Key takeaways
  • For every company you really want, contact 3 or 4 people: hiring manager, a team member, a recruiter, and someone with a shared background.
  • Keep messages short, specific and polite. Ask for advice or a short call, not for a job.
  • Follow up once after about a week, then stop.
  • Most outreach in my program goes by email, the rest on LinkedIn.

An application alone puts you in a pile. A message to a person puts you in a conversation. In my own search, and with the people I work with, the first interview calls usually came after we started contacting people directly, not after the 50th online application.

Who to contact at each company

  1. The hiring manager. Usually the team lead or head of the department in the job ad. They decide.
  2. A team member. Someone doing the same job. They can tell you what the team really needs, and many companies pay employees for referrals.
  3. The recruiter. Often named in the job ad.
  4. Someone with a shared background. From your university, your home country, or your previous company. People help people they relate to.

How to find them

  • Search LinkedIn for the company name plus the team or role, for example "Siemens data analytics Munich".
  • Check the company's team pages, press releases and conference talks.
  • For email, many companies use a simple pattern such as firstname.lastname@company.com. Check the pattern from a public email on their website before you use it.

What to write

Short. Specific. Polite. In Germany, start with "Dear Mr Schmidt" or "Dear Ms Schmidt", not "Hi dear" or "Respected Sir".

To a hiring manager
Dear Ms Schmidt, I applied for the Junior Data Analyst role in your team today. I spent three years building supply chain dashboards in Power BI for a manufacturer in Pune, which matches the reporting work in your ad. Could I ask you two short questions about the team's priorities? Kind regards, Priya

To a team member
Dear Mr Becker, I saw that you work as a QA engineer at your company. I am applying for a similar role there and would really value 10 minutes of your view on how the team works. I am happy to fit around your time. Best regards, Arjun

Notice what is missing: no CV attached in the first message, no long life story, and no "please give me a job".

How to follow up

If there is no reply, send one short follow up after five to seven working days. Then stop. If someone says no or asks you not to contact them, thank them and move on.

Keep it organised

Use a simple sheet: company, role, person, channel, date sent, follow up date, reply. In my program, most messages go by email, because inboxes are less crowded than LinkedIn, and the rest go on LinkedIn. Ten good companies with three or four people each is 30 to 40 conversations, which is already more than most people start in a month.

Common mistakes

  • Copying one message to 200 people. People can tell.
  • Asking for a referral in the first message to a stranger.
  • Sending messages on weekends late at night and expecting quick replies.
  • Giving up after five messages. Networking is a numbers game with a long tail.

In my 3-month program, we do this networking with you for every target company, alongside the applications.

Free PDF: send TEMPLATES to @swapnil_in_germany on Instagram for "10 messages that get replies". See all 33 free guides.

Written by Swapnil (Samadhan Mule)

I moved to Germany for my master's, collected more than 1,000 rejections, and then got multiple job offers within six months. I work in digital marketing in Germany and help international professionals get hired in Europe. Read my story.