Searches for cold outreach tools and services rose 21% in three years while how-to searches fell 29%
Cold Outreach Demand Index, 2022 to 2026. Published October 2026.
A Hollerly study of US Google search demand for cold email, cold calling and LinkedIn outreach, October 2022 to August 2026.
Key findings
- US searches for cold outreach tools, software, automation and agencies rose 21% from the October 2022 to September 2023 period to the September 2025 to August 2026 period.
- Over the same period, how-to and general searches about cold email, cold calling and LinkedIn outreach fell 29%.
- Tool and service queries grew from 5.1% to 8.4% of all outreach searches in the basket.
- Searches for cold email tools, platforms, automation and agencies rose 42%, the fastest gain of any channel and query type.
- Cold calling remains the largest channel by search volume, with 338,310 US searches in the latest 12 months, 27% below the 2022 to 2023 level.
- LinkedIn outreach tool and automation searches rose 19% while general LinkedIn outreach queries such as social selling fell 50%.
What the data shows
People who search about outbound prospecting are asking different questions than they were three years ago. The data covers 58 distinct US Google keywords across three outreach channels, in two groups: searches for tools and services (software, platforms, automation, agencies) and how-to or general searches (definitions, scripts, templates, tips).
Total search volume across the basket fell 27% between the first 12 months of data (October 2022 to September 2023) and the latest 12 months (September 2025 to August 2026). That drop came almost entirely from how-to queries. Searches for outreach tools and services went the other way, rising 21%.
The tool line did not rise in a straight line. It peaked in 2025 and has eased since, so the latest 12 months are 30% below the prior 12 months. Even after that pullback, tool and service demand sits above its 2022 to 2023 level.
Channel by channel
Cold email shows the clearest shift. General cold email searches slipped 14%, while searches for cold email tools, platforms, automation and agencies rose 42%. Overall cold email demand was nearly flat (-9.8%), which makes it the most stable of the three channels.
Cold calling is still the biggest topic by far. Much of its volume comes from definitional searches such as "what is cold calling", and those general searches fell 28%.
LinkedIn outreach splits the same way. Searches for LinkedIn automation tools, outreach tools and outreach automation rose 19%. General queries fell 50%, mostly because searches for the term "social selling" dropped sharply.
| Channel | Searches, Oct 2022 to Sep 2023 | Searches, Sep 2025 to Aug 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cold calling | 466,210 | 338,310 | -27% |
| Cold email | 117,120 | 105,700 | -10% |
| LinkedIn outreach | 131,020 | 79,950 | -39% |
| Tools and services (all channels) | 36,370 | 43,870 | +21% |
| How-to and general (all channels) | 677,980 | 480,090 | -29% |
What it means for outbound teams
The pattern fits a market where the basics are widely known and buyers are now comparing ways to run outreach at volume. Fewer people need a definition of cold calling or a sample cold email. More are looking for software, automation or an agency to do the work. For teams selling to sales and marketing leaders, that is a sign that buying research, not education, is the growing share of outreach search demand.
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About the data
- Data: monthly US Google search volume (English), October 2022 to August 2026.
- Keywords: 58 generic keywords with measurable volume across three channels (cold email, cold calling, LinkedIn outreach), with no brand or vendor names. The full list is in the Raw tab of data.xlsx.
- Close variants: close variants (for example "cold email" and "cold emails") share one grouped volume and are counted once.
- Intent groups: a keyword counts as "tools and services" if it contains software, tool, tools, platform, automation, agency or services. All others are "how-to and general".
- Periods: first 12 months (October 2022 to September 2023), prior 12 months (September 2024 to August 2025), latest 12 months (September 2025 to August 2026).
- One-month spikes: isolated one-month spikes that do not match surrounding months (for example a keyword jumping from about 5,000 to 165,000 searches for a single month) are replaced with the keyword's centered 7-month rolling median when they exceed 4 times that median. Unadjusted values are in the Raw tab of data.xlsx.
- Limitations: search volumes are rounded estimates and are coarse for small keywords. A fixed keyword list can miss new phrasings. Search volume measures interest, not outreach activity or results. Data before October 2022 is not included, because longer-run Google Trends series for these terms show irregular 2025 and 2026 spikes that do not appear in search volume.
Sources
- Monthly US Google search volume (English), October 2022 to August 2026
Source: Hollerly, Cold Outreach Demand Index, 2022 to 2026, October 2026. https://hollerlyai.com/research/cold-outreach-demand-index
Charts and data are free to use under CC BY 4.0 with a link to this page. Press questions: hello@hollerlyai.com