Only 10 percent of sales messages actually explain why something should matter to the buyer. The other 90 percent are just decoration on a generic pitch.

That stat comes from Leslie Venetz, who audits thousands of sales messages every year and just released her USA Today bestseller, Profit-Generating Pipeline. She broke down what real relevance looks like, and the exact method she uses to build it.

What Relevance Actually Means (And Why Most Sellers Miss It)

Leslie defines relevance simply: a message has to be relevant to the person receiving it, not to the seller sending it.
The biggest problem she sees is that most outreach centers on the seller's process, product, and company goals instead of the buyer.
When she audits sales messaging, and she reviews thousands of messages a year, only about 10 percent actually explain why a piece of information should matter to the prospect.

The Mail Merge Era: When "Fake Personalization" Felt Like Magic

Back around 2012, Leslie ran a basic mail merge strategy that felt groundbreaking at the time. Prospects were genuinely impressed just to see their name and company pulled into an email.
That tactic hasn't disappeared. It's evolved into things like mentioning a prospect's new job title or congratulating them on a funding round.
The problem is the same one it's always been: something can be true about a prospect without being relevant to them right now.

Personalization Versus Relevance

Leslie draws a clear distinction: personalization is a fact about the prospect. Relevance is why that fact should matter to them today.
I shared my own experience of digging through my inbox after the pandemic and realizing most pitches weren't even relevant to my actual role, let alone my actual problems.
The real gap, in Leslie's words, is that most sellers never get into the buyer's emotional state, the specific pressure a person is under right now, not just their job title or industry.

The Earn the Right Philosophy: De-Centering Yourself From the Pitch

Leslie's core philosophy is called Earn the Right: before asking for a meeting, a call, or a contract, a seller has to earn the right to that person's attention.
That means shifting language away from "I'm an account executive at [Company] and we sell [Feature]" toward messaging built entirely around the buyer's specific situation and outcome.
The shift shows up in something as simple as word choice. Leslie says the biggest difference she sees in client messaging is emails that stop being about I, we, and our, and start being about you and your.

The Five-Filter Segmentation Method

Leslie's starting point for anyone new to territory planning is the five-filter method: four firmographic filters plus one demographic filter, layered together to turn a broad list into a hyper-specific one.
She recommends starting with the demographic filter first, since narrowing a title, like going from "IT executives" down to just "CIO," forces a seller to ask what that exact role actually cares about.
That one change alone, narrowing from a broad title to a specific one, has increased reply rates by more than 12 percent for her clients.

A Real Client Example: Narrowing a Healthcare IT List

Leslie walked through a real example from a global software company: a list originally aimed at "IT executives in healthcare" got narrowed down using all five filters.
The firmographic filters included US-only, hospitals specifically, revenue between 100 million and a billion dollars, and customer service departments over 100 people.
They also added a signal: whether the hospital had missed a recent best-of list. That detail alone reframed the entire pitch around better patient outcomes and service rankings, instead of generic product features.

Shorter Emails, Longer Cadences

A common mistake Leslie sees even after sellers embrace outcome-focused messaging: trying to cram everything they want to say into a single email.
Her fix is to trust the cadence. Spread the story about a buyer's likely outcomes across multiple touches instead of one dense pitch.
That shift also means holding off on a hard call to action early in a sequence, and letting later touches carry more of that weight.

Why "More" Isn't a Strategy

When results slow down, Leslie sees most teams reach for the same lever: hire more reps, send more emails, make more calls.
Her pushback is direct: more is never the answer on its own, because it skips the harder work of understanding who you're actually talking to.
Good segmentation is what makes every other activity, calls, emails, cadences, actually worth doing in the first place.

The Marriage of Art and Science in Sales

Leslie pushes back on using AI as a way to fully remove the seller from the process. If a prospect is expected to give their time and attention to a reply, the seller owes them a message that was actually written with care.
The science side is the data: confirming you're talking to the right person, at the right account, about the right thing.
The art side is judgment: knowing that just because something is technically personalized, like mentioning a promotion, doesn't mean it's the most relevant or human thing to say next.

One Thing to Do Right Now to Get More Relevant

Leslie's starting point for any sales leader: audit your current sales messaging and count how often it uses I, we, my, and our instead of you and your.
That audit gives you real data on how self-centered your outreach actually is, even if it doesn't feel that way from the inside.
From there, use AI for research instead of mass automation. Learn what a specific persona at a specific type of account actually cares about, then build that into the message.

"More is not a strategy." — Leslie Venetz

Resources

Credits

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