You're not the main character

Read time: 4 minutes

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You're not the main character

So stop pitching to yourself and start giving them the plot twist they didn’t know they needed.

We hear this all the time:

"I wouldn’t reply to that email."

 "That message wouldn’t work on me." 

“I’d care about this thing the most”

Cool. But I hate to break it to you, you’re not the main character (at least not at work).

Just because you’d find that stat impressive, or you’d care about a faster assay, doesn’t mean your prospect will. Likewise, you might not think short emails make an impact, or that think that casual CTAs like “worth a chat?” sound unprofessional, but that doesn’t mean your audience feels the same.

You’re not selling to yourself. You’re selling to people with different goals, pressures, timelines, and KPIs. 

So when you write every email like it’s going to people who think like you, act like you, and care about what you care about, no wonder your reply rate’s tanking.

To be slightly less harsh, I think this sometimes comes from salespeople who were previously scientists. They try to cast their minds back, to before they came to the dark side, to figure out what they used to care about. 

But things change. Funding shifts, buying power consolidates, therapeutic areas crash and burn, new technologies emerge and the game changes. 

Your outreach has to change with it. You need to get deep into the heads of your ICP and meet them where they are right now.

But that looks different depending on who you’re targeting.

Different roles, different realities

A scientist running assays on the bench is thinking about:

• Reproducibility

• QC bottlenecks

• Data they can trust to make the next decision

• Whether the cells will survive the weekend

The Head of Biology managing that is thinking about:

• Whether the team has enough resources

• If this program will survive the next portfolio review

• If that CRO will hit the next milestone

• Budget vs output trade-offs

Procurement cares about:

• Vendor duplication

• Discounts and contract leverage

• Risk (IP, compliance, timelines)

• Making fewer people do more work with less budget

Commercial is stressing over:

• Hitting quotas

• Meeting launch deadlines

• Hitting growth KPIs

All of those people might be good targets for the same offering. But if your messaging reads like a one-size-fits-all monologue, you're getting ignored.

Let’s break this down. Here's how to build messaging around the individual.

1. Speak to their personal pain (not just the company goal)

This is more important than ever as inboxes get flooded with more cold outreach. Company-wide transformation sounds nice, but most people care about what will make my day suck less, so that’s what will get them to reply. 

Ask yourself:

• What do they hate repeating every week?

• What creates tension between them and their boss?

• What would get them blamed if it fails?

Then tailor the message:

• “Sick of manually QC-ing every plate?”

• “Still chasing vendors for reports?”

• “Your CRO missing timelines again?”

2. Map personas to their KPIs

What actually makes them successful? Think like their boss. What are they being evaluated on?

• Bench Scientist: QC pass rate, data quality, time to result

• Principal Scientist / Director: Throughput, pipeline progression, decision-making confidence

• Procurement: Savings, compliance, vendor count, contract efficiency

• Commercial / Brand / Sales: quotas, launch metrics, market share

Ask yourself:

• What would make them look good on their next performance review?

• What would get them promoted?

• What would get them left alone by leadership?

3. Understand the cost of inaction

People don’t just buy to gain. They buy to avoid pain. (If you’re interested, check out Kahneman's theories, particularly Prospect Theory and loss aversion)

Instead of just listing benefits, ask: what happens if they don’t do anything?

• Scientist: Wastes 3 weeks on a failed run, their technical reputation takes a hit

• Director: Misses key milestone, delays IND filing, their leadership credibility tanks

• Procurement: Gets grilled for signing 3 vendors doing the same thing, their promotion slips out of reach

• Commercial: Launch flop, projections not hit, their bonus is cut

Paint the consequences that would keep them awake at night.

4. Consider timing, context and funding cycles

The life sciences industry isn’t static. Your ICP’s priorities shift constantly.

Funding tight? Talk about:

• ROI on existing tools

• Data quality vs cost per sample

• Ways to reduce repetition or repeat runs

Funding just landed? Now’s the time to show:

• How your tech de-risks new programs

• How it unlocks new capabilities (speed, scale, endpoints)

Deadline looming? Lead with:

• Low-lift pilots

• Fast onboarding

• External validation they can show to internal stakeholders

Same offering, but tell the story differently depending on the context.

5. Budget season is now. Act like it.

Right now, a lot of your buyers are:

• Reviewing this year’s spend

• Planning 2026 partnerships

• Trying to justify budget increases for next year

Ask yourself:

• Who influences the budget?

• What do they want to allocate budget to

• What would make your solution worth allocating budget to?

• What can you give them to help them champion this internally?

So...

• If you’re not talking about problems they’re actively trying to fund solutions for, you’re background noise.

• If you’re not giving them language they can use to justify spend, your message isn’t useful.

• If you’re not helping them look good upstream, you’re not getting prioritised.

Arm them with what they need:

• One-pagers with metrics that matter

• Case studies that map to their pain

• Pilot proposals and business cases they can forward up the chain

6. Test communication style like it’s part of an experiment

Different people engage in different ways. And it’s not just about job title or function, it’s about how individuals like to communicate.

Some of it’s generational:

• Boomers might appreciate a bit more formality, full names, clear value props.

• Millennials often want concise, helpful, confident, not too stiff.

• Gen Z might be more open to casual tone, humorous intros, or emojis, if the content feels authentic.

Some of it’s role-based:

• Scientists might scan for technical language and ignore your funny CTA completely.

• Commercial folks might want you to jump to the ask, then decide if they care about the proof points later.

• Procurement might respond better to bullet points, clarity, no fluff.

And some of it is just personal:

• Early-career folks might welcome a warmer, collaborative tone.

• Senior execs might prefer brevity and authority.

• Some people will never respond to “let me know if this is of interest.” Others hit reply every time.

So test it:

• Long vs short

• Casual vs formal

• Soft CTA vs direct ask

You wouldn’t run an assay and skip half the conditions because you think they won’t work.

You’re not guessing, you’re experimenting. Let the reply rate decide. 

TL;DR

You’re not the main character. They are. And that means your outreach has to start with their world, not your assumptions.

So before you write your next email, get out of your own head and think:

• Who am I talking to?

• What do they care about?

• What hurts if they don’t act?

• What can I say, and how can I say it, that makes them want to learn more?

Your ego can sit this one out.

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