What lands in a CEO's inbox
There are 204,350 chief executives in the United States, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and their median annual pay is $213,990. That works out to $102.88 an hour. Fifteen minutes of a person at that rate is $25.72, which is the honest way to think about what you are asking for when you send a cold message.
What lands is narrow. A subject line that names the thing you want to talk about. A first sentence that shows you know something specific about the company this quarter, not in general. An ask small enough that the reply can be one sentence, or a yes to a time. What sinks is everything before the request: three sentences of background, a paragraph about your career, a compliment that could have been sent to anyone.
Assume the CEO is not the first reader. A chief of staff or an assistant triages most inbound and forwards what looks worth ten minutes. Write so the message still works when it arrives stripped of context: no chains of "as I mentioned below", no attachments the reader has to open to understand the point.
Before you write
Decide which of three things you want, because each gets a different message. Money: state the stage and the size of the live round in the first two lines. A hire: name the role and what it reports to. Advice or advising: say what decision you are facing and what a useful answer would look like. If you cannot put the ask in one line, you are not ready to send.
Then find the reason it is them in particular. Not the company, the person. A market they entered, a product line they shut down, a pricing decision they defended publicly, a talk they gave. One sentence, checkable, specific enough that they would recognize their own year in it. If the sentence would fit any CEO in the sector, cut it and start again.
Price the ask honestly, using their time rather than your urgency. At the median hourly figure, five minutes is $8.57, fifteen is $25.72, thirty is $51.44, an hour is $102.88. If you want a decision, ask for fifteen minutes and say so. If you want a read on a document, say how long the document takes to read.
What to say in the first message
Boomerang's analysis of more than 40 million emails found that messages of 50 to 125 words got the most replies, that one to three direct questions did better than none, and that plain writing did better than formal, college-level prose. Treat those as a checklist rather than a formula. Most cold messages to executives fail all three: too long, no question at all, and written in the register of a press release.
A structure that fits in that length: one clause on who you are, one sentence on why them, the ask and how long it takes, one close. Weak line: "I'm reaching out because I'd love to hear your thoughts on our go-to-market approach when you have a moment." Strong line: "You moved [Company] from [channel] to [channel] in [year]; we're weighing the same shift and I'd like 15 minutes on what you'd do differently." The second one can be answered yes or no in four seconds.
On subject lines, "Question about [Company]'s [product line]" beats "Reaching out." Keep it under 70 characters so it does not truncate on a phone, and make sure it would make sense to someone who has never heard of you. The body should not repeat it word for word.
Cut the phrases that mark a message as bulk: "hope this message finds you well", "I came across your profile", "touch base", "circle back", "synergy", "to whom it may concern". Each one costs a line and tells the reader you send this often. Replace them with a fact about their business and a sentence about yours.
How to follow up
Send one follow-up, about a week later, and add something. A document you mentioned, a number from your own pilot, a shorter version of the ask. The follow-up is not a reminder that you exist; it is the second half of the argument. If you have nothing to add, wait until you do.
Keep it under 75 words and leave the subject line alone unless the content changed. "Re: [original subject]" helps the reader find the thread. Do not forward the original message back with "bumping this" on top; it reads as pressure and gives them nothing new to answer.
Then stop. Two messages from a stranger is a complete attempt. If the answer is no, ask a smaller question, one line, no meeting, or ask who else inside the company owns the topic. A no that names a colleague is worth more than a third email.
When a paid message makes sense
A paid message changes the arithmetic for the person receiving it. On Introworth, members set a price for messages from people they do not know. The sender's card is held, not charged, and the payment is captured only if the recipient replies within the reply window; if they do not, the hold is released. The recipient keeps 85% of the price, and Introworth's commission is 15%.
The price points track the time asked for: about $15 for a five-minute question, $40 for a considered reply of fifteen minutes, $75 for a review or a short call of thirty minutes, $150 for an hour of advice. The lowest price is $15. Compare those with the $25.72 that fifteen minutes of a median chief executive's time costs on paper. The $40 is less a fee than a signal that you know what you are asking for.
Before you pay, Introworth's message coach checks the draft privately: length, questions, the reason it is them, the time you are asking for, plain wording. It screens for the same things a busy reader would check, and it runs before any money moves.
Use a paid message when you have no shared connection and the answer is worth the price to you. If you do share one, connections message each other with no per-message fee, and a member can ask a mutual connection to forward an introduction with a note. That route is slower and warmer; a paid message is direct and priced.
Pay figures come from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and are computed by Introworth's price calculator. The guide text is drafted with AI from those figures and Introworth's product rules, and checked automatically before it is published. It is general guidance, not legal, tax or financial advice.