Why is LinkedIn so Effective in Attracting High Quality Leads?

When people go to LinkedIn, their mind is on the subject of work.  They are there to collaborate, to find suppliers and partnerships.

LinkedIn is the perfect platform to initiate a conversation with a prospective client.

An Example of a LinkedIn Messaging Sequence

 

The 5 Step LinkedIn Strategy to attract your ideal clients

Welcome to part 4 of our 5 Step LinkedIn Strategy to attract your ideal clients. If you missed part 3, you can find it here, where we discussed content. Now it’s time to attract some of those ideal clients!

 

Step 4 : Propagate Leads on LinkedIn to Attract High Quality Clients

Step 1 to 3 of this process has been setting the stage for this step – you’ve got your plan, your profile is one of the best, your content is establishing you as a thought leader and this is where the rubber hits the road, where your cash register starts to sing. You could wait for your ideal clients to find you organically, or be referred to you (and they will!) but if you want to grow your business exponentially, it’s now time to  proactively reach out to them.

When people go to LinkedIn, their mind is focused on work. They’re there to collaborate, to find suppliers and partnerships. LinkedIn is the perfect platform to initiate a conversation with a prospective client. We’ve put together a timeline to help you manage your strategy.

First, build your network. Use LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator to find a list of your ideal clients. For example, you can use it to show you a list of the business owners of accounting firms in Melbourne.

Then create a template of general content that will be relevant to most of them. DO NOT use the generic template that LinkedIn provide. You will damage your brand and reputation by spamming people with generic messages that do nothing to build a relationship. Instead, consider the market you are focusing on, look at their profile, see if you’re connected to specific people and use that to personalise your message. The higher the worth of the client, the more personal the message should be.

Aim to get 10 messages a day out as a minimum, but if you’re serious about building your network, Perfect Boom offer this service at 50-70 messages per day. Then the timeline kicks in.

Day 1: The day your connection gets accepted. Remember, not everyone is on LinkedIn every day, so your request may take a couple weeks to be accepted.

Day 2-3: Send a personal message. Thank them for connecting, then offer a giveaway that helps them by providing industry insights. Then use a spreadsheet or CRM to track your outgoing marketing activity  and any responses. One of LinkedIn’s very few weak spots is that it’s not great as a lead tracker, so we suggest  you manually track what you’re doing to measure success. If people are responding well to your thank you message, but not your marketing message, for example there’s a potential issue there. It’s the same with your posted content – Google analytics will show if people are following the links to your site and helps to highlight the most successful articles.

Day 30: Send a marketing message. There will be a small percentage of people who you’ve connected to who are actually ready to invest in your type of service in the immediate future. This is the “low hanging fruit”, they are ready to buy right now, and your timing is perfect!

Sending this message at around the 30 day mark is the perfect time to scoop up all these hot leads.  It’s the best way to get a return on the effort you’ve put into your LinkedIn profile.

The main gist of the message will be to ask them if they’re interested in finding out more about how you could help them. The message can’t be salesly, it has to be conversational.

If there’s no response to your day 30 offer, don’t give up. They might not be ready to do business with you right now, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be in the future. At around day 50, share a link to some pillar content. Every 3 weeks or so, send another message to them. Invite them to an event you’re attending, ask for their opinion on some research you’re doing, send more pillar content. Each message, when well crafted, further establishes your credibility as a thought leader. There will be more on nurturing your leads in step 5.

If you get to about day 150 and they’re just not responding to you, start looking at their 2^nd degree connections. If you feel comfortable and you feel it’s appropriate, ask to be introduced to them. They might not be interested in your services right now, but you can leverage the goodwill you’ve built up to get to someone else who might.

By now this must seem like a LOT of effort, and yes, it is. But if your lifetime engagement is in the $20K-100K mark per client, then the time and effort invested in this process is worth it. This is high level engagement stuff, it’s consistent, it’s considered, it’s strategic, and as a result, it works.