How to make a warm introduction

Why the introduction is the whole job

For an advisor, an investor, a recruiter or anyone whose value comes partly from who they know, the introduction is not a favour on the side. It is the product. A founder does not remember the advice; they remember the head of sales you found them.

That makes it worth doing properly, and most people do not. They forward an email with "you two should talk" and no context. They connect someone who did not ask to be connected. They make the ask and then never follow up, so the person who wanted the intro waits three weeks and hears nothing. Each of those costs a little trust, and trust is the only thing that makes the next introduction land.

The double opt-in, and why it became the standard

A double opt-in introduction has two steps before the introduction itself.

First, you write to each person separately. You tell them who the other person is, why you think the two of them should talk, and you ask whether they want to be introduced. You give them enough to decide and an easy way to say no.

Second, once both have said yes, you send one email to both, introducing them and stepping back.

The reason this became the default in venture, sales and recruiting is simple. Nobody is ever handed a conversation they did not ask for. The person with the scarce time, usually the one being asked for something, gets to decline privately, without the awkwardness of ignoring a stranger in a thread. And the person asking is protected from the worst outcome, which is an intro to someone who then does not reply.

It costs one extra round of email. For anything that involves someone's time, that round is worth it.

When to skip it

The double opt-in is the default, not the law. There are three other shapes, and choosing the right one is part of doing this well.

Single opt-in, asking the side that has not agreed. A founder told you last Tuesday they need a head of sales. You do not need to ask them again before sending a candidate; you need to ask the candidate. Most introductions an advisor makes are like this: one side has already opted in by asking. Ask the other side, then connect them.

Single opt-in, the other way. Sometimes the person who would be receiving the ask is the one who already said yes. An investor who told you "send me anyone doing fintech infrastructure" has opted in. Ask the founder, then send.

Direct, no ask. Reserved for people close enough that an unexpected email from you connecting them to someone is a gift, not an imposition. Two friends who you know would enjoy each other. Two portfolio founders solving the same problem. If you would be surprised that either minded, go direct. If you have to think about it, ask.

The wrong choice in either direction has a cost. Double opt-in for two close friends is fussy and slow. A direct intro to a busy stranger burns the relationship.

The ask

The ask is where introductions succeed or fail, and it is the part people rush. It has four parts.

Who the other person is, in terms this person cares about. Not their title; what they have done that is relevant. "She ran sales at a payments company from seed to Series C" tells a founder more than "VP Sales at Acme."

Why you think they should talk. This is the sentence only you can write, because you know both of them. It is also the sentence that makes the person say yes. "You mentioned mid-market fintech, and that is exactly the segment she built."

What the ask actually is. A fifteen-minute call. A look at a deck. Advice on one question. Keep it small; a big ask belongs in the second email, after they have met, not in the introduction.

An easy no. "No pressure either way, and I will not mention it if it is not a fit." People say yes more often when no is cheap.

Send the ask separately to each person. Never cc both on the ask; that is a direct intro wearing a costume.

The introduction email

Once both have said yes, the email is short. A good one fits in six lines.

Both names in the subject line, so it is findable later. One line on each person, the same terms you used in the ask. The reason they should talk, once. A next step, usually that one of them will reach out to schedule. Then you are done.

Put yourself on bcc in the reply, or say "moving myself to bcc" in the first line. The conversation is theirs now, and the fastest way to make an introduction feel heavy is to stay in it.

Do not write the email for them. Do not suggest three times to meet. Do not summarise their businesses at length. The introduction is a door; you open it and step aside.

After the send

This is where most introductions die, and where the people who are good at this are different from everyone else.

Watch for the reply. If neither person has responded in four or five days, one nudge, light, to whichever side you know better. "Just checking this did not get buried." One nudge, not three.

If one person said no at the ask stage, tell the other. Kindly, without the reason, quickly. "I checked and it is not a good time on their end, sorry about that." The person who asked can now stop waiting and try another route. Almost nobody does this, and it is the single thing that makes people trust you with the next ask.

Keep a record of what happened. Who you introduced to whom, whether they met, and what came of it. Not for the satisfaction of a tidy list, but because the same founder will need the same kind of person again in eight months, and because knowing that two people you introduced actually worked together is how you learn whose judgement to trust.

Doing it at volume

An advisor with six portfolio companies can easily have twenty introductions in some stage of flight at once. At that volume the failure is not the writing; it is the tracking. Which asks are out, which have been answered, which introduction sent last week has had no reply, who said no to whom.

That is the point at which the introduction stops being an email and becomes a small workflow with a state. Requested, asked, agreed, sent, replied, met, outcome. Whether you track that in a notebook, a spreadsheet, or a tool, the thing that matters is that nothing sits at "asked" for three weeks without you noticing.

NetworkOS runs that workflow end to end: it drafts the asks in your voice from what it knows about both people, sends them from your own Gmail, watches for the replies, sends the introduction once both have agreed, and nudges when nothing comes back. It supports all four shapes above, including the direct intro, and it records the outcome. It is Gmail-only today, which rules it out if your mail is elsewhere. Bridge does the sending and tracking well too, with an introlink so people can request intros from you without an account; it does not draft or watch for fading relationships.

The short version

Ask each person separately, with who the other is, why they should talk, a small ask and an easy no. Connect them only when both have said yes, in an email that fits in six lines, then step to bcc. Skip the double opt-in only when one side has already asked or the relationship makes an unexpected intro welcome. Watch for the reply, nudge once, and if someone says no, tell the other person so they can stop waiting. At volume, track the state of every introduction, because the ask that sits unanswered for three weeks is the one that costs you the relationship.