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Have you ever been blocked–or even locked out of LinkedIn and do not know why? About 4-5 times a week I get this email: “Help! I have been locked out of LinkedIn! What can I do about it?” If your business is serviced by your connections and activity on LinkedIn, this can be a huge headache – costing you a bit of time and money.
While there are a couple of things that can get you limited on LinkedIn (something other than your name in the last name field, specific content, duplicate accounts), it has been my experience that most people have their accounts blocked because they automated too many processes on LinkedIn.
Now do not get me wrong, I do automate some of my activities – and even recommend it. But you must work on LinkedIn’s End User Agreement, and you must be conservative in your activities!
Here are some LinkedIn automation DO NOTs and what to DO instead!
Do not automate SPAM.
By this I mean:
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Do not use 3rd party apps to automate inviting people to connect extremely.
Do not use 3rd party apps to automate sending messages to your connections extremely.
LinkedIn does not want you to use any 3rd party automation tools at all – and has been actively using both the software tools and the users of many of these tools, coming down particularly hard on what it thinks “data scraping tools.” I do automate some of my LinkedIn activity, at the very least, if you overuse these automation tools, your account can be blocked or shut down completely!
Do automate repeated activities.
I do utilize a tool to automatically send messages to particular LinkedIn connections (Linked HelperChrome Extension). But I delicately curate these connections, I delicately curated the content I post them, (I never “sell” them anything in these messages) and I never do more than 100 private messages a day. My practice of thumb is: I make sure every message I send utilizing this automated process, I would have sent manually. I usually only send my delicately curated list:
A post I wrote exactly for people like them;
Or a tool I found that will support them in their LinkedIn marketing and lead gen practices;
Or a free webinar I might be doing;
Or a book I have read that I think they might like.
I utilize the tool because it saves my assistant's time and my money!
Do repetitive delegate activities.
I have my partner do some of the more repeated daily activities on LinkedIn for me. Since I get tons of invitations a week, she goes through and manually messages each would-be connection. Since I'm at my 35K connection limit, I have to choose who I accept into my network delicately.
My partner goes through every connection request, sends a different message to each person, and leaves the material and/or personalized invitations for me to respond to. He also manages my inbox alerting me to urgent posts and messages my contact as updates and (when needed) to Publisher for me.
This is a process I could fully automate, but choose not to because I think it is essential that human eyes are laid on each and every person who invited me to connect.
Do not automatically add everyone to whom you connect to your email automation list.
One method (that drives me insane) is when people connect with me on LinkedIn and then attach me to their email lists. Just because I approve to connect with you doesn't give you permission to spam me with your newsletter that I did not sign up for! I'm already signed up to all the newsletters I can handle. If you automatically add me to your newsletter I won't only unsubscribe from it – I'll also report you! (And disconnect from you on LinkedIn –another issue my assistant does for me.) If you want to use LinkedIn to drive traffic to your automated email marketing process, then ask me to opt in! Which brings me to.
Do respond to every invite with a free lead/offer magnet.
When I respond to requests and new connections, I always give them a variation of free resources. I assume that people are connecting with me because they want to learn more about LinkedIn. So, I'm happy to provide them with information! I would highly recommend building a “lead magnet,” a piece of content that your connections would find highly valuable and offering it to them for free.
I add about 60 people a week to my email list- because they OPT IN to get my information! Yes, I would be adding tons if I just shoved every unsuspecting contact into my email list – but not only is that a bad practice, it is illegal in some countries (like Canada). So I would rather have fewer people who wanted to hear from me, rather than a bigger list that could get me to shut down on LinkedIn, get my website blacklisted or get me sued!
Conclusion.
LinkedIn automation can be helpful but only done in moderation with highly curated content and connections. LinkedIn can be a great site for driving people to your automated marketing list, but only when you give them the option of opting in – otherwise you risk getting your account blocked and possibly sued! So carefully consider what, and how you'll automate on LinkedIn!
There are tons of software tools for LinkedIn, which help to automate even more accurate and prompt. As an example, you can use Orca to automate email sequences with LinkedIn profile visits, which will increase leads amount.
What’s up, guys. I hope you enjoyed my last article on Triggering a social selling sequence when leads are added to your CRM.
This week, I am back with another social selling hack. And I promise you will love this one!
As you already know, I like coming up with these social selling growth hacks, experimenting with different sales enablement and marketing tools, etc… so this week I will be working with one of my all-time-favourites, Typeform.
Typeform helps you make super cool forms and surveys that you can share.
Here’s what I’m thinking? What if I could trigger a social selling sequence on Linkedin through Typeform in exchange for something valuable?
In this post, I’m going to show you how to do exactly that. We’re going to set up a Zapier trigger with Typeform to automatically engage prospects who want to access to a guide, e-book, or just pretty much anything you can share that you think will attract them into your funnel.
Warning: Make sure you are sharing something of value and not scamming them into your funnel because that’s just f’ed up and just really bad for your personal brand. If you want this to work, you’ve gotta give value to get value. If people can’t trust you, what makes you think they’ll trust your product or service?
The best sales tactic? Always Provide Value. It’s not ABC… it’s all about APV. That said, if you’re going to try this hack out, do it the right way or don’t do it at all.
Let’s get started. Here’s are the tools we’ll be using in this social selling hack:
Orca
Zapier
Typeform
Let the madness begin.
I will assume you already have a Typeforms account. If not, it’s free, so make one!
Make sure you have at least one form set up according to your needs and make sure that there is at least one Linkedin URL in your Typeform responses, so we can test the Zap.
Open up Typeform and go create your first form by clicking on New Typeform.
Now go ahead and pick the form that suits you the best. There are quite a lot of different forms, so I am sure everybody can find something. I will go ahead and choose Sign up Sheet.
Click Use this template and it will appear on your Dashboard. Open up new window automatically to help start editing it.
Now comes the fun part. Form building is hella fun, I can spend hours here on the look and feel!
An important note here while you create your form… Make sure you ask for the LinkedIn URL and make it a required field. Take a look at my super stellar form below:
When you are done editing and beautifying the form. Go ahead and click View. It will show you a preview of the form where you can spend 10 plus or minus 2 minutes admiring your masterpiece.
Test the form out by adding in your own information into the form — we need at least one Linkedin URL as a form response to test out the Zap.
Next, click on Share. You will find a link to your form that you can copy and share. Again, don’t forget to fill your form first so we have that Linkedin URL to test later.
Awesome, let’s move on to the next step and Connect Orca with Zapier.
To connect Orca with Zapier, open your dashboard and head on over to Preferences. Under Integrations, you see the Zapier integration.
Click on View integration on Zapier. A new window will open, login to accept the invite. If you don’t have a Zapier account, you’ll be prompted to create one.
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Login to accept the invite. Get ready to create your first Zap with Orca.
Let’s head back to Orca and create a Zapier campaign.
Setup your sequence, publish and Click set up your Orca Zap.
Create this Zap and select Typeform from the list.
You have one option for a trigger here: social selling sequence will be triggered every time a new form is created. Save + Continue.
Next, connect your Typeforms account by entering your login credentials. Test. Save and continue.
On the next screen, you’ll see a list of forms, choose the one you want to use and Continue.
On the next screen, you’ll see a list of your completed forms, choose the form you want to test and Continue.
When you’re ready, move on to the next step to connect Orca with Typeform.
Choose Orca from the app list.
Then select Add Lead to Orca by Linkedin Profile URL. Save + Continue.
Select the account and campaign you’d like to push leads into.
Note: If you haven’t created a Zapier campaign in Orca, do so now. Otherwise, you won’t see anything in the drop-down menu.
Next, tell Orca where it can pull Linkedin URLs from the form.
On the next screen, test the Zap by clicking on Send Test to Orca. If the test was successful you will see your sample lead in pending verification status in the campaign details.
Click Finish and then turn on your Zap!
Once your Zap is live, you can start sharing your form.
Now whenever a new response is submitted through your form, it will automatically push leads into a social sequence in Orca.
By default, leads will be in pending verification status until Orca verifies that the Linkedin profile URLs is formatted properly. Once they are approved, they’ll be passed into the social selling sequence.
Whooo! Congrats, you’ve successfully set up a Zap to trigger social sequences in Orca through Typeform! Again, let me reiterate… make sure you are adding value.
Sales is about relationships. So if you’re going to do this hack, do it the right way.
As my pop would always say to me, “if you’re going to do something, do it right and do it well… or don’t do it all.”
That said, don’t half-ass this hack with garbage.
As the world's largest professional media marketing platforms, it’s the go-to service for anyone who wants to connect with recruits under a range of job titles from-workers to customers, among others.
In the past, we have discussed the many ways to use LinkedIn advertisements to generate sales and social selling. While this is a solid approach that can generate big-time results, there is no reason to stop there.
In this blog, we're going to review 4 of the best LinkedIn automating tools that can help you become a wisdom media marketing expert.
We will touch on the finer details of each tool, including how and when to use them. Soon enough, you will find that each one could fit nicely with your current and future media marketing and content marketing methods.
By the end of this blog, I hope that you better understand how to use LinkedIn to boost sales and social selling, along with building trust in your marketing team and your marketing plan.
Let’s explore the four tools to help you nail life as a media marketing pro.
Here is how LinkedIn describes its approach to small business:
“LinkedIn is much more than a social website. It is a community of professionals – in a business-mindset – that is waiting to hear from you.”
Through the use of LinkedIn Small Business tool and its three-step approach to social selling and being an excellent lead builder, your small business will find itself on track to increase sales, build trust, and reach a different of related purposes. The three steps include:
Build your brand presence
Connect with your target audience
Engage them with content marketing
Step number three is my fav because this is where you establish and share valuable content marketing skills with your target audience. By doing so, you're in a position to not only attract recruits and motivate them to be decision-makers but to“turn followers into brand advocates.”
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There is a lot to learn upon visiting the LinkedIn Small Business center, so make sure that you take enough time to review each feature that is available to you. From text ads to sponsored content, there is sure to be a strategy that fits in with your sales goals.
Sometimes a media marketing tool gets around that is different than anything else in its area. This is unquestionably what you get when you turn to Crystal, known as the“world’s largest personality platform.”
The company explains its service as follows:
“Crystal gives you instant access to millions of personality profiles and free communication advice for anyone you meet.”
So, what does this mean for those who use LinkedIn as a social selling tool? In short, Crystal can examine a LinkedIn profile or premium account and provide feedback and insight into a person’s personality.
With this information, you will find out it easier to interact with the person in the proper manner rather than just making a cold call. From the words you apply to the way you approach the prospect, this tool will give you a high-level ofguidance.
When you contrast two LinkedIn profiles, you may see the same thing (for the most part). But, when you use Crystal, you will soon find that many subtleties can be picked up on and applied to your benefit to avoid the dreaded cold call.
If you want to develop your LinkedIn social selling, it is imperative to become a better communicator. With this tool, you do not have to do much, to make this fundamental change and swap out your cold call for stronger lead builder potential.
One of the biggest advantages of LinkedIn is also a primary challenge for many sales professionals. What is it, you ask? It is the more than 440M members.
Without the help of a prospecting tool, you could soon find yourself sinking in data with no real concept as to which direction to take.
And, this is whyLeadFuze is so attractive. It lets you to quickly create a list of leads and target accounts through a simple search.
While the lead group process is a big deal, it does not stop there, after you need to be a lead builder actively. Users of this tool also have access to contact information, including phone number and email, making it simple to begin the sales process.
If that is not enough, LeadFuze also helps you automatically send personalized emails and follow-ups.
At this time, you can dig up contact information for more than 210 million B2B professionals and premium accounts. And, with customers adding roughly 360,000 prospects each month, it is easy to see that you will always have an endless supply of leads.
LeadFuze is known as one of the head all-in-one LinkedIn lead generation tools. With the capability to automatically uncover all of the essential information, this one tool can give your media marketing strategy a big increase.
The title of this tool alone should give you an idea of what it has to offer. However, if you want to experience its power, you need to give it a chance.
For those who practice multiple sales tools to reach their goals, SalesLoft should not be overlooked.
The basic concept is that you can integrate all of your most important sales tools, ensuring that they work together in perfect harmony.
On its official website, SalesLoft Prospector discusses the integration of the following tools:
DiscoverOrg;
Owler;
Crystal;
RingLead;
InsideView;
Datanyze;
Orca;
Sigstr.
Do you currently use any of the above sales tools? If so, you can join them all together through the use of this platform.
Conclusion
Twitter and Facebook are top notches social media platforms, but they do not offer the same level of B2B networking opportunities that LinkedIn does.
With the guidance of these tools on top of your social media platforms, you can take benefit of everything LinkedIn has to offer. From better organize your contacts to managing the sales funnel, there is something out there that will work for you and help you to become a better decision maker in the world of media marketing.
https://useorca.com/blog/blog/which-are-the-best-software-for-automating-linkedin-activity
When we talk about LinkedIn marketing, its a lot of work and we all love to do VA’s and outsource the work and to most extent, automate the business so we can concentrate on most important stuff. But a lot of people are undecided to use automation and especially Linkedin Automation software in their market.
I understand you do not want to risk your LinkedIn Account. But what if you test and pinch and come up with a strategy that is either semi-automated or fully automated that can bring you leads 247 366 without doing anything at all? Taking this risk is worth taking sometimes.
Who would not like to do that?
Off course everyone. But there're pros and cons of using automation tools on your Linkedin Account. Today, we're going to study this in details.
So let's get started.
Pros
1) Automation is great for scaling. If you want to get your LinkedIn account to the next level. You can use different software tools to automate your Linkedin Connections, advertisements and even customizing your intro message. Now I assume you are a one-person army and imagine once you set up software that can send invites in your behalf initiate chats, liking other people status and even comment your friends status. How much can more leads you close?
2) Consistency and Quality. We all informed that in manual work we always lack consistency. As a human being its quite tough to work on the specific task, especially repetitive work consistently. As long as you have a pure mindset going forward with your Linkedin prospecting. You can pretty much automate lead prospecting to a good level. And automation software isn't going to get bored with work; you are going to get your job done 24/7 366!
For automating your lead prospecting, you can try the
3) Automation will be an enormous time Saver. Time isn't infinite, and once you have a tactic that is bringing a good amount of leads, you can use a software piece and almost set and forget. Your most constant task will be handled by the automation software which is going to keep you a ton of time.
And we all experienced that Time is MONEY.
4) Reduce turnaround time in testing new methods. If you have to work manually and test different approaches. You need a lot of time and sources. But if you use a software, you have a tremendous competitive advantage because you can test tactics on the scale. For instance, you want to test, how much connection requests per day is safe? Manually, you have to do everything by yourself. Which is a slow task? Using software, you can exponentially increase connection request and find out how much requests per day are safe.
Cons
As we discussed a few advantages of Linkedin Marketing automation. There're some risks as well, once you use the software on these type of social networks you're always at risk getting your account banned. So let's discuss the disadvantages of using automated software for your Linkedin Lead Generation.
1) You can get your account banned. This is the highest risk associated when you decide to use Linkedin automation software. After all, you're spamming and once LinkedIn found that this is a bot operation. They're going to take seconds to either limit your account or ban it.
2) Quality vs. Quantity. When you practice automation in a Linkedin lead generation, you always compromise on quality. But your quantity gets through the roof. In Automation, you trade off between quality and quantity. But some people want to scale up things very fast, so you have to keep in mind that one needs to compromise on quality if in automation.
3) You cannot depend on automation. You must get regular updates. No matter how powerful your software is, you're playing with one of the world largest social media platforms. So you need to have a regular upgrading system that helps you to stay ahead of the game. If you're using software, it works great for you, and the company shut down and stop to update the software. You're in trouble.
Conclusion
We discussed the pros and cons. Now it's up to you how much risk you want to take and how much safe you want to play. In my opinion, use both automation and manual and at them in parallel. And see which one plays well for you. If you do not have time yourself, write your approach to steps, and you can hire cheap VA’s on Upwork and Fiverr.
Let's brainstorm it; you can semi-automate your Linkedin Automation as well.
Use software for Sending connection requests, beginning chat manually. And then use chatbots always to get them back to your website/lead funnel and whatever you want to send them. This is probably the best approach for everyone out there.
Now, this is up to you, and what task that you think are the least essential and time sucker, you can automate it. This is a huge conclusion, and you must do your due diligence on your own. Once you do that and take steps to semi-automate your Linkedin Lead Prospecting. You can double or even triple your profits and revenue.
Thoughts? Let us know in the comments section below.
https://useorca.com/blog/blog/best-ways-to-automate-your-activity-on-linkedin-pros-amp-cons
There is a potential goldmine on LinkedIn, just waiting for you to tap into its ability to locate and connect with your ideal users. This goldmine has only become more even helpful as LinkedIn has improved and updated its free search feature, making it easier to find possibilities using the LinkedIn Advanced Search function.
So just what makes LinkedIn such valuable for you to find out and connect with your potential possibilities?
Think about that at the time of writing this that LinkedIn has over half a billion global members in 230 countries. That is a huge pool for you to search for potential possibilities (this is where the updated Advanced Search comes helpful).
Today we'll learn how to search for candidates who themselves are in search for a candidate like you.
Searching for a job or the motivated people by using traditional methods can take you a lifetime, and you will be still sitting at home with that newspaper and pen in your hand. Times have changed and so have the process of finding jobs. LinkedIn is now considered the best method of searching for a job. It has around 348 million users, and we're sure that your future employer is one of them. So how do your search for them?
LinkedIn’s Advanced Search is a unique feature that will help you in finding the vacancies or the suitable people in the right places, all you need to know is how to use it to your advantage.
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How to use LinkedIn’s Advanced Search Option?
When you sign in to your LinkedIn account, you'll find an Advanced option next to the search bar, tap on that option, and you will see a dialog box appear on your screen. Advanced search option on LinkedIn gives you two options :
• Searching for whose who might help you to get a vacancy.
• Searching for the vacancies directly.
Advanced People Search on LinkedIn
Searching for Recruiters
Through LinkedIn’s people search characteristic, you can search for the reps of your dream company without knowing their any details and can connect with them.
For instance, if you have a company in mind and want to connect to its HR team, you can do it through this option. Just specify the name of the company under the option of Company, and in Title, you can specify the designation (HR executive or HR manager or just HR).
Searching for people who share the same experience and education as yours.
Not sure about which company to join? Do not know which companies provide the job that you are looking for? This method will help you in connecting with people in the similar field. As an advice, take into account that by using Orca you can increase your email sequences rate. That will allow to be noticed by your leads even more faster.
Through LinkedIn, you can discover which companies hire people who have the same experience or education as yours. In the keyword field mention your experience or your degree and in location field select the location of your choice and tap on search. So if you've searched for marketing skills, you will receive a list of experts who have listed marketing as their experience. You can go through their profile and get info about the employer and can also check for a job through their company page.
Advanced Job Search on LinkedIn
The LinkedIn job search function will tell you about the jobs in a particular field. Through this function, you can exactly know if there're any vacancies in the companies that you're interested in. For example, if you want to know that about the job at Ogilvy & Mather in the Digital Marketing Department in the US, you exactly must search for the same thing. In the keywords section type Digital Marketing, in company type Ogilvy & Mather, and in location section US. You can also type the postal code if you're looking for an exact location.
You'll see the list of vacancies when you tap on search, go through them and apply for the one which you think is relevant. If you do not have any particular company in mind, then you can leave the Company field empty, and you will see the vacancies in Digital Marketing at your location.
Boolean Search on LinkedIn
If you want to search for several keywords at the same time, you can use Boolean functions which will demonstrate relevant results for all your keywords. You can use AND, OR, and NOT functions to enhance/filter your results.
AND function
When you want to search for job/people with more than one keyword, you can use the AND operator or Boolean search. For instance, if you're going to search for people with SEM, SEO, and Social Media skills listed so that you can use SEM AND SEO AND Social Media in the keywords field, and you'll see the results show the list of specialists who have all these three skills listed.
OR Function
When you want to find the job or people that consist of at least one of your diversity of keywords, then you can use the OR operator. For instance, if you want to find people that are either good at Social Media OR SEO, then you can type Social Media OR SEO in the keyword section.
NOT Function
When you want to remove something from your search, you can use NOT function. For instance, if you're searching for only SEO specialists, then you can type SEO NOT Social Media NOT SEM NOT Digital Marketing in the keyword field and you search results will show you only SEO specialists.
The best part about the Advanced Search Option on LinkedIn is that your search can be as broad as possible or as narrow as possible. If used correctly, you definitely can find your dream job via LinkedIn.
So if you haven't yet started using this advanced search feature then start today and if you've been using this then share with us how it has helped you by commenting below.
https://useorca.com/blog/blog/benefits-of-using-advanced-search-on-linkedin
We all want to change the world, or at least do something unusual in it. Often, we get burnt out, have bouts of FOMO (fear of missing out), make excuses, or get distracted by our LinkedIn feeds. However, the reality is that to make a difference – whether it’s in the world or our lives and businesses – we need to be more productive to do it.
Starting a business isn't everybody’s cup of coffee. Trust me, entrepreneurs, project owners, business owners and can't succeed without asking the help of groups of people who have that skill and can lead them better. Without these groups of people, it becomes a challenge for small project managers & business owners to scale their business on their own.
If you are an expert, there's a high chance that you are already present on LinkedIn. A social media network with over 600 million users spanning more than 250 countries, can be a great source of a system with industry professionals and join heads with like-minded people.
For years, LinkedIn groups were regarded as a core of all self-promotional posts and the spam, but the recent changes in LinkedIn Groups allowed them to help entrepreneurs, project management professionals, and small business owners.
LinkedIn Groups are one of the most overlooked tools that the network has to offer. If you are an entrepreneur, these groups can be an invaluable and inexhaustible resource to help you improve and grow your business. Here're 10 LinkedIn groups that all entrepreneurs should consider joining.
LinkedIn Groups for Project Managers
The Project Manager Network: A group handled by Recruiter.com, a leading career website specializing in recruiting. This dynamic group comprises of 870,241 members, who discuss topics about software recommendations, project management methodologies, the dynamics of team leadership, and much more. In this group, you can find advice on how to manage your team effectively and share skills that worked for you.
Project Manager Community: Follow the # 1 Project Management Community for program, project & portfolio management. Find vacancies, raise discussions and meet others of your kind! Another large group is accommodating 371,842 members, where you can discuss anything related to project management including PMBOK PDU, PMP certification, Prince2, software development, ISO, CMMI, IEEE, Six Sigma, Scrum, Agile, ITIL & PMO. ProjectManager.com manages this group.
PMI Project, Program & Portfolio Management: An Official group of Project Management Institute, this active group boasts over 234,836 members. All group discussions center on latest PM courses, career training, and advance career tips. This's the right place to glean all the information about PMP certification.
PM Link: While it seems like high efforts to group 84,614 members in the field of project & management under one umbrella, this group achieves it to ideal. The conversations in this group are all about PM tools, PMP exam, methodologies, and tips on how to manage your team and projects efficiently. PMLink.com directs the group.
Project Management 2.0: In this group over 20,940 members, there's a huge opportunity for project managers to learn the effective methodologies, tools, and discipline needed to run an efficient team. The group is used by thinkers, innovators, and experienced projects managers who share million-dollar advice for free.
LinkedIn Groups for Entrepreneurs
Digital Marketing: A group with over 1,162,318 members is dedicated to helping digital marketers from across the world. Usually, the group contains topics ranging from social media marketing, mobile marketing, and email marketing, to industry reports. The group is an invaluable resource for all the entrepreneurs out there.
On Startups: A group of 642,162 members where entrepreneurs can discuss your issues about finance, sales, marketing, operations, and startup failures. The group was started by a group of entrepreneurs who help each other navigate through the rough seas of the initial years of a startup.
Executive Suite: A group of 327,750 people where all the high-profile executives connect and share information related to leadership, decision-making, and team management. When you become a member of the group, you'll get access to the web-series, discussion board all the practical advice you need.
A Startup Specialists Group: 284,143 members combine to form an online community aimed at helping startups and entrepreneurs find mentors and investors by pitching ideas. Here you will also find crowdfunding, best business advice, and a lot of networking.
Band of Entrepreneurs: This group of 26,753 members is lead by entrepreneurs to facilitate fellow startups and founders to support them in areas related to human resources, technology, PR, and idea generation. The concept of this group is to facilitate and accelerate the development of the entrepreneurial /startup ecosystem.
Over to you: What're your favorite LinkedIn Groups?
LinkedIn is the best channel to reach professionals who are interested in connecting with other professionals. This makes it an excellent platform for startups, project managers, and entrepreneurs to help them balance their business. In order to improve your startups, make your project manager or entrepreneurs skills even more effective, use Orca.
What're your most favorite LinkedIn Groups that have helped you with your business?
What’s up, guys. I hope you enjoyed my last article on how to scrape LI groups.
I really enjoyed putting the last hack together and got a ton of great feedback, so I’ve decided to put double down and put another article together. This isn’t a growth hack, so let’s just call it a workflow hack.
I like coming up with social selling growth hacks, experimenting with different sales enablement and marketing tools, etc… but this week, I want to show you some quick workflow hacks to make your life easier.
That said, we’re going integrate Orca with Hubspot through Zapier. I know… It’s not the most ideal solution, but this is the best we’ve got until we finish up our direct integrations with Salesforce and Hubspot.
In this post, I’m going to show you how you can a trigger a social selling sequence on Linkedin in Orca whenever a lead is added to Hubspot CRM.
Let’s level up your Hubspot game by giving you the power to sequence Linkedin engagements in parallel, before, or after your email sequences.
Here’s are the tools we’ll be using in this workflow hack:
Orca
Zapier
Hubspot
Some enthusiasm as always
First things first…
I will assume you already have a Hubspot account. If not, it’s free, so make one! If you’re using another CRM, as long as it’s integrated with Zapier, you’ll be able to follow along.
If this is your first time using a CRM, check out this article to help you get started using Hubspot.
Next, let’s make sure you have at least one Linkedin URL in Hubspot, so we can test the Zap.
Open up Hubspot and go to Contacts.
Create a contact. I’m going to use Dan and myself as test contacts.
When you create a new contact on Hubspot, you can enter basic information like name, email address, company, etc.
You can also input other data, like Linkedin URL (you’ll need to do this if you want to trigger sequences in Linkedin).
Click on View all Properties. Find Social media information, you’ll see a space for your lead’s LinkedIn bio. Copy and paste the Linkedin url and save.
Awesome, test contacts are set in Hubspot. You’re ready for the next step.
Connect Orca with Zapier
To connect Orca with Zapier, open your dashboard and head on over to Preferences. Under Integrations, you see the Zapier integration.
Click on View integration on Zapier. A new window will open, login to accept the invite. If you don’t have a Zapier account, you’ll be prompted to create one.
Login to accept the invite. Get ready to create your first Zap with Orca.
Let’s head back to Orca and create a Zapier campaign.
Setup your sequence, publish and head back to Zapier.
Create this Zap and select Hubspot from the list.
On the next step, pick trigger. There are several different triggers, for this hack we’ll be using New contact trigger, which can trigger a sequence everytime a new contact is created in Hubspot.
IMPORTANT: Make sure when you create a contact, to always include Linkedin URL.
Next connect your Hubspot account by entering your login credentials. Test. Save and continue.
Test this step by Pulling in the samples (test contacts we created earlier).
On the next screen, you’ll see a list of your contacts, choose a contact you want to test for this setup.
When you’re ready, move on to the next step to connect Orca with Hubspot.
Choose Orca from the app list.
Then select Add Lead to Orca by Linkedin Profile URL. Save + Continue.
Select the account and campaign you’d like to push leads into.
Note: If you haven’t created a Zapier campaign in Orca, do so now. Otherwise, you won’t see anything in the drop-down menu.
Next, tell Orca where can find Linkedin URLs. In Hubspot, that would be LinkedIn bio space.
Set the CRM Record ID to contact email. Press Continue.
On the next screen, test the Zap by clicking on Send Test to Orca. If the test was successful you will see your sample lead in pending verification status in the campaign details.
On the next screen, test the Zap by clicking on Send Test to Orca. If the test was successful you will see your sample lead in pending verification status in the campaign details.
(this wasnt here few seconds ago :D)
Turn on the Zap!
(and its on!)
Once your Zap is live, you can start adding more contacts to Hubspot. Just make sure you enter their Linkedin URL to Linkedin bio section.
Now whenever new leads are added into your CRM, it will automatically push leads to a social sequence in Orca.
By default, leads will be in pending verification status until Orca verifies that the Linkedin profile URLs is formatted properly. Once leads are approved, they’ll be passed into the social selling sequence.
Whooo! There you have it…Connecting triggering a social sequence in Orca through Hubspot.
What are you waiting for? Go! Start building relationships with your leads on Linkedin. Extend your influence… build up your network of potential buyers and followers.
Hope you liked it! :)
If you aren’t using LinkedIn as a lead generation tool, you are passing up a most excellent opportunity. Linkedin is one of the best b2b lead generation platforms in the entire sales enablement universe... or at least it's one of my favorite outbound lead generation tools in my sales stack.
I mean seriously, where else are you going to find a platform specifically designed to help you build relationships with other professionals in your space or in a space that you’re trying to sell into?
Linkedin, hands-down is seriously one of the best platforms to build relationships that could easily lead to new sales opportunities.Traditional outbound lead generation tactics like cold emailing and cold calling are tactics of the past. I’m not saying cold emailing or cold calling doesn’t work anymore. It’s just not as effective as it used to be, when the tactic was still fresh and only a few people we’re doing it and doing it well.
We’re living in different times. Pretty much anyone who's in sales knows about sales automation and is using some form of it to send automated cold emails. It’s gotten to a point where it has become a major pain in the butt for end users who are on the receiving end of these emails.
People hate emails. I hate emails. I hate waking up in morning to an inbox full of spammy sales emails pitching me this and that… things I don’t need or want. So what do I and the rest of the world do? We delete it. Follow-up enough times, and we report it spam.
Does it make sense to start off a relationship with someone you hope to do business with through a tactic that triggers a negative emotional response?
That's what makes Linkedin perfect for b2b sales teams.
Linkedin automation, let’s talk about it.
It’s a no brainer and if you're in b2b sales, you should be doing it because it works.
Here's why...
Like all social networking platforms, Linkedin is designed to hook you and bring you back. Linkedin does this through notifications. Anytime someone visits your profile, sends a connect request, likes a post, or endorses you, you'll get a push notification on your mobile phone, in-app notification, and emails, if you haven't unsubscribed. That's what Linkedin automation is all about: Triggering notifications to get you noticed.
Here's a short list of tools that can help you sell faster on Linkedin, starting with our tool:
Orca
Orca is a Linkedin automation tool that basically allows you to sequence engagements or touches that trigger notifications that increase your chances of getting noticed by your lead. We currently have three types of engagements you can sequence together. You can automate profile visits, connect requests, and follow up messages and sequence them in a similar fashion as you would email sequences.
It's a desktop app that runs Linkedin automations through your IP address to protect your account and reduce the risk of restrictions or banning. It's built for for b2b inside sales teams and agencies, and is integrated with Zapier, lead generation tools like Growlabs and EasyLeadz, and crms like Salesforce.
There's also a free chrome extension we built to help you manage your Linkedin messages by preventing Linkedin's UIX from scrolling you to the top every time you respond to a lead. Here’s a link to the chrome extension.
Other Tools
In no particular order:
Jetbuzz.io
Protop
LinkedProspect
Castanet
LinkedDominator
Meet Leonard
source: https://useorca.com/blog/blog/best-linkedin-automation-tools-that-will-surprise-you
If you’re a B2B salesperson, you’ve got to be using social selling on LinkedIn to engage with your audience. With over 400 million users, there’s a ton of opportunity to generate new leads.
But with the amount of noise on LinkedIn, how do you stand out from the crowd? How do you use LinkedIn as an alternative to cold email and other channels?
In this definitive guide, you’ll learn how to use LinkedIn to build a social selling machine. Once you’ve followed these steps, you’ll have an efficient and effective lead generating machine that builds real sales opportunities.
Contents
Foreword: What is Social Selling?
Chapter 1: Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile for Ultimate Positioning
Chapter 2: Creating Content & Building Your Personal Brand
Chapter 3: How to Find Red-Hot Prospects on LinkedIn
Chapter 4: How to Engage & Build Trust with Your LinkedIn Leads
Chapter 5: Getting Key Insights on Leads, Competitors & Influencers
Chapter 6: 4 LinkedIn Tools for Automation & Efficiency
Foreword: What is Social Selling?
Let’s kick things off with a simple definition:
“Social selling is the art of connecting, engaging with, and nurturing leads through social media channels. Whether that’s on Twitter or LinkedIn, the primary goal is to create real-world sales opportunities by being active through these channels.”
So, why should you even bother paying attention to social selling? This next stat is a pretty good reason: according to LinkedIn, 78% of sales professionals who use social media outperform their peers who don’t.
If you’re still not convinced, here are three more reasons why social selling is advantageous:
Your leads are there: LinkedIn has exploded in recent years. Users are more engaged than ever. Which includes your ideal clients. According to a study conducted by IDC, 75% of B2B executives use social media as part of the buying process.
So are your competitors: That’s right, if 78% of salespeople are already utilizing social selling, you can bet that includes your competitors. These statistics from eMarketer drive this point home:
Your competitors are already eating up the attention. Luckily, the rest of this guide will show you how to outperform them.
It leads to lifelong relationships: Relationships are the foundation of successful selling in 2018. By engaging with your leads on LinkedIn, you can add more value and build stronger relationships while boosting your sales teams’ credibility at the same time.
You know why social selling is important, and the benefits it will bring to you and your sales teams. Let’s dig into the seven-step process to becoming a social selling rockstar on LinkedIn.
Chapter 1: Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile for Ultimate Positioning
Your LinkedIn profile is the first thing your prospects will see.
Which is why you’ve got to optimize it.
Why? Here are a few reasons:
It’s what your connections will judge you on
It will boost your credibility as an expert
It will convince your leads they are in safe hands
It’s the perfect vessel to boost social proof
Let’s break down each element of your profile and what they must include for ultimate optimization:
The Perfect Profile Picture
In a perfect world, we wouldn’t judge a book by its cover.
As humans, however, we do it all the time. Which is why your profile picture must be high-quality and professional looking.
But what does this actually mean? Let’s break it down:
Use the right expression: You want to appear warm and friendly to your prospects. The best way to do this is to “smile with your eyes.” Don’t put on a Cheshire-cat grin, but don’t come across too seriously either.
Dress the part: Wear the clothes you’d usually wear in a work setting. Depending on your personality and target market, that might be a traditional shirt (or even suit), or perhaps something more casual. Allow your personality to shine through.
Take up 60% of the frame: Your profile picture is all about you. This means no landscape photos where you’re somewhere in the background.
Use a simple background: You don’t want the background setting to be too distracting. Make sure that you are the focal point.
Credibility Boosters for Killer First Impressions
Once you have a polished profile picture, it’s time to show your audience why they should pay attention to you.
To do this, you must quickly demonstrate that you’re a credible figure in your industry or subject matter.
Do this using these two LinkedIn profile elements:
Your header image
Your headline
For example, Matthew Howells-Barby, Director of Acquisition at HubSpot, uses a simple header image to illustrate his public speaking ability in front of a large crowd:
Karola Karlson, Marketing Manager at Taxify, uses this space to showcase the publications she has contributed to:
Then there’s your headline. You can use this to show off your work experience, accomplishments, and, most importantly, how you help people.
This is exactly what SaaS marketing consultant Siddharth Bharath does. Instead of simply telling his prospects what he does, he shows how he helps them:
Write A Clear and Compelling Bio
The bio section is where you can truly sell yourself.
Use this to expand upon your accomplishments, add more credibility boosters, and talk about how you help your clients.
Josh Fechter, founder of BAMF Media, is a great example of this:
He lists out the services he offers, as well as the companies he’s worked with.
What about an example from the SaaS world? Here’s how David Cancel, founder of Drift, positions his company’s value proposition:
Include this value proposition in both your bio and company description. It’s more likely to get read if a prospect scrolls past your header section.
Recommendations & Endorsements
Receiving recommendations from your peers are like testimonials for your LinkedIn profile. It shows that people vouch for you:
In the example above, people talk about the value they received from working with Oli Gardner, founder of Unbounce. These people not only vouch for his expertise as a marketer, but his ability as a leader – something that will appeal to potential candidates.
To receive recommendations, you’ve got to give them first. People are more likely to write a glowing testimonial if you write one for them.
Start with those closest to you. These include colleagues, existing clients and friends within your industry. You should also endorse them for relevant skills:
You should now have a LinkedIn profile that boosts your credibility and shows why you’re an expert in your space.
The next step is to add value to your audience.
Chapter 2: Creating Content & Building Your Personal Brand
These days, there’s only one way to build lifelong business relationships:
Deliver an insane amount of value upfront.
The best way to do this is through content. Content that goes above and beyond the call of duty. Content that helps people solve their specific problems.
Here’s how you do it on LinkedIn:
Create Killer Owned Content
In 2018, I recommend that all salespeople start building their personal brand with owned content.
This is content that you publish on your own blog or website. You can either do this on your company blog or your personal website.
For example, Tito Bohrt, CEO of AltiSales, created an in-depth guide on sales development for the Sales Hacker blog:
By doing this, he boosted his own authority within his industry, while creating content for his ideal prospects at the same time.
The first challenge to doing this is coming up with topic ideas. As a salesperson, you’re in the best position to uncover content ideas.
You’re talking to prospects and clients on a daily basis. Keep an ear out for common complaints, questions, and challenges. What hurdles are your prospects trying to overcome?
Keep track of these challenges in a spreadsheet like so:
Next, you need to create the content itself. There are several formats you can use to frame your content, including:
How-to guides: Create an instructional guide on how to solve a problem step-by-step.
Case studies: Show how a client or someone from within your industry solved a problem.
Opinion pieces: Write about your thoughts on a certain area of expertise.
Proprietary research: Use owned data or research to create a unique piece of content.
Struggling to write this yourself? Interview subject matter experts from within your organization. These include senior decision makers, marketers, and product designers.
Interviewing these experts will help you fill in the gaps and create content that serves your prospects.
Publish Content on LinkedIn
Did you know LinkedIn has its own publishing platform?
It allows anyone to post content and share it directly with their connections.
Now you know how to create killer “owned” content, you can re-publish it on LinkedIn.
To do this, click the “Write an article” button under the status text box at the top of the page:
Then, you’ll need to create a header image. My favorite method of finding a relevant image is to head to Unsplash and search for relevant keyword:
The optimal size for header images is 1200 x 644 pixels. You can use a tool like Canva to upload your photo from Unsplash and resize it to perfection.
Once you’ve uploaded your header image, simply copy and paste your existing content into the article:
You now have owned content published on LinkedIn to share with new connections.
Writing Engaging LinkedIn Posts
As well as LinkedIn articles, it’s also important to write posts that appear directly in the news feed.
Publishing native posts on a regular basis is the perfect way to nurture leads over time. Here’s an example from Aaron Orendorff, Editor in Chief at Shopify:
The results? Over 250 likes and 90 comments (so far):
So, how do you create engaging posts like this? There are several formats you can adopt:
Stories where you’ve overcome tough hurdles
Stories of mistakes you made and how you fixed them
Stories from people you’ve met or interviewed
Short, instructional guides on new strategies, tricks and hacks
Stories are very popular on LinkedIn. They generate the most attention as it allows your audience to connect with you.
Let’s take a look at another example from Gaetano Di Nardi, VP Marketing at Sales Hacker:
He hooks readers in with an attention-grabbing question. One that speaks to the pains of his main audience.
He then leads into a polarizing opinion on the nature of cold calling.
Instead of talking about what’s wrong, he then gets into the crux of the post: actionable advice on what to do instead.
He then wraps it up with a question to spark engagement with his audience.
This short post has generated over a hundred likes and dozens of comments. This engagement gets him extra exposure, as the connections of those who comment will also see the post.
You can also create engaging video content. For example, Quentin Allums uses LinkedIn video to spread his message and educate his audience on the power of storytelling:
Creating content in this manner is simple. Simply stand in front of a camera (or iPhone), hit record, and talk about a topic that matters to your ideal clients.
Add subtitles to your video to capture mobile browsers. This engages users who can’t watch with the sound on, and has been proven to generate a higher engagement.
Chapter 3: How to Find Red-Hot Prospects on LinkedIn
You now have an optimized profile and killer content that delivers value to your leads.
It’s time to go and find them.
Prospecting for the ideal customer on LinkedIn doesn’t have to be difficult. Luckily, LinkedIn provides tools that make it even easier.
Finding the Best Leads with Advanced Search
The first and most obvious tool is LinkedIn’s advanced search. With it, you can run searches on criteria like location, keywords and industry.
To access advanced search, click the search button followed by the magnifying glass icon:
Click “All filters” along the top bar to access the advanced search:
You’ll see a list of advanced filters to refine your search, like so:
For example, if you wanted to find prospects with a job title of “VP Marketing” who work for IT companies in the San Francisco area, your search would look something like this:
You can also use Boolean logic to construct better search queries. By using Boolean search, you’ll generate more refined results.
Here are five variables you can use in your Boolean search strings:
Quoted searches: You can use quotation marks if you want to find someone with a multi-word title or exact phrases. For example: “senior product manager.”
NOT searches: If you want to exclude a particular term, you can use an uppercase NOT immediately before the term. For example: programmer NOT manager.
OR searches: To see results that include one or more terms, separate the terms with an uppercase OR. For example: ceo OR “chief executive officer” OR founder OR cofounder.
AND searches: To get results that include two or more terms in a list, you can use the uppercase word AND as a separator. For example: manager AND director.
Parenthetical searches: To do a complex search, you can combine terms using parentheses. For example, if you want to find people who have “VP” in their profiles, but you want to exclude “assistant to VP” or SVPs, you can type: VP NOT(assistant OR SVP).
Boolean search must be constructed in this order:
Quotes [“”]
Parentheses [()]
NOT
AND
OR
A few other things to note when running Boolean searches:
LinkedIn search only supports standard quotation marks. Stop words such as “by”, “in”, “with” etc. are not used or recognized in a search.
The + and — operators are not officially supported by LinkedIn. Using AND in place of a + and NOT in place of a — makes a query much easier to read and guarantees that LinkedIn will handle the search correctly.
When using NOT, AND or OR operators, you must type them in uppercase letters.
LinkedIn does not support wildcard searches.
Boolean search will only work in the keyword word field.
Sophisticated Prospecting with Sales Navigator
If you have the budget, Sales Navigator is well worth investing in.
With it, you can run advanced searches, get invaluable insights on your leads, and save your searches for later use.
Use these techniques to get the most out of sales navigator and supercharge your lead generation efforts:
Integrate with your CRM: You can bring your CRM data into Sales Navigator (and the other way around) thanks to LinkedIn’s various partnerships. Below is an example of how this looks in Salesforce:
No more tab-switching when looking for insights on your leads!
Advanced Filters: Sales Navigator ramps up the power of advanced search with more sophisticated filters. These filters include: Years at current company, Years in current role, Years of experience, Company type, Seniority level, Keywords found in posted content
TeamLink: Using the TeamLink filter, you can find prospects that share an acquaintance with you. This includes both first- and second-degree connections.
Save your InMails: Some users have marked themselves as “Open Profiles.” These are people who want to be approached, meaning you don’t need to be connected with them (or use InMail’s) to send them a message.
Tag Prospects: Keep track of your leads by tagging them with their current status. This will help you keep track of several contacts within the same target account:
Use “Shared Experiences:” This filter allows you to find leads who have something in common with you. This could be a place you lived, a company you both worked for, or a group you’ve both engaged with.
Once you’ve found the perfect criteria, click the “Create search alert” to save your search. You can then decide if you want to be alerted to new leads on a daily or weekly basis:
4 LinkedIn Prospecting Tricks
LinkedIn contains several features that can aid with prospecting. These are peppered around the platform and can help uncover new opportunities:
Look at competitor networks: Competitor customers often make the best prospect. These leads already see the value in the problem you solve. You just need to convince them why your solution is better
See who comments: People interacting with your leads posts are likely to be within your target market. Use Sales Navigator to monitor prospect content and identify those who engage with them.
The “People Also Viewed” sidebar: Head over to an existing prospect’s profile and look in the “People Also Viewed” sidebar. This contains similar profiles that may be worth reaching out to.
Send Free InMails: Did you know that you can message 2nd degree connections if you’re in the same group together? When you find a prospect, check out which groups they’re in and join one.Then, browse the list of members in that group and find the prospect you wish to reach out to. Click the “Message” button and you’ll be able to message them without using InMails:
Chapter 4: How to Engage & Build Trust with Your LinkedIn Leads
Once you’ve identified your ideal leads, you need to begin a relationship.
Due to LinkedIn’s explosive growth, people are constantly bombarded with sales messages on a daily basis.
If you want to stand out, you need to approach your engagement differently. As you’ve already started creating content that positions yourself as an expert, half the work is already done.
The next step is to execute intelligent outreach. Here’s how:
Step 1: Create Conversation Starters
Your connection request is the first point of contact you have with prospects.
Use these conversation starter scripts as a guide for reaching out to new connections. For example, in your connection request, you can reference a LinkedIn post or a piece of content they’ve shared:
“Hi [NAME], I loved your post on [TOPIC]. I agreed with your point about [THING]. I’d love to connect to stay up-to-date with your future posts.”
Here, we’re personalizing the connection request by referencing a post they’ve recently made. We’re then going the extra mile by stating exactly what we found useful about the post. Finally, it’s wrapped up by stating why we want to connect with them.
There are dozens of ways you can personalize your connection request, including:
A company you’ve both worked for/with
A group or skill you have in common
A mutual connection
Engagement on other channels (e.g. Twitter)
An upcoming event you’re both attending
It’s key you include a viable reason to connect that’s personalized to them. Here’s an example of what not to do:
“Hi [NAME], I’m looking to connect with other marketers and found your profile interesting.”
This includes no personalization and is far too generic. While it can work, your acceptance rate will drop significantly. Use a personalized approach to ensure your connection requests get accepted.
Sound like too much work? Don’t worry. You’ll learn how to automate this process in chapter six.
Step 2: The First Message
Once a connection accepts your request, it’s time to begin a conversation.
Remember all that content you created in chapter two? This is where it becomes fuel to light your lead generation on fire.
Wait a day or two after your connection request has been accepted. Then, send them a message including a piece of content you (or someone in your organization) has created. This can be an article or LinkedIn post.
When choosing content, pick a topic that matters to them. For example, if you’re messaging a CMO, you should send something strategic in nature. Tactical and how-to guides may not resonate as well.
Here’s an example message you can send:
“Hi [NAME], thanks for connecting!
Just wanted to send this over, as I think it would be of interest. It’s an article on [TOPIC] that shows how CMOs in SaaS companies overcame [CHALLENGE].
[LINK TO ARTICLE]
I’d love to hear your thoughts!
Thanks,
[YOUR NAME]”
It’s simple, to the point, and most importantly, it’s specific to their needs.
Step 3: Move Them to The Pipeline
Once you’ve added value, it’s time to turn your prospects into sales leads.
To do this, it’s key you take the conversation away from LinkedIn. Whether that’s by driving them to a call, email thread, or landing page.
Create sales-driven scripts to help you guide prospects into the sales pipeline. Use these as frameworks to send to your prospects. Don’t copy-and-paste the same thing to each and every lead.
This is the perfect opportunity to send content lower down the funnel. This includes whitepapers, case studies, and eBooks. Here’s an example script you can adapt for your own use:
“Hi [NAME],
As [JOB TITLE] at [COMPANY], I thought you might find this new [CASE STUDY] of interest:
In it, we show how [CLIENT] overcame [CHALLENGE]. As [CLIENT] is in a similar industry to you, I thought it would be well worth reading.
I’d love to send it to you. Is [EMAIL] the best address?
Regards,
[YOUR NAME]”
From here, it’s important to follow up. Once you’ve sent this piece of content, it’s time to move into a sales conversation.
Here’s an example script:
“Hi [NAME],
I hope you found [CASE STUDY] useful.
At Orca, we help B2B companies like yours automate their social selling using omni-channel sales tools. I’d love to chat with you to see how we may be a good fit to work together.
Would this be of interest?
Thanks,
[YOUR NAME]”
This moves the conversation into a sales context. From here, follow your usual sales process to nurture each lead.
Voila! You’ve turned an unknown LinkedIn connection into a real business opportunity.
Chapter 5: Getting Key Insights on Leads, Competitors & Influencers
LinkedIn isn’t just a great lead generation tool.
It can also provide valuable insights on contacts at target accounts, thought leaders, and your competitors.
This approach is also useful for account-based marketing (ABM) efforts. LinkedIn provides a host of insights on contacts and companies you can use in all aspects of social selling. Here’s how.
Use Sales Navigator to set up alerts on specific leads and target accounts. First, save the leads and accounts you want to monitor.
This will display updates from these leads and accounts within your Sales Navigator news feed. You can then keep tabs without the clutter of the regular LinkedIn news feed.
Use this real-time insight to fuel your follow-up outreach.
Have they just been featured in a publication? Share the content.
Did they just secure a fresh round of funding? Email them and congratulate them.
This is publicly available information, so don’t worry – this form of “spying” is 100% white hat.
Here are the specific ways you can do it:
See who they interact with: It’s likely you’re connected with someone who works for a competitor. Set your viewing setting to “anonymous,” check out their profile and see who they’re interacting with.
Analyze company pages: Companies advertising on LinkedIn must tie their account to a company page. You can use this to determine if a company is spending on LinkedIn ads.For example, if a page has thousands of followers but a scattered posting schedule, it’s likely this audience was built from ads. Similarly, if some posts have significantly more comments and likes than others, it’s likely these posts were amplified using sponsored posts.
Be the audience: Want to see what ads your competitors are running? Amend parts of your profile to look like your competitor’s target audience. This can include job title (at a fictional company) and bio.You’ll start to see competitor ads over time. When making these changes to your profile, make sure to check the “Share with network” setting to “Off:”
LinkedIn is the perfect place to find target influencers and research them. Finding influencers is simple. Search for a relevant keyword and then click on the “Content” tab:
On the results page, make sure the “Sort by” filter is sorted by “Relevance.” LinkedIn usually organizes results by how popular they are. And more engagement means more popularity:
Have a list of influencers you want to engage with?
Great!
Now you can use their profile to understand the topics that matter most to them and where they hang out online.
Look at the following profile areas to generate influencer insight:
Articles & Activity: Look at the articles they publish and posts they engage with. What do they write about? What kind of content do they comment on the most?
Experience: Where do they currently work? This is useful, as it’s likely they’re publishing their own content on their company blog.
Skills & Endorsements: What areas of expertise do they focus on? These skills can fuel your outreach efforts.
Accomplishments: This often includes third-party content they’ve published in other publications. Sharing and commenting on this content will help you get their attention.
Groups: If they’re active in certain groups, join them and contribute to the conversation. Find content and questions they share post to get on their radar.
This insight is invaluable when driving your influencer marketing efforts. It can fuel your outreach and show you which publications and communities they’re active in.
Get on these channels and contribute to their conversations. Comment on their content and share it to your own audience. This is how you warm up strategic influencer relationships.
Chapter 6: 4 LinkedIn Tools for Automation & Efficiency
You now have a complete system for generating, nurturing, and understanding your leads.
The question is, how can you make this process more efficient?
To wrap-up this guide, here are four social selling tools to help you automate your LinkedIn processes.
For example, you can connect with users with specific job titles in a certain location and industry using a mixture of Boolean searches and criteria. Orca will then autodiscover 1000 new leads for you every month.
You can then create advanced sequencing. View your prospects profile, connect, and send initial messages (see chapter four). Insert snippets to your messages to add personalization to every message:
Want to try it yourself? Get started with 200 free leads today.
It also integrates with Gmail, helping you write more effective emails based on a prospect’s personality type. This helps you create messaging that resonates with each contact on an individual level.
The extension shows snapshot information on your target contact and the company they work for, as well as insights from other social networks they engage on.
This includes updates and tweets, providing contextual information without having to leave your inbox.
Datanyze
If you sell software, then you should check out Datanyze. It lets you know when a target account stops using a competitor’s product or solution. Meaning you can reach out to them and strike while the iron is hot.
Nudge.ai
If you have a list of target accounts, then Nudge.ai can help fill in the gaps. Instead of a cold outbound approach, Nudge.ai helps you find opportunities in your network to facilitate warm introductions with the best contacts.
Your turn
Building an effective social selling system is all about adding value up front. Create excellent content and position yourself on LinkedIn as an expert. This makes outreach far more effective.
Unlike cold email, prospects on LinkedIn want to be engaged with. Do this in a contextual manner using the tools and techniques we’ve shared here.
Now it’s your turn: how are you using LinkedIn to generate new sales opportunities? Share your ideas with us in the comments below.
source: https://useorca.com/blog/blog/the-definitive-guide-to-social-selling-on-linkedin
What’s up, guys. I hope you enjoyed my last article on Triggering a social selling sequence when leads are added to your CRM.
This week, I am back with another social selling hack. And I promise you will love this one!
As you already know, I like coming up with these social selling growth hacks, experimenting with different sales enablement and marketing tools, etc… so this week I will be working with one of my all-time-favourites, Typeform.
Typeform helps you make super cool forms and surveys that you can share.
Here’s what I’m thinking? What if I could trigger a social selling sequence on Linkedin through Typeform in exchange for something valuable?
In this post, I’m going to show you how to do exactly that. We’re going to set up a Zapier trigger with Typeform to automatically engage prospects who want to access to a guide, e-book, or just pretty much anything you can share that you think will attract them into your funnel.
Warning: Make sure you are sharing something of value and not scamming them into your funnel because that’s just f’ed up and just really bad for your personal brand. If you want this to work, you’ve gotta give value to get value. If people can’t trust you, what makes you think they’ll trust your product or service?
The best sales tactic? Always Provide Value. It’s not ABC… it’s all about APV. That said, if you’re going to try this hack out, do it the right way or don’t do it at all.
Let’s get started. Here’s are the tools we’ll be using in this social selling hack:
Orca
Zapier
Typeform
Let the madness begin.
I will assume you already have a Typeforms account. If not, it’s free, so make one!
Make sure you have at least one form set up according to your needs and make sure that there is at least one Linkedin URL in your Typeform responses, so we can test the Zap.
Open up Typeform and go create your first form by clicking on New Typeform.
Now go ahead and pick the form that suits you the best. There are quite a lot of different forms, so I am sure everybody can find something. I will go ahead and choose Sign up Sheet.
Click Use this template and it will appear on your Dashboard. Open up new window automatically to help start editing it.
Now comes the fun part. Form building is hella fun, I can spend hours here on the look and feel!
An important note here while you create your form… Make sure you ask for the LinkedIn URL and make it a required field. Take a look at my super stellar form below:
When you are done editing and beautifying the form. Go ahead and click View. It will show you a preview of the form where you can spend 10 plus or minus 2 minutes admiring your masterpiece.
Test the form out by adding in your own information into the form — we need at least one Linkedin URL as a form response to test out the Zap.
Next, click on Share. You will find a link to your form that you can copy and share. Again, don’t forget to fill your form first so we have that Linkedin URL to test later.
Awesome, let’s move on to the next step and Connect Orca with Zapier.
To connect Orca with Zapier, open your dashboard and head on over to Preferences. Under Integrations, you see the Zapier integration.
Click on View integration on Zapier. A new window will open, login to accept the invite. If you don’t have a Zapier account, you’ll be prompted to create one.
Login to accept the invite. Get ready to create your first Zap with Orca.
Let’s head back to Orca and create a Zapier campaign.
Setup your sequence, publish and Click set up your Orca Zap.
Create this Zap and select Typeform from the list.
You have one option for a trigger here: social selling sequence will be triggered every time a new form is created. Save + Continue.
Next, connect your Typeforms account by entering your login credentials. Test. Save and continue.
On the next screen, you’ll see a list of forms, choose the one you want to use and Continue.
On the next screen, you’ll see a list of your completed forms, choose the form you want to test and Continue.
When you’re ready, move on to the next step to connect Orca with Typeform.
Choose Orca from the app list.
Then select Add Lead to Orca by Linkedin Profile URL. Save + Continue.
Select the account and campaign you’d like to push leads into.
Note: If you haven’t created a Zapier campaign in Orca, do so now. Otherwise, you won’t see anything in the drop-down menu.
Next, tell Orca where it can pull Linkedin URLs from the form.
On the next screen, test the Zap by clicking on Send Test to Orca. If the test was successful you will see your sample lead in pending verification status in the campaign details.
Click Finish and then turn on your Zap!
Once your Zap is live, you can start sharing your form.
Now whenever a new response is submitted through your form, it will automatically push leads into a social sequence in Orca.
By default, leads will be in pending verification status until Orca verifies that the Linkedin profile URLs is formatted properly. Once they are approved, they’ll be passed into the social selling sequence.
Whooo! Congrats, you’ve successfully set up a Zap to trigger social sequences in Orca through Typeform! Again, let me reiterate… make sure you are adding value.
Sales is about relationships. So if you’re going to do this hack, do it the right way.
As my pop would always say to me, “if you’re going to do something, do it right and do it well… or don’t do it all.”
That said, don’t half-ass this hack with garbage
source: https://useorca.com/blog/blog/triggering-social-selling-sequence-with-typeform
Lead generation. Let’s talk about it.
But before we dive in, let’s set the record straight… What exactly is a lead?
Believe it or not, this term is misused all the time. So let’s take some time to define and understand what the word is actually referring to.
A lead is someone who has indicated interest in your company’s product or service in some way, shape, or form. The keyword to look at here is that they’ve indicated interest.
The term lead is often confused with prospects, and used interchangeably, even though they don’t mean the same thing.
A prospect is a potential customer, someone that has been qualified as fitting certain criteria:
fits your target marketer (sole/seniority, industry, and company size),
has the means (money) to buy, and
is authorized to make buying decisions
Prospects DO NOT have to have indicated interest in your product or service. They just need to meet the criteria above.
Straight? Dope, let’s move on.
What is lead generation?
Lead generation is the process of attracting and converting strangers and prospects into someone who’s indicated interest in your company’s product or service. There are two types of lead generation: Inbound and Outbound.
Lead magnet. Awesome illustration by Gustavo Zambelli. Check it his amazing illustrations on Dribbble.
We’re going to focus our attention on Outbound Lead Generation, but let’s take a few moments and understand the differences and similarities between the two, so you can determine which approach is best for you.
Fishing or Hunting
I like analogies. So that’s what I’m use here.
Inbound Lead Generation is a lot like fishing. You’re literally putting bait on a line, casting it out, and reeling it back in when you get a bite. Bait, in this context, is any material, information, incentives, etc. (content) that your prospects can follow back towards your company.
Seriously… what are the chances.
It is a process where you, the sales hacker or marketer, find unique ways to attract people to your business. Inbound lead generation is warmer than outbound lead generation, often referred to as cold outreach, because in an inbound scenario, it’s the prospect who chooses the type and timing of the interaction.
That doesn’t mean outbound lead generation sucks. Not at all…
Outbound Lead Generation is all about the hunt, and good hunters not only shoot well, but also track well. Tracking, in this context, is the ability to identify and decide if a target is worth the shot.
The key characteristics you’ll find any skilled huntsman:
Patience. You’ve got one shot… so you’ve gotta take your time, think, and decide when the moment is right.
Empathy. Great huntsmen respect the game, and they respect the kill… oops I meant close. It’s the circle of life baby!
Note: The hunters I’m referring to are the real hunters… you know the ones that actually aim? I’m not talking about shotgun hunters, spraying slugs, and hoping they get a kill.
If you’re a “shotgun” hunter… stop, you dumb fuck. You’re giving us real huntsmen a bad rep in a game that was once highly reputable.
No, I’m not going to apologize for my choice in words. Love it, hate it… I don’t give two 💩 in a bucket. I spit #truth… and you are a dumb fuck when you think it’s a good idea to mass blast people cold… disrupting their day-to-day.
Respect the game, or don’t fucking play.
Outbound marketing has gotten a lot of negative press in the last decade or so. Punch the term into Google and you’ll a million results filled with negative language like “interruption,” “in-your-face,” and “irrelevance.” Some posts even go so far as to proclaim its death.
Outbound is not dead.
If you think it’s dead, you’re dead wrong. Stop blaming the game, and take a real hard look at yourself because the #truth of the matter is… it’s you who’s been doing outbound all wrong.
Let’s correct that… put that dang shotgun down and pick up your big boy rifle. I’m going to show you how to aim and shoot.
Lieutenant Dan here gonna show you the way. Damn straight, U.S. Army veteran reporting in from the illest fighting force known to mankind. Boom boom!
Lead generation using intent signals… let’s talk about it.
Outbound lead gen is typically colder than inbound lead gen, and is often referred to as interruption marketing as opposed to permission marketing. You’re actually more familiar with this than you probably think. You’ve experienced these growth tactics in your daily routine — messages on signs, buses, billboards, and commercials…
Marketing is a contest for people’s attention. Let me show you how to warm up your cold outreach by using intent signals to generate leads.
The majority of lead lists are generated based on your definition of an ideal customer, such as industry, company size, job title, seniority, technology used, etc.
List building using intent signals allows you to generate leads based on what’s actually happening real-time. For example:
Recently funded Internet companies with more than 50 employees in US and with min 50,000 monthly web traffic.
OR
Blockchain companies in New York that are hiring for developers & have less than 100 employees.
OR
Recently launched mobile apps based companies that are hiring for software testers in India and headquartered in the United States.
OR
Companies spending money in digital marketing in London and have more than 100 employees and use Hotjar.
Lead generation with intent signals allows you to take your targeting to the next level, enabling you to go beyond just basic search filters that everyone else is using.
This approach allows you to get hyper targeted in your outreach messages, whether that’s through Linkedin automation with Orca, traditional email prospecting techniques, or both together as one in a multi-dimensional pipeline.
It’s a new day, and sales is changing… better lead gen, better prospecting tools. That said, we’re proud to announce our partnership and integration with EasyLeads.
EasyLeadz + Orca = Growth
Our top priority at Orca is to help you do sales better the right way.
Our direct integration with EasyLeadz allows you to generate leads based on intent signals so you can warm up your cold outreach with companies who are hiring for roles, using software, etc. complementary to your products/services.
Don’t get left behind… level up your skills, huntsman.
Ready? Checkout this guide to get setup and running with EasyLeadz + Orca integration.
source: https://useorca.com/blog/blog/intent-based-lead-generation
Hey guys, Sanja here, checking in for the first time with my first ever social selling growth hack through Orca. It’s taken me a minute, but you know what they say…
Good things take time.
I didn’t want to share anything until I had something really valuable to share. There’s justway too much garbage and noise out there already, right?
That said, I’m super excited and a bit nervous at the same time to share this little social selling hack with you. Fingers crossed that you get something out of it.
Let’s splash in (see what I just did hehe 😂)
In this article, I am going to show you how to scrape and engage members of LinkedIn groups with automated social selling sequences in Orca, but first let me share some thoughts on this hack.
Why scrape LinkedIn groups
“Is this hack even worth my time?” you’re asking.
I’ve been running this hack for the past week, and have been making some mental notes that I am now going to share with you into writing.
Here are two reasons why scraping members from Linkedin groups rock my socks…
#1 Build ginormous lead lists in under 5 minutes
You can build a lead list of 500,000+ leads in under 5 minutes unless of course, you have really slow internet speed, type slow, or just do things slow…that I cannot help you with dear sir or madam.
Plus, you can literally find a Linkedin group for any niche, vertical, market, segment, etc. There are teeny tiny groups to supersized groups. Take your pick.
#2 More data = better segmentation = improved messaging in your campaigns
The lead data you get back from this scrape is for a lack of words: “Woaaah”
You’re not only going to get the basics like name, position, LinkedIn URLs, but also top 3 skills, current companies they’re working at, previous companies, the industry, titles and the different groups they’re in, which btw you can probably run a follow up scrape on. 🤔
Why is having more data better? Well, when you have a list of a few hundred thousand leads, you’ll want to segment and bucket them into smaller categories. So with all this data in your CSV, you’ll be able to narrow your lead list into more precise segments… I highly recommend playing around with different combinations of interests and professions.
Once you’ve narrowed down your groups, you will be able to do a much better job personalizing messages in your social selling campaigns. Write engaging copy and use the data to generate real conversations to help you start building relationships with potential buyers and followers on Linkedin.
Convinced yet? Keep reading…
So, to run this social selling hack, you will need the following tools:
Phantombuster
Orca and, of course…
Positive vibes and some creativity 🤘
Okay, let’s not wait any longer and get going with the hack!
Step 1
Create a Phantombuster account on. You’ll get a 14-day free trial — trust me that’s plenty of time to scrape a few Linkedin groups. After that, you’ll need to upgrade. If you got some value from this hack… it might make sense to take the leap,
If you don’t subscribe, you can still scrape one Linkedin group per day with some heavy call limits. So… keep that in mind.
Step 2
Once your account is created, go to the Phantombuster’s Linkedin Group Members API. Read through the API if you must, but if you’re ready, simply click on the bright orange button to Use this API.
Clickity-click.
Step 3
Next, you’ll be redirected to your dashboard (aka My APIs) where you can configure the Linkedin Group Members API.
Click on Show More designated by the three dots next to the Launch button.
Step 4
Next, we’ll need to insert your Linkedin session cookie and the group URL into the configuration.
But Sanja… “How do I get the session cookie?”
No worries homey, I got your back… just follow these steps:
Open LinkedIn, right-click anywhere on the screen. A drop-down menu will show up.
Select Inspect from the list. A side window will open.
Under the Applications tab, click on Cookies from the left panel and select “https://www.linkedin.com”.
Locate the li_at cookie from the table and copy the alphanumeric string under the Values column.
Go back to Phantombuster and paste the string into the Season cookiefield.
Tada! And there you have it… on to the next.
Step 5
Next, copy and paste the LinkedIn group URL into Group URL field into configuration form.
Note: You need to be a member of the group in order to scrape it.
Step 6
Give your list a name.
Step 7
When ready, Launch the extractor and watch growth hacking magic happen right before your eyes.
Step 8
Once it’s done scraping, you can download your CSV by clicking on the Download button.
Step 9
Once you’ve got your lead list, head on over to your dashboard in Orca and create a campaign.
I recommend choosing the Upload CSV campaign because that’s the one I’m going to use for this hack. Alternatively, you can also use Zapier, though I’d like to reserve those campaigns for lists that are generating leads dynamically through on-going hacks.
Note: Make sure your CSV has a column of Linkedin profile URLs.
Once you’ve uploaded the CSV and set up your social sequence in Orca, Publish the campaign.
Uploaded leads will be in pending approval status, during which Orca will be working in the background to verify the profile URLs. Once verified, leads will move from pending status to approved status, which basically means they’ve been passed into the sequence.
This can take anywhere between to 30–60 minutes depending on the number of engagements scheduled ahead of this campaign.
***** Update *****
I’m currently running two campaigns with this social selling hack, I’ll be updating this post at the end of my campaigns with the results and after action review.
If you enjoyed this post, give it a little 👏
source: https://useorca.com/blog/blog/how-to-scrape-and-connect-with-members-from-linkedin-groups
Okay! So this post is a bit of a rant… not a social selling growth hack. But no worries young blood, I’ll work on a hack over this Sunday (today is Saturday) so you can get your fix.
Super steller animated illustration by Anastasia Steshkina, check out her work on Dribbble.
Now, if you’re just getting in bed with social selling and aren’t exactly sure what the right approach is… keep reading.
This post is going to be part of a long series of posts I make on the do’s and don’ts of social selling.
On a serious note though… before we get started, can someone please tell me why the apostrophe on don’ts is between the n and t and not t and s? I’m high af again and cannot stop thinking about it. FML…
Okay, focus Dan… focus! Hooah.
What I am about to share with you has definitely happened to you at some point while using Linkedin.
Somebody sends an invitation to connect. You have no idea who this person is… so you check out his profile and decide, “Hey, this seems like a good connection to have. Possibly a potential buyer done the road…”
Out of the kindness of your heart you accept their request, nothing wrong with that… That’s what Linkedin is for anyways, connecting with other professionals.
But what do they do in return? They do this…
What is dis shizzle? They pitch you… No sweet talk, no foreplay. Nothing.
The dude just straight up tried cold selling some service you probably didn’t need or want.
It’s like inviting someone to your home, just so they can pop a squat and take a 💩 on your newly installed and polished hickory vintage barrel, hand sculpted, solid, hardwood flooring from Home Depot.
The shit ain’t even warm… it’s cold. Colder than cold email. Ice cold.
You begin to question why you even accepted the dude’s invite, thinking to yourself (but really wanting to respond with a 🖕 but since you is a true professional, you let it go…):
“Bro… I literally just accepted your invite. Why turn a warm conversation into a cold pitch? As if I’m ready to buy already… I just met you! At least shake my damn hands (virtually of course)…”
If you’re reading this and your like… “Oh shit, I do that…”
Stop. This is not how sales is done. I don’t where the fuck you learned to do this or who your sales manager is, but you need to stop that shit because you give us good sales guys a bad rep.
Sales is about providing value… it’s not a pitch competition. So stop pitching your shitty service or product.
People make purchases not because your product or service is superior…
Rabbit hole #1: First off, if what you’re offering is not differentiated… and NO… We’re higher quality is not a differentiator you jack ass… and if you also find yourself in an inundated market like sales enablement (talking to myself here), web development, marketing, seo, etc… what I am about to say applies directly to you, so listen (read) carefully…
People make purchases not because your product or service is superior… they make purchases because they trust and respect you as an individual. That’s how business is done… that’s how it was always done…
Rabbit hole #2: Over last 5 years or more… but 5 years because that’s when I first got my taste in sales… companies have been way too focused on making money over providing value. We spend way too much time thinking how we can optimize the pipeline and speed up the sales cycle… and what it’s created is a generation of jackass sales guys who have no idea what sales is really about. I blame this phenomenon on egoic “rockstar” entrepreneurs and business owners who optimize for profit versus building something valuable.
Sales is not about speed… it’s about listening and providing value when and wherever possible. Sales is about the human experience… a deep compassion for wanting to truly help the person standing opposite of you solve their pain…
Sales is NOT about ABC it’s about APV. I just made that shit up, but it works… here’s what it means:
Always Provide Value.
I am a firm believer in the Golden Rule, from Luke 6:31 NIV… Do unto others what you want done unto you.
If you don’t like getting cold emails and messages in your inbox pitching bullshit products and services, don’t be a goddamn hypocrite and cold pitch your bullshit product and services to others, even if you think your shit don’t stank… because it does. Let me explain…
Rabbit hole #3: The secret of life is to reach a point of peace. Some experts call this Heaven others call it Enlightenment… the state that these experts are all trying to capture with silly buzzwords is a simply a state of internal peace, not external peace because that shit won’t happen. When you do the right thing you feel at ease, because it feels right… when you do bad things, you create conflict. You know this because you feel it within yourself… So the secret of life is to really rid yourself of any internal conflict you have… that is if you want to be happy because happiness is simply just a state of deep internal peace.
Okay, Dan you high as hell again… what does this have to with my shit stankin’?
So you may actually have an amazing product or service, but how you share that product or service with people you don’t really know, determines how it is received.
If you serve cold soup, it will be received cold. Warm soup taste much better.
Bottom line… stop spamming people with pitches. Sales is not about the quick win, it’s about relationship building. Take your time and get to know the other person, their company, their needs… you may not close the deal this week or next, but I guarantee you… if you give value, it will be returned in ways you’ve never imagined.
Think about what I said… and share your thoughts below. We’re in super interesting times right now, especially when it comes to selling.
Cold emailing is out the door. Sales guys need to adapt and take on a social approach.
With automation comes great responsibility. The point isn’t to remove humans from the equation, but to give them more time to meet, learn, collaborate, share, and help others.
If you enjoyed this post give it some claps… If you agree that we need to change the way sales is done today, share this post with those in the force.
If we want to change the way outsiders see us sales guys, which isn’t so positive if you haven’t noticed… we need to start by changing the way we do sales.
Sales is an art, one that should be respected, not looked down upon. Help me and my team at Orca change sales for the better.
source: https://useorca.com/blog/blog/apv-not-abc-sales-done-right
What up, fam. I hope you guys enjoyed the last article on how I scraped my competitors FB group, found their Linkedin profile urls, and pushed those leads into Orca to engage and connect with, if not… well, I just don’t know wh-what to…
Oh hey, you’re still reading. Thank you. I love you. You just gave my ego the boost it needed to survive.
Okay then, moving right along. In this post I’m going to show you how you can set up a Zapier trigger with Google Forms to automatically engage prospects who want to access to a guide, e-book, or just pretty much anything you can share that you think will lure them into your funnel.
Warning: This little tactic is super useful when posting in highly engaged groups… that said, whatever you decide to share in life, make sure it’s something of value. Last thing you want to do is waste someone’s time for bullshit, while damaging your own brand or image.
Btw, I’m NOT talking about how and it’s perceived by the general public. I’m saying, as long as you genuinely believe it’s adding value, share it. Deep down, we all know when we’re doing something good or bad. That feeling is called conflict. Resolve it and whatever you do will prove fruitful.
I’m a firm believer that we should only do the things that make us feel good when we do it. This hack can be used or abused. It is in my hope that you do not abuse it and instead, use it to create value.
What you need for this hack:
Orca
Zapier
Google Forms and
Something you want to share
But before we get started. A story on How this hack come about:
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been thinking a lot about Facebook and how to use it effectively to engage members in groups I think could be potential buyers. Now, my thought on Facebook is that it feels more personal, kind of like email, as opposed to Linkedin where by design it feels more public facing.
In practice, Facebook isn’t really personal, but it is perceived as such and that’s the important thing to keep in mind here. Perception trumps all, and that’s why your personal brand and company’s is super duper important. It’s hard to earn, so don’t fuck it up by doing stupid shit. Just sayin’
That said, outbound engagements on Facebook are not super effective because it feels just as cold as email. Facebook is excellent for observing potential buyers in a social environment to learn about their culture and psychology. Take notes and learn how to interact like them.
Anyways... Back to the story.
So there I was, leaning back on my chair with my legs kicked propped on my desk, deep in thought and high as a mf.
It’s high noon. The sun pierces through the skylight into my eyes, the same eyes I Lasik’ed a few years back.
I squint my already squinty eyes, and that’s when the idea hits me.
“Eureka!” I exclaim losing balance in the process and falling backwards off the chair and onto the floor. Thank God, it’s carpet...
As I lay there, my mind is racing… what if I could share something of value in a Facebook group, but instead of giving them immediate access to the doc, grab their email, then trigger an automated follow-up via email with a link to the guide.
“Good idea!” I shout. Shooting up from the ground, making a one-step dash back to my desk, then carefully pulling out my 5-year old mac I think is about to die on me and slowly type in my password (I’m high gotta do shit super slow sometimes, passwords are one of them things…)
In a matter of hours, I put together a guide on how I scraped DS group members, which at the time was just a google doc, then went ahead and made a post in the Dux-soup user group with a link to Google Forms, where I captured their email triggering a follow up with the link to the doc.
I’m sitting at the same desk right now, and it occurs to me that I should have instead captured their Linkedin url so that I could set a social sequence to build up my network of potential buyers, followers, readers on Linkedin.
So that’s what we’re going to do here.
First, things first…
Make sure that whatever it is you plan on sharing can be shared. For example, if you’re sharing a Google doc, make sure it’s available to the public for anyone who has the link. I’m not going to insult your intelligence by showing you how to do this… you’ve gotten this far in this particular article, I am led to believe you are smart enough to figure the sharing piece on your own.
Next, let’s setup the Google Form
Open up Google Drive and click on the big +New button on the side menu and select Google Forms from the drop down. You may need to first select More to expand.
Give the form a name, like Bill or George! Anything but Sue! Then give it a nice description.
Add a question and change the question type to Short Answer so you can ask for Linkedin profile URL. Make sure the question is Required.
If you know about regular expressions, click on the show more button indicated by the three vertical dots and select Response validation.
Make sure Regular Expression is selected and type the expression into the form… then send the expression over to me because I literally just tried setting that up for 45 minutes and got no where. FML
Once the content of the form is set up, go to settings by clicking on the gear icon in the navigation bar. You can opt to grab user’s emails and limit to 1 response. Most importantly, don’t forget to uncheck the Restrict to {{your_org}} user if its checked.
Don’t to save your settings. When the form is ready, click Send and grab a shareable link.
Next, we’ll need to create a Send Linkedin Profile URLs by Zapier campaign in Orca. I’ve already got a few pieces showing you how to set up sequences in Orca, so I’m not going to dive into detail here, but if you need a refresher, feel free to check my previous articles to learn how or here’s a link to recording of a Live Webinar I did on Social Selling with Orca.
The last thing we need to do is set up a trigger in Zapier to push leads into the campaign you created in the previous step.
Create a new Zap and select Google Forms from the list of apps. Then choose the option to trigger an action when a new response row is added to the bottom of a spreadsheet… which reminds me, we totally forgot to set up the form to accept responses and to push those responses to Google sheets.
So let’s do that now. Open the form you we’re working on and go to the responses section and Toggle on Accepting Responses.
Then click on the show more button indicated by the three vertical dots and choose Select response destination from the drop down. Create the new spreadsheet. I just use the suggested name.
Back in Zapier, go to the next step and select the Google account you want to use. This is the account where your form is saved.
Next, we need set up your Google Forms Response by selecting the spreadsheet where your responses are being sent to.
Make sure you have at least one response in the form so that Orca can test the push. I usually just throw my Linkedin URL in there. Then Fetch+Continue.
Next, add an action step and select Orca from the list of apps. By default, whenever a response is added to the spreadsheet, the Linkedin URL will be pushed over to an existing campaign of your choosing in Orca.
But first, select the Orca account you want to use. Then once the account is connected, select the campaign you created in Orca to engage respondents. Don’t forget to set the column storing Linkedin URLs (or responses).
Sup guys, in this post I’m going to show you how I scraped members from my competition’s Facebook group to engage and connect on Linkedin.
Before we get started, here’s the stack you’ll need:
FB Group Scraper Extension (only works in developer mode)
Phantombuster LI URL
Orca
Let’s get started.
Click on the link above to download the FB Group Scraper Extension and unzip.
Open Chrome extensions and toggle on Developer Mode.
Select Load Unpacked
This will open Finder if you’re on a Mac or […] on Windows. Locate the unzipped fb group scraper extension and upload it. This is what you should see:
Turn the extension on, if its off. You should extension in the toolbar.
Head on over to your competition’s facebook group.
Once you’re in the group, simply click on the extension. It will take a few minutes to scrape the members and will automatically download it to your computer as a csv.
The next step is to create a trial account on Phantombuster and utilize their LinkedIn Profile URL Finder to generate the LI urls for the members you just scraped.
Once you’ve generated the LI urls for the group members, go to your campaign dashboard in Orca and click on Create Campaign in the navbar.
There are four types of campaigns in Orca:
Search on Linkedin
Upload a CSV of Linkedin URLs
Send Linkedin URLs by Zapier
Send Linkedin URLs from Growlabs
For this hack, you can either upload a CSV or pass leads through Zapier.
BLUF: don’t be that idiot that sends a paragraph long pitch in a connect or follow-up.
Dux-soup User Group — winning
Why winning? To give your campaign some positive vibes. :)
Once your campaign is published, the leads will be in pending status while Orca verifies the URLs are valid. Note: make sure that your Linkedin account is connected with Orca, otherwise… all the leads will be invalid because Orca won’t be able to login to your account and verify.
Verification will start within 15–30 minutes, unless that is you’ve already ran Orca all day and it needs to rest. Yes, robots need sleep too.
Orca runs around 200 engagements per day for premium users and half that for basic users. I don’t know the exact number because we randomize it to keep your account safe from being flagged.
Don’t get flagged. Set up a automation schedule under Automation Settings in Preferences
Okay, cool. So what was the result of my scrape? Well, I managed to generate around 300+ Linkedin URLs, 230 are still pending verification. Out of the 91 profiles that I’ve engaged with, I connected with and started conversations with 52.8% …. when was the last time you saw email opens or response that high?
Better get cracking on your Linkedin game before everyone and their mothers start running social selling campaigns on Orca. There’s a shelf life to every growth tactic. Don’t be a damn laggard.
source: https://useorca.com/blog/blog/how-i-scraped-my-competitions-facebook-group
Loving Orca? Learn how you can save up to 100% on your subscription by sharing Orca with your friends and team members. Deets below:
When you open your dashboard you’ll see a link in the navigation bar next to the Create Campaign button with the text Share the love (save $$$).
When you click this link you’ll be taken to the referral section under Preferences. Simply copy your unique referral link from the Share thissection (highlighted in the screenshot below), and share it with the world to start
As soon as one of your friends, colleagues or followers uses your unique referral link to subscribe to Orca, both of you will get $5 off your subscription, for as long as both of you keep your subscriptions to Orca.
How can your friends use the code?
When your friend clicks on the link, they’ll be sent to the signup/login page, where they can sign up for an Orca account. After creating an account and subscribing, the discount will be applied to both of your accounts automatically.
Ta-da! Magic.
I’m long overdue on this one… it’s been about month since we launched our integrations with Growlabs, a super powerful lead gen and email automation platform, and we still don’t have an announcement post, but hey, better late than never… right?
Originally, when Anson and I first set out on building Orca we envisioned a tool that could do everything from lead generation to prospecting on social and email. We didn’t like the idea of having to string together all these different sales enablement tools.
We were using Dux-soup + Massplanner to automate social engagements on Linkedin and other platforms. For cold outbound emails we were using several different tools from Yet Another Mail Merge to Mailshake. I’ve since stopped running cold email campaigns. Don’t get me wrong, I still run email campaigns, I just do it differently now, but more on that later.
Anson and I still believe in our vision, we’re just approaching it differently now. Rather than going it alone and competing with existing tools in the sales enablement space, we’re instead collaborating with other companies. This enables us to focus on what we do best, which is the social selling aspect, while enabling our partners to do what they do best, relationship management, lead generation, and email outreach.
Why did we integrate with Growlabs?
Simple. Our lead generation tool is shite, and I’ll be the first to admit it’s shite. With lead generation, you need a tool that can help you get more precise. Our tool is basic, but Growlabs’ isn’t… their audience search filters enable you to get more targeted.
Growlabs’ audience filters are broken out into five buckets; most common filters, company lists, financials, technographics and more contact details. I’m not going into details on how to use their filters, but if you’re interested, here’s a really awesome post they’ve put together: Lead Generation Filters Overview.
I just want to quickly show you how you can now automate and sequence LinkedIn profile views, connect requests, and follow ups by pushing leads from Growlabs into Orca before, or in parallel with, sending your email sequences.
We use this integration a lot at Orca. We know this is definitely something that will help your team get noticed faster without them having to manually engage leads on Linkedin.
Alright, without further adieu, here’s the webinar I did with Jeff from Growlabs. Feel free to fast forward to 5:50 for the demo on pushing leads from Growlabs to Orca.