Latest / Founder Unfiltered - What Founders Think But Never Say / Post Anyway: 4 Mindset Shifts That Changed My LinkedIn Game

Transcript

Post Anyway: 4 Mindset Shifts That Changed My LinkedIn Game · Founder Unfiltered - What Founders Think But Never Say

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  Welcome to another episode of 6 Figure Secrets for Fractional
• 0:04
  Experts. My name is Bradley Jacobs, I'm
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  your host and the founder and CEO of Mylance.
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  And today we're going to be talking about the LinkedIn
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  mindset that is getting you in trouble or preventing you from
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  starting or preventing you from continuing and talking
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  specifically about four things or ways of thinking that really
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  hold people back. We're going to get super
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  tangible. We're going to talk about what
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  it is, how you can think about it totally differently, and how
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  you can overcome it to have a lot of long term success on
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  LinkedIn. And frankly, I'm coming from a
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  lot of experience here. I've been posting on LinkedIn
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  for five years nearly every day. I'm not going to say 365 days
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  for five years, but I'm going to tell you on average 300 days for
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  five years. So I have probably posted 1500
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  times on LinkedIn over the last five years and I've seen post go
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  viral, I've seen post be completely dead.
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  I've changed my strategy. I've been through the ups and
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  downs of the algorithm change on down the line.
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  So I'm certainly coming with a lot of experience here.
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  Mistake number one is people choosing to chase virality.
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  I need a post to go viral for this to matter or even just
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  lesser. I need this crazy engagement,
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  right? If I have my post doesn't get,
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  you know, 20 likes. It wasn't a good post, right?
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  I need it. I need it to be big to matter.
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  And here's why that's flawed. It's flawed for a number of
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  reasons. A lot of posts that go viral are
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  not going viral in a way that's actually helping out your
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  business, right? Because if the, and this is the
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  best example is a, a recruiter came to me and she was like, I
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  want to mimic this guy's LinkedIn content.
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  His stuff is going viral. I was like, well, let's go take
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  a look. And it was another recruiter and
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  all of his posts were tailored towards job seekers.
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  And I asked her who's your client and her client or the
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  companies? I was like, OK, great.
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  So if he gets 1000 likes from 1000 job seekers, is that
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  helping him win business? Is that helping him get new
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  companies signed up so that he can go make money by doing
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  placements, which is placements for the company?
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  Like finding the job seekers is not hard.
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  Anybody can do that, right? They all want jobs.
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  It's easy sign up, right? What's hard is the companies.
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  And she was like, Oh no, I'm like, OK, great.
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  So if you get 1000 likes from engagements, whatever you want
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  to call it, from job seekers and you get 10 likes from companies,
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  which would you rather have, right?
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  Let's say decision makers at companies.
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  It's like no doubt I'd rather have the 10 engagements from
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  someone at a company or even 3 engagements from someone at a
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  company versus literally 1000 from job seekers.
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  Because his, the whole idea, right, is to build thought
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  leadership in a space to attract clients.
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  That's what this is all about, right?
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  Like build trust, build a relationship and attract
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  clients. So you might be attracting the
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  wrong audience. Your incentives are frankly
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  misaligned, and you're going to be chasing this viral post,
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  which frankly, even doing this for five years and posting 1500
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  times, I can't tell when a post is going to go viral versus not.
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  Like my most viral post ever got 750,000 impressions.
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  I wrote it in 15 minutes. I didn't think twice.
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  I posted it. And then I left my computer and
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  I came back 24 hours later to LinkedIn and I was like, holy
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  shit, it was crazy. So you just really never know.
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  And that's why consistency over time and really talking to your
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  ideal audience and your authentic, genuine voice add,
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  value add from the, you know, all the things we've talked
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  about a million times from the first person point of view, just
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  focus on adding value and don't let the engagements, the
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  comments, the likes, the impressions really play a role
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  in how you feel about showing up on LinkedIn and the
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  effectiveness of of your content.
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  So that's number one #2 the mindset mistake is I'm just
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  going to contribute to the noise.
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  LinkedIn is all noise and I'm just going to contribute to it.
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  I don't have anything unique to say.
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  I think every single one of my clients has told me this at some
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  point or another. And this thinking gets you stuck
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  because you are just saying that you were going to produce
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  generic content like everybody else and just be in the sea of
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  bullshit on LinkedIn. Sure, you could do that and it
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  will add no value and you will get no clients from it.
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  Or you can say nobody in the world has the unique set of
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  experience that I have, which is true.
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  Nobody has the combination of work experience, skill set,
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  mistakes, feedback, wins, learnings, lessons, education
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  that you have. Which means when you share from
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  a genuine first person point of view that no one else can
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  replicate that number one. And #2 it's unique.
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  And #3 if you are communicating it from AI, want to add value by
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  sharing my experiences, what I've learned, what has worked,
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  what hasn't worked, all those kinds of things.
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  It is by definition unique. Now, the more high level it is,
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  the more broad it will be. It's still unique, but it might
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  not be that valuable, but the more niche and detailed and
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  tangible and interesting it is, then it's very valuable.
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  It's very, you know, unique and it's interesting, frankly.
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  And the other part of it, and this is really the crux is it's
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  building trust. Because if you lay out the
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  detailed situation in which you established marketing analytics
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  for the DTC company that allowed them to track attribution of the
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  different users and then they double down on this specific
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  channel. So they grew 10X over the next
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  two years. You are showing a establishing a
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  really interesting, you know, growth story.
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  That's just, I want to read about that.
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  But you're establishing trust that you know what you're doing.
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  And then I want to hire you, right?
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  Because I want you to do that for me.
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  I want you to see around that corner for me.
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  So you do a bunch of different things when you lean into your
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  unique voice on LinkedIn. And if you go in with the
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  attitude, I'm, I'm just going to contribute to the noise, then
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  you're missing out on the entire point of what, in my opinion,
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  LinkedIn, the opportunity on LinkedIn is, which is truly
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  sharing from your unique first person point of view, what
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  you've done, how you've added value, what you've learned and
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  from a place of I'm, I learned this so that you can learn it
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  too. And oh, by the way, if you need
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  me to help you with that thing, I got you right.
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  And then you have a client. So that's number two #3 is a
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  fear driven mindset. It is what if what I post is
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  stupid? Or what if people don't like it?
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  Or what if people, you know, cancel me or write bad comments?
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  Or what if the post just isn't that good?
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  Let's just summarize to say the post isn't that good.
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  And there's that fear. And so one of two things
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  happens. Either the fear holds you back
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  from ever doing it at all, or you do it like once a month when
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  you get a lot of courage. Or you refine the post over and
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  over and over and over again and you spend 2 hours on one
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  LinkedIn post and you waste a ton of time taking it from 90%
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  of the way there to 100% of the way there.
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  Those are what I see happen. So the end of the day, your fear
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  generally comes from a perfectionism kind of place and
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  it is holding you back. It is holding you back from
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  getting the reps in, of being consistent and knowing you're
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  human. You're not perfect.
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  You don't need to be perfect to add value or any for any reason
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  to be perfect. Clients don't expect perfect.
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  Nobody does. And if they do, you don't want
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  to work with them, I promise. And so you get to really give
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  yourself permission to post 80% of the way there and know that
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  if your post does poorly, meaning nobody likes it, then
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  nobody sees it. I'm going to say that again.
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  If your post does terribly, if your post sucks, if it doesn't
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  resonate with a single human being, nobody sees it.
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  It doesn't get picked up by the algorithm, none of your audience
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  sees it, doesn't matter. Move on.
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  It's into the abyss, right? On the other hand, if the post
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  that you think is a six out of 10 resonates with a ton of
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  people, then the algorithm picks it up and your audience sees it
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  and you surprise yourself. Because the end of the day, we
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  are not a good judge of what's going to resonate with people
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  and what isn't. Because if we were really good,
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  everybody's posts would go viral all the time.
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  Nobody writes a post hoping nobody sees it, right?
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  But the end of the day, we're not good judges of our own
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  performance. Basically we're, you know, most
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  people listening to this podcast are high performing people that
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  have done well in their career that are going out on their own
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  have already gone out on their own.
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  And we are high achievers that expect a lot from ourselves.
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  And so we often have this perfectionist, I need to do it
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  right mentality. When the end of the day, we
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  don't we, we don't need to do it right.
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  We don't really know what's going to work and not work.
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  And so we just get to kind of risk it and we just get to trust
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  that it's either going to work or it's not.
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  And if it doesn't work, I'm going to learn what doesn't
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  work. And if it works, I'm going to
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  learn what works and I'm going to do it better next time.
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  It's like the first time I recorded this podcast, it was
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  terrible. It just wasn't very good.
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  And I had to just be OK with that because the end of the day,
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  nobody's beginner. Nobody's good at something when
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  they're a beginner. You're all you're always bad.
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  We are always bad. And so the only way to do it is
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  just put yourself out there and learn and get the reps it so you
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  really get to let go of that mindset of the mindset of like,
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  what if this post is stupid? What if this post sucks?
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  What if nobody's what if no one likes it?
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  OK, great. I learned something that doesn't
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  work, we move on. Like is that really the end of
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  the world? So stop taking forever to
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  perfect your posts. Stop worrying what your
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  engagement's going to look like. I at this point I have almost
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  24,000 followers. I have literally had a post in
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  the last year that got zero likes.
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  That's relatively hard to do right?
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  Like that post must have really resonated with nobody.
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  The number of impressions it got was like 150.
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  So 150 people read it or saw it in some way, and not a single
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  one of them, zero out of 150, liked it or commented on it.
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  It's like, OK, well, that post just just really didn't land.
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  OK, we move on. Fine.
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  Does it really matter? Am I going to go lick my wounds
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  and be all down about myself? Like, Oh my God, I'm done with
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  LinkedIn. It's like, no, I'm going to go
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  write another one and I'm going to publish it the next day and
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  it's going to, I don't even remember what the next day did
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  right, but it did fine. So in the average post that I
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  write probably gets between 1 and 2000 impressions.
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  So if I write 7 posts a week, which I do, I get about 10 to
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  15,000 impressions a week, ends up about 30 to 40,000 a month.
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  You do the math, it ends up being pretty significant.
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  So all to say, it's about consistency.
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  It's about letting go of the fear of being perfect, of
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  needing to do it well, doing right.
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  Like be willing to make a mess. I had a post about launching
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  Uber Eats in Italy and I wrote about how the Italian culture
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  was different than US culture in working style.
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  And I really tried to write it from a sensitive place of like,
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  I'm not making anything right or wrong, it was just different and
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  interesting for me to experience.
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  And then there were about 30 or 40 Italians that came to attack
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  me in the comments, like I was this ignorant American.
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  And I was like, oh, shit, like I, that feels bad and I don't
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  want to do that. And I pissed a bunch of people
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  off. And you know what, it went away.
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  It went away in like a week. I just, I think I respond, I
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  think I, I might have edited the post and told people I added the
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  post and made it a little bit more PC.
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  And, you know, I tried to do some damage control, but the end
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  of the day it was gone in like a week.
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  And I the only time I remember is when I record a podcast like
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  this or I tell someone like the worst thing that's ever happened
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  to me on LinkedIn is I pissed off about 30 Italians.
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  It's like, OK, can I live with myself?
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  Like, is that OK? Is that recoverable?
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  Yeah. I mean, everything is
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  recoverable, right? The most, the worst PR things in
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  the world. And frankly, none of us are big
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  enough that anybody truly cares. Like mylance didn't suffer
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  because I pissed off 30 Italians.
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  And just while we're on this point, if you're still employed
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  and doing freelance on the side or consulting on the side, you
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  don't have to worry about your employer because you're not
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  saying like, please hire me in your post.
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  You're just sharing your learnings and experiences and
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  wins and mistakes and all the stuff we talk about.
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  There's nothing wrong with doing that, right?
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  Is there anything against your employment contract that says
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  you can't share what you've learned in your career on
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  LinkedIn? So you get to really challenge
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  the stories in your head that prevent you from putting
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  yourself out there, which is going to be the game changer in
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  your marketing. Because what happens for me,
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  because I've been posting every single day on LinkedIn, I
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  haven't had to introduce myself on a phone call, on a zoom call
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  in over 2 years. People know who I am, they know
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  my philosophies, they know my strategies, they know how I
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  think about things like because they've been following my
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  content, right? So you have this opportunity
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  where you can build relationships with people in A1
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  to many format. Every time I write a post, I'm
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  furthering that relationship or building a new one.
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  And so that you just can't buy that relationship.
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  You can't buy that trust. And what ends up happening is
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  these people, they literally they, I can't.
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  The number of times someone says to me like, look, there's lots
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  of companies with a similar offer to you, but I want to work
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  with you because you're someone that I trust.
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  And why do they trust me? Because it's not like we went to
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  college together and we were like best friends at the bar,
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  right? They trust me because they've
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  been showing up. And I show my character and I
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  show my thoughtfulness and that I'm a genuine person that's
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  really just trying to help people.
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  Like I just love supporting people.
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  I think actually most of us do, which is whether you actually
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  show that or not. So you get to really challenge
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  the story in your head and you get to just put things out there
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  and not worry about all the things that people worry about.
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  And the fourth one, we'll make it quick because we're running
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  out of time is I have to mimic the top influencers to succeed.
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  And at the end of the day, it kind of goes back to the earlier
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  point of you get to own your unique voice, your stories.
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  The only thing that that can support you is look at the
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  format of posts that do well, right?
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  There's good spacing. There's a hook line at the
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  beginning. There's the first person point
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  of view. So mimic that style, but write
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  it in your own style. Write in your unique style, like
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  trust yourself. And again, you'll see what works
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  and what doesn't work, but you don't need to mimic anybody
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  else. I'm going to sign off with that.
• 15:07
  We are building the coolest AI tool ever.
• 15:12
  Come check it. Check it out at mylands.co.
• 15:14
  It's going to help you become a thought leader on LinkedIn in
• 15:17
  less time. It's going to resonate with your
• 15:19
  ideal audience. It's going to be a game changer
• 15:22
  that to really stand out. As I shared with from the noise
• 15:25
  on LinkedIn, it's not going to be your typical AI wrapper on
• 15:28
  ChatGPT. It's going to be really, really,
• 15:29
  really powerful. So I can't wait to get that in
• 15:32
  front of you guys. Come sign up for it at my
• 15:34
  lance.co, check us out at the website and come, come look at
• 15:37
  my stuff on LinkedIn. And if this was valuable,
• 15:40
  helpful to you, let me know. I love hearing from you guys.
• 15:44
  It means a lot. Give the podcast a rating share
• 15:47
  with a friend. Obviously, it's not free to
• 15:48
  create this, so we're just doing it to to really provide value
• 15:51
  and of course, marketing for my lands.
• 15:53
  But if you got value out of the podcast, please give us a
• 15:57
  review, a rating and let me know.
• 16:00
  LinkedIn. Love you guys so much.
• 16:01
  Have an amazing Tuesday.