Spam filters do a good job filtering out obvious spam, yet professional inboxes are often plagued by automated cold sales emails that get through them. Surprisingly, it’s mostly an unsolved problem. Here’s 2 approaches to tackle it on Gmail.
This is a free albeit limited solution, as it does not automatically catch all cold outreach.
Identify keywords or phrases common in cold outreach emails. This could include terms like “introducing,” “opportunity,” “business,” “collaboration,” or specific phrases like “just following up” or “reaching out.”
OR (e.g., introducing OR opportunity OR "just following up").As you encounter new types of outreach emails, add relevant keywords to your filter to improve its effectiveness. You can edit the filter under Filters and Blocked Addresses anytime.
Observe how the filters perform. Once you’re happy, go to the filter’s settings like described above, then click Continue and check “Skip the Inbox (Archive it)”. Fear not, archiving does not delete any emails.
It will stop Cold Outreach from showing in your main Inbox, but you can still find them under the “Cold Outreach” label.
To get full control of cold outreach, you can use a Gmail add-on built for this purpose such as Inbox Airlock. Inbox Airlock works out of the box and detects cold outreach cross-checking if the sender is someone you’ve corresponded with before. It is not free, but surprisingly effective for the price and comes with other useful features to increase your productivity.