

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youtube ↗AI & Automation

Hey Nick, what are some automations, builds, and offers that can be easily sold by beginners on cold traffic? Is it strictly stuff that brings new money or clients to the company? And is there something automation related rather than say cold email?

Cold email isn't really automation; you can easily build an AI‑enabled cold‑email agency, which is a top solo‑freelancer model right now. But the simplest, highest‑leveraged system you can build for a client is a 'speedtole' system—a glorified autoresponder. You watch a mailbox for incoming mail from a filter (e.g., Facebook lead ads sending an email), then using Make.com, n8n, or cloud routines you scan the mailbox, get the trigger, and immediately reply via email. Then you send a Twilio SMS, and a team member calls the prospect. This cuts response time from minutes to under a minute, boosting pickup and conversion rates because of the perceived professionalism of your system. I’ve seen this system add over a million dollars in revenue for clients and improve existing funnels by 10‑20%, easily generating an easy $500k per year.

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