How Hemlane Generated 830 Leads & Boosted Replies to 5.5% with ColdIQ

Foundation

If you’ve ever managed rental properties, you know it’s not just about collecting rent. 

There are listings to post, tenants to screen, leases to manage, repairs to coordinate, and (when things don’t go as planned) evictions to handle.

Hemlane was built to simplify all of this. Their software takes on the heavy lifting of long-term rental management: tenant placement, lease management, maintenance, rent collection, and even eviction protection. 

For landlords and property managers, it means control without chaos.

But for Hemlane to grow, it isn’t enough to have a great product. They need to consistently reach the right people (property owners, managers, and agents) at the right time. Outreach is at the heart of their sales motion. And like most companies selling into the rental property market, that’s not as easy as it sounds.

Jesse Litwin, Sales Outreach Consultant at Hemlane, put it plainly: “Our business is largely B2C, and so it can be really difficult to reach people in a valid and really efficient way.”

That’s where ColdIQ entered the picture.

The challenge

Before teaming up with ColdIQ, Hemlane had tried a mix of solutions: some outreach managed internally, some handled by external providers. Neither approach delivered the consistency or scale they needed.

A few of the sticking points:

• Manual outbound was eating up time. Their team was working hard but struggling to reach meaningful volumes.
• Low visibility into messaging. It wasn’t clear what was working, what wasn’t, and why.
• Poor contact quality. The leads they were sourcing internally often didn’t convert into real conversations.
• Frustrating benchmarks. Open rates, reply rates, and bounce rates just weren’t competitive compared to industry averages.

In short, the effort was high, but the return was low. Hemlane wanted a partner that could not only help them scale but also ensure that each touchpoint was strategic, targeted, and measurable.

As Jesse explained:

The mission was clear: help Hemlane scale outbound in a way that actually generated meaningful conversations and pipeline.

The process

When Hemlane partnered with ColdIQ, the goal wasn’t just “send more emails.” It was about building a system for smarter, more consistent outreach.

1. Understanding the ICP

ColdIQ started with the basics: who exactly does Hemlane need to talk to? 

The answer wasn’t just “landlords.” By analyzing Hemlane’s Ideal Customer Profile, the focus became property owners and landlords actively listing rentals. This sharpened the outreach dramatically.

2. Tools and automation

Previously, Hemlane didn’t have the right setup to scale. With ColdIQ, the team adopted:

• Clay for advanced lead sourcing and enrichment
• Smartlead for managing multi-channel outbound campaigns

This reduced the reliance on manual work and gave Hemlane visibility into what was happening at every stage.

3. Campaign design

ColdIQ didn’t just launch generic email blasts. Instead, the campaigns were:

• Super-targeted to property owners with active listings (for example, on Zillow).
• Written with spintax messaging – variations in the emails to keep them fresh and personal while still being scalable.
• Designed with clear sequencing, ensuring follow-ups felt natural rather than robotic.

4. Collaboration and communication

From Hemlane’s perspective, working with ColdIQ felt like having an extension of their own team.

Jesse recalled:

“Working with ColdIQ was great, and it has been great. Super easy! They’re really true partners, and they provided a lot of insights into how we could grow. 

Always felt like we had a clear understanding of what was going on.”

This was more than execution. It was a collaboration. ColdIQ shared insights, over-communicated on progress, and constantly adjusted campaigns to refine results.

5. Timeline of collaboration

• Nov 2023 → Apr 2024: First engagement phase. Campaigns built, tested, and scaled.
• Aug 2024 → ongoing: Hemlane returned for a second round, building on the success of the first collaboration.

The outcome

The numbers tell the story better than anything else:

• 830 qualified leads sourced from just one Zillow campaign targeting active property owners.
• Open rates, response rates, and positive reply rates are all above industry averages.
• Reply rate at 5.5%, which is higher than standard benchmarks for B2C cold outreach.
• Bounce rate at just 0.5%. For context, industry averages often hover between 2–5%. This level of deliverability meant almost every email landed where it needed to.
• Time savings of 70% compared to manual outbound, all thanks to automation and better targeting.

Even though reaching B2C contacts is notoriously tough, Hemlane saw results that exceeded expectations.

As Jesse summed it up:

Lessons learned

From this collaboration, a few takeaways stand out for both Hemlane and ColdIQ:

1. Targeting is everything. Instead of casting a wide net, going after landlords with active listings on platforms like Zillow yielded the strongest results.
2. Deliverability matters. A 0.5% bounce rate didn’t happen by accident. It was the result of careful list building, validation, and technical setup.
3. Partnership beats transactions. The success wasn’t just about tools or copywriting. It was about communication, iteration, and shared ownership of results.
4. B2C doesn’t mean unscalable. While B2C outreach can be harder than B2B, with the right process it’s possible to outperform industry norms.

What’s next

Hemlane continues to refine their outreach and build on the foundation ColdIQ helped create. The focus now is on scaling campaigns further, while continuing to keep quality and targeting sharp.

For ColdIQ, the Hemlane partnership is a reminder of why process-driven, practical outreach matters. It’s not just about filling inboxes. It’s about creating meaningful connections that turn into business outcomes.

Final thoughts

Outreach is one of those areas where small improvements compound. A slightly better reply rate, a lower bounce rate, a few extra hours saved, multiply those across campaigns, and suddenly the results are game-changing.

For Hemlane, the collaboration with ColdIQ turned a time-consuming, low-visibility outbound effort into a structured, data-driven engine. It brought clarity, efficiency, and measurable outcomes.

At the end of the day, this case study shows that the combination of smart targeting + the right tools + real partnership can move the needle in even the toughest markets.

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If you want to cut your bounce rates to near zero, lift your reply rates above industry averages, and generate hundreds of qualified leads like Hemlane did, book a GTM Strategy Call with ColdIQ today. 

Let’s turn your outbound into a predictable growth engine.