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I analyzed 4 years of my inbox, and look what AI has done to it

Published almost 2 years ago • 2 min read

Buying robots from robots

Last week I received the following obviously-ChatGPT-generated sales mail in my Textio inbox:

What is the product? Who knows!

As I've written recently, I'm currently receiving hundreds of identical-sounding sales mails every single week, most obviously written with ChatGPT or with tools that wrap ChatGPT pretty thinly. The majority of these messages are offering AI-powered sales and marketing tools. Oh, the irony.

Here's what I'm wondering: Is anyone reading this stuff, let alone buying it?

Your inbox is an awesome data set

I love a good data story, and the best data sets are often hiding in plain sight. Some years ago, I wrote rules for my inbox to push cold mail into different categories based on what the mail was trying to sell. The result is that I have a clear map of what people have tried to cold-sell me over time.

tl;dr If you think the rise of lowest-common-denominator AI tools has changed your inbox, you're probably right!

Here's the story in three simple charts.

#1: Between mid-2022 and mid-2023, cold mail shot way up

For many years, I've received hundreds of cold sales mails every week. Call it an occupational hazard of having a leadership job title and a stable email address.

But even with that baseline, look what happens in the 12 months after ChatGPT launches: the number of cold sales messages I receive shoots up dramatically. Thanks, Sam Altman!

#2: More of it is software, and especially sales and marketing software

You might look at the first chart and think, "everyone is relying on outbound sales more these days," or "your email address has ended up on some terrible lists." Maybe! But the increase isn't distributed equally. It's nearly all coming from software sales. The other categories have only increased slightly over time.

I've coded various categories of software sales in different shades of blue on the chart above, so you can see the differences. Software sales increase faster than everything else, and it's mostly software to help me sell stuff myself: sales and marketing tools.

#3: 91% of software cold mail is trying to sell me AI

Here's the kicker: in the first half of 2023, only 24% of the messages pitching me on buying software mention AI. Just 18 months later, 91% mention AI. Whoa!

Here's the deal:

  • ChatGPT launches, the rate of cold sales mail surges, and it's mostly people selling sales and marketing software
  • Over the same period of time, AI-as-value-prop completely takes over the pitches
  • Because all the pitches are themselves written with the same AI tools, they all sound exactly the same
  • I don't want any of these products, maybe because I can't tell any of them apart (but all this mail sure makes a nifty data set)

Many sales leaders say that outbound no longer works. This is why.

What do you think?

Thanks for reading!

Kieran

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nerd processor

Kieran Snyder

Every week, I write a deep dive into some aspect of AI, startups, and teams. Tech exec data storyteller, former CEO @Textio.

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