Introduction to Cold Outreach Tools

Cold outreach is a core tactic in B2B marketing and sales engagement.

Instantly vs Saleshandy vs Salesforge is a battle between three major platforms. Their aim: enable users to scale outbound campaigns, manage multiple email and LinkedIn accounts, and personalize messages at scale.

Below, we thoroughly compare each tool’s core features, automation capabilities, and user interface.

Unlimited Email Accounts & Multiple Sending Accounts

All three tools support connecting multiple email accounts.:

• Saleshandy explicitly advertises “connect unlimited email accounts at no extra cost” making it easy for sales teams to scale volume.
• Instantly likewise allows unlimited email addresses on paid plans and automatically rotates sending across them.
• Salesforge supports unlimited mailboxes, letting users add as many domains/accounts as needed. This enables a cohesive outreach strategy.

In addition to unlimited email accounts, Salesforge also grants unlimited seats for LinkedIn senders with no additional hidden fees.

Cold Email Campaign Automation

Each platform offers advanced campaign automation features for cold outreach:

• Saleshandy’s system automates multi-step email sequences with personalization.
• Instantly’s product is described as an automated outreach solution combining email campaigns with deliverability networks and a lead database.
• Salesforge similarly automates sequences but distinguishes itself by blending human workflows with AI.

All three manage drip campaigns and basic email marketing functions, but Salesforge’s framework is built to fuse human efforts with machine-driven automation.

AI-Powered Message Personalization

Personalization is key to high reply rates:

• Saleshandy emphasizes highly personalized cold emails, using templates with custom fields.
• Instantly provides AI prompts that generate personalization variables and can auto-craft entire sequences for each prospect.
• Salesforge's plans include personalization credits, which let the system generate unique email and LinkedIn message copy for each lead.

Automated Follow-ups & Sequence Management

Effective cold outreach relies on timed follow-ups:

• Saleshandy enables automated follow-ups within its sequences (you can set keyword triggers, delays, etc.).
• Instantly similarly automates follow-ups: its AI can trigger next emails based on out-of-office replies or common bounce reasons.
• Salesforge offers automated follow-ups through its AI SDR agent (Agent Frank), which handles prospecting, messaging, follow-up tasks and more.

Deliverability & Spam Protection

Inbox placement is critical:

• Saleshandy includes a Deliverability Suite with warm-up tools, SMTP management, and spam avoidance touting the promise “Never land in spam”, though that promise isn't always fulfilled.

• Instantly provides enterprise-grade deliverability tools (MX, SPF/DKIM setup, spam word checker) and claims users will “never worry about getting stuck in spam”.
• Salesforge users get free automated warm-up for all mailboxes, and Salesforge’s infrastructure actively monitors sender reputation.

Unified Inbox & Conversation Management

Managing replies is key for any cold email tool:

• Saleshandy provides a Unified Inbox, so all campaign replies and conversations appear in one view.
• Instantly has an inbox preview and CRM links, but lacks a single unified inbox view built-in.
• Salesforge offers Primebox, a unified email client where you can review all incoming replies in a simple view. Salesforge even adds AI-assisted reply drafting inside Primebox.

Multilingual Outreach

A unique advantage of Salesforge, besides additionally offering LinkedIn outreach, is support for multilingual campaigns:

• According to Salesforge, users can send outreach in 2 or 20 different languages without extra staffing.
• Neither Saleshandy nor Instantly mention multilingual capabilities.

This makes Salesforge especially appealing to sales teams targeting international markets.

Team Collaboration & Workspace Management

Each platform supports teams differently:

• Saleshandy has tiered plans and allows multiple mailboxes, implicitly supporting teams but without explicit workspace features.
• Instantly offers team user roles and workspaces on higher plans (you can invite multiple users).
• Salesforge provides unlimited workspaces for both email and LinkedIn outreach, allowing separate projects or clients to be managed distinctly. It also integrates natively with Slack and Zapier for real-time collaboration.

Advanced Analytics & Campaign Performance

Tracking performance is a core feature:

• Saleshandy includes built-in email tracking and analytics, collecting data on opens, clicks, and replies in dashboards.
• Instantly provides email and account-level analytics on all plans.
• Salesforge offers sequence-level analytics and allows optimization of campaign settings from a single dashboard.

User-Friendly Interface & Ease of Use

The user interface affects adoption:

• Saleshandy’s interface is straightforward, grouping tools by function (outreach, warm-up, inbox, etc.).
• Instantly states its UI is clean and easy to use, though not all users agree.

• Salesforge also emphasizes ease of use and combines a friendly interface with advanced functionality. Salesforge’s dashboard is intuitive (with separate lanes for human vs AI leads).

Deliverability Features & Infrastructure

Salesforge extends beyond basic email and LinkedIn campaigning with a focus on deliverability:

• It offers automatic domain and DNS setup
• Reputation monitoring
• Free integrated warm-up (via Warmforge)
• Calculated sending times

Saleshandy provides an Inbox Radar and warm-up features, but they stop short of dedicated infrastructure.

Instantly’s deliverability suite includes spam word checking and sender reputation tools.

AI Capabilities & Advanced Features

AI is central to these tools:

• Saleshandy includes AI features like automated sequences but mostly focuses on classic email templates.
• Instantly leverages AI for personalization (prompts, A/B testing with AI optimization).
• Salesforge packs more advanced AI features: not only personalization but also fully autonomous agents (Agent Frank) and AI-assisted inbox workflows. It even offers an AI-powered email generator to draft custom messages among other various free tools.

Integration with Other Tools

• Saleshandy supports integrations with popular CRMs (HubSpot, Pipedrive, Zoho, etc.) and 6,000+ apps via Zapier.
• Instantly offers API access on higher plans and can integrate with CRMs like Salesforce and HubSpot.
• Salesforge also integrates widely - it includes native Slack and Clay support, and full Zapier/Webhooks support for virtually any tool.

Personalized Outreach & Mail Merge

All platforms offer core personalization features:

• Saleshandy and Instantly can insert basic fields (first name, company) and support A/B testing of subject lines and body. Saleshandy even includes a mail merge capability for contact lists.
• Salesforge goes further with AI-driven personalization: You can generate entire paragraphs that reference prospects’ LinkedIn or website info (using personalization credits).

Advanced Deliverability & Spam Folder Avoidance

Keeping emails out of the spam folder is a focus for each platform:

• Saleshandy’s Deliverability Suite helps users warm up accounts and rotate senders.
• Instantly’s system maintains sender reputation with automated warm-up and domain verification.
• Salesforge provides unlimited automated warm-up and suggests infrastructure options (even dedicated sending IPs via Infraforge).

Because Salesforge actively handles warm-up and monitoring, users often see better inbox placement.

Detailed Analytics & Performance Tracking

Analytics are built-in:

• Saleshandy tracks opens, clicks, replies, and sequence scores to gauge performance.
• Instantly includes analytics dashboards and email/account stats on all plans.
• Salesforge also tracks campaign metrics and provides heatmap-style analytics for domains and mailboxes. Salesforge can also aggregate performance across all sequences for both email and LinkedIn campaigns for a cohesive outreach strategy.

Pricing Plans & Scalability

• Saleshandy offers tiered plans. Saleshandy’s free trial sends 100 emails and 5 lead credits.
• Instantly offers tiered plans. Instantly has free and paid plans up to “Light Speed” with millions of contacts. It's worth noting some users report being overcharged.

• Salesforge’s pricing starts at $40/mo and includes unlimited contacts storage and mailboxes/seats. Salesforge offers annual discounts and a 14-day free trial to try out both its email and LinkedIn outreach.

Small Business & Agency Use Cases

• Saleshandy targets SMBs and agencies (10,000+ customers) with a complete outbound solution.
• Instantly emphasizes both freelancers and enterprises with features like an included CRM.
• Salesforge brands itself for sales leaders, agencies, and recruiters, aiming at sophisticated outreach needs.

Unique Features

Salesforge brings together many advanced features that others lack:

Its multi-channel, multi-language messaging capabilities give it a global edge.

It includes unlimited workspaces, giving the potential of managing unlimited clients.

Also included is warm-up infrastructure for agencies.

Among email cold outreach, Salesforge also offers LinkedIn outreach within the same platform for no additional pricing plan cost!

When coupled with other products from the Forge stack, Salesforge turns into more than just an outreach tool, but an integrated outbound platform with every aspect of cold outreach covered (from infrastructure to AI, to lead gen).

Email Tracking & Analytics

Each platform offers email tracking:

• Saleshandy has Gmail/Outlook trackers.
• Instantly has built-in tracking dashboards
• Salesforge’s Primebox also records open and click stats.

Integrated Lead Management

Proper lead management ties outreach to CRM:

• Saleshandy and Instantly offer integrations to send prospects directly to CRMs or manage them within a unified inbox.
• Salesforge integrates with Slack and Zapier, and the Leadsforge product can push leads straight into pipelines.

Choosing The Right Tool For Your Business

Saleshandy and Instantly each offer core features essential for cold email campaigns. However, Salesforge elevates the game for teams that need more advanced features and support.

With its multilingual messaging, unlimited workspaces, and integrated deliverability tools, Salesforge goes beyond a basic email campaign manager. It provides a comprehensive solution that enables sales teams and agencies to scale cold emails at unprecedented rates and efficiency.

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