How to Sell on LinkedIn

Personal branding, in my understanding, has a number of definitions, as we know.
But personal branding is not being popular on social media.
A personal brand is when people have an aligned sense of what you’re about and what you’re there for, and they feel a certain way about you. Everywhere they see you and everywhere they go, it feels aligned and consistent.
And the people who get that right, who know what they’re doing — the proper personal brand specialists, who I know plenty of and I’m very fortunate to know — they’re the ones who really go deep on the science and the theory behind it, rather than, “I can tweak your profile and I can make you popular.”
And that is smoke and mirrors to cover up the fact that very little else might happen.

No Bullsh*t Talks is a podcast for entrepreneurs, by entrepreneurs.
There’s too much bullshit out there, especially when it comes to business.
This podcast aims to highlight what’s true and what’s not in the world of entrepreneurship, bringing you honest and raw conversations about the rollercoaster that is entrepreneurship.
Each week, my guest will be a high-performing entrepreneur, sharing the ups and downs of their journey and helping you prepare for the road ahead, while providing you with actionable insights and absolute gems of knowledge.
Stay tuned as I introduce this week’s guest.

Richard Moore is the founder of the LinkedIn CEO Accelerator and has been helping consultants and coaches win more clients on LinkedIn for the last decade.
He’s known to be one of the world’s experts on selling on LinkedIn and has built the number one sales training community to help people sell with excellence.
He’s helped clients land contracts with big brands such as Coca-Cola, Novartis, and Amazon.
I present to you this week’s guest, Richard Moore.
Welcome, Richard, to No Bullsh*t Talks.
Thank you very much.
Oh, so excited to be here.
Pumped.
We’ve got a lot of combined energy. I think this could be quite a high-powered podcast.
So, I want you to explain what you do in your own words before I talk about it, because I feel like I’m going to butcher it right now.

Right now, the thing I do is I mostly help people to convert, so actually make money, like get customers to pay into their bank account for the services they offer.
And that typically is with an attraction-based approach. My vehicle is LinkedIn, and so content is the thing there.
But I’m very, very big on helping the little guy who doesn’t have massive influence and a huge following, who can’t miss if they do anything.
I’m looking at competence and conversion rather than volume to kind of offset that.
And whatever happens, I end up with a deal somehow without trying.
So I love teaching people how to understand the nuance of communication and nurture a fragile moment that might turn into a sale, because everyone can do it without becoming irritating or a salesperson.
Yeah, that’s crucial.
I love that the first word you said was convert.
You didn’t say, “I do LinkedIn training. I do content marketing.”
You didn’t say any of that fluffy stuff.
You literally said, “I help people convert and get paid.”
Because at the end of the day, that’s what everyone wants.
We’re not all in business for fun.
And don’t get me wrong, I talk so much about how I want people to enjoy it and have fun along the way, but if it ain’t going to pay the bills, it’s not going to be very helpful.

And I think we’ll both agree that the current narrative is that, for instance, personal brand, or being popular, or having lots of attention, or having a strong presence online is the end game because that’s what is being pushed.
But it’s not. It’s the beginning, really, of your funnel. Then you have to nurture and convert.
Ultimately, you’re either deluded or you recognize you’re there. LinkedIn, for instance, you’re there to convert. You are there for customer acquisition. Otherwise, what the hell are we doing?
It’s just knocking around trying to compensate for something.
No one is there just to give value. Ultimately, they should be there for a goal to help their business.
And I feel very strongly about that because I’m right. That’s the truth.
And that’s the end of the podcast. That’s all I needed to say. I’m just right. That’s it.
But you know what’s so funny? Like you said, no one’s there to give value, but yet 90% of the content on LinkedIn at the moment is like, “You must give value.” That’s what it is.
And it’s so funny because I had a call with someone the other day which basically turned into a free consultation because she clearly had no intention of paying me.
But she wanted to pick my brains on LinkedIn content.
She was like, “You seem to do something right on LinkedIn, so I wanted to kind of pick your brains.”
So I was like, “Sure.”
And then I asked, “What is the sole reason? What is the reason you want to create content?”
So I asked her that question.
She was like, “To give value.”
And I was like, “Okay. Is it to give value?”
Then I think, well, if it is, then you’re already doing it because you’re making a lot of great content.
So why should…
She’s like, “No, no, but I want to give value, but then I want a bit…”
I was like, “Do you want to make money? Is that it?”
She said, “No.”
And I was like, “Do you know what? It’s fine to just say, ‘I want to make money.'”
And she found it such a difficult thing.
She’s like, “Okay, fine. I want to make money.”
I was like, “Well, now we’re at the real stuff. We’re having the real conversation.”
No one wants to admit it.
Exactly.
But why is that bad?
People think it’s crass.
What’s crass is people bragging about how much money they’re earning on LinkedIn when they don’t even earn that.
But why is it crass to say, “I’m looking to earn a living”?
Absolutely.
Because what we’ve got is a very skewed view of what matters.

And the problem is that humans, as an animal — human animals — are hardwired to revere status. We just are.
And so what happens is, if we see someone with what we believe is status, then we think that is right. So we try to map our actions to what they’re doing.
The issue is that “big numbers are good numbers” is the current narrative.
And the fact is, getting followers, impressions, or engagement is easy relative to learning the nuance of communication with people.
Again, I’m right.
And so what’s crucial about that is to understand that it’s harder to be effective and sell correctly, but it’s easier for people to engineer a perception of popularity, which makes people think — because perception is reality, especially online — that you’re successful because you’re popular.
Therefore, you can feel good about the thing you’re missing.
And I know this is pointing the finger at people, but we need to recognize that that is a slow death.
It sounds negative, but ultimately it is a route to misery.
This is over a decade of doing this online, speaking, and like seven years on LinkedIn. I’ve seen it all from the beginning, really, of content marketing on LinkedIn.
I’ve seen it all, and it’s misery.
You get people who appear popular but don’t have any money. They’re grinding through 18-hour days to appear popular on the assumption that that will feed them in the end.
So what needs to happen is that we’re clear with ourselves that there’s no harm or problem in being popular, or having attention, or building an audience that’s into us.
But what are you going to do with it?
Look after yourself, make your agency or business and clients successful, or give to others — brilliant.
But value for the sake of value isn’t worth it because conversion, which needs to be defined by the self, can take many forms.
It could be:
“Do you know what? I want to convert people to listen to this podcast because I feel I’ve got something to give.”
“I want to convert people to follow our charity to make that more present.”
Or:
“I want to convert people to make more money.”
But you’re right.
I think there’s this sense of nobility, isn’t there, in saying, “Oh, well, I don’t do that because that’s just a bit crass.”
But ultimately, we’re lying to ourselves unless it’s a nonprofit. And even then, you’re still trying to convert in some way.
Giving value is just a nice way of saving face and appeasing a narrative that’s in here, as opposed to what we really should be doing.
It’s really crucial.
Yeah.
And actually, it’s funny because I’ve done the opposite.
I’ve been very much telling everyone recently that I need to make more of a salesy turn on my LinkedIn because I don’t think I used it to create value.
I might have accidentally created value.
I was more using it as an outlet for ranting, as you probably can tell.
No, I think it’s really interesting because, again, what we’ve got there is the idea that ranting, for some, is negative.
But actually, you coming up with an opinion — and in the world of fluff in content, it’s only an increasing echo chamber of agreeable stuff.
Yeah.
Even if you look at AI, AI is programmed. The AI comment is programmed to be agreeable, to say agreeable stuff.
The ranters are the ones we need.
Because another way to define a ranter is someone who has an opinion and who is strident in delivering it.
And what happens with ranters is that it polarizes.
And if you’ve got the boldness to actually say, “Actually, I genuinely believe in this thing,” you know, say things like, “I’m right,” although tongue-in-cheek, what happens is you get some people who go, “Well, I don’t agree,” and so hopefully have some good dialogue.
Or you have people who go, “Yeah, thank you. Finally, someone said it.”
And that’s really what we should be doing.
It’s all about discourse rather than just agreeing.
Otherwise, why don’t we just let AI do it all?
That’s what I think.
I don’t understand why this content is ever seen as valuable because it’s the same stuff over and over again.
It’s like, then you might as well just be learning from AI.
There’s no human connection or conversation there to have.
I think debates are healthy, like you’re saying.
For me, I keep doing it because it’s like having a blog.
That’s my blog, right?
Exactly.
That’s my outlet.
So I’ve not thought about sales, but it happened accidentally.
But I do it for the fact that every single post I do, someone drops into my DMs and says, “Thank you so much for saying the things I really wanted to say.”
And then it became a bit of pressure because I felt like I was the person that was supposed to say things that other people couldn’t say.
And then it was hard because I felt like I had…
That’s an amazing brand to have.
Yeah, it’s hard though.
Because people would come up to me at events and be like, “Oh, you’re the one who says all the things that we think but we’re too scared to say.”
And I’m like, “Damn, that’s a lot.”
And then they were like…
And I was like, “I suppose I do.”
But I just say how I feel because I’m entitled to an opinion.
I never do it offensively. There’s a difference.
I’m not pointing names.
I don’t say, “You’re full of shit, you’re full of shit.”
I’m just like, “Here’s what I don’t like. Here’s why I don’t like it. Here’s the science to back it up,” most of the time.
And that’s kind of what I do.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.
But I think you’ve touched on this really well.
Being agreeable and just giving value in the “Oh my goodness, that’s so obvious” common-sense kind of way is such a low barrier to entry.
And that’s what new beginners do.
They’re like, “Well, look, the majority are doing this stuff, so I’ll just do the same because if I participate, I’ll fit in.”
This is all that’s going on.
“I’ll fit in, and I’ll get some of what they’ve got.”
The most prominent ones in my feed have 4,000 or 20,000 or 60,000 followers.
Cool. I’d like some of that because if I have followers, I’m sure everything will just work out.
So I’ll emulate what I’m seeing.
And we’ve moved so far from having intelligent discussion or suggesting there’s another way, or an evolution, or a revision on the mainstream idea, that you end up with people like you being incredibly unique.
And with all love, the fact is that all humans probably have an opinion if they gave it a moment’s thought.
But it’s becoming a unique thing because people don’t want to rock the boat.
They’d rather sit in the middle than be an outlier.
And I think that’s always been a human thing, but what we’re seeing is very, very magnified on social media.
What happens, if people want to know the real timeline, is you start and you don’t know what to do.
So you go, “Well, what’s the prevailing approach? Well, I’ll just give value like everyone else.”
Then after a while, when you get bored — as does the audience — of continually posting motivational quotes, you end up a bit further down the line going, “Maybe I should be a bit more cutting-edge, or at least believe something and say it.”
And then, as long as we haven’t quit, we start moving to a place where we actually have something to say.
And people who pop out of that part are the ones who can start to win.
I think that’s…
There’s a difference between having an audience and attracting the right people, specifically in the right way.
That’s massive.
I love that.
And I think one of the comments I’ve had the most when people talk about my content is, “I’m not as controversial as you,” or, “I can’t be as controversial as you.”
And I was like, “I’m not trying to be controversial.”
I’m not actually actively thinking, “What’s controversial that I can say?”
It’s just that every day when I’m consuming content, I get pissed off with stuff.
I’m scrolling through and I’m like, “That’s full of shit. That’s full of shit.”
And I’m like, “I’m just going to say my opinion on it.”
And that’s all it is.
Every time I have an opinion on something, I just put it to paper.
Then someone will leave me a voice note and be like, “Oh, I totally agree with this, blah blah blah.”
And I’m like, “That’s a post. Why don’t you just say that?”
They’re like, “Oh no, I can’t say that.”
And then fear.
But here we have the other extreme.
This is the problem.
It’s, “Well, what would get me uber results, like loads and loads of engagement?”
Well, what do those people do?
They’re really polarizing.
So what we start getting is people forging sensationalist posts and getting really, really hooky.
But I’m not particularly polarizing or anything like that.
One thing I have always done is say, “Well, what do I believe?”
And as an interesting, useful point of knowledge for my audience, how could I say it in a particular way?
Usually the form of my post is:
“You probably think this thing, and it has some weight. However, have you considered this blind spot as well?”
Just an evolution on what the mainstream belief is.
I think that goes a long way.
When I started, if I go back to 2014 when I was on Facebook — do you remember Facebook?
So when I was on Facebook, I would go to Google and type “sales tips.”
It would come up with “10 sales tips.”
I’d read them and be like, “No.”
Then I’d write my own version.
It would literally be, “I just read a bunch of sales tips. Here’s what I think they’re missing.”
Just dare to bother to do a bit of reading or research and then have that dialogue with yourself.
What do you think?
Do you have an opinion?
Because actually, followers typically follow you because they want to hear your opinion on something.
It’s crucial.
That’s exactly what I think.
So that’s where I think the value from humans comes in.
Otherwise, you are just a monkey operating the AI.
And this is what people don’t understand.
They use AI before it replaces you.
But I was like, you’re basically just regurgitating AI.

So what I’ve noticed, and I don’t know what you think about this, is that people don’t even know how to form an opinion anymore.
I’ve even seen it in real-life settings where I’m in a situation and I’m like, “Oh, what could we do here?”
And they’re like, “Let me just check ChatGPT.”
I was like, “Wait, are you joking? You’re actually going to ask ChatGPT in this scenario and not even try to use your brain to come up with something?”
I think people are so obsessed with, and some have become so reliant on, AI that they actually can’t form their own opinions.
I see this on talks and panels. They can’t answer questions. It’s an AI answer.
Well, there’s a pre-AI version of that, which is, “What do you think?” before answering.
Putting something ahead of you thinking for yourself is dangerous because you absolutely work that muscle instead of your own brain.
What we’re talking about here is, in order to fight back against this, how do we actually systematize — not in a really overbearing way — but how do we systematize thinking for ourselves so we don’t lose that art of it?
The way you do it is:
Step one: What’s the received information?
Step two — the hidden step two, typically — is test it or get elaboration.
For instance, if you tell me something, it’s tempting for the average human — you can tell I’m a bit of a geek in communication — the average human will be like, “I want to give you an opinion or a response.”
Typically, the response at the moment is, “Oh, I agree.”
That’s really lovely. People please, right?
But secret step number two is: “What do you mean?” or “Can you elaborate a bit further?”
It’s a really good tip, and I think anyone should test this in their next conversation.
It works literally every time.
If someone says something to you — unless it’s, like, “What time is it?” — if they say something to you, ask, “What do you mean by that?” or “Can you elaborate a bit further?” or words to the effect of, “Can you give me a bit more, please?”
Because now we get more information.
Step three is, “Well, what do you think on that?”
And you are allowed to pause for a minute and think, “What is my opinion?”
Your opinion isn’t wrong because it’s an opinion.
The things that are wrong are things that are not facts, but you say them as facts.
Correct.
Yeah.
So there are facts and there are opinions, and you’re allowed to have an opinion.
But facts are facts.
That’s crucial to be aware of.
Then your next step is, “Well, what is my opinion?”
And if you’re struggling with paralysis or making an opinion, then a really important thing to consider is: What’s your feeling toward the information you’ve received?
You can comment from there.
That’s how you can form an opinion.
Rather than trying to sound intelligent, say to yourself, “How do I feel?”
And it’s physiological.
How do I feel about the information I’ve received?
That will help you form something.
It sounds crazy that we’re discussing how to have an opinion, but people should go and try it.
Although I’ve made it seem like a flowchart is required, the truth is it should be innate enough that if we give it a try, it will feel fairly natural.
But it is being lost.
If I may, I think it’s really important to add that one should develop a level of — disgust is too much — but disdain for themselves if their default reaction is, “Must check ChatGPT.”
Your reaction should be, “What the hell am I doing? Aren’t I educated? Aren’t I intelligent?”
Because I bet you tell everyone else you are, right?
I bet you’re like, “Well, I hold myself in high regard.”
So show it.
Do you really need the AI?
That’s not to diminish the value of AI because that should be your final step, should you need it.
You can collaboratively say, “I wonder what the internet says,” rather than, “What does the internet say?”
I must say, pre-AI, the response often was, “Do you know the answer to this?”
It’s like, “But you can just work that out.”
Or, “It’s obvious.”
Or, “What did Google say when you checked?”
It’s like, “Well, my impulsive reaction was just to ask someone else.”
So let’s not lose the art of thinking for ourselves.
It doesn’t have to be hard at all.
And I think that therein is how we can write great posts.
Just stop and actually ask, “How do I feel about this?”

So I have to ask, what is the difference then between — and I’m going to offend you here — what you do and personal branding?
Not to say there is no difference, but I’m deliberately asking you so you can clarify for everyone else.
I’m glad you’re being clear. Otherwise, you’d be like, “How dare you?”
Because I feel like everyone out there now — there’s suddenly a new LinkedIn trainer every week on LinkedIn, and it’s just nuts.
I just don’t really understand why.
People, we’ve hit peak LinkedIn trainer for sure this year.
Honestly, it’s a joke.
And so personal branding is all the rage, and everyone seems to be a personal branding expert.
I don’t quite know how.
But you are an expert in LinkedIn, and you don’t call yourself a personal branding expert.
This is not what you do.
And like you said, conversion is your priority.
Can you please walk through what you do and how it’s very different to personal branding?
Yeah.
And I want to put a big disclaimer in at the start.
I like personal branding.
Done right, it is utterly critical to your next level of success. It’s absolutely crucial.
The two major rockets behind my business were shifting from Facebook to LinkedIn and starting to put money behind people who know what they’re doing to help me build my brand properly, rather than, “Maybe I’ll quote Henry Ford today.”
So, personal branding, in my understanding, has a number of definitions, as we know.
But personal branding is not being popular on social media.
A personal brand is when people have an aligned sense of what you’re about and what you’re there for, and they feel a certain way about you.
Everywhere they see you and everywhere they go, it feels aligned and consistent.
And the people who get that right, who know what they’re doing — the proper personal brand specialists, who I know plenty of and am very fortunate to know — they’re the ones who really go deep on the science and the theory behind it.
Rather than, “I can 10x your profile and I can make you popular.”
And that is smoke and mirrors to cover up the fact that very little else might happen.
And of course, when someone then does get a customer, it’s confirmation bias that it all works.
Yes, exactly.
So there’s a crucial definition there.
I happen to have some measure of a personal brand behind what I do because I am disciplined enough to stay in my lane and every day talk about the thing I do.
And if I talk about adjacent topics, I map them to what I do.
So everyone knows.
Whenever they’ve seen my content enough, everyone has a sense of what I’m there for and what I want to talk about.
And my flavor is always related to conversion.
It’s not always, “That’s rubbish” or “That’s no good,” but I will call out any suggestion that you just need more followers, or you just need more audience, or more engagement.
So specifically, what I do is help people understand that deals — real conversion, proper deals, and acquisition of a customer — ultimately come down to one person and you.
An interaction between two people.
It might be online, it might be on a call, it might be in person.
Ultimately, money has to come down to that one person.
Even if you’re speaking to a customer with multiple stakeholders, one person ultimately is going to sign off.
And that interaction between you and them is multifaceted and needs to be understood.
What’s interesting, going back to the top of this session, is that there’s a view from those who maybe aren’t as versed in the details and nuance in business that it’s either value for the masses or being salesy.
But there’s a spectrum.
And what you’ve got there are two far extremes of a spectrum.
I’m trying to articulate this right.
At one end, it’s:
“If I become super popular and influential and have a big personal brand, then I don’t have to do anything. People just buy stuff.”
Which is a thing. It can work.
But you have to hold your breath for years while you grind to get everyone to love you.
The other end is no personal brand.
This is what I used to do when I was in my early twenties in the city.
You just dial and call and impose and sell at people.
My job was to do 100 dials a day.
Yeah.
I wasn’t doing literally anything else.
Not account management of the companies I’d sold to.
One hundred dials a day.
If I did all right, I would pop out the end of the week with one deal.
One percent.
No, less than one.
Maybe one every week.
Because I was doing 500 a week, and I would probably get 10 to 15 actual demos of our product.
I was selling internet marketing in 2003.
And I would get a deal.
We’re talking two grand.
My first deal was $1,700 for a year of internet marketing.
Because back then people were like, “Oh, come on, the internet? Are you kidding?”
We’d just had the dot-com bubble burst.
“We’ll stick with paid advertising in newspapers and things like that.”
So, a long time ago.
But what’s interesting is that that is a far extreme.
People don’t want that.
Cold outreach does not work.
Let me be clear on it.
It does not work as a way to make sure you can get deals every single day.
You can grind, and you might win some people who happen to be in the market for it.
But it’s not a strategy that is fulfilling for either party.
They didn’t want you.
You didn’t want to do it.
You happened to overturn something that ended up as a purchase.
But it’s a bit like buying lottery tickets and happening to win every so often.
Now, in the middle is something of the two.
And for the last ten years running my own business, I’ve really enjoyed the attraction gained through content.
But I’m never focused on virality or follower count.
I’m always focused on one crucial thing:
Am I saying the right thing to the right people?
Now, if I was selling how to be popular and how to be a LinkedIn guru, then I would be going for leverage in the form of loads of followers and loads of engagement.
But I need one person, ultimately, to be like, “Hey, that could be useful,” or, “Hey, I like the opinion you wrote today.”
And then that’s my starting point.
So I’m really helping people to understand that, sure, volume can help.
But there comes a time — and daily it should be — where you choose to interact with individuals.
Because when you interact with individuals — I hate the term “picking them from the herd” because it’s like a lion taking a wildebeest — but it really is like that.
They’re all listening, but ultimately you have to speak to individuals.
And when you have deep conversations with a very low volume of people each day — this is high-ticket selling — rather than trying to speak to millions, what happens is you get depth.
And when you get depth, you get trust.
And when you get trust, you get a propensity toward possibly hearing you out and maybe wanting to buy from you.
And sales…
No one likes to sell.
No.
But they bloody love it when someone wants to buy.
Yeah.
Suddenly sales is the best thing ever.
And I find it laughable when people say, “Oh, I don’t sell, Richard, because people just come to me.”
It’s like, well, you do sell because there’s a point when you have to take the order.
Ideally, this is the fusion of marketing and sales, isn’t it?
Brand and marketing and all that kind of world.
Because if you get it right, all that heavy lifting of positioning and the optics around seeing you in the right way, and essentially this internal emotional belief that you’re their hero who can fix the problem, gets done before the point when you’re interacting.
In short, when they’re kind of in love with you a bit.
That’s the point where you’re like, “So, how do I not mess that bit up?”
And that is critical, that moment.
I’m so fortunate that in my past I learned how to do bread-and-butter sales.
You know, $1,700 deals all the way up to six-figure deals.
And what that feels like.
In person.
That kind of thing.
I really cut my teeth in just volume selling over a decade.
It’s wonderful to do that.
All of those experiences have really helped me understand what it feels like to be in the buyer’s chair.
And I think what matters is that if we’re trying to transact, we need to understand that how we want to sell — which is, “Hey, could you buy my thing please?” — everyone is like, “Oh my God.”
Of course that isn’t going to happen.
What we need to do instead is meet them where they are.
And the state of a buyer, potentially a buyer, when they look at your content is typically:
“Huh, that’s kind of cool.”
“Okay, who is that person?”
And then they’re gone.
So how do we nurture that cool, passive audience member?
People really like this because I think they like the fact that obviously the outcome is deals, and people like money — don’t know why, it’s weird.
But prior to that, they really like the depth and nuance around how people interact.
And what I love the most, aside from people making money — because they love that a lot — is when people say things like:
“I didn’t realize that about how I was interacting.”
“I didn’t realize if I said it in that way that it would have that effect.”
Those minor blind spots can make massive changes.
One of my favorite moments a few years ago was a chap I worked with who said:
“I just love that now I don’t scare people off when someone looks at my profile.”
Because most people genuinely — and I mean it — most people I speak to are paralyzed to the point that they don’t bother to interact because there’s this fear of:
“Well, I’m going to piss them off.”
Or:
“I’m going to say something wrong.”
So they don’t even try.
Meanwhile, their business is tanking completely.
We have to try.
But if you can bring a bit of elegance, you tend to find that people are quite happy to speak to you.
The key — and this is ultimately the point I’m trying to make — is not to be salesy.
The key is to run everything through a filter first of:
“If someone said it to me…”
Or an even better one:
“If I said it to someone literally face to face, would I cringe or feel the ick?”
Yeah.
If so, don’t.
Yeah, I think that’s everyone’s fear, isn’t it? To feel cringe.
What I’ve noticed, though, is that there’s obviously different things people are selling.
And I think the popularity thing, and posting the Henry Ford quote, and posting all the generic niceties that look really popular, only work if you’re then selling a course or something.
Because those people are selling the course, and they still don’t need to interact with anyone.
Essentially, you don’t actually have any face-to-face contact there.
There are people out there setting up a business like that because essentially they don’t have anything real to give.
So they have AI churning out their content.
Then they have AI creating their videos for them.
They’ve got a video avatar of themselves, which is wild.
They’ve just got AI doing that for them.
And then they’re all directed into a course that’s pre-recorded from a script written by AI or someone else.
To perpetuate and sell how to do exactly what they’ve done.
Exactly.
So actually there’s not really any value given because they’re not actually doing anything.
They’re just taking AI and putting it into the form of themselves.
So they don’t need to sell anything.
Because I’ve actually got something to give.
The problem is, I think there’s so much content geared around that kind of selling, and it just doesn’t work if you’re in the process of selling a real service.
Real consulting.
An agency.
That kind of thing.
I just don’t think the same method works.

Let’s get tactical.
Because the fact is, if I’m a LinkedIn guru selling how to be a LinkedIn guru to LinkedIn gurus, then fine.
Because as long as I’m the biggest, most popular LinkedIn guru, everyone will buy how to be a LinkedIn guru.
But where we…
And that’s fine.
But ultimately, it’s diminishing returns down the line.
It’s bad.
I’m laughing because that actually does happen, and it’s the most stupid thing ever.
But it’s an economy that allows people to not have to go get a job.
Because they can do it and make four grand a month.
And they don’t think about the fact it’s less than minimum wage if they work out the number of hours worked.
I remember telling someone once, “You know you could stack shelves in the supermarket and you would be paid more.”
And they were like, “Don’t tell me that.”
But the truth is, even if they are making less than minimum wage, they can choose — inverted commas — to not be answerable to someone else.
And so there is something in that.
Actually, it might — and I’m trying to be nice now — be a great way to help yourself have the space to learn discipline and other things.
And what you find is those that aren’t full of bullshit, who actually genuinely do get LinkedIn and are selling how to do it right, when they sell those kinds of things, they do it enough that they pop out the end after a while and say to themselves:
“This is a bit… not vacuous, but am I getting enough impact? What do I really want?”
And if they’re making a bit of money, they’re like, “Actually, why don’t I do something with a bit more depth?”
And then you start getting some value from them.
So there is that.
But you’re absolutely right.
Because the majority of people aren’t LinkedIn gurus wanting to be LinkedIn gurus.
What the majority are, are people who are like:
“I don’t have time.”
“I don’t want to muck around online.”
“And I am really good at this thing over here.”
And the problem is that they think that emulating the results of their LinkedIn guru will get them similar results.
So emulating the actions of a LinkedIn guru will get them similar results in the sense that they’ll have loads of followers, be a big thought leader, and have loads of attention.
And life will be very easy.
But the truth is, if I’m selling a cybersecurity IT business and I’m the CEO of that, I may have to suck up the fact that I’m not going to be as popular.
Which is where we need to be tactical.
It’s like:
So what do we need to do?
And again, it’s back to this point of:
Are we saying the right things to the right people?
Where it all starts, though, isn’t content.
It starts with adding the right people into your network daily.
Because by virtue of the fact that gurus and peers and friends and allies engaging with our posts will distribute them more, it will unlock distribution of our posts to people in our own network.
So what that looks like is every day I add people who are either potential buyers or in that person’s ecosystem.
Do you actually add people every single day?
I do exactly that.
And not millions.
I might add four.
Okay.
But four a day across a month is 120 curated additions.
I basically turn down every one of these connection requests unless they’re like:
“Huh, I think that might be someone who’s got some measure of effort going towards LinkedIn.”
Because that’s what we’re going to be using.
They clearly have a bit of experience.
My sweet spot is someone who’s got a bit of talent, maybe ex-corporate, running their own thing, but clearly just not doing well enough.
And it’s sad, but I tend to help the frustrated people who are fed up with the LinkedIn gurus teaching them how to get in pods or do really well in the form of more views.
They just want to make some money.
So adding a few people every day is job number one.
Because what we’re doing then is saying:
If my post was to get some traction, then LinkedIn will send it to some portion of those I’m connected to, which includes these right people.
So you need to coach or train LinkedIn.
Like it’s this region, this kind of job, and this kind of industry.
It’s those people I keep adding.
And then the next thing is:
Now, am I speaking to them in the right way?
And here is the biggest blind spot of creators.
They assume that the buyer or prospect is solution-aware, or even problem-aware.
Now there’s a famous thing that everyone’s adopted when they read one book on sales.
It’s like a matrix:
They’re either unaware, problem-aware, or solution-aware.
They have no idea.
Or they know there’s a problem.
Or they know what the solution is.
And they’re the best because they just want to shop and buy now.
What’s missing is that between the first and second one is the bloated majority of people you’ll encounter.
And it’s not defined.
And it’s completely overlooked.
When I talk about problems, the issue is that the buyer — a managing director of a six-million-pound company that sells whatever, a bricks-and-mortar company for instance — isn’t thinking about the problem.
But what they are doing is experiencing the symptoms of the problem.
Right?
So here’s a nice way to explain it.
I’ve said this a million times online.
A really good way to put it is:
If I’ve got a cough and a wheezy chest, I don’t know that I’ve got bronchitis — the problem.
But I know the symptoms: a cough and a wheezy chest.
A doctor, an expert, someone who can help me, would know not just my symptoms.
They would know the problem.
But they would also know the solution.
So what we want to do is meet the buyers where they are.
So we’re adding them at the top of the funnel each day.
Adding them in.
And then our content, rather than:
“If I write the word 10x, maybe I’ll get more views.”
It’s:
What’s the inner dialogue that a potential buyer has?
And it’s not even inner dialogue sometimes.
It’s a feeling that represents symptoms of a problem.
So if you can get in their heads — and all it is is a ten-minute quiet-thinking exercise — asking yourself what kind of feelings someone has, what the frustrations are, what the things are that make them feel fed up.
Because what we’re mapping to is a reaction or response to your post of:
“I feel seen.”
Or:
“Ah yes, that’s exactly how I would put it.”
Or:
“Oh my God, you’re in my head.”
That’s how we hook in.
And you can almost feel it.
I only need three of those a day.
I don’t even need that.
I need three people who might be interested in speaking, at least.
Or who are welcoming it if I reach out to them because they look at me.
But imagine if I end up with three or four calls in a week.
Not thirty leads a day from the gurus.
Four leads a week with people who are like:
“You’re so right.”
And you’re like:
“There’s a couple of things you could do, by the way.”
And now we’ve got a call.
And it’s about low volume, but high-quality interaction.
That starts with meeting them where they are.
The final thing I’ll add on this is:
As one becomes more of an expert within their space, it’s really tempting to articulate things in really beautiful ways that summarize everything perfectly.
But actually, I found a really good hack.
When you’re writing your posts, use the wording that they would use.
The way I’ve described it before is:
The stumbling, clunky wording they would use.
So that’s a long quote I used:
“All my friends think I’m crushing it on LinkedIn, but I’m stone-cold broke, Richard.”
That’s how she phrased it.
When you phrase the observation of symptoms in the way they would describe it, rather than your perfectly elegant articulation of it, suddenly they’re like:
“Yes, finally.”
“Yes, that’s exactly how I feel.”
And I tend to find I get a lot of people nodding and going:
“Oh my God, so true.”
For instance, when I say:
“You know how everyone keeps saying you need more followers?”
Or:
“You know how it’s all algorithm and engagement?”
Sure.
But don’t you want, at some point, to eventually close something?
And they’re like:
“Thank you, finally.”
And I’m just doing that for my thing.

So that’s the question everyone can ask themselves: the symptoms that those with a problem you can solve are currently experiencing. Speak to that, and now we’re on the inside of their brain.
And no one does it. It’s funny—I’ve done personal branding talks, and I don’t know how I’ve managed to be on them, but I’m saying this stuff and they’re like, “Oh my God, this is a complete blind spot.”
Because people go straight to, “You’ve got this problem, haven’t you?” And you’ve got an audience going, “Oh, it must not be for me because I’m not aware of having that problem.”
I think that’s so—oh my God, I love it. Because, again, it highlights where AI falters. The AI is not going to say the words that humans are going to say in their pain points.
And I think that’s the other reason we’re having deep conversations with people. Because, again, you’re not going to get those real feelings and answers from those surface-level conversations.

Because most of the time on social media, everyone’s going to be banging on about how great they’re doing. Like I said, everyone appears to be crushing it on LinkedIn.
And I only realized people weren’t crushing it on LinkedIn when I was trying to sell my retreat to people, and they were just like, “Oh my God, I don’t have that much money.”
And I’m like, “Why has no one got any money? I thought you were all smashing it on LinkedIn because apparently you’re all earning…”
A really good sign of this is that the people who are most revered and the ones who appear to be doing the best are bragging about having a six-figure business, which is not impressive.
Because if you are trying to target someone who has money, they get paid six grand, and you’re talking about the turnover being six figures. It only impresses people who are broke.
“Yes, exactly.”
It doesn’t impress people who are going to give you eight grand a month.
So that’s a massive, massive red flag. If someone’s bragging about having a six-figure business, they’re showing off about their whole company managing to get over the line to six figures. Well done. Probably a solopreneur has made some money.
But what really are we impressed by?
“That’s exactly what I said a while ago, because I was like, people going, ‘Oh yeah, let’s help you get to six figures.’ That’s only impressive if you are a solopreneur. If you’re running an actual company—like, I’m from the agency world—six figures means you’re not doing very well, because everyone has a seven-figure agency, really, if you think about the turnover. Profits are a different matter, but still.”
I think that’s why most of the people talking about it are targeting coaches, from what I’ve seen. It’s that sort of coach mentality because they’re solo and they want to get their $10K months and that sort of thing, right?
It’s the same thing. Actually, relatively, they may not—I don’t want to belittle people who are trying really hard right now and not quite cracking it—but when you do do it, you’re like, “It’s really not that hard.”
You just have to get your mindset right. You have to have a product that’s clear. You have to broadcast it in the right way.
But you do get to a point where it’s like, “This isn’t that impressive.”
And yeah, you’re right. They’re selling to freelancers and solopreneurs who are basically someone with some talent in a thing that is relatively better than the average person, who’s doing it on their own and trying not to have to go and get a job.
And again, good for them. I bloody love that economy because I think it makes the world go around, and I have all the time in the world for it.
But bragging to people who are going to spend loads of money is missing the point completely.

And this is one of the big blind spots, because that’s a perfect example there of not selling in the right—or rather, it’s a perfect example of not saying the right things to the right people.
Because what a lot of creators do wrong is that they write content for their peers, not for their buyers.
So when I’m in personal branding, trying to get a company that doesn’t do personal branding—they sell microphones—to buy my services, but I talk about personal branding all the time. What I get is what I describe as a false positive.
I get thousands of people going, “Yes! Oh, so right. You’re so right. Personal branding works. It’s all about personal branding at the end of the day.”
And it’s like, yeah—they’re all personal brand gurus doing the same thing. So we’re all agreeing with each other, and it feels like we’re getting somewhere.
Meanwhile, the person who I’m actually selling to runs the microphone company. He’s like, “Uh, I don’t know what that has to do with me.”
No one gives a shit about personal branding. They give a shit about the outcome that personal branding gets them.
Yeah.
It would be like a mechanic bragging about air compressors and loads of mechanics going, “Oh yeah, I love air compressors. They really make the world go around. More air compressors!”
Meanwhile, me, who has a flat tire, going, “I don’t know anything about air compressors. It’s not for me.”
So I’m not keen on consuming that content. I’m not in orbit around that influencer or content creator who’s a mechanic.
But what’s interesting is that if they’d only speak about the outcome of quickly and efficiently fixing my tire, I’d be all over them.
They happen to have an air compressor, which is their tool to fix my tire, but I couldn’t care less. I don’t care. I just want a tire that’s inflated.
And I know that people hearing this—because every time I say it, it’ll be the same every time—people hear this and they’re like, “Huh, I’ve been totally speaking to the wrong set of people.”
But because I get applause for it, I feel like I’m doing it right.
But you’ve got to understand what “right” is.
Right is either engineered perception of popularity and people who do what I do saying, “Yay, right!”
Or it’s people going, “Do you know what? I saw what you said, Sabrina. Actually, I’d be really interested to speak a bit more.”
Now we’ve got leads, and now we’ve got some sales out of it.
So I’m so glad you talked about talking to the right audience because it’s quite interesting.
I’ve been in the agency world for a long time. I am my own agency. And the kind of advice you’re given in agency world is that you should mingle with other agency owners.
And like you’re saying, it’s about talking to your peers.
Everyone just basically writes content for other agency owners, and they attract agency-owner networking events with other agency owners.
I was like, “Wait a minute, but I want customers.”
Sure, I’m going to maybe get some outsourcing or whatever—partnerships, as people say—but at the end of the day, I want to be known for what we do.
So I was like, I don’t want to be known in agency world.

I want to be known by my customers as doing good work.
So I was like, “I’m going to start doing events for customers.”
And everyone thought I was mad. They thought I’d gone rogue.
I was like, “This is such a better way to do it—talk directly to your customers, not to your peers.”
So my past in corporate was selling internet advertising—online advertising and events and stuff—but mostly online advertising to proper corporate businesses.
And then, of course, many times there’d be an agency involved.
I remember I did a deal with Vodafone in the mid-2000s, and that was through their agency.
And what you find is there are a lot of agencies who will get the work and then kick elements of the work downstream to another agency. Essentially, they subcontract some of it because they’re like:
“Okay, we’ve got this job. We’re the hero agency that won the big deal with Microsoft. We get 200 grand for this campaign this month, but part of it is graphics, and we could outsource it to this company because I’m pals with them and I play golf with them.”
And what you find is there is a lot of agency selling to agency and being pals with agencies because they want little slices. They’re nibbling at the pie.
What you’ve done—I love it. I respect it so much.
Because you’re like, “But if I just go direct to source, then all that money is mine.”
“Yeah, that’s the thing.”
And what I was doing with it—I love that I went through the process of being an employee for ten years because I learned more than I could ever learn in that amount of time on someone else’s money.
But the problem with being a salesperson in a business is that you do all that work. You prospect, you find the person, you build a relationship, and then at the end of the deal, the company you work for is like:
“Well done. Here’s your little bit of commission. Thanks for all the work.”
And I was like, “That’s not good enough.”
Which was one of the contributors to me starting my own thing.
But jumping over what is actually relatively much easier—just interacting and networking with other agencies to get a slice of their pie—and instead doing it direct is hard.
Because you have to be not just able to deliver anymore. You have to be the one they believe in.
And doing that is tough in a world where, of course, there are a lot of agencies directly working with the end customer, but there are also a lot of behemoths that will just steamroll you.
So we’re right back again at this question of:
“Why would they buy from you?”
And it’s like, they buy from you because you bothered to go deep in your interactions with them, and they like Sabrina more than someone else.
So that’s how you get the biggest slice of the pie.
But it requires boldness, and that’s crucial.
“So how do all these people out there now, who are consuming all this content about personal branding—because let’s face it, so many people out there are just like, ‘I must create content. I must write LinkedIn every single day. I must do this. I must do that’—and they’re doing it, and I know there are so many people who are doing it every single day and, let’s face it, they all look like they’re crushing it on LinkedIn but are so-called broke, right, as you got that message.
How do people go from that to actually really selling and converting, which is what you said you help with?
How do people transition and actually start making money?”
“It’s hard because you basically have to unprogram yourself.
And if you’re in that zone, it’s painful.
Because you have to start to live with FOMO first.
And that FOMO takes the form of:
‘I’m now not going to be on LinkedIn for the next hour when otherwise I would be.’
I know in my head there’s the chimp brain saying:
‘But right now, those people who are really popular are having a conversation. They’re all having banter. The thread’s long in the comments, and I’m not in there posting my GIF and being popular.’
But if I could deploy that time instead speaking to some people who are actually looking at me on LinkedIn…
Just click on your profile. Click on ‘Who viewed my profile’ and have a look through.
And if no one interesting is looking at your profile, your content sucks, or your network sucks. You’re not adding the right people. You’re not spending time in the right places.
So you don’t go cold turkey.
But what you do is say:
‘I will now put some of my time into individual one-on-one interactions.’
Because conversations with individuals either:
A) End up with an amazing new connection who is now thinking fondly of you—and guess whose content they see tomorrow? And they will support that. And maybe eight months downstream they’ll start engaging with you to the point where they’re like, ‘You know what? Now’s the time. We’ll buy something.’
Which happens all the time.
Or:
B) You end up on a call, and that’s potentially a deal.
The moment you realize that you need to get off the merry-go-round and actually start interacting with people…
And it’s not selling at them.
And sliding into the DMs sounds cringe as well.
“Exactly.”
People need to understand it’s not that.
It’s not:
‘Here’s the agenda. You need this.’
It is:
Help without agenda.
Genuinely without agenda.
But first, you have to connect as a human does.

Because helping comes first.
So if I don’t know you, but you’ve looked at my profile because you like my posts, if I was to say:
“Sabrina, thanks for looking at my post. Here’s a link to my webinar. I know you’ll find it valuable.”
Or if I ask something stupid like:
“What kind of challenges have you got in your business?”
It’s none of my business asking that. We’re not there yet.
So step one is just: be reasonable.
“How are you?”
The first thing we said to each other was like, “Hi.”
Then we had a hug and, “Oh, it’s so nice to see you.”
Be normal is something I say a lot.
But that’s so crucial. Just do the thing you’d probably do if you met them for the very first time.
Then you can talk about the thing they did.
“You looked at my profile. Did you see anything useful?”
Asking reasonable questions like that.
Because it’s reasonable, it’ll often be very welcome.
Pretty much always they’ll be like:
“What a good question.”
Or:
“I don’t know. I just looked and that was it.”
But at least we’ve got a conversation.
You kill it dead the moment you start a conversation with value that’s not yet earned.
So what we need to do is just get into conversation the way you would chat to someone for the first time.
And now we can spend some time asking essentially what or why-based questions.
“What made you do that?”
Or:
“Why do you feel that’s the case?”
And it’s just so simple.
If someone is showing interest—not in the form of:
“Oh my God, I think I might need to buy your thing.”
Because that’s not going to happen every day.
They’re showing interest in the form of:
* They’re into the conversation.
* They’re writing paragraphs.
* They’re giving detail.
* They’re choosing not to do their work and engage with you instead.
That’s a big display of interest in you.
So your next step—this is crucial, this help-without-agenda step—is:
“Why don’t we have a call? Wouldn’t that be nice?”
Yeah.
And then you get on a call and you’re like:
“Do you know the thing you were saying in the chat?”
Because it’s much better than DMs back and forth.
“Why aren’t we connecting properly?”
“The thing you said in the DMs is really interesting. There are a couple of things I’ve found that can really help.”
And here they are.
And if it all ended there, you’ve got a great connection.
They think highly of you.
They might tell other people.
Some of them are like:
“Oh my God, can I write you a recommendation?”
You sometimes have that.
But worst case, you’re there.
And I know it’s small quantities, but that is worth way more than a hundred of the wrong people just looking at you.
But what might happen is they say:
“Oh man, I had no idea I could do it that way. I didn’t even know about that suggestion, Sabrina.”
At which point, you’ve totally emotionally earned the right to now give them value and say:
“Well, why aren’t we working together?”
“Well… that’s what I do. We can explore how I can help if you’d like.”
Yeah.
“I mean, I love this because do you know what’s weird?
I get inquiries every single day.
I wrote this the other day—I get inquiries every single day, which is amazing to have this inbound thing.

“Obviously not everyone’s going to be the right person, but most of them… and it’s nice.
I was on a call with someone the other day and they were like:
‘You came so highly recommended by my friend X.’
And I’m thinking, ‘I have no idea who that person is.’
I felt really bad, and I was researching through all my DMs and all my emails. I was like, ‘I still have no idea who this person is.’
And half the time this happens.
I’m like, ‘Wait, I’m getting really highly recommended by someone I don’t even know.’
So it shows you that you’re touching people, that you’ve helped in some way or whatever.
And then sometimes I’ve been recommended by people where I had a quick DM conversation with them or met them briefly at an event, and they still recommended me highly because I was just helpful.
I didn’t follow up with anything crazy or try to sell to them.
I just think if you’re nice to people, people respect that.”
“That is so profound.
And people who don’t realize it—that is so profound.
Because what it represents is a truth that you don’t realize, or at least realize last.
That in the often hundreds of people who have looked at you, there will be a tiny group of people for whom you are perfect.
You are their hero.
And you just said it the right way.
And that’s why we can exist in a sea of people doing the same thing.
But the way we say it, someone thinks:
‘Oh, I love how you put it that way.’
And now we’re back at: *you choose you.*
You either regurgitate and be like everyone else, or you say it your way because you have an opinion.
And people are like:
‘Yes. Thank you.’
It’s so crucial.
I can’t overstate it.
It’s very profound, that point.
It’s so crucial that people understand that what they believe is possibly just something they know, but for some person it might be a major change in trajectory.
It might be earth-shattering.
Honestly, I’ve had people say things like:
‘I know it sounds crazy now, but I never even considered getting into the DMs with people who interacted with me.’
And I’m like:
‘What?’
But it’s obviously normal for me.
That doesn’t mean it’s normal for them.
You’ve just got to remember that.
And I think this is the beautiful way of putting it:
There’s someone out there literally right now—even if this audience is listening to this podcast now—who is genuinely struggling with the problem you can solve.
If they don’t interact with you at some point, then we’ve got some real misery there.
They’ve got problems.
They’re going to lose sleep over it.
And if you dare to give your opinion, that person might see you.
And if they see you, you can genuinely change their life.
And eventually, if you work with enough customers, you get some who are like:
‘I can’t tell you how much this changed things. If I hadn’t met you, I would not be here.’
It’s like a sliding doors moment.
It’s made such a difference.
And it’s almost borderline immoral not to share your opinion on something because that’s the outcome.
And I’m not talking about thousands of people.
I’m talking about just a handful.
But that’s typically all you need to get going.
If ever there was a manifesto to speak your opinion on something, it’s that.
It’s so profound what you’re saying.
And you’ve just got to remember that there’s someone out there who is probably lurking and being very quiet about it, but who is nodding intently because you’re saying exactly the right thing to them.”
“And I think you’ve just said so many things there about the numbers.
It goes back to the very first points we were talking about.
Because in what you’ve just said, it doesn’t have to be many people.
But you also mentioned something a moment ago about how you have a conversation and then eight months later it turns into something more.
And I think that’s the problem.
People are looking for this instant, quick solution.
They don’t realize that it takes time to build up a relationship and the trust before you give your money away.
And I think what people aren’t doing is putting themselves in that situation as well.
Like you said, that thing about offering value.
I get so many people on LinkedIn who immediately go:
‘Oh, I did this thing. I thought you’d like it.’
I’m like:
‘Why would I like it? I don’t even know who you are. I don’t know what this has to do with me.’
And I just don’t need another piece of advice that’s unwelcomed right now.
That’s the last thing I want.”
“Because the thing is, it’s never the advice.
The advice might be brilliant.
But you are not in an emotional state where you want it yet.
So you don’t.
It’s weird, but emotionally our guard is up.
We don’t want to like it until we want to like it.
So until that stage, it’s none of our business.
We can’t be giving people value.
That’s why it’s really healthy to have a vibe that is unentitled.
Every day we should be recalibrating back down to zero.
We have to earn every view of that post.
We have to really make sure we’re clear with ourselves that we need to say something useful rather than assume people will just fall all over it.
And what you just described is a perfect example of selling the way we want to sell, which is:
‘Here’s a thing.’
And then hoping they’ll jump.
You tend to find people getting really miserable because they’re doing that at scale.
They’re like:
‘Look, I’ve gone through all these courses. I’ve spoken to these lead-gen gurus. I’m doing 50 DMs a day, Rich.’
And it’s like:
‘How are you getting literally nothing?’
Because they’re just leading too early.
They’re not doing something wrong.
It’s just wrong in terms of the position in the process.
There’s nothing wrong with value.
But not at the start.
You have to earn it.
Which is about recognizing that before someone is the job title they are, they are a human.
And that human is going to want to protect their time and be a little unsure of the unknown.
So you have to build some trust.
And it’s about touchpoints.
You know, there are all these hilarious things like:
‘It takes seven touchpoints to get someone to buy from you.’
No, it doesn’t.
It takes however many it takes.
Sometimes I’ve had people say:
‘I’ve been following you for a year, Rich.’
I’m like:
‘You would know.’
They’ve never spoken.
I’ve had that all the time.
People come up to me and go:
‘I love all your content on LinkedIn.’
And I’m like:
‘You’ve never interacted once with my posts.’
So you don’t know who you’re talking to.
And I find that really the majority of deals, when you actually get results, come from lurkers.”
“Yes.
They’re not the people going:
‘Oh my God, I’ve got to write a comment.’
Those are usually your friends, peers, and supporters, which is great.
You need them too.”
“Absolutely.
Because that helps distribute it to the lurkers.
That’s the way to look at it.
And don’t underestimate them.”
“Not at all.
Now I need to ask you about your community because you’ve got a new community, and I feel like you’ve just said so many amazing things in this podcast.
I love that you’re all about selling and actually getting results.
So tell me more about the community, who it’s for, and how people join.”
I’m really pleased you asked. Thank you.

So, I’m very, very aware that if I’m going to launch a product, I’ve got to do it right.
My last flagship product was my LinkedIn Client Accelerator, which was four and a bit years ago.
So I’m not just chucking out new products. I’ve got lower-level ones, but for the next big flagship thing, I was like:
‘It needs to be done right.’
It’s called **The Art of Sell**.
And it’s not LinkedIn-focused. Not because I’m not a LinkedIn guy, but it’s not LinkedIn-focused and it’s not personal-brand-focused.
It’s all things selling.
And it’s funny because people are like:
‘Well, is it like LinkedIn?’
And I’m saying:
‘No. All things selling.’
Because I think selling has a bad reputation, and selling needs to be fixed.
So it’s about education in the elegance of selling, so you don’t have to become what is classically an awful salesperson.
You learn the things that help you so you can stay in your area of genius.
Now, the way I’ve done this is there are two crucial components.
One: humility on my part.
I can’t know everything about all areas of sales.
I’d like to think I’ve done well over 21 years, but I can’t know it all.
And I think there’s a much more exciting proposition when we get legends in instead.
So every single week we have a masterclass.
And I remember when I started thinking about this, I was like:
‘Well, what do most communities do?’
Because I can’t do that. I need to be better. Otherwise it’s not going to be exciting.
Most communities have a host or community leader—that would be me—and then they have all their cute friends from Instagram or LinkedIn, and they’re all gurus and heroes.
That can be really useful.
If I was going to do a LinkedIn community, I’d get loads of LinkedIn legends on it.
But this is about selling.
So I thought:
‘What would the best look like?’
And what I’ve done—it’s been really hard—is every single Thursday we have a masterclass for the group from someone who is crazy good.
Last night we had a guy who is one of the judges of the Emmys and has worked with major creative agencies for more than 20 years.
He casually dropped in:
‘One of my clients was Discovery.’
The week before that, we had someone who was head of an entire region for Louis Vuitton and, before that, led luxury partnerships at Airbnb.
The week before that, we had someone who was Sales and Marketing Director for Hard Rock International. It’s almost a six-billion-dollar business.
I’ve got the sales trainer from Ascenta.
I’ve got someone who works in enterprise sales.
All walks of life.
Not:
‘Hey, I’m a marketing bro who made six figures.’
These are people at the very top.
It’s really hard getting them, but when you do, the quality cannot be denied.
And selfishly, Sabrina, I get to sit there every Thursday with a notepad and learn myself.
I do masterclasses too.
Each month I’ll do something really tactical because I love that world, and that seems to work well.
So that’s one side.
The other side is that it is a community in the true sense of the word.
My other thing is a membership.
With a membership, you learn a thing and then off you go.
Whereas this is an actual community.
So I’ve made hires rather than doing it all from my laptop in my mum’s house.
I’ve hired four people to help, including community heads.
And the focus is making sure the experience is a good one for the members.
Not just the masterclasses, but making sure they feel heard.
You asked, so I’ll give you the detail.
When I started this in the summer, I spent a load of money and time paying hosts of communities—big communities—for their time.
Not picking their brains for free.
Respecting them and saying:
‘Here’s a thousand quid. Can I have an hour to ask questions?’
And they were incredibly generous.
I also spoke to community managers and community leads.
Then I spoke to loads of members.
I used my posts not to become a guru but to conduct market research through polls and conversations.
And what was interesting was how many people stepped forward and shared things like:
‘I just want to be heard.’
‘I don’t want to be one member of many.’
‘And if I am, I’d better be heard.’
People also said:
‘I don’t want fluff.’
So we learned so much.
And I love that we built it this way.
But what’s crucial is being mindful that people can become information-based rather than action-based.
You can focus on learning all the time and never get any work done.
So it’s about action.
The brief for the masterclasses is:
‘Make it tactical so people can go and do it.’
One of the biggest things that came out of building The Art of Sell was:
Don’t have too many things going on.
Because people think more value equals higher value.
But it doesn’t.
If someone comes in and thinks:
‘Oh my God, there’s an event every day. There are all these sections in the platform. There’s so much going on. I have to learn all this stuff.’
That creates overwhelm.
And now they’re not doing any work.
So we have one masterclass a week.
Maybe two or three seminars a month.
That’s it.
Everything else is support.
The point is:
Learn the stuff that’s useful now.
Then get on with your work.
Because otherwise, seriously, you can’t help your clients if you’re learning all the time.”
“Exactly.
If you’re learning all the time, what the hell are you doing?
You should be learning only what you need.”
“Exactly.
I call it positive procrastination.
You’re doing things that feel relevant, but really it’s evasion.
It’s avoiding the work.
Get on with your work.
But come here and learn things that are genuinely useful rather than consuming a bloated amount of value that is mostly fluff.
So I’m incredibly proud of it.
We’ve had our first month.
Only 25 people per month are allowed in.
The waiting list is already in the hundreds, which is lovely.
I’m so excited.
Thank you for letting me talk about it.
The idea is that every month we add more people.
We’re booking more and more speakers.
Everyone has been so giving and so kind.
I’d like to think it’s because I’ve been a decent enough guy over the years that people are willing to help.
Giving people an understanding of sales that doesn’t give them the ick is really important to me.
That’s why we’re here.”
“So who is it for?”
“Who is it for?
I’m going for the low-hanging fruit first.
The people who tend to engage with my content: consultants, coaches, solopreneurs, people who find me on LinkedIn.
That’s populated most of the waiting list.
But there’s no reason it can’t help anyone who has to transact in some way.
Salespeople in any form.
A solopreneur has to be a salesperson.
A corporate-employed salesperson is selling too.
But what’s interesting is it’s sales in the broader sense.
Yes, it’s transactional selling.
But it’s also about understanding communication more deeply.
Understanding mindset, performance, and how to carry yourself.
Someone who works internally and needs to sell an idea across departments within a company—that’s sales too.
It’s for them as well.
I’m just starting with the obvious audience because they’re already in front of me.
But I hope it becomes much bigger than me.
It’s not the Richard Moore Show.
It’s about all things sales.
I just want people to have a good taste in their mouth when they think about selling.
So we’ve got quite a big brief, which is helping people view selling differently.

“I love it, and I think it’s great.
And I want to end on some advice from you because I feel like you’ve said so many great things.
But I feel like there’s such bad advice on LinkedIn at the moment. There’s so much of it. So much bullshit.
That’s actually why I’ve got a separate podcast called *Sniffing Out the Bullshit*. It’s just me by myself ranting.”
“Oh, that’s healthy.”
“I know. It actually does feel good.
I had to change it halfway through and make it less ranty and put more science into it because I felt like it was getting a bit angry.
But there’s just so much bullshit out there.
And I’d like to pick out the things that are really great.
So I’d love to end on this:
You spend a lot of time on LinkedIn. You see all the stuff people are doing wrong. You’ve filtered out your feed now, so you’re seeing good stuff.
Where would you say people are going wrong?
For those who want to make more money—not become bigger on LinkedIn, but actually make more money—what are the top things they should be changing right now?”
“Yeah.
So I’m going to start with something important.
I hope people have taken everything that’s been said today in the right way.
I have no beef with anyone unless they’re full of bullshit.”
“Exactly.”
“And if they are, then absolutely we need to recognize it.
Not everyone has noble intentions.
What’s crucial first is to say to ourselves:
There are a lot of people trying to make a buck out of us.
Job number one is recognizing that.
Even though it all looks rosy, we need to realize that many of the posts we consume—and even the products we buy, courses, communities, whatever—require us to ask:
**Am I buying the hype or am I buying the thing I actually need?**
My daughters hate this because they’re nine and twelve and they’re at that age where every advert works.
They’re like:
‘I want that thing.’
And I’m like:
‘Are you buying the hype or the actual thing?’
When you’re a grown-up and ask yourself that question, sometimes you realize:
‘I’m completely falling for the hype.’
And look, I do it too.
It’s an easy sell a lot of the time.
But when you become conscious of it, before you buy something—or even before you consume a piece of content—you start asking:
‘Is this hype and hyperbole?’
Because there’s no easy way.
There aren’t really hacks.
If someone appears to have all the answers and some magical shortcut, it’s incredibly unlikely they’ve suddenly discovered a secret nobody else knows.
Most of the time they’re hyping you up because attention pays.
So don’t become cynical.
Just become aware.
That’s the first thing.
The second thing is this:
If you want client acquisition and you want to do it in a way that’s fulfilling—not just for them but for you—and you want customers who stay, renew, refer, and genuinely love working with you, then you have to earn that at the front end.
Which means spending time with individuals.
You have to show that you genuinely care.
And if you don’t actually care about outcomes for the prospect, you need to take a long hard look at why you’re doing any of this.
Because it’s consistently true that people who only want money often end up without much money because they’re so focused on themselves.
Or if they do make money, they’re often not fulfilled by it.
If you want impact, if you want legacy, if you want to feel like you’ve done something worthwhile, then do good work.
It starts with genuinely giving a shit.
I care how someone does.
And if I’ve sold someone something and they’re struggling, I take that personally in the right way.
I’ll jump on a call.
I’ll help.
Give first.
Without agenda.
If it turns into a sale, great.
But don’t bait and switch.
That’s short-term thinking.
And every long-term cliché is a cliché because it’s true.
Play long-term games.
Be a good person.
The dividends show up later.
So:
* Don’t buy the hype.
* Spend time one-to-one with people.
* Actually care.
And then there are a few questions you should ask yourself every day.
The first one is:
**Where is my next deal coming from?**
A shocking number of people never ask themselves that question.
They only ask it when they suddenly need money.
Then they start wondering how last night’s post performed.
That’s not my first thought.
My first thought is:
‘Where is my next deal coming from?’
That’s not toxic.
It’s not mercenary.
It’s business.
A business exists to make sales.
So where is the next one coming from?
The second question is:
**What conversations am I starting today?**
Not:
‘Can I go viral?’
Not:
‘How did my post perform?’
Not:
‘How many comments did I get?’
Those things are useful, but they’re peripheral.
The real question is:
**Am I having meaningful interactions with people?**
So if you need KPIs, here they are:
* Ask yourself where your next deal is coming from.
* Have three to five meaningful conversations every day.
* Post something that speaks to the symptoms of a problem.
* Make sure it reaches the right people.
* Show them you understand what they’re going through.
That’s pretty much a successful day.
And then the final thing—which is slightly more sales-focused but incredibly healthy—is this:
**Have I scheduled one call today?**
Just one.
It doesn’t have to happen today.
It could be next Tuesday.
But have I booked one?
It might be a catch-up.
It might be a new connection.
This comes from a managing director I worked with years ago in the City.
He used to ask me:
‘Who are you having coffee with this week, Richard?’
I loved that question.
At the time I’d think:
‘Probably nobody.’
And he said:
‘You should have coffee with someone new every week.’
Some of them will be boring.
Some of them you’ll think:
‘Thank God this is only coffee and not dinner.’
But every now and then someone says:
‘You need to meet this person.’
Or:
‘There’s an opportunity you should know about.’
That advice was probably fifteen years ago.
And it completely changed how I think.
Now I do it every week.
You’re basically my coffee today.
And those conversations are powerful.
Sometimes it’s someone who can open doors.
Sometimes it’s a collaboration.
Last night I had a conversation with a major advisor who works with some serious heavyweight businesses.
We swapped decks.
Shared ideas.
The conversation was incredibly valuable.
It’s good for the soul.
And sometimes those conversations become deals.
So if I finish the day having:
* avoided buying into hype,
* met new people,
* had meaningful conversations,
* posted something useful,
* contributed thoughtfully,
* and booked a call,
then I’m golden.
That’s enough.
Because those actions create opportunities.
The hard part is getting off the merry-go-round.
The constant cycle of:
‘What about my likes?’
‘My post didn’t do well.’
‘Maybe I’m not succeeding.’
A post doing well isn’t lots of likes.
A post doing well is someone sending you a message saying:
‘That really resonated with me.’
I remember about eight months ago I felt compelled to send you a DM.
Not to sell anything.
Not to ask for business.
Just to say:

“I loved what you said. That was brilliant.”
And that’s why meaningful interactions matter.
Because ultimately everything reduces down to that.
If we’re going to end up with a deal, that’s what a day looks like.
And if you’re spending twelve hours a day grinding away on LinkedIn, what are you actually doing with your time?
A lot of it is superfluous fluff.
But it’s one of the hardest things to detach yourself from because it feels like the right thing to do.
It’s what the mainstream does.
It’s easy.
It looks like success.
But it’s probably the biggest myth in content marketing:
Looking popular is not the same as being successful.
That’s so crucial.
And if you reduce it down to behavioural science, it all comes back to one thing:
As human beings, we’re impressed by status.
That’s really all it is.”
“I’m so glad you said all that.
Do you know what I’ve felt recently?
LinkedIn feels more and more like high school.
And I was thinking back to high school—or even those American high school movies—and asking:
How often are the most popular kids actually the most successful people later in life?
Usually they’re not.”
“That’s exactly it.
They have their moment.
They have their time.
But it’s often short-lived.
Meanwhile, the people in the shadows are the ones who go on to have the happiest and most fulfilled lives.
They’re often deeply happy inside.
Whereas some of the people who are always chasing popularity are deeply unsatisfied.”
“Well, the people listening to this will know deep down if that’s them.
Or even partly them.
And ultimately it catches up with you.
I’ve met some really interesting people who started there.
They achieved the attention.
They achieved the money.
And then eventually they reach a point where they say:
‘I’m just not happy.’
Even while making good money.
And they’re thinking:
‘I see that person over there making a real impact.’
‘I see that person helping people.’
‘And all I’m really doing is monetizing other people’s frustrations and fears through hype.’
And that’s not very fulfilling.
Ultimately, we have to think about who we become.
I’m going to sound like a grandad now, but imagine a deeply satisfied ninety-year-old version of yourself.
Not just someone who says:
‘I travelled.’
‘I did exciting things.’
Those are great too.
But imagine being ninety and saying:
**‘I genuinely made an impact.’**
‘I contributed.’
‘I helped people.’
‘I built something worthwhile.’
Not:
‘I extracted money from people using manipulation.’
Imagine which path leads to that feeling.
That’s usually my mic-drop moment.
Because sometimes you have to accept that it’s going to take years.
Not weeks.
Years.
Years in the shadows.
Years of doing work that nobody notices.
Years of having conversations that nobody applauds.
The silent, dark years are often the years that create the result.
Anyone with any meaningful success—real success—went through that stage.
My dark years were a decade of cold calling.
A decade.
It was horrible at times.
And even after I left and started my own business, there were more dark years.
Days where success looked like:
‘Six meaningful conversations today.’
Or:
‘Only three conversations today, but one person bought six hundred dollars of consulting.’
That was progress.
That mattered.
It wasn’t fame.
It wasn’t instant success.
It wasn’t viral posts.
It was just:
‘I’m doing good work and moving forward.’
And the truth is that doing it the right way is the only route.
Everybody knows that deep down.
People just want to believe there’s a shortcut.
Eventually you realize there isn’t.
And it’s not resignation.
It’s acceptance.
You realize that the right way is simply the right way.
You have to do the work.
I love that.
And I think that’s the perfect note to end on.
Because it’s no bullshit.
It’s simple:
Do things properly.
Thank you so much for everything today.
It’s been wonderful.
Thank you.
I love your energy.
I’ve loved this conversation.
Thank you so much.
It’s been brilliant.
[Music]