Inbox Sales Messages?

YOUR LINKEDIN QUESTIONS ANSWERED! 

Do you have questions about your LinkedIn profile or how to use LinkedIn? Send your questions to our LinkedIn Expert Debbie McCormick and she’ll answer them in the magazine! Use info@LinkedInBossLady.com with subject Dear Debbie. 

In this week’s article, I’d like to dive deeper into a LinkedIn post written by our own Cathy Alessandra not long ago. 

She wrote: 

“Seriously... what part of dropping a full blown "buy my stuff" message into my inbox, without having ANY sort of relationship, makes it worth your time to post and my time to read?” 

I’ve written about this before, but it bears repeating every so often because she got a lot of “likes” and comments on that post … 

LinkedIn is not about selling. It’s about building relationships. It’s about helping without asking for anything in return … until you’ve earned the ask. µ 

I’ve found readers of this magazine to be pretty enlightened about social media, so I don’t mean to preach to the choir. 

But enough people are having this problem, including me, that I keep thinking that the more I teach people how to build online relationships, the more it will become the norm, and the more successful everyone will be. 

Building these relationships is called Social Selling.  

I kind of hate that the word “selling” is in the name at all because in this concept, selling comes last in the relationship. I wish it were called Social Building but my phone must have been on DND the day they called to ask my opinion. 🥴 

PROBLEM 

Many people have been incorrectly and obnoxiously trained that as soon as they make a connection with someone they are to start explaining their product and why it would be good for the person they’ve just met.  

Lots of used-car salesmen are trained this way, and isn’t it fun to go used-car shopping, knowing the barrage that awaits you. 

Starting your “pitch” as soon as you’ve met someone is a lot like meeting a girl at a party and within five minutes asking her if she’d like to dance naked in the moonlight. 

Um … wasn’t there supposed to be a get-to-know-you part in the middle?? 

SOLUTION 

Connect with someone who seems like they would be a good match for your service and then Get To Know Them. 

And here’s the part that throws people: you have to be genuinely and authentically interested in them and what they do.  

I think sometimes people feel like they’re going to sound “sales-y” no matter what they say, so why not bulldoze right into presenting your product? 

That discomfort is what is preventing you from developing a genuine bond. 

If that happens to you, try this: 

• Picture yourself talking to your brother or sister just having a conversation, not trying to sell anything. Not thinking of yourself at all. 

Wouldn’t you ask how their week went? What’s went well? Did you get stuck anywhere? Did you figure it out? 

That’s showing genuine interest.  

• Now what if your brother said, “Yeah, we had an ABC problem.”  

• Wouldn’t it be great if you could say, “Hey, I just read a great article about that very thing! You want me to send it to you?” 

THAT’S how you establish a genuine bond.  

You help without asking for anything in return. 

With someone on LinkedIn, whom you don’t know, you ask the same types of questions. And you help in exactly the same way as in the example above. 

That’s “earning the ask,” meaning that at some point in the conversation about a problem they’re having, there will be a natural opportunity to say, “You know, that’s exactly what my company does. Do you want to get on a Zoom call to see if we can fix that for you?” (Or … “if we’d be a good fit to work together on that?”) 

By that time, you’ve offered so much helpful information, that the person feels like they can trust you, that you know what you’re talking about. 

Another way I establish rapport is to genuinely say, “I love what you’re doing! Please let me know if you ever have any questions about how to use LinkedIn to help you with your message/visibility/becoming widely known as an expert in your space — that’s my specialty” (I pick one of those). 

No push, just the offer to help. 

 __________________________________________ 

I’m happy to answer your LinkedIn questions every week in the YES I CAN Living Magazine. 

For further help or support from me, feel free to schedule a one-on-one consultation at www.BookWithDebbie.com. 

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 LinkedIn.com/in/DebbieMcCormick 

@LinkedInBossLady 

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