6 successful pitches

End Feast and Famine – Forever

One client disappears and the panic sets in?

Sales for Sane People is a proven system for booking 4–8 warm calls a month – without a single cold email or spammy pitch. 

• Full system, setup, and walkthrough

• 5 step-by-step daily workflows

• Over-the-shoulder videos

• Notion pipeline template 

• Real-life message examples

Lifetime access is $249 or join MOFU to get access for as little as $29/mo. 7-day, no-questions-asked, money-back guarantee.

👉 Get Sales for Sane People here

Want to see real pitches that landed TOFU members work?

Then keep reading 👀

The other week, I put out a shoutout for successful pitches.

Thanks to some incredibly generous TOFU members, I’ve got screenshots of six pitches that led to paying clients to share with you – and what you can learn from each one.

Some included detailed keyword research. Others are a couple sentences long.

But they all worked.

Let’s dive right in…

🕜 “Right place, right time” pitches

As a great man once said:

Sometimes, landing a new client is simply a case of sliding into someone’s DMs at the right time.

Here’s the perfect example from Johanna Gruber:

“It took them a month to respond,” Johanna told me. “But they are still a client of mine a year later (and probably my favorite client 🙂)”

Here’s another example of this in action Archit Shukla shared with me:

And one from Francis Walshe, too:

“This client happened to have a content idea pretty much ready to go, but didn't have a freelancer on hand to get it moving,” Francis told me. “I'm not sure if serendipity is a marketing strategy, but whatever works!”

I recently discovered that if the stars align and you hit up someone’s DMs at the right time you don’t actually need to hit them with a pitch. 

Check it out:

The key here isn't perfect copy – it's perfect timing. These pitches work because they solve an immediate problem the prospect already knows they have. 

When someone's actively looking for help, even a simple "hey, I do this thing 👋" can land you work.

💎 “Value-first” pitches

Here’s a pitch that led to work for TOFU legend Nadira Bostic (which she says was inspired by an edition of friend of TOFU Liam Carnahan’s newsletter).

As you can see, Nadira put a tonne of work into this one, running keyword research for a potential client.

There’s soooo much value here for the potential client. 

And this is a super smart template, because you run a few keyword reports for each new prospect to get a banger pitch to send them.   

These pitches work by proving your expertise before asking for anything. Instead of telling prospects how good you are, you show you’re the right person to take their content to the next level by solving a real problem upfront.

Nadira is living proof this approach can lead to work for clients you’re a really good fit for. And I’ve had some success with it too.

As I mentioned in my last deep dive, I’ve landed two of my ​​34 clients through cold pitches.

I landed the first through this kinda intense email:

Which luckily left the prospect asking “can I pay you to edit my stuff from now on?” and not “how about you go fuck yourself?” 🥳

Which was a HUGE win…

But the truth is, it’s far from the only email I’ve sent like that.

Here’s one that led to a conversation, but no work:

I sent half a dozen or so emails like that around 2017 when I was first looking to start freelancing.

And I only ever landed the one client from them 🙃

Obviously, these kinds of pitches are a lot of work upfront with no guaranteed pay off. So you’re going to want to pick your targets carefully with this approach!

🤩 "Personality-packed" pitches

Here’s the actual email the magnificent Mike Straus used to land Hockey Canada (🤯) as a client:

When I asked Mike why he thought this pitch worked, he said:

• First and foremost, I injected it with personality. Personality-packed pitches work 1,000x better than bland corporate-speak.

• Second, I proved that I know the sport of hockey by using hockey idioms, like “Keep your stick on the ice”.

• Third, I leveraged social proof and real results to show the prospect what’s possible when they work with me.

• Fourth, I commented on a piece of recent news right at the start of the pitch to prove that I was paying attention to their brand.

• Fifth, I proved that I understood their mission by talking about promoting the sport of hockey to all Canadians.

• And sixth, I used an informal subject line with a clear value prop, while simultaneously leveraging hockey vernacular to prove that I’m passionate about what they do. 

Hope you’re taking notes folks, cause this right here is a masterclass in personalised pitching 👀

The amazing Trisha Turner takes a similar approach with her pitches.

Here’s an email she sent that led to work:

Here’s why Trisha thinks this approach works:

“I try to keep in mind that, when I worked in-house, good freelance help was such a lifesaver when I got buried. So, I’m not here to blather on about my awesomeness – I’m simply here to see if you need help and offer to provide it.

I find folks I think align with my background and interests. Then I send emails that: 

1. Let them know that that their work resonates with me

2. Ask if they use freelance help (so they know I’m not looking for a staff role)

3. Briefly list what I do and some of my clients that are in line with what they’re doing (and, if applicable, I note where I’m based)

4. Offer to use my experience to help them tackle projects they need a hand with”

Trisha is also a big fan of following up:

“I always follow up. I know lots of folks consider this a waste of time, but I often hear back from people after that second – very brief - email if I don’t initially get a response. I figure the kind of people who need my help are busy people; they might miss my first email.”

She had to judge this particular client twice before getting on call with them and closing the sale:

These kinds of pitches work because they prove you actually understand the client's world – their industry, their challenges, their language. When you sound like someone who "gets it," prospects are way more likely to respond.

🙏 “Spray-and-pray” pitches

When I went freelance full-time in 2020 I needed clients – like, yesterday.

So I sent this pitch to 21 local wedding photographers:

This one to 40 local wedding venues:

And this one to 26 UK-based SEO agencies:

I followed up with each pitch at least once – sometimes three times. So that’s getting on for 200 emails.

And all that time and effort drove one paying client (who I did roughly £2,000 of work for) 🫠

The worst part? Some of the replies I got back:

Spray-and-pray pitching is what most freelancers default to (including me back in the day) because it feels productive. 

But volume can't fix a fundamentally weak approach. When you're a stranger sending templated emails, you're competing in the worst possible way – on price and availability rather than relationships and trust.

My most successful pitches – the ones that actually led to long-term clients – weren't sent to strangers. They went to people who already knew me.

As I mentioned last week, I’m three for three on warm pitches like this:

When someone recognizes your name in their inbox, your “pitch” doesn't need to be a masterpiece. It just needs to show up at the right time. 

But when you're a complete unknown, you're competing against every other freelancer flooding their inbox with templated outreach.

From my experience, the math has been:

• ~200 cold emails = 1 client

• 3 warm emails = 3 clients

In other words:

If you want your pitches to land, it’s way smarter to spend time building connections rather than tinkering endlessly with your cold email script.

Which is why Tyler created Sales for Sane People – the step-by-step system you need to build a sustainable, predictable pipeline of client work, once and for all.

Instead of teaching you to write better cold pitches, he shows you the exact system for identifying prospects, engaging authentically on their content, and positioning yourself as the obvious choice when they need help.

No more cold pitching. No more begging for work. No replies accusing you of “sneaky advertising”.

If you're tired of the cold pitch hamster wheel and ready to build a business where clients come to you, Tyler's course is exactly what you need.

👉 Get Sales for Sane People here

And once you’ve used Tyler’s system to warm leads up? 

Johanna Gruber, Archit Shukla, Francis Walshe, Trisha Turner, Nadira Bostic, and Mike Straus have given you the blueprint for the perfect pitch to float by them 🔥

Business news as it should be.

Join 4M+ professionals who start their day with Morning Brew—the free newsletter that makes business news quick, clear, and actually enjoyable.

Each morning, it breaks down the biggest stories in business, tech, and finance with a touch of wit to keep things smart and interesting.

Try it yourself (for free)