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Here’s why I believe sending InMails is so effective:
- Anyone who works for a company is swamped with e-mails at work. But she isn’t swamped with personal e-mails. And that’s the email address I see most people use. Why? Because a job is temporary, but LinkedIn and the contacts you make there last forever. You want your LinkedIn stuff to follow you from place to place—it’s about you, not about your company. Also, many LinkedIn users are always looking for their next opportunity—and don’t want that opportunity to come through on their work email servers. So, you’re standing out in two important ways: You’re standing out because you’re in their personal email inboxes, and you’re standing out because receiving an InMail is still somewhat novel. They’re curious how it works. Curiosity works in our favor.
- InMail protects the recipient’s email address. The recipient can read the email and respond—“yes, interested,” or “no, not interested”—without ever revealing her email address. This makes people feel safe and comfortable, which makes them more likely to engage with you.
- As a social networking community, LinkedIn isn’t quite as buttoned down as other forms of communication. You can send a quick note with a call to action, without getting into the entire sales pitch. It’s a good way to let prospects self-qualify. They can easily check you out—profile, recommendations, contacts, website—before agreeing to move forward. It gives them control—a very good thing.
- It’s very unlikely your prospect is getting bombarded with LinkedIn mails from spammers and others trying to “sell” her something. For $50 a month, you only get to send out 10 InMails. You get those InMails credited back to your account if the person doesn’t reply–but it’s not enough to make it worth a professional salesperson’s time. As a solo consultant, you don’t need to send out more than 10 InMails a month, because you can only handle so many new clients. You’re not selling stuff—you’re developing a relationship. I got a 41% positive response rate—which is better than any other form of marketing I know. It could be the industry or the timing, but whatever it was, I’m positive no other tool could have brought these kinds of results. I don’t know what results you’ll get—but whatever they are, they’ll be better than cold calling or direct mail.
Step 1: Identify your target market. The key is to be able to say you specialize in their area, that you know their industry; to sound like you’re one of a kind.
Example: Vice President of Marketing of a Growing Clean Tech Company
Step 2: Search for various combinations of keywords around the person you’re trying to reach and the industry she’s in.
Step 3: Sort the results by “in your network” and “outside your network.” Contact the “in your network” people first, and copy and paste the URLs into a doc so you don’t have to keep searching to rediscover them. You can only contact 10 people at a time, but if you come back the next month, you’ll have those URLs ready.
Step 4: Click on their profiles and check their company website to verify they’re the right kind of client for you.
Step 5: Check their contact preferences. If “consulting offers,” “new ventures,” “job inquiries,” or “business deals” are listed, it’s okay to proceed. If not, do not send an InMail, no matter how badly you want to. For one, it’s bad karma. And for another, they could lower your InMail rating—a 5-star rating displayed to everyone you contact. If you want to get in touch with this person, you’ll need to either be introduced, make a cold call, or send a personalized letter in the mail.
Step 6: All systems go. Send InMail. Here’s the one I used, with minor tweaks depending on the individual:
Hi Alan,
I’m Kelly Parkinson, my company is Copylicious, and we specialize in working with green tech companies to capture their prospects’ attention. My knack is translating fancy concepts into clear, accessible stories. I’ve written for [company], [company], [company]. I know how tough it can be to find a copywriter who ‘gets’ the green tech industry. I’m that girl!I’d very much like to speak with you about your marketing ROI. I only need about 10 minutes or so. Could you let me know when might be a good time to speak?
Look forward to hearing from you!
Kelly Parkinson
415-335-1300http://copylicious.com
But you don’t want to use my exact InMail. So, let’s deconstruct it into a template:
Dear [Name],
I’m [your name], my company is [your company], and we specialize in [helping (x) struggling with a problem; or accomplish a result]. [A sentence on how you help them do this.] [A sentence on who your clients are—ideally, these clients should be in their industry.] [Why you’re the right person to help them.][Call to action: what would you like to do, what will the topic be, when would you like to them to do this. Ask them an open-ended question.]
[Sign off]
[your name]
[LinkedIn lists your contact information automatically, so you don’t need to put it here.]
I’d love to hear back from you if you try this approach—please comment here with your success stories or questions!
Kelly, A great article! Thanks for sharing your methodology and results. David
Kelly, Great how-to article. I never knew about InMail. I’m going to pass it on to our new business director. Thanks. – Sean
Wow! How generous of you to share the steps and the template. I appreciate that.
I also appreciate the info about this product. I’ve heard of it but not about it. Thanks for filling in that gap.
Hi Loraleigh — Good luck, and please let me know how it works out!
Great info, thanks so much for sharing!
I’m been irritated by the hawking on LinkedIn for their upgrade and inMail because I never saw it as a marketing tool (I use it for other business reasons), so I see what it could be… even for a confidential service (since I can’t ask for testimonials) — this is very helpful — hats off to you Kelly ~ !
Thanks for these tips, Kelly. I’m considering how I might use your Linked-In techniques for my own business: http://www.rosiegoa.etsy.com. Any specific feedback welcome!
Oh. My. Goodness. I’ve never even thought of this! You’re brilliant! Seriously. I’ll have to try it!!!
Thanks so much for the advice.
*smiles*
Michele
Hello there, I’ve just started up a blog website and I’ve started making somewhat varied content. Do you mind if I blog about this article? I will of course give you and this post due acknowledgment.
Thank you so much for sharing this. It’s great advice. I just have one question: What subject line do you use? I struggle with this, as I know it’s key to getting people to open the message and not immediately hit delete.
Thank you for your help!
Hi Marla,
I used “Should we be talking?”
I don’t think I’d use it today because my style has changed, but it seemed to do the trick back 3 years ago.
(Or, you could hire me to come up with something just for you!)
Kelly
Hi there, thanks for this article. A quick question: isn’t LinkedIn just for networking? I’m told that it is a networking site and that people don’t appreciate being contacted regarding someone’s services, etc. They see it as soliciting.
Thanks,
Gaszton
Hi Gaszton,
Great question. If you look at the person’s profile whom you’re considering contacting, and scroll down to the bottom, it lists their “contact preferences.” As long as they’re open to “consulting inquiries,” you’re in the clear. If they’re not open to consulting inquiries, then yes, I would not recommend contacting them.
Hope this helps!
Kelly
Thanks Kelly! That was another question I had: what category to choose? Is “consulting offers” the most appropriate?
Gaszton
Yes, I’d go with consulting inquiry.
Thanks much!
Your original InMail campaign went out in 2008 or even earlier, going by the date on this blog entry. Given how quickly things change in the web and social media space, do you believe sending InMails is still a viable technique for generating business?
Caitlin, if I was just starting out and wanted to work with companies, I’d definitely use InMails. You have nothing to lose, since it gets refunded if they ignore you. I’d also go deeper into LinkedIn and be an active Groups participant. And I’d get to know marketing consultants on Twitter. Marketing consultants ended up becoming my bread and butter for a while, although I met most of them at in-person networking functions. LinkedIn is just one piece of all of the marketing pie. Not sure I’d take the same approach now, but I’m going after different audiences now, so it all depends on who you want to write for.
Thank you! I also wanted to know if the recipient of the Inmail can see the sender’s entire profile or not?
[...] to LinkedIn Group members. Cannot add comment at this time. Sohail Menon http://www.copylicious.com/2008/…Figures and stats on linkedin seem few and far between. The article above had the closest thing I [...]
Ok, I must be cursed.
I sent 9 InMails out to relevant contactees. I write copy and my target is marketing departments of enterprise and B2B software companies. The contactees were marketing executives and directors. NOT ONE InMail was opened and read. All expired with “In Progress” status. Of course, I got the credits back, but … not one out of nine got read?
I did everything you said. It seems to me that I’d better start hitting the phones.
A follow up on what could be happening would be appreciated.
Sounds like your target people are already getting lots of InMails. My audience at the time was not heavily exposed to copywriters or marketing types, so I may have fared better than someone at, say, an enterprise company. Following up by phone is an option. Consider having a white paper or some other guide to offer them, instead of a conversation alone. Read anything by Jill Konrath. http://www.sellingtobigcompanies.com/ You’re targeting big companies, and so is everyone else. The process I used to target small companies probably won’t be enough.
At $50 for only 10 e-mails, I’ll pass.
It’s great you got 6 clients from so few e-mails (if you are telling the truth, that is), but that is rare.
It’s more like getting 1 client out of every 50-100 (if not over 100) e-mails sent.
At $50 for every 10 e-mails…well, those dollars add up.
And, on top of that, it’s a pretty safe bet that over half do not want e-mails, even at LinkedIn.
Not trying to sound negative here…just trying to keep it real.
James, if I was going to do this all over again, I’d spend much more than $10 on each email. This is why email is so ineffective. People send them out like candy, instead of spending time researching each company and making sure it feels like there’s a fit. In addition to the $10, I’d spend some time digging into the businesses of all the people I wanted to reach, so I could make my message as relevant as possible. The reason this campaign succeeded in 2007 was because it was relevant and specific. If I was going to do it again, I’d have to go even deeper–because you’re right, people are even less receptive now than they were before.
[...] receive a response and your message is neither accepted nor rejected, you get your $10 back. When I used InMails to promote my business in lieu of cold-calling in 2008, LinkedIn claimed its InMails were 10 times more effective than cold calls. In my experience, this [...]
[...] a recruiter, for example, you may need to work harder. I’ve written about LinkedIn here and here and also here. I also highly recommend the Mixergy courses on LinkedIn. Start with this one [...]
[...] When copywriter Kelly Parkinson experimented with InMails, she got a 41% response rate, and six new clients. You can read more about how she did that (including an InMail template) here. [...]
[...] When copywriter Kelly Parkinson experimented with InMails, she got a 41% response rate, and six new clients. You can read more about how she did that (including an InMail template) here. [...]
You also have to consider that this was over 4 years ago at this point.
I’d be curious about the response rate now.
Me, too, Aaron! I wrote a follow-up post on this here: http://www.copylicious.com/2012/06/do-linkedin-inmails-really-work/
[...] When copywriter Kelly Parkinson experimented with InMails, she got a 41% response rate, and six new clients. You can read more about how she did that (including an InMail template) here. [...]
[...] When copywriter Kelly Parkinson experimented with InMails, she got a 41% response rate, and six new clients. You can read more about how she did that (including an InMail template) here. [...]
[...] a 41% response rate by using LinkedIn InMails instead of cold [...]