Today I'm going to walk you through how our reps book 20 meetings per month using LinkedIn DMs.
This process has generated more than $1,000,000 in sales for us over the last 12 months.
We don't use automation - we're not breaking any rules - we've just found a process that works.
I can hear you - LinkedIn DMs are filled with SPAM, our prospects aren't active there. Won't work for us.
Maybe - but we've made it work targeting Contract Managers, HR, Sales, Marketing, IT, CEOs in industries as varied as SaaS, Financial Services, Retail, Manufacturing - you name it we've scheduled meetings with them using LinkedIN DMs.
If you decide to keep reading - I'll walk you through how we structure each of these messages and how to send them to maximise response rates.
Here's How To Really Use LinkedIn to Generate Leads
Our outreach on LinkedIn has 4 Steps:
1. Inticing Connection Request Message
2. Audio Message
3. Video Message
4. Text DM - Break up message
Let's get into it.
Step 1: Inticing Connection Request Message
When you try to connect with someone on LinkedIn you have the option of adding a message to your connection request.
You want this message to be like a dangling carrot in front of a prospects face. Make it so inticing that they can't help but accept it.
Here's how we structure ours at Sales Science :
Hey {{first_name}} was hoping to connect on here, not sure if you guys are doing any outbound at the moment -
but if you are - accept this request and I'll share a unique approach we've been using to set a bunch of meetings.
Here's one a rep at Gong could use:
Hey {{first_name}} was hoping to connect on here to share interesting insight with you based on research we conducted across 150,000 discovery calls especially relevant for {{company Industry}} businesses -
accept this request and I'll share it with you - might help your team out.
Here's one a rep at Vidyard could use:
Hey {{first_name}}, wanted to connect on here to share an interesting approach {{relevant adjacent company or competitor}} used to drive 22% higher conversion rates on inbound leads.
Not sure if this is a focus for you guys as well but if it is - accpet this request and I'll shoot it to you.
You get the point here - think of something you can use a carrot to dangle in front of your prospects nose.
It could be a new approach, a specific insight on their industry, something a competitor has done, something you've identified they could improve - anything that gets them to say "fine let me accept to see what's on the other side".
Step 2: Audio Message
The next step is to deliver the thing that you promised to deliver in the form of an audio message and tie that into a question that illicts a response.
Here are some examples.
Sales Science:
Hey {{first_Name}} thanks for connecting - so I promised to share a unique approach we've developed with you, that approach is called channel validation.
We have identified a way to figure out which channel (either phone, linkedIn or Email) you should use as the primary channel for outreach to each individual prospect.
For example our process dictated that LinkedIn would be the best way to reach you. I guess time will tell if we're correct.
But basically this approach allows reps to have 3-4X as many conversations with prospects everyday when compared with a multi-channel outbound approach. Does this sound like soemthing worth scheduling a call to discuss?
Gong:
Hey {{first_name}} great to be connected with you - here's the isnight I promised. It turns out that the oft mentioned 80-20 rule for listen to talk time is compeletly wrong.
Our analysis shows that in discovery calls the optimal ratio is actually 65-35% on outbound meetings set.
Calls that follow this ratio are 1.5X as likely to progress to the next stage in the pipeline vs those at 80-20.
Do you have a way to quickly identify reps that might be talking too much or too litle in their discovery calls?
Vidyard:
Hey {{first_Name}} thanks for connecting. I'm guessing you were probably curious about what {{relevant adjacent company or competitor}} did to drive 22% higher conversion rates on inbound leads. Really simple actually they used personalised video messages in the first follow up. Have you guys ever experimented with 1-to-1 video for inbound leads?
Sending an audio is really easy - it needs to be done on the LinkedIN mobile app. Open up the message dialouge box to the prospect and click the microphone icon on the right hand side. Hold down to record just as you would in WhatsApp.
Step 3: Video Message
If you haven't been able to seed a conversation from the audio message it's time to move onto the video.
You'll want to embed this into the linkedin messages as opposed to sending a Vidyard or Loom link. You'll get higher play rates by not asking the prospect to visit an external URL.
To record that follow these steps:
1.Click on the paperclip icon next to the message box (you can see this in the image above)
2. Click "take a video"
3.Record the video and press send
Now what should you say here?
At this point in the sequence you can start to fold in more relevance and personalisation. At each stage of the funnel the number of messages you need to send decreases. The core of the video message should be to build on what was outlined in your audio and provide additional context around the problems you solve.
Sales Science:
Hey {{first_Name}} - Fun fact - people tend to play videos when I hold up an intersting object in the thumbnail. Anyway since you've pressed play - hear me out. I noticed you've not got any BDRs in place at ACME but do have 2 AEs.
If they're doing outbound I'd hazard a guess that
they're averaging somewhere around a 5-7% connect rate on outbound activities. Meaning they're probably only speaking to 10 new prospect every week. We help organisations increase this 3-4X so that they're having 30-40 conversations every week.
Or we can handle the whole thing for you and just fill up their calendars with sales meetings. Open to learning more about any of this or have I outstayed my welcome? Let me know Cheers.
Gong:
Hey {{first_Name}} - Noticed you've added 4 people to the sales team over the last 3 months. Getting them productive ASAP is probably one of your highest priorities. Now I may be way off base here - and you've already got this dialed in but I thought I'd share a quick story around how X used Gong to decrease ramptime by 2 months.
Essentially they were able to codify what made their top reps - their top reps everything from talk tracks, to objection handling, talk to listen ratios, the kinds of questions they asked right everything they needed to build the high performing playbook and then lay on top of that new rep perfromance to clearly identify discrepnacies that may be slowing their progress without listenting to every minute of every call.
You've probably got a plan for this internally but thought I'd reach out in the off chance it was relevant. Let me know if you'd like to chat further.
Vidyard:
Hey {{First_Name}} - Inboun follow up can be kind of a drag - people expect a series a emails post an event that (no offence to amrketing) were clearly approved by comittee.
X decided to try and break the mould by including 1-to-1 personalised video to all inbound leads from the webinar event series. Conversion rates to discovery call increased by 22%.
I don't know if you're currently leveraging this kind of video outreach or you think it's corny and you'd never get your team to do it - but Thought I'd reach out on the off chance improving inbound conversion was a priority. If you'd like to lerarn more about this let me know. Cheers
Step 4: Text DM - Break Up Message
Last step in the process is a breakup message. Idea here is to try and get the prospect to engage with one or ideally both of the messages you've sent previously.
Here are a few examples:
Hey {{first_name}} did the video not play for you - or do you just hate the idea of listenting to me talk to you through a camera for 37 seconds so decided not to watch?
Hey {{first_name}} is all of my hard work for nothing or are you going to atleast say "thanks for the effort but not interested" that might make my day...
Hey {{first_name}} do you hate recieveing audio and video messages as much as I hate sending them or are you guys just sorted on this front?
There it is.
This strategy has generated more than $1,000,000 in revenue for Sales Science over the last 12 months.
I really believe the medium has as much to do with the sucess as the messaging. Put it another way - if you just transferred all of the messaging to text I don't think you'd get the same conversion rates.
We certainly didn't before including video and voice.
It can be uncomfortable at first but trust me when I say - if you put this in place and execute consistently - It will work.
Should probably have put this behind a paywall but I guess the email list is small enough at this point.
Hope you got some value out of it.
Happy Hunting!
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