Brainy Butterflying — A Simple LinkedIn Strategy to Grow Ideal Followers

Growing your LinkedIn following the normal way… you post, you wait, you pray, and nothing. Or, you try adding 10 names a day but get 1 new connection a week. It’s a ghost town.

Instead, let’s make it fun and productive. You show up, you post, you comment, you have smart conversations with smart people… and your followers grow, with people who could actually become clients someday.

So here’s what to do …

Step 1: Find the Right Rooms to Stand In

Pick 10 to 20 profiles of people who have a similar audience as you. People whose followers look a lot like the clients you want to work with — could be simply demographics, job roles, age, location, or industries.

Avoid more mentors of coaches. Don’t go chasing big-name life coaching gurus with massive followings, their audience is full of other coaches, not your ideal clients but rather competitors ;P.

For example, if you’re a career coach help folks find more meaningful creative roles. Let’s say your past clients are professionals who have managerial roles in say tech or finance companies. Then profiles with a medium following who are active and in that industry are likely posting on topics they know about — attracting more of the same types. If you’re ideal client isn’t crystal clear, try looking at the specifics of your best past clients — their titles, industries, age and such.

Step 2: Show Up Early, Not First

Find out their usual posting schedule, and show up early. You don’t need to be the very first comment on a post, just show up while it still has some life in it, not three days later showing up to a party that’s already been cleaned up.

Comment number seven, with something worth reading, beats comment number one that just says “Great post!”

Step 3: Write a Mini-Post, Not a Compliment

This is the big one. Skip the empty praise… the “Love this!” and “So true!” comments everyone else is leaving. Instead, put some brain cells behind it, honest reactions with your unique perspective. Let me double-down and DEFINITELY add your viewpoint.

Instead of:

“Great point! Leadership takes courage.”

Try something more like:

“I’d be careful, lots of folks treat fear like a weed, something to yank out and toss before anyone notices it was there. Putting attention to your fear, questioning it, planning if it comes true, and taking steps to mitigate it gets to the root of it.”

People who read your comment, like it, reply, that gets your name more visibility.

Your conversations would likely spark amazing articles ideas your own profile, website and newsletter. So this social habit can be a natural fire-starter for your marketing. Just visit your favorites, enjoy the content, and let your brainy ideas run rampant. Just don’t forget to reel yourself back in and get your goal number of posts made. For nerdy smart folks, it’s easy to get lost in your head, cause it’s fun.

KENN’S GAME SECRET MOVE

You’ll get more visibility too. A comment that gets a reply, especially from the person who wrote the post, tends to stick around longer, get seen by more people… so don’t just drop a thought and disappear.

Step 4: Check Your “Comment Views”

See how much engagement you get. LinkedIn shows you how many people saw each of your comments. Nobody talks about this feature much, but it’s a way to track results. Tracking is good!

See: View Analytics for Your Comments

After three or four weeks, look back. You’ll probably notice something like this: comments on one person’s posts get seen by 1,800 people, comments on another’s barely crack 130.

The Whole Strategy Comes Down to This

The key is the voices you follow and engage with need to have an audience full of the clients you want. It doesn’t have to be a perfect fit.

So now, this nerdy fun way to engage and share ideas becomes a productive marketing effort.