Key Takeaways
- B2B buyers now use roughly 10 different interaction channels in a typical buying journey, so relying on a single outreach channel (like just email) is fundamentally out of step with how they actually buy.
- For most outbound programs, the critical channels to master are cold email, cold calling, LinkedIn/social, and opt-in SMS, then orchestrate them into a coordinated, multi-touch sequence.
- Average cold email reply rates hover around 3-5%, while well-run LinkedIn InMail campaigns often see 18-25% response and SMS delivers ~98% open rates, proving that channel mix dramatically changes engagement.
- You can improve results quickly by tightening ICP targeting, shrinking list sizes, and adding at least one additional channel (phone or LinkedIn) to every sequence you currently run over email alone.
- Over 80% of sales require 5+ follow-ups, yet nearly half of reps stop after a single attempt, so your outreach strategy must be built around persistent, multi-touch follow-up-not one-and-done blasts.
- Cold calling is still very much alive: 60% of buyers say they prefer phone for high-value solutions and 78% report purchasing because of a cold call at some point, making it essential for complex B2B deals.
- The bottom line: winning teams don't chase every shiny new channel; they go deep on 3-4 core outreach channels and leverage partners like SalesHive to run high-volume, multi-channel programs without burning out their internal team.
Modern buyers move fast across channels
Outbound works best today when it matches how B2B buyers actually buy: across multiple touchpoints, in multiple places, over time. McKinsey’s B2B research shows buyers use about 10 different interaction channels across a typical journey, which makes single-channel prospecting a self-inflicted constraint. If your team is still running “email-first, everything-else-optional,” you’re not just missing reach—you’re missing timing. Our job is to show up where your buyers already are, with a coordinated message that feels consistent instead of random.
This is why outreach channels matter more than ever: buyers don’t evaluate vendors in a straight line, and they don’t want to be forced into your preferred communication method. They bounce between email, phone, social, and internal forwarding, and your outreach either keeps pace or falls behind. The goal isn’t to chase every new platform; it’s to execute a reliable multichannel motion that creates repeated, credible moments to respond.
At SalesHive, we see the same pattern across industries: teams that “pick a lane” too narrowly end up blaming the lane when performance drops. Inbox fatigue rises, deliverability tightens, and the average rep compensates by sending more—often to the same tired list. The fix is not volume; it’s orchestration, better segmentation, and building a repeatable sequence that your SDRs (or an outsourced sales team) can run without burning out.
Why single-channel outbound breaks down in 2025
The biggest risk in outbound isn’t that a channel “stops working,” it’s that you build a program that can’t absorb change. Email-only outreach is exposed to spam filtering, reputation swings, and inbox competition; LinkedIn-only outreach is exposed to platform noise and limits; phone-only outreach can be capped by screening and low pickup rates. A practical outreach plan treats channels like a portfolio: a few core channels, deliberately combined, so one doesn’t carry the entire quota burden.
Follow-up is where most teams quietly lose deals, and it’s rarely because reps don’t care—it’s because the motion isn’t designed for persistence. Research summarized by ProfitOutreach reports roughly 80% of sales require 5+ follow-ups, yet about 44% of reps stop after a single attempt. If your only follow-up lever is “send another email,” the sequence gets repetitive fast and performance stalls.
This is also why we recommend measuring “sequence performance” instead of channel vanity metrics. Open rates, dials, and connection counts are activity, not outcome. When you normalize by impact—meetings per 100 touches by channel, and then meetings per sequence—you can see which combinations create real conversations and which are just motion.
The outreach channels that do the heavy lifting
For most B2B motions, we recommend anchoring on three core channels—email, phone, and LinkedIn—before you add anything “fancy.” That triad maps well to modern buyer behavior: email gives scalable coverage, phone gives high-signal learning and fast objection handling, and LinkedIn adds social proximity and credibility. Once the core is producing meetings predictably, you can layer an accent channel like opt-in SMS for high-intent moments.
Benchmarks help keep expectations grounded and force better execution. In 2025 cold email benchmarks across large datasets, average performance is approximately 27.7% opens, 5.1% replies, and roughly 1–2% meetings booked—meaning you can’t “math your way” to pipeline without tight targeting and strong follow-up. Other benchmark reporting puts typical B2B cold email reply rates in the 3–5.1% band, with standout programs higher when the ICP and hook are dialed in.
Use the table below as a quick reality check when you’re deciding where to invest coaching, tooling, or sales outsourcing support. These numbers don’t replace your internal reporting, but they do set a baseline for what “normal” looks like so you can diagnose whether you have a channel problem or an execution problem.
| Channel | What “typical” performance looks like | What it’s best used for |
|---|---|---|
| Cold email | 27.7% open, 5.1% reply, 1–2% meetings booked | Scalable top-of-funnel coverage and message testing |
| Cold calling | 4.82% meeting success rate from conversations | High-signal discovery, objection mining, and deal acceleration |
| LinkedIn InMail | 18–25% reply rate (typical benchmark range) | Warming accounts, adding credibility, and reaching execs |
| Opt-in SMS | 98% open, 45% response rate | High-intent follow-up, reminders, reschedules, and no-show recovery |
How to stitch channels into one sequence SDRs can run
Multichannel outreach isn’t “do more stuff”—it’s aligning touches so each step has a job. A strong starting point is a 10–14 touch cadence over 2–3 weeks that mixes email, phone, and LinkedIn, where every touch advances a single narrative. Email carries the structured value prop and proof, phone creates real-time discovery and learns objections, and LinkedIn provides familiarization so later messages land warmer.
The most common implementation mistake we see is running channels in silos: email in one tool, calls in another, LinkedIn in someone’s head. That creates duplicated touches, inconsistent positioning, and sloppy handoffs. Centralize reporting in your CRM or outbound platform and review at the sequence level—sequence to meeting, meeting to opportunity—so you’re optimizing for pipeline, not for “more dials” or “more sends.”
To compare channels fairly, normalize your scorecard to conversions per 100 touches: meetings booked per 100 emails, per 100 calls, and per 100 LinkedIn messages. This is where a sales development agency or outbound sales agency can help because they’ll enforce clean definitions and consistent execution across reps. When you can see performance by sequence and by segment, you stop guessing and start reallocating effort based on evidence.
If you want more meetings without more burnout, stop asking one channel to do an entire buyer journey’s worth of work.
Cold email: still the workhorse, but only with precision
Email remains the easiest channel to scale, which is why so many teams treat it like a shortcut—and that’s exactly when it stops working. When typical reply rates sit around 3–5.1%, you can’t afford bloated lists and generic copy that “kind of applies” to everyone. The fastest lever is usually targeting: shrink segments, clarify the hypothesis, and make the ask realistic for a first touch.
Another common mistake is confusing personalization with merge fields. Real personalization is when the prospect can see why they’re in the email and why now, based on role, trigger, or operational context. As a cold email agency and SDR agency, we lean on structured research and scalable personalization, including our eMod approach, to make messages feel one-to-one without turning outbound into a manual craft project.
Deliverability is the quiet foundation that determines whether any of your copy matters. If your domains and sending patterns aren’t protected, your sequence metrics become misleading because you’re measuring a deliverability problem as if it were a messaging problem. Treat list quality, list building services, and deliverability management as part of the outreach system—not afterthoughts—and your benchmarks become both more stable and more improvable.
Cold calling + LinkedIn: your high-signal pairing
Phone is still one of the best “truth channels” because it gives immediate feedback you can feed back into every other step. Cognism’s 2024 reporting put average cold call success (meetings booked from conversations) at 4.82%, which sounds small until you remember how much pipeline one qualified meeting can create. The point of a modern cold calling team isn’t brute-force volume; it’s meaningful conversations, objection capture, and clean next steps.
LinkedIn is most effective when it warms the account rather than acting as a second inbox for pitching. A few minutes a day engaging with target accounts makes your eventual outreach feel familiar, and it’s a natural complement to b2b cold calling services where the rep can reference a recent post or company update. Benchmarks for LinkedIn InMail reply rates often land in the 18–25% range, which is why LinkedIn outreach services are so valuable when your ICP is active on the platform.
The mistake to avoid here is optimizing for activity instead of outcomes: more dials, more connection requests, more messages, but not more meetings. Build daily call blocks with a coaching loop, and track “meetings per meaningful conversation” so reps don’t game volume. Whether you run this internally or via cold calling services from a b2b sales agency, you want the same thing: repeatable conversations that sharpen the entire sequence.
SMS and messaging: powerful, but only when intent is real
SMS is not a replacement for email or calls; it’s an amplifier for moments where the buyer is already leaning in. Benchmark reporting commonly cites around 98% open rates and roughly 45% response rates, and it also suggests about 44% of B2B companies are already using SMS somewhere in their funnels. That’s exactly why you should treat texting like a concierge channel—short, helpful, and contextual—rather than another place to blast cold pitches.
The biggest mistake is using SMS as a first cold touch or texting without clear permission and context, especially in the US where compliance and brand trust matter. Keep SMS reserved for high-intent scenarios like meeting reminders, quick reschedules, and fast qualification after a form fill or positive reply. Done right, it reduces no-shows and increases responsiveness without adding friction.
If you want to pilot SMS safely, start with a narrow rule set: only confirmed meetings, only short reminders, and only a clear path to reschedule. Measure no-show rate before and after, then expand to other high-intent follow-ups if the data supports it. This “accent channel” mindset keeps your motion disciplined and prevents SMS from becoming the next noisy channel you have to recover.
Optimization: measure what matters and fix the real bottleneck
Most outreach underperforms for one of three reasons: the ICP is too broad, the message is too generic, or the sequence lacks persistent follow-up. The fix is to run a 90-day audit by channel and by segment, then standardize one multichannel backbone sequence for your primary ICP. When your SDRs aren’t improvising from scratch, your data gets cleaner and your coaching becomes practical instead of theoretical.
This is where multichannel follow-up becomes more than “best practice”—it’s measurable lift. ProfitOutreach cites a 28% increase in MQL-to-SQL conversion when teams use a multi-touchpoint follow-up strategy across channels versus single-channel outreach. That improvement usually comes from better timing, higher trust, and fewer lost leads that simply needed another credible touch to respond.
From an operating model standpoint, decide what you want to own versus what you want to outsource. Building an internal engine gives maximum control, but it also demands recruiting, training, data hygiene, deliverability, and consistent execution across channels. Many teams choose sales outsourcing or a sales development agency model to stand up a predictable engine quickly, then bring pieces in-house later once the playbook is proven.
Next steps: build your core triad, then scale with confidence
If you do nothing else, commit to the core triad—email, phone, and LinkedIn—and make it measurable. Start by shrinking your targeting into tight cohorts (role, vertical, trigger) and building one consistent sequence that blends those channels over a few weeks. This is how you move from “we tried outbound” to “we have an outbound system,” whether you run it internally or through an outsourced sales team.
Once the system is live, improve it like a product: iterate weekly on messaging, review call recordings for objection trends, and adjust LinkedIn touches so they warm accounts instead of spamming them. Add opt-in SMS only after the core sequence is producing meetings consistently and you have clear high-intent moments to support. The teams that win don’t chase every channel—they execute a few channels extremely well.
At SalesHive, we built our model around this reality: multichannel outbound is hard to run consistently without process, data discipline, and coaching. Since 2016, we’ve operated as a b2b sales agency and sdr agency that combines cold email, b2b cold calling, and LinkedIn touchpoints into one accountable motion—supported by list building and deliverability management. If you’re evaluating cold calling companies, a cold calling agency, or broader sales outsourcing, prioritize partners who can prove sequence-level outcomes, not just channel activity.
Sources
- McKinsey (B2B Pulse / omnichannel research)
- Revenue Velocity Lab via Optif.ai (2025 cold email benchmarks)
- The Digital Bloom (cold outbound reply benchmarks)
- Cognism (State of Cold Calling 2024)
- SendIQ (LinkedIn InMail reply benchmarks)
- LinkedIn Sales Solutions (improving InMail response rates)
- Marketing LTB (SMS marketing statistics 2025)
- ProfitOutreach (sales follow-up and multi-touch statistics)
- SalesHive (eMod personalization)
📊 Key Statistics
Expert Insights
Anchor on 3 Core Channels Before Adding Anything Fancy
For most B2B motions, the money channels are still email, phone, and LinkedIn. Nail your ICP, messaging, and follow-up cadences across those three before you worry about SMS, video, or direct mail. Once you can consistently generate meetings from your triad, then layer in supporting channels to squeeze out incremental gains rather than trying to fix a broken foundation.
Shrink Your Lists to Grow Your Reply Rates
Benchmarks show small, tightly segmented email campaigns often get 2-3x higher reply rates than big blasts. Instead of pushing 1,000 generic emails a week, carve your TAM into 50-200 prospect micro-segments and personalize heavily for each cohort. Your SDRs will have better conversations, and you'll get cleaner feedback on what actually resonates.
Treat Phone as Your High-Signal Discovery Channel
Cold calling isn't about brute-force dialing anymore; it's where you get live feedback loops that sharpen every other channel. Use calls to test positioning, surface new objections, and mine language that you can then roll back into email and LinkedIn copy. Track 'meetings per meaningful conversation', not just dials, so reps aren't gaming volume at the expense of quality.
Use LinkedIn to Warm, Not Just Pitch
If your only LinkedIn motion is 'connect → pitch slap', you're leaving a lot on the table. Have SDRs invest 10-15 minutes a day engaging with target accounts' posts, commenting thoughtfully, and sharing short, useful content. That social proof makes your eventual DM or email feel familiar instead of random and usually bumps acceptance and reply rates across the board.
Reserve SMS for High-Intent and Time-Sensitive Moments
With 98% open and 45% response rates, SMS is too powerful to waste on cold pitches. Use it for meeting reminders, last-minute reschedules, and quick qualification after someone raises their hand via form fill or reply. Always get explicit opt-in and keep messages short and helpful-more like a concierge, less like a marketing list.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Relying on a single outreach channel (usually email) for all prospecting
When buyers are using around 10 channels to research and evaluate vendors, a single-channel approach means you're missing where they actually pay attention-and you're fully exposed to inbox fatigue and spam filters.
Instead: Standardize a simple multichannel play: pair every email sequence with coordinated phone and LinkedIn steps, then add SMS or chat as buyers show intent. Start with 2-3 channels and a repeatable cadence before scaling volume.
Confusing activity metrics (dials, sends) with channel effectiveness
It's easy for SDRs to rack up dials or emails that never had a shot at converting, which leads you to double down on channels that are noisy but not actually producing meetings or pipeline.
Instead: Track conversions per 100 touches by channel-meetings booked per 100 emails, per 100 calls, per 100 LinkedIn messages-and shift effort toward the combinations that reliably generate conversations and qualified meetings.
Blasting large, unsegmented lists with generic messaging
Big generic campaigns drag down domain reputation, tank reply rates, and make it harder for even great messages to hit the inbox. You end up paying for tools and data to yell into the void.
Instead: Segment by ICP, persona, and trigger events, then run smaller, highly personalized plays. Use AI personalization tools and research frameworks to make every first touch feel like a one-off, even when it's sent at scale.
Treating SMS like just another cold channel
Cold, non-consensual texting is a fast way to damage your brand and run into compliance issues, especially in the US. Prospects experience it as intrusive and will remember you for the wrong reasons.
Instead: Only text opted-in contacts or those who have already engaged via another channel, and keep messages short, contextual, and value-focused. Think confirmations, quick answers, and reminders-not unsolicited pitches.
Tracking channels in silos instead of as part of one journey
When email, phone, and LinkedIn live in separate tools with separate owners, you can't see how they work together. That leads to duplicated touches, inconsistent messaging, and a poor buyer experience.
Instead: Centralize outreach data in your CRM or a unified outbound platform, enforce shared stages and definitions, and review performance at the sequence level. Optimize for 'sequence → meeting → opportunity', not channel vanity metrics.
Action Items
Audit your current outreach mix and performance by channel
Pull 90 days of data and calculate meetings booked per 100 emails, per 100 calls, and per 100 LinkedIn DMs. This gives you a baseline to decide where to double down, where to fix, and which new channels to test.
Design one standard multichannel sequence for your primary ICP
Build a 10-14 touch sequence that combines email, phone, and LinkedIn over 2-3 weeks, with clear objectives for each touch. Roll it out as the default play so every SDR is working from the same proven backbone instead of improvising.
Tighten targeting and shrink list sizes in your outbound campaigns
Break large target lists into smaller cohorts (50-200 prospects) by role, vertical, or trigger event and customize messaging to each slice. You'll see reply rates lift and get cleaner insights on what's working for whom.
Add structured call blocks and coaching for SDRs
Schedule daily call blocks with clear goals (e.g., 20 conversations or 2 meetings) and review recorded calls weekly. Focus coaching on openers, discovery questions, and transitions to next steps, not just talk-track compliance.
Experiment with LinkedIn touchpoints tied to email sequences
For each outbound email step, add LinkedIn actions like profile views, connection requests, or short follow-up messages. Track connection acceptance and response rates to see how social touches influence overall engagement.
Pilot opt-in SMS for meeting reminders and no-show recovery
Start by texting only confirmed meetings with short reminders and an easy reschedule link. Measure no-show rate before and after; if it drops, expand SMS to other high-intent moments like post-demo follow-ups.
Partner with SalesHive
On the email side, SalesHive’s eMod technology personalizes cold outreach at scale using public prospect and company data, often tripling response rates compared with generic templates. SDRs execute structured sequences that pair those personalized emails with high-volume cold calling and targeted LinkedIn touchpoints, all backed by accurate list building and deliverability management. Because everything rolls up under one playbook and one team, you get consistent messaging, transparent reporting across channels, and a steady stream of qualified meetings without building an internal SDR org from scratch.
If your team is light on bandwidth or expertise, SalesHive effectively becomes your multichannel sales development arm. They handle the daily grind-research, dialing, emailing, follow-up, and appointment setting-while your AEs focus on discovery calls, demos, and closing. With month-to-month flexibility and risk-free onboarding, you can stand up a professional, multi-channel outreach program quickly and adjust your channel mix as you see what actually performs for your market.
❓ Frequently Asked Questions
Which outreach channel should a B2B sales team prioritize first?
If you're starting from scratch, prioritize cold email-most B2B buyers still prefer email communication, and it's the easiest channel to scale and test. From there, layer in phone and LinkedIn as equal partners, not afterthoughts. Email gets you broad coverage and asynchronous conversations, while phone and LinkedIn create higher-signal, higher-trust interactions that move real opportunities forward.
Is cold calling still worth it in 2025 for B2B sales?
Yes, if you use it intelligently. Average cold call success rates for meetings hover around 2-5%, but 60% of buyers say they prefer phone for high-value solutions and 78% report purchasing because of a cold call at some point. That makes phone critical for complex or high-ACV deals. Treat calling as your live discovery and learning channel, pair it with strong data and coaching, and you'll see it amplify your email and LinkedIn performance.
How many channels should we use in a typical outbound sequence?
For most B2B motions, three main channels are enough: email, phone, and LinkedIn. That gives you enough diversity to match modern buyer behavior without overwhelming your SDRs. You can add a fourth 'accent' channel like SMS or direct mail for high-intent leads or key accounts, but only once your core triad is consistent, measured, and coachable.
When does it make sense to use SMS in B2B outreach?
Use SMS when there's clear intent or an existing relationship, not as a first cold touch. Great use cases include meeting reminders, quick qualification after someone fills out a form, and rapid responses to urgent questions. With ~98% open rates and ~45% response rates, SMS is high-impact but also high scrutiny, so stay compliant, get opt-in where required, and keep the tone service-oriented rather than pushy.
What's a good reply rate for cold email and LinkedIn messages?
Across B2B, 3-5% reply rate on cold email is typical, 5-10% is solid, and 15%+ usually means you've nailed your ICP and message. On LinkedIn, connection messages and InMails commonly see 15-25% response, with top-performing campaigns hitting 30-40%. If you're below those ranges, look at list quality, personalization depth, and whether your ask is realistic for a first touch.
How many touches should we include before giving up on a prospect?
Data shows around 80% of sales require at least 5 follow-ups, while nearly half of reps quit after one. High-growth teams often run 10-16 touchpoints over 2-4 weeks across multiple channels before they pause or recycle a lead. A good starting point is 8-12 touches (mixing email, phone, and LinkedIn), with clear rules for when to pause, when to recycle, and when to hand over to marketing nurture.
Should we build our own multichannel engine or outsource SDR work?
If you have the leadership, tech stack, and time to hire, training an internal SDR team gives you maximum control. That said, many companies underestimate the complexity of running list building, deliverability, dialing, and reporting across channels. Outsourcing to a specialist like SalesHive lets you plug in a proven multichannel engine quickly while your core team focuses on demos and closing, and you can always bring efforts in-house later once you've seen what works.
How do we compare performance across channels fairly?
Instead of just looking at email open rates or total call dials, normalize everything to conversion per 100 touches: meetings booked per 100 emails, per 100 calls, and per 100 LinkedIn messages. Then look at opportunity creation and revenue influenced by sequences that include each channel. That way you're comparing business impact, not vanity metrics, and you'll see how combinations of channels perform vs any one in isolation.
