Posted by Ben Kniffen in Uncategorized
You have a great business that you’re proud of.
You do quality work, you get results, and your clients think the world of you.
The problem is, you need more of them… MUCH more of them to make your business grow and to hit your goals. And as busy as life is for a business owner, there are only so many hours in the day.
You HAVE to get more appointments with targeted prospects… but you don’t have a lot of time to spend identifying and approaching them.
Seems like one of those catch 22’s that you just can’t get past, doesn’t it?
Not necessarily.
What if I told you that I could show you a simple strategy that would allow you to not only connect with more targeted prospects, but actually get more appointments with at least a dozen of them every month… and it would only take you 10 minutes a day TOPS?
Spoiler: That’s what I’m telling you.
Using The Case Study Strategy to Get More Appointments
This is a simple but powerful LinkedIn strategy we’ve been using and teaching at LinkedSelling for a while now, and it’s worked great for us and many of our clients. We call it The Case Study Strategy and it’s super simple to execute.
There are 4 steps, and you’ll only need to invest 10 minutes a day to see results. In fact, after you’ve done it a few times, it may only take you 5 minutes a day.
Commit to this strategy for one full week. Do it every day for 7 days. It doesn’t matter what time of day you do this, so just block off 10 minutes each day for 7 days and follow these 4 simple steps.
Step 1: Identify Your Ideal Client
First you need to get super clear on who your ideal client is. You’re going to do that by creating a short client profile “cheat sheet” you can use when you’re searching for prospects on LinkedIn. You can include things like geographic location, title, industry, age… anything that fits the kind of prospect you’d most like to work with.
The key is that you get specific and not just start trying this strategy on anyone with a heartbeat. That’s too broad, and it will result in lousy results and wasted time when you find yourself on calls and in meetings with people who aren’t the right fit for you.
Step 2: Create a Targeted Case Study
Next, you’re going to create a simple case study specifically related to the kind of person you’re targeting. Base it on a common problem in their industry or something else that is specific to them or their situation so it will resonate strongly with them.
Don’t let the idea of writing a case study intimidate you or turn into a big project. It doesn’t have to be that elaborate or difficult. Keep it simple – a page or two at the most.
Just write a story about a similar client and make sure to include the main components of a good case study: The Problem the client was having, The Solution you offered, The Results your solution got, and The Outcome for the client and their company. When you’re done, save it as a PDF.
Step 3: Write a Great Connection Request
Once you’ve identified 6 prospects that fit your profile using LinkedIn’s search function, you’re going to send them a connection request.
The key in this step is to use the right kind of messaging. That means your connection request isn’t just that stock LinkedIn default message, and it’s not a big, elaborate pitch either.
The right kind of connection request is simple, personalized, and sincere. Here’s an example…
Personalizing your connection request is crucial. This may sound crazy, but we’ve seen time and time again that just by personalizing your connection request in this way, you’re going to get a 50% to 70% acceptance rate.
That means in the first 7 days, you should wind up with 21 to 29 new targeted leads!
But let’s keep it conservative for our purposes here and just say you’re generating 21 new prospects in your first week.
It’s also important to remember that this is just one of many strategies we teach in our whole system. It’s one component of a process to get more appointments and clients. So by itself, this strategy will work for you, but the results you get by using the whole process and combining all of the strategies in our system will be many times better than using just one strategy by itself.
Step 4: Follow-Up With Your Case Study
Your last step is to send a personalized “Thank you” note to each of your new leads and attach the case study you tailored to them earlier. Again, you want the messaging to be personalized, friendly, and on-point. You can see an example of good messaging in the screenshot below…
When you approach your new prospect in this way, you’re accomplishing 3 important things…
First, you’re being polite by following up after connecting and thanking them – which most people don’t take the time to do.
Second, you’re sending a highly targeted case study to them which is going to get them thinking about a problem they’re facing – and their need for a solution.
And third, you’re offering to set aside some time to talk to them. How you phrase this is important.
Look at the message again and you’ll see that it’s casual, friendly, and makes it sound like you’re doing them the favor. The word probably indicates you’re busy too, and while you’re not desperate to talk to them, you’ll make time if they’d like to.
The Results Speak For Themselves
On average, we find that 15% to 22% of prospects who are approached with this strategy agree to meet. So out of your 21 new leads, you should wind up with 3 to 5 of them on the phone in a relatively short period of time.
3 to 5 highly targeted, qualified prospects who have read your case study, were intrigued by it, and have now committed to talking about how you can help them.
If you’re one of those folks who’s just a selling machine and can close 50% to 70% of those new prospects… awesome! You’re going to kill it with this strategy.
But even if you close only 10% of those people… you’ve still created an effective and free method of generating brand new clients whenever you want to.
How to Take it to The Next Level
The kind of impact this strategy has on your business is up to you. There are two ways you can go from here.
You can take what I just showed you here, and use this strategy as a stand-alone… and probably see decent results.
Or, you can take advantage of the fact that you’re here on the blog of the company who’s the best in the world at doing this stuff – and learn the whole system. And when you execute all the components of the system, you’ll get the high-level result results that our clients enjoy.
We regularly put on an Advanced LinkedIn Masterclass that teaches The Case Study Strategy in-depth plus two other excellent strategies that work hand in hand with this one and maximize its effectiveness.
The good news is, if you want to learn more about whole system, it’s totally free to do. Just register for the Advanced LinkedIn Masterclass and you can see it all first hand.
Just Follow the Plan
If you follow this plan and its 4 simple steps every day for just 10 minutes a day, you’ll find yourself with a consistent flow of new clients. And if you find that you have time to do more, bump up the number of requests you send, and multiply your results even more.
And if you’d like to learn how to really kick your prospecting into high gear, make sure to join us on The Advanced LinkedIn Masterclass and get the details on what our whole system can do for you and your business.
Now I want to hear from you…
What challenges have you faced approaching new prospects online? What has worked well for you? Let’s discuss it in the comments.
Thanks for this article. Will attempt to use the suggestions to fill my calendar with appointments!