TL;DR: Don’t send impersonal DMs. Make authentic connections and you’ll 10x your sales. 

Feature: How to Get More Clients on LinkedIn

Have you seen these messages? Every day I get DMs that sound like this:

“Hello. We are a fantastic service provider that provides a fantastic service that will benefit your business with our fantastic service. When can you hop on a call so we can demonstrate how fantastic our service is?”

If you’ve ever sent a message like that, I can’t forgive you, but I get it.

You need to make sales because you’re a human being and therefore have to buy groceries. You know that if you copy and paste hundreds of these generic messages, then once in a while someone who needs what you offer will become a client.

But there’s a better way. Especially if you:

• Sell a high-ticket back-end product

• Expect to generate recurring revenue

• Plan on getting even more business by word-of-mouth 

In each of these cases, the value of every client is many times higher than the original sale. So doesn’t it make sense to invest more time to acquire a new client?

Ten-Minute Lead Generation

Instead of spending an hour sending a generic appeal to 100 potential clients, spend ten minutes on each individual.

You’ll only reach six people in that same hour, but you’re at least 10 times more likely to land a client this way.

If you’re already paying for an app that sends automated DMs, at least invest a little bit of time and money to personalize the messages.

Better yet, if you’re tech-heavy in your approach, use AI for research and you can send DMs that include your personality, or at least your status as a living human. Let’s look at how this could work.

Five Minutes, Five Facts

Will Allred, the cofounder of Lavender, has a simple suggestion for LinkedIn. He calls it “Five minutes, five facts.”

The key is to spend 5 minutes looking at someone’s profile before you reach out. Then, all you have to do is incorporate one of these 5 facts in each message.

I still do this manually, because I like to know who I’m reaching out to. But you can easily train AI to do this for you.

Once you have your info, use it to make a connection before you try to make a sale. Here’s an example of the kind of request for connection I send:

“Hey, Joseph, I’m a Bears fan and I’d love to learn about your commercial real estate experience in Chicago. Wanna connect?”

With a message like this, they’re already ten times more likely to accept your invitation Not to mention you have the additional possibility of some back-and-forth about “da Bears.”

Once I have a connection, I send another message that’s admittedly generic. But it usually leads to further conversation:

Hi Joseph, thanks for connecting! What’s new and exciting in your world?

Most people ignore this message. But when I do get a reply, it’s often the beginning of a great relationship.

Eventually it’s time to make a sales pitch, or ask for a referral or introduction.

But ulike the you’ve already got them on your side. That’s the advantage of gathering 5 facts and building a connection.

Using Info in Your Ask

Now you’ve made a genuine connection. You know a little bit about the person and their business. When you ask for the sale or referral, incorporate a fact about them that supports the benefits of doing business with you.

For example, as a copywriter, I look for something they already do that could be enhanced with good copy. I present the offer as a collaboration, and it usually sounds like a no-brainer to them:

“Hey Jospeph, I was thinking about that CRE training you offer to real estate investors. I’ll bet a strong follow-up email series could get you more deals. Do you want to work together to bring in more revenue?”

The Power of the Unscalable

The secret behind everything I’ve told you here is simple.

It’s constantly getting easier to mass message, and it’s getting cheaper to scale. This means more people are doing it.

But Alan Weiss, the author of Million Dollar Consulting, repeatedly says, “Do things that don’t scale.”

Sure, if you have the budget and the tech skills to stay on top of the mass marketing arms race, then maybe you can make the shotgun a core element of your marketing.

But if you want to stand out, I suggest using AI and other tools for research and personalization.

But every contact that you initiate should be authentic and human. People have always wanted to feel seen and heard.

In a world where evetrything is scalable, doing things that don’t scale becomes your superpower. 

That wraps it up for now. If you have any questions or comments about this issue, hit the Reply button and tell me what’s on your mind. I may not answer you directly, but I read every one.

Always keep growing,

Jacob Bear