How automated cold messaging on LinkedIn brought me 30+ interviews with potential customers
When conducting research for my product, I conducted interviews with over 30 professionals in my field. I secured all these interviews by cold messaging people on LinkedIn.
Initially, I would send a connection invite accompanied by a short, friendly note. Once the connection was accepted, I would follow up with two more messages (after one day and three days). As time progressed, acceptance rate increased due to having more mutual connections with potential interviewees.
Initially, I performed all these tasks manually. Later, I automated the process using an automation tool.
Stats:
- Sent out 841 invites.
- Got 212 accepts, that's a 25.20% acceptance rate.
- 29 replied to the 1st message.
- 14 replied to the 2nd message.
- Ended up conducting 36 interviews.
Full message sequence:
Trending on Indie Hackers
Which tool did you use?
PhantomBuster
Hi did you tried lemlist ? It's a good tool to automate mailing and linkedin messages. You can use Walaaxy too
Yeah they seem like good tools. I used PhantomBuster because a sales friend of mine introduced me to it; I had no prior experience with these kinds of tools.
I really like your messaging style, it doesn't feel too pushy or automated. Great results too!
Thanks!
Pretty impressive!
Thanks 🙌
Impressive hustle securing those interviews! 🚀
Thanks 🙌
How many of those 36 interviews were actually of value?
In terms of what they contributed to my thought process about the product, almost all of them were. Only 2 or 3 were awkward or useless.
Nice work! I tried something similar once but wasn't sure about the approach. Did you close any of those people you interviewed?
I think volume is key here. When doing it manually, I had not much results because I would send only 10 messages/day. Haven’t close anyone yet, but I’m working on it!
I've read that you can message unlimited group members, and I do get quite a few cold messages every day from group members. Have you found this to be true or is there some kind of limit?
LinkedIn’s limits are indeed hard to overcome, and they're becoming more restrictive. They now limit the number of daily connection requests. Regarding messaging group members, I'm not certain, but it does sound intriguing. If you find an answer to your question, please share!
Yeah that I know about. Around 100/week for a normal account, 150 or so for a Premium account. But the direct messaging to groups apparently has no limit, so I'll be testing this method this month myself.
Awesome post @theophileavoyne! Is this campaign still going on? Did you see a dip in the numbers?
Are there any limitations or restrictions in sending connection requests from PhantomBuster? What is recommended daily outreach count?
I can't remember if it's 10 or 20. In either case, it isn't much, so you should ensure it runs for a sufficient duration, as the stats significantly improve after 20-30 days.
You must have some incredible networking skills! We're trying Apolo and it also works very well. Thanks for sharing :D
Actually, not so much! I'm naturally quite uncomfortable with these things. But I find it psychologically easier to work on a large scale rather than a small scale, as you're not directly confronted with ghosting. I use Apollo too! It's a great tool for finding prospects, but I prefer Hunter as the email-sending platform because I find its UI simpler.
Awesome! I'll try it out. Thanks!
Wow this is super helpful as I my self am looking for users for my new app!
Happy it helps! DM me on Twitter if you want me to get a look at your sequence.
I'm currently working on an extension for a client, it's meant for LinkedIn Sales Navigator like Lusha, it's meant to extract leads to CSV or any custom endpoint. I'll check out PhantomBuster.
Weren't these any request limits in place on LinkedIn? I was trying something on twitter, but they have this restriction.
Yeah, there are, always. But even on a smaller scale, you can achieve good results. Key is to write a well-structured sequence.
Wow, great results! I think you could get even more interviews by just sending a calendly / cal.com link instead of asking for a time slot.
I’m not sure, I was hesitant and ended up not doing it. IMO, it would make it sound like an automatic message, whereas the power of this sequence lies in the fact that it sounds naive.
I love how the 2nd message gives people a better idea of how the interview is gonna go addressing some of their potential objections. Bookmarking this template.
Happy it helps!
This comment was deleted 2 years ago.