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Social Media Marketing Podcast
Driving Qualified Leads With LinkedIn Content: A Proven Formula
00:45:41
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- [00:01]
A
Hey, it's Michael Stelzner here. After running Social Media marketing world for 12 years, I've noticed something fascinating about the marketers who attend. They usually fall into two camps. Camp number one is those who show up because they have to. Their results are declining. They're scrambling to catch up. And camp number two is those who show up because they want to. They're already achieving a level of success, but they know that change is coming and they want to go so much further. Both learn valuable insights, but their outcomes are completely different. As Emily Ray Shutti said, I came away with a million ideas and new creative ways to approach my work. My business has since doubled in size and revenue. The AI revolution is here. Instagram algorithms keep shifting. Facebook's ad costs keep rising, and the list goes on and on and on. What type of marketer will you be in 2026? Join thousands of marketers at Social Media Marketing World 2026 this April in Anaheim, California. Save big when you register today at Social MediaMarketingWorld.info welcome to the Social Media Marketing Podcast, helping you navigate the social media jungle. And now, here is your host, Michael Stelzner. Hello, hello, hello. Thank you so much for joining me for the Social Media Marketing podcast brought to you by Social Media Examiner. I'm your host, Michael Stelzner, and this is the podcast for marketers and business owners who want more exposure, more leads, and more sales. Have you been using LinkedIn to try to generate qualified leads and for whatever reason, it's just not working for you? Well, today's guest is going to unravel a strategy that she has never talked about publicly before. And if you pay very close attention, you are going to get much more qualified prospects and leads contacting you. Her name is Mandy McEwen. And also, if you are new to this podcast episode, be sure to follow this show because we've got some great content coming your way. Let's now transition over to my interview with Mandy, helping you to simplify your social safari. Here is this week's expert guide. Today, I'm very excited to be joined by Mandy McKeown. If you don't know who Mandy is, she is a LinkedIn expert and founder of Luminetics, a LinkedIn training company that helps sales and marketing teams drive visibility and revenue. Her podcast is your future business. Mandy, welcome back to the show. How you doing today?
- [02:31]
B
I'm good. Thanks for having me, Mike.
- [02:32]
A
I'm super excited that Mandy is going to be joining me today. We're going to explore how to use LinkedIn to generate qualified leads. Now Mandy, we have a lot of people listening to this show that are using all sorts of other platforms.
- [02:44]
B
Perfect.
- [02:45]
A
Perhaps they're all over Instagram or TikTok or YouTube or Facebook or LinkedIn to a lesser extent. But why should marketers use LinkedIn to attract quality leads? Said another way, if they really pay attention to what we're going to talk about today, what is the upside? What's the possibilities that they could unlock?
- [03:02]
B
LinkedIn is really the only social media network that is networking first, right? So it literally is for building relationships and over the years obviously has evolved. I was here, I don't know, a while ago talking to you about it a few years ago and it's changed a lot since then. But it's the easiest way to start win win relationships when it comes to revenue driving activities. So you have Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, very, very content heavy and less on the relationship building side. What we're talking about today is still content with LinkedIn. But the beauty of LinkedIn is when you have strategic content, it starts conversations a lot faster and easier than other social media networks because it literally is for business professionals to network and build relationships. So it has the best of both worlds with building your personal brand with content and also building relationships really quickly.
- [04:02]
A
Now when we were prepping for this, you said you had a story you wanted to share about how this led to some big opportunities for you. Do you want to share that story, your 10k story?
- [04:10]
B
Yeah, for sure. So I have been posting on LinkedIn for over a decade now. Before I even created Luminics, I had my agency, Mongrel Marketing, I have my agency still. This is not new territory for me. But we have getting more strategic over the years with the types of posts that we are creating. And I'm always testing out new formats and new structures of post, et cetera. So we started switching things up and focused more on problem solution type posts recently. And it's funny because when you do that, it's not like that viral worthy type of content. So you don't get as much engagement, which is kind of annoying. But you can't worry about the vanity metrics. What does happen is you get actual leads that turn into revenue. So this is what we did just recently. We had a problem solution type of post, didn't get a ton of engagement. The worst one of the week actually. And yet it led to 10k in pipeline in probably 8 days from that post. And with LinkedIn right now with the algorithm, it's showing Post a lot later. Also, like, you'll see posts that show up from like two weeks ago organically, you know, without even ads. So this is what's happening now. We have these very strategic type of posts with a very specific type of format. Well thought out. Pretty lame if you look at it. There's no image, there's no video, there's nothing to look at. It's just text, very strategically, yet it's leading to more pipeline than anything else right now.
- [05:35]
A
Love it. And we're going to get into this in detail in just a second here. So before we begin, let's talk about said another way for those that want to do what we're about to talk about today, which is to create this content on LinkedIn that's really designed to get that qualified prospect to contact you or be interested in you. What kind of foundational things do we need to be thinking about? You've already hinted a little bit at some of the stuff, but I would love to kind of unravel a little bit about baseline stuff that we need to kind of revisit or reassess before we get into the details.
- [06:11]
B
Absolutely. And this is crucial because anything I'm about to tell you is not going to work if you don't have the fundamentals in place. First thing is you need to know your ICP inside and out. So your ideal customer profile, your Persona, who are you targeting? Who is the perfect customer for you? What keeps them up at night? What are their pain points? You need to be super, super clear on this. An easy way to do this is to look at all your past calls, take the transcripts, pop them into your favorite AI tool and ask for the problems, the key points, the things that are noticing and coming up time and time again. Right. Easiest way to do this, but you really need to understand them inside and out. Then you need to make your profile speak to that ideal customer. Talk about, this is the value I provide people and businesses like you and results that I've achieved for people like you. That's the concept. Right? So then your profile, your LinkedIn profile should not be all about you and how amazing you are. It should be a little bit of that, of course, because I need to trust you. But it should really be a mini landing page for you and your business, showing people, this is exactly how I help people like you. And here's why you should trust me. So back it up with case studies, testimonials, et cetera. So those are really the fundamental things you need to have in place and Then obviously you need to have a legit offer. That's not what we're going to talk about on this podcast today, but you need to have a proven offer also for this to work in a sales funnel. So you get the lead and then it takes them to the next stage. But before you even do that, those are the two important things. Profile and really understanding your ideal customer.
- [07:42]
A
Okay, so here's what I heard you say so far. Number one is we need to make sure we know who that ideal person is we're trying to attract, and we might get into that a little bit more. We'll see. And we need to make sure that when they come to our profile and the keyword is profile, not page, that there's signals there that indicate that you are for them. Right. And then like you said, you need to make it look like almost like a miniature landing page. And then ultimately you have to have an offer that, as you said, has been proven, meaning there have been people that have bought it before. You know, it's kind of tested and tried and true. And you need to have some sort of a process or funnel to move them down so that ultimately you can bring them to closure. I love this. A couple of things I wanted to talk to you about and just to back the train up just a little bit. The kinds of posts that so many of us are doing today are not the kinds of things that you've alluded to, which is this problem solution thing. So. And the kinds of metrics that we measure might need to change a little bit. So I just want to zoom in on that for a second. What's wrong with the way so many of us are posting today? And what are the metrics that maybe we've been misled by most people?
- [08:53]
B
It almost seems like we're just posting for the sake of posting. And I know we've been talking about this for years, as we've both been in the social media industry for years. And that's just one thing that is a common challenge with people. They just feel like they need to get up content and they don't take the extra step to think through what is the intention of this content. So most people are just, Here's a helpful tip. Here's a new blog post. Here's a snippet from a video. Here's a. Here's something random. They're not thinking about dissecting the root problem that their customers are facing and really digging into that and then giving them an alternate solution to solve that. They're just they're not going deep enough in that. So it's more surface level stuff. It's like, oh, yeah, this was helpful. Cool. And then they move on to the next thing because they can't picture themselves in that exact scenario. So you're not triggering that emotional response of that is me. That is 100% me. Most posts don't do that.
- [09:52]
A
Got it. And then what about the metrics? You know, you kind of alluded earlier when you were telling the story that maybe the metrics that used to matter don't matter anymore because you were talking about engagement a little bit. So talk to me a little bit about what are the metric. Do the metrics that used to matter still matter, which predominantly for us are going to be like views or whatever, that number is, that total reach. Right. And then comments. Are those the metrics that still matter when it comes to qualified leads?
- [10:18]
B
Yes and no. Because you have to have a good mix. Right? So the impressions on LinkedIn, obviously that's what everyone is looking at, impressions. But that doesn't mean that impressions drive revenue. Now, you can't have the same type of post over and over again that are low impressions without mixing it up. So in some degree it matters because we need to have diverse content, some of them that naturally is going to get a lot of impressions because it's a certain type of post or format, and then those ones that are specifically for generating leads. And so that's a kind of a tricky question to answer because overall, I would say, like, no, at the end of the day, the number of likes, number of comments, the number of impressions doesn't necessarily equate to revenue. However, you have to be getting impressions and engagement and likes overall for you to grow your audience. Right. Obviously, there's lots of other ways to grow your audience, like reaching out to people and sending connection requests. But people get way too caught up in the vanity metrics, and that's all they're looking at. All they're looking at is impressions. The Cool thing with LinkedIn analytics is you can actually see who visited your profile since that last post you made, what job titles are looking at that post, what companies saw that post. So there's all these different analytics you can get. It's kind of gauging. This is the right audience that's seeing my stuff. And to me, that's more important, the number of impressions, because you could get a million impressions on something and it could be customer service reps when you're trying to go after chief technology officers. Right. So that doesn't really do you any good. You might get some followers, but they're likely not going to be in your target audience. So I feel like the most important thing is the types of people that are looking at your content and then obviously the messaging, like the messages. Are you getting messages from people and are they going to your call to action? If you had a link in there for them to fill out a form, are they actually taking that action? So leads. Leads and conversations and then what we call dark social, which is stuff that comes up that you can't really track and then later on they might mention it, right? Oh, yeah, I did. I saw your post. Oh, I love your video. Like today I had a lead that I never engages with my stuff. And he's like, your videos are great. Like your videos recently have been, have been really great and helpful. I'm like, huh, interesting. Because I had no idea you liked them because you've never engaged. Right? So those are like those metrics that I like to pay attention to. Like, what are people actually saying? Are they mentioning it? Are they filling out the form? Are they messaging you? Are they reaching out to you? That's the most important metric of all.
- [12:44]
A
Love it. Okay, so back to the foundational stuff. You mentioned profiles. And there's plenty of people listening that are focused on pages because they work for a brand. Talk to me a little bit about the importance of the personal profile and let's just go there for a second because I feel like maybe that's like the opportunity for some people to catch something here that maybe is different than what they've been doing for a long time inside the business they work for.
- [13:12]
B
LinkedIn will tell you that personal profiles get three to four times more reach than it might actually be more than that now, to be honest, than company pages, they will admit this. They that's just how it is. That's how the game is played. They favor personal profiles and the reason is because people do business with people, not logos, not company pages. So you're going to get a lot more reach when you're leveraging the humans inside your organization and not just your company page. With that said, do not neglect your company page. That would be silly. So continue to post on your company page and try to grow it, but try to get more people involved, Try to get more of them posting and reposting the company page content. But it's really, really important that you try to lift up your people in your organization and encourage them to build their own personal brands because you're going to Notice a significant increase and reach and visibility when you have individuals posting as well as the company page.
- [14:09]
A
Perfect. Okay, So I feel like at this point we've done a really good job establishing the foundational issues that, you know, involve understanding who that ideal prospect is, utilizing that personal profile, making sure that you are not just doing the boring old things that you've always done, and also being open to the fact that the stuff that generates leads might not be the stuff that gets the most engagement. Right. And it might not be the stuff that, that gets the most comments and the most views or whatever those metrics are. So now you've introduced at the very beginning this story where you got the $10,000 prospect and you mentioned that there is like this problem concept a little bit. So what I'd like to do is like unravel that a little bit. Let's talk about the concept of the kinds of posts that you write that seem to generate higher qualified leads.
- [14:58]
B
So we call this the niche problem posts, the specific one, and what it is, is essentially we are calling out the problem and our ideal customer and then we're digging a little bit deeper. So we like to do it as a little 80% problem, 20% solution is how we're kind of framing this. Right. And then the goal, I already mentioned this earlier, it's literally to get prospects to nod their head. That's me. That's your main goal is to be like, dang, Yep, yep, yeah. Oh, yep. Like that's what you're trying to get. And so you're just really like digging in there. So you're calling that out, you're breaking down why that problem happens. And then you're lightly introducing your solution, but you don't do that. And so you really, really get to like the nitty gritty of this is the problem. And this is why it's why it's killing you.
- [15:51]
A
Do you have an example that you could share? Maybe something you've done for your business or for some of your clients, just so people can understand this?
- [15:57]
B
Absolutely. So with me, in our company, we have a program called the Modern Social Seller. And essentially it's from a to Z, LinkedIn, personal branding and social selling for sales teams. So we start off with saying in this example, like, Cold Outbound isn't dead, but it's definitely on life support. And the number one cause, a spray and pray approach that treats people like prospects or treats prospects like a list and not like people. And then we go on and on. And it's like you think it's the right thing to do. But here's what's actually happening. And so we get into like, this isn't working, this isn't working, this isn't working. And then we kind of say why it's not working. And everyone knows this language, the spray and pray. And then we get into the, the details of. Eventually someone suggests there's a better way, like LinkedIn. Right. And then we kind of paint that of, of what that is. And then we kind of re. Introduce it at the end. Because when you don't do something like this, you're doing spray and pray, which leads to an invisible sales team. So we're calling it something, we're calling the problem something. Go into it a little bit more. That's exactly why we built the modern social seller system, a system that does X, Y, Z. Here's how. Right. That's the short version. It's longer than that.
- [17:08]
A
Oh, I like this a lot. So I think what I'm hearing you say is. You are. What I heard you say was a couple things. Number one, you said identify who that ideal customer is and name the problem. So I would love to, like, I'm trying to remember exactly what you said, but something along the lines of spray and pray is what I remember. You know, like you're trying the, the cold call. You made a declarative statement in the beginning, if I recall. Like something isn't dead, but it's on life support. Right. Cold calling isn't dead, but it's on life support. So that, that effectively. Is that the way of like naming the problem? Is that what that we mean by that or is that just a strong statement that's going to get the head nodding thing turned on?
- [17:51]
B
Yeah, that's kind of the hook. So we had a bunch of different hooks for the same type of thing. Like one of them was your sales teams. Everything is basically cold outreach. Like the hook has something about cold outreach. That one was like outbound. Like cold outbound. Right. So it's, it's dumping and cold calling with cold email essentially is what it's doing. And people who are abusing LinkedIn in mail. And so another one could be your sales team's. Cold outreach is getting harder, open rates are dropping, replies are rare. You know, so like each hook is a slightly different. Most sales team think their team is scaling outbound. What they're really scaling. More noise, less relevance and then it goes in. So the beginning is a slightly different, but it's saying the same thing. And because this is like a Common theme right now it's a trend for people to talk about. Cold calling is dead, Cold email is dead. I'm trying to say, like, look, cold album in this post isn't dead, but it's pretty much on life support and here's why. So it's like literally the same type of thing I'm saying here can be said in 18,000 different ways with different hooks.
- [18:52]
A
Do you have any tips on how somebody can figure out how in the world to do something like this? I believe you were telling me that you were using AI with some, some of the call transcripts or something like that to kind of help you a little bit, like talk to people about how they can do this. Because some people have no idea where to even start with something like this.
- [19:09]
B
Sure, yeah. Valid question. We have built custom GPTs for everything, including this, the Lumi Postwriter, which helps with. And we have a membership, just 97 bucks a month. And we do this for our clients. But if you, you can do this yourself too. You can literally pick whatever AI tool you like, get all of your transcripts.
- [19:27]
A
Transcripts of what exactly?
- [19:28]
B
Transcripts, sorry, transcripts of sales calls and customer calls.
- [19:31]
A
Okay.
- [19:31]
B
Because what we're trying to do. And then you prompt it, right? You can literally just ask it for a prompt for this and it will give it to you. Or Google it. Like, there's tons of people talking about this, but essentially like we're trying to call out certain things. Please read these last 25 sales calls, the transcripts. And I want you to identify common themes, what are frequently asked questions, what are the biggest pain points and challenges that come up? You know, what are the patterns that you're noticing here? And it's literally going to dissect all of this and tell you these, these are the patterns I'm seeing. This is the most common theme. These are the problems that people are facing. And then you could take it from there and kind of like reverse engineer this. Okay. These are the main problems I'm going to go back to AI and ask it for. Give me five different ways that I could call out this problem that's going to capture their attention. And you just keep having back and forth conversations with whatever LLM you use, whatever AI tool you use best. You can literally do this. And then it helps. Obviously if you're like, here's my company insert URL. Here's what we do, here's our solutions. I need you to help me tie this together, right? And then you. This is a process, right? This isn't Something that, like, I worked with someone on my team with this. This isn't something that I just like, I want to go to AI and five minutes later. No, no, no, no. Like we spent hours dissecting this with AI. So you guys still have to put in the work here. And I've been doing this for 15 years. Right. I didn't just start my company yesterday. So this still takes time for you to really get to the heart of. This is the problem, this is solution, and this is very strategic. Smart copy copywriting skills are going to get them to be like, raise their hand and say, that's me. I can help you. But it is a process and it's back and forth and it helps if you have someone like, I didn't do this alone, right? I had someone on my team and we got on phone calls, we got on zooms and we literally went through it line by line. This is what we found. This is transcripts. Okay. What do you think about this? No, this is better. Let's try this. It was a process to get to this point and now that we have this down in the templates, we can roll with it and I can create posts and with my AI tools and this process we came up with in like two minutes, you know, love it. But it was not that simple to begin with.
- [21:41]
A
Have you ever attended a conference and came back with all sorts of ideas and you were fired up but you struggled to get everyone else on your team to be on the same page? Well, here's what I noticed after a dozen years of social media marketing world, when one person attends, they get great ideas. But when a team attends together, they create something much bigger. Think about it. One person learns about AI and marketing. A team builds out an AI strategy, one person discovers Instagram tactics, A team redesigns their entire content approach. Noah Stanley told us, quote, I will bring multiple members of my staff next year. The mindset, openness and amount of time the experts gave to us was head and shoulders above other conferences, unquote. When your team attends together, you can cross pollinate ideas in real time, divide and conquer to cover more ground and return with a unified action plan, not just a bunch of scattered notes that you never get around to. Plus, you've got a built in support system. When you try new strategies and you're back at the office. The company's seeing the biggest results from social media marketing world. They're the ones investing in team transformation. Bring your team to Anaheim this April and multiply your impact. Learn more@social mediamarketingworld.info okay, so we're talking about the niche, niche, niche, niche. I mean, I always get that. Niche, niche problem posts. We're going to mention how to get access to your AI tool at the end of the interview. But I love what I'm hearing so far. What I'm hearing so far is like these posts that we're writing are almost like mini sales pages. Yeah, right.
- [23:14]
B
They are.
- [23:15]
A
They're really leveraging or mini scripts for a YouTube video or whatever. Like they're actually done in text, which is really cool. Which means people can go through them extremely fast. And so far what we know is they start with a hook. Right. And we know that they are identifying problems that are sourced from actual content with customers. Right. Like telephone conversations with existing customers, customer support inquiries, sales people, transcripts, dealing with. Objection. Handling all that kind of stuff is great source material to kind of look for these themes. I love this. So at this point, we know we're going to write these text posts, these problem niche posts, and we know that we really have to have that ideal prospect dialed in and we need to have some of those problems dialed in. But I know that this is just the beginning of the process. There's this next section which you called symptoms when we were prepping for this call. So talk to me a little bit about this because there's a. There is a art form, obviously, to what you're doing here.
- [24:17]
B
Yeah, absolutely. When you call it the problem and you're saying, you know, this is possibly why it's failing. This is why it's failing. But I'm saying, if you want to throw that in there.
- [24:26]
A
Yeah. Give another example of what one of the problems are. Because I know we went off on the AI trail a little bit. Just give a couple of examples of the problems and then let's go into the symptoms a little bit.
- [24:34]
B
Yeah, for sure. They're doing all the, all the things. Right. So it's saying your team's cold outreach getting harder. What's going on? They're doing all the things. They're sending this hundreds of cold emails, calls and mails, blah, blah, blah. But here's the hard truth. You know, the problem might be the messenger's attack of the wrap. The real problem is you're still operating on spray and pray. Here's what it looks like. And then we detail what it looks like.
- [24:56]
A
So the real problem, just so we're clear, you're calling it a name in this case, spray and pray, but it could be anything. Like you're Giving it actual name as if. As if it existed for all time. Right? I mean, is that kind of what we're saying here?
- [25:08]
B
But that is the. There's two names here. That is a name everyone knows, okay? So that is something that, like most people in the. In the industry, in the sales, they know what spraying pray is, right? Because, like, you blast it out. So that's a name that everyone knows. But then I'm also calling it your invisible sales team at the end, right? So I'm not calling out invisible sales team in the beginning because I don't know what that is. So I'm not naming it something till the very end because then they could be like, yeah, she's right, it's total. Our sales team is invisible. But if I said that in the beginning, they'd be like, what is she talking about? You know? But they know what spray and pray is. So I'm also using language. I know we talked about this also, like, we're also using language that our buyers use. This is where the transcripts come in. This is where AI can help you. You literally need to tell AI, I want you to use the exact same words and phrases that my customers use. And if you don't say this to AI, they're going to paraphrase stuff and they're not going to give you back exactly word for word. So I'm glad that I thought of this right now because you literally need to say, like, give me the exact phrases and words that my prospects are using on these calls.
- [26:10]
A
Yeah. So for the marketing community, especially the social marketing community, the algorithm, you know, would be like an obvious problem that you could talk about. Like the algorithm is repressing your reach. Right? And we kind of personify the algorithm as this, like, horrible algorithm that's out to make sure that everything you do is not seen unless you pay Big daddy social media. You know what I mean? Like, this is the kind of phrases everybody uses, right? And we personify the algorithm as the problem. Other examples could be like email we call the spam traps. You know what I mean? Like getting stuck in the Google spam or promo tab. Right, the promo tab or the email hell. I mean, these are the kind of phrases that everybody talks about, right?
- [26:49]
B
And.
- [26:50]
A
And you gotta know what those problems are. But then what I'm hearing you say is you could relabel these problems as part of a bigger problem or an unseen problem. Right. And that's valuable. And when you do something like that. So if I was to talk about the algorithm problems and I wanted to relabel it. I could say the real problem is you've fallen into the promotional trap. I could call it the promotional trap. And it just so happens the algorithms captured you inside the trap because they knew you were promoting. Is that an example of what we're talking about? Kind of like reframing it into something that makes sense to the audience, but kind of does that important reframe to help them understand that the problem maybe isn't what they think it is. Is that kind of where we're going with this?
- [27:29]
B
Yeah, and we're really, like, dumbing it down too, Mike. So we're simplifying it also to where it's like. We're simplifying it in a tiny little phrase with maybe just a few words where they're like, yep, that's it.
- [27:39]
A
Even though they've never heard those words before, but those words make sense in the narrative. Right.
- [27:43]
B
And then it makes you look like the expert because you're giving us a name. So it's like instant credibility and trust because they're like, well, this person obviously knows what they're talking about. They already have a name for this that I've never heard before, and it makes perfect sense. So you instantly have credibility too.
- [27:56]
A
Yeah, kind of like everybody uses the word ICP now, right? Because they used to call them avatars, and before that they called them who knows what, you know? So, okay, so let's talk about the symptoms thing a little bit, because I feel like this is related somehow to what we've been talking about.
- [28:10]
B
You actually said some of the symptoms that I have in mind. Right. So it's like, here's what it looks like. The real problem is, you know, you're operating on Spring brain. Here's what that looks like. And then I literally list out what it looks like. Reps, blasted template and emails to long, untargeted lists. They sprinkle in personalization like, saw you brought in a new CRO, but it feels fake because literally everyone's doing that right now with AI Messages go cold zero contacts or relationship. Buyers don't recognize the sender. It might be marked as spam, or they ignore it. And even if they open it, they check LinkedIn and they see someone with no credibility and no presence, so they're not gonna. So. And then that is like painting the picture before I get to the bottom of saying you have an invisible sales team, because I literally just told them that their sales team is invisible. That's why this isn't working. People aren't going to answer. People are, they're really, you know, they're thinking that everyone's blasting them with AI robots these days. Like, no one trusts anyone. You know, I love AI, but it's harder and harder to stand out. And if you don't have a person, this is my thing. If you don't have a personal brand and you're not using LinkedIn strategically to build real relationships, you're going to blend in like everyone else, which means you have an invisible sales team. That's where this comes in.
- [29:17]
A
Okay, so the symptoms part of this problem, niche problem post thing is to kind of like identify a list of symptoms that might be, for lack of better words, like, when you're sick, you know what your symptoms are, right? You have a cough, you have a headache, that kind of stuff. You identify the symptoms and you call them out so that they attract the audience that you want and repel the audience that you don't. Is that kind of what we're doing right here?
- [29:42]
B
It's also to be like, yeah, yeah, that's right. Yep. Our emails are not getting opened right now. You know, like, it's for people to be like, yeah, that makes sense because it's happening to us. Because I literally hear this. Like, I'm literally using the same phrases people are telling me every day. It's so hard for us to stand out right now. And email. No one's opening our emails, you know, and like, I'm like, what are you doing for personalization? Like, oh, we use this tool and it just says if they're hiring or like, it's like really simple personalization. And now everyone is like, is this AI or is it not? You know, and so I'm hearing this daily, so I'm just throwing it back. Their exact words that they're telling me into these posts.
- [30:19]
A
So how much of this post is this kind of stuff as I think through, like, I know I'm opening the post with some sort of a problem. Like, here's the problem with the algorithm, you know, like your, your posts, your social posts aren't getting any reach anymore. And you think social media is dead, but is it really dead or is your strategy dead? You know what I mean? Outdated. I just free flowed a little bit. Right? That would work, right? And then you start talking about symptoms. So in this case, I'm going to free flow. You need to promote your products. And every time you do, it seems like there's. It's crickets, there's nobody there. Right. And I just, do I go Through a list of these kind of things here. Is that kind of what I'm doing? And how do I know when to stop and what do I do next? Does that make sense?
- [30:56]
B
Good question. Yeah, because it can get pretty. An exhaustive list here. So I think we stop. Like, I'm looking at all these posts we made that are following this. Five. The one that I just read with you is five. Like, I stopped at, like, five symptoms. Another one was three. Another one was five. So what I'm seeing is like, we don't do more than five. Okay, four. There's another one that's four. So I'd say three to five.
- [31:18]
A
Got it. And these are just short little statements that we're making over and over again, right?
- [31:22]
B
Yeah. And we just literally rephrasing it in a different way for a different post. But we're essentially saying the same thing. It's just said differently because then we can test which ones. I mean, not really, because there's a lot of different things going on, but you might be able to test which ones resonate more. But it's literally this almost the exact same thing in all these different posts. It's just set in a different way.
- [31:41]
A
Okay, so once we've called out these symptoms for lack of better words, by name, in a way that uses the language of our audience, what's next? I guess. What's the next part?
- [31:51]
B
So when we do that, that is when we can then call out. The most teams don't realize, but they have an invisible. Or most, you know, sales leaders don't realize this, but they have an invisible sales team. Because we just told them that they basically have an invisible sales team. Then we're naming it. So that comes after, like, the symptoms part.
- [32:10]
A
Ah. And that's where we're given a new name to the problem. Is that what. Yeah, right.
- [32:13]
B
That's the new name. Yeah.
- [32:14]
A
How hard is it to come up with this new name? I mean, like, how long did it take you guys to come up with this?
- [32:18]
B
It's funny. He said it's like, it took a little bit. It took a little bit to come up with this. I'm not gonna lie. Because we were like, what can we call this? Where, you know, I'm like, well, they're not visible. And he's like, invisible. I'm like, yep, you nailed it. It's invisible. Right? So it wasn't something that I instantly just, like, went to AI and I was like, what can we call this? You know, this was from our heads, right? No AI included. But it took a little bit. It took a little bit. We already had the name. So you don't normally want to do this, but because my product name, it's a curriculum essentially with multiple products inside of it. My product name is the Modern Social Seller, or Modern social seller system, which is literally what we're trying to do for our prospects is take them from invisible to a modern social seller team. So we literally just named the solution, like the thing that they want as our product name. That doesn't always work out, though. Right. And in that case, you're going to have to come up with two different names. Like one, the issue that they have now and then, the thing that they need, it doesn't necessarily need to be your product name. It just needs to paint that picture of this is what you need to be doing. Right.
- [33:22]
A
Couldn't you argue it's actually better to not call it the name of your product?
- [33:26]
B
Yeah, absolutely.
- [33:27]
A
Because here's. This is my market in mind. If you say what you need is social media Marketing World, for example, well, then they're going to just instantly know that you've been promoted to. But if you say what you need is professional development, you know, and you need training, like, let's just say hypothetically, you need to keep up with the latest and greatest of what's happening in the world of marketing and AI. What you really need is. You need. You need an intensive professional development experience or something. You know what I mean? I don't know. Or is that too specific? Because that's the. We're getting into the solution here. I've actually pivoted, haven't I? We're naming the problem and I've already transitioned over to the solution.
- [34:04]
B
Yeah, I think that was me, though. That's because we were talking about.
- [34:07]
A
Oh, yeah, you did that. Okay, so hold on a second. Let's back up the train a little bit. Well, then, so we've got to name the problem, but we have to make sure the problem is not the name of our product. That's the key thing. Right?
- [34:17]
B
Yes.
- [34:18]
A
So. So in this case, the problem is that if we're going with this theme that I just threw out there, the problem is that your marketing strategies are outdated or you're relying on outdated marketing strategies. Right. And we could come up with a better name. Right, but you could call it something as simple as that. Or is that not good enough?
- [34:36]
B
I mean, yeah, if you think it would resonate with people, then.
- [34:39]
A
Or you can make it a big ugly name. You know, I can't come up with one on the flyer. But it needs to be something that you could use over and over again, presumably. Right. Ideally it's a trap. I mean, that's kind of what I'm hearing from you. Like if you have an invisible sales team, ideally you're stuck in some sort of trap that we're trying to personify. So if we can somehow use AI to help us personify this trap. Right. Or bias or whatever, and we can help people realize I've accidentally stumbled into a pit. You know what I mean? That's probably the ideal situation. I'm thinking I'm free flowing with you a little bit here.
- [35:12]
B
Absolutely.
- [35:12]
A
But does that sound accurate?
- [35:14]
B
Yes.
- [35:14]
A
Okay, so then once we've called out that problem and we've like given it a name, what's next?
- [35:22]
B
So a little bit after that, you might have a couple sentences or two that just kind of like drill in on that if you want and then you introduce. That's why either it's. That's why we built X, Y, Z, or that's why you need a blank. And the reason that ours is the same is because this isn't like a trademark thing. There are literally people that are using this exact same phrase. Like modern social selling. It just happens to be the name of the product. But it's because it's, it's a broad phrase that anyone people are using it. It's not like social media marketing world where it's just yours. You know what I mean?
- [35:56]
A
Right.
- [35:56]
B
If it was that, I would have ever done that. So you're calling it something that everyone could be like. Yeah, that's right. I need what are. In your marketing case, I'm trying to think of like what we could call it Algorithm. Algorithm. You know, something like algorithm.
- [36:10]
A
Or you need an algorithm buster strategy or something like that.
- [36:13]
B
Yeah, exactly.
- [36:13]
A
Right. Something along those lines. Right.
- [36:15]
B
You need to bust algorithm buster strategies. Right.
- [36:18]
A
You need a log, algorithm, whatever. Yeah, but you can come up with it. But ideally what I'm hearing you say is it should be something that you could use over and over again in all of your. Your messaging. Right. So you want to be careful, probably test it. Right. Because if it doesn't resonate in your next post, you could name it something different, right?
- [36:33]
B
Absolutely. Yeah. And try to keep it shorter. Right. So like three to four words tops. Because we're going to repeat this over and over again. Might get kind of annoying if you pick something that's like seven words long. Right. So try to keep it simple and simple, like keep it stupid. Simple, like the kiss, like we always talk about. Like, literally just simplify this for people so anyone can instantly resonate with it and they know what it is without them thinking, hmm, I wonder what they mean by that, you know, so then.
- [37:01]
A
What do we do when we introduce the solution? Because this is where I need your salesmanship a little bit. Right. Because so many people do not like promoting themselves here, but somehow you've got to do a little bit of this here and this is going to be the key to attracting the prospect.
- [37:13]
B
Right. We also have to remember, Mike, that we're not just pitching ourselves. We're literally giving people tips on what they need to be doing to solve their problem. It just so happens that we do that, but they can go and do it anywhere else. So as an example, that's how I built the modern social seller system. And then we bullet point out what it is. Reps build buyer facing profiles that create credibility. They show up before or after outreach. They recognize when it counts. They post useful content that shows they understand their prospects. Outreach starts genuine human conversations instead of getting ghosted. So I literally just gave them four things that they need to be doing so they can use our system or they can go do it themselves.
- [37:51]
A
In this particular case, you're zooming in on desired outcomes a little bit here, which is an important copywriting concept. Right. You are effectively saying this is the result of what happens when people, sales reps in this case, go through your program. Right. They're writing social posts that are more designed to attract prospects. They are, Right. So it sounds to me as if using some of those desired outcome phrases that might come out of your research would be important here. Is that right?
- [38:20]
B
Yes, absolutely. Yeah. And that if you could use their words, that's even better. Right. And because they literally tell us that like, yeah, their profiles aren't my eyes. Oh, they're not posting content. They don't know what to say to prospects. They're really just spamming them, you know, so we're just taking that same thing.
- [38:37]
A
Now, how are you ending this post? Is there a call to action? Is there no call to action?
- [38:42]
B
There is a call to action, yeah. Also before the call to action, we're giving proof. So in this there's a bunch of different. I have like eight different posts that are following the same format and they're slightly different of where we're putting stuff in. But when I'm mentioning this, that's how we built this system. With this system in place, open rates improve or pirates improve. I'm Getting sales cycle shortened, etc. And then teams are seeing these results. One team hit 120% of quota consistently, quarter quarter, one sales team triple pipeline created a culture, accountability, another got three new clients, blah, blah, blah, right? So we're literally calling out another bullet point of like result one result to result three. So every single post of these isn't just us saying, you're doing this wrong, you need to be doing it right. Listen to us, because we're the best, we're putting proof in there. This is. We named it something we already look credible. And now we're telling you when you do this this way, doesn't matter if you hire us or not, but when you do it in the way I just told you that you need to do it, you're going to see these results or people similar to you have seen these results. So before I get to the call to action, I paint the picture so they can imagine themselves at that finish line, like, oh, this is working well.
- [39:58]
A
And then what is the call to action?
- [40:00]
B
The call to action in this case is a landing page. There's two different ones. One, send me a message if you want to see how a 15 minute demo of how this can work for your team. This one says, here's how to plug the system into your current workflow and it takes them to a long form landing page that goes into more detail with lots of testimonials, but it goes into a lot more detail of what I just said and it goes into our program details as well. But it paints, it just redoes what I just did in a more detailed way and shows them how they can work with us. And then it's a 15 minute demo.
- [40:31]
A
Now, a lot of people want me to ask this. Do you actually put a link inside the post or do you put it in a comment? Because isn't it true that if you put a link in a post, it's going to have less reach?
- [40:41]
B
Yeah. So it's so funny, I just had this conversation before you and I got on here. LinkedIn literally just came out. Like, I don't know what his job title was, some leadership role at LinkedIn algorithm department, if you will. He was just on video not long ago, like a month ago, saying that we don't penalize posts with external links. We don't do that.
- [41:03]
A
Do you believe it?
- [41:04]
B
If, if, if. Exactly. If it provides value.
- [41:08]
A
Oh, okay.
- [41:10]
B
I will say this though. We've tested it, we've been doing this a long time. You will get a decrease in reach. However, it's going to be way better than what you're going to see if you put it in the comments. Because people don't. They're not going to go and sort through your comments and click on them. A lot of people aren't. So there's two things here. When it's a lead generation post, put the link in the post, period. Like don't. That's my point blank recommendation. If you're trying to generate leads, put the link in the post. If you're just trying to get visibility, then don't put a link in the post. If you're just, you know, because you can't have every post be a lead generation post. That's what we're focused on right now. Absolutely. Put the link. But test things out. You don't need a link in every post. Send me a message if you want a 15 minute demo, right? Like switch it up. But in this particular case, because I was making these organic posts with LinkedIn ads in mind, right. So eventually we, we promoted. So the 10k was organic, it came organically pipeline. Then we promoted the post and LinkedIn ads. So these are, these are meant to be promoted. That's why we have the link. If it was just organic. I do send me a message. I do both organically. So you need to test this out though. Like we already talked about testing. Like everything comes down to testing too.
- [42:21]
A
Okay, side note, when you make an ad on LinkedIn, can it be a text only ad?
- [42:24]
B
Oh yeah, absolutely. That's what works better actually.
- [42:26]
A
It's cheaper on the other platforms. You kind of have to have an image, you know, which is fascinating. So, okay, so now here's the big question. Like how long are these things on average? Like are we talking like really long, short? Like they're long.
- [42:39]
B
The one I gave you the example, the Shorter1 was 331 words. I knew you were going to ask me that, so I had it pulled up. Word counter. Right now it's 331 words. Some of them are a little bit longer.
- [42:50]
A
That's not that bad. 300 words doesn't seem super huge.
- [42:53]
B
No, it's not. But for like social media though, you know, for people that are used to posting on Instagram and TikTok, they're not doing ones that long. I guess. This one was 294, so maybe so I would say like close to 300 is like average. I'm posting these other ones in here now and I'm like, actually they're not, not too bad. They're all around the same. What's this one?
- [43:13]
A
Are you using short paragraphs? Are the paragraphs really short too? Like one sentence per paragraph kind of thing?
- [43:19]
B
All space? Yeah. A lot of them are spaced out. Not every single sentence is spaced, but because of LinkedIn with scrolling. And that's why we do no image or no media in these because we want them to not get distracted with anything else. We want them to read it and have no distractions and we want them to easily be able to skim it fast. So we actually use a text generator tool. There's tons of them. You can go like, Lingojam.com is one, but it will bold certain words and it will italicize certain words that we then paste into these posts. So when we're calling out the problems, here's four signs. Your sales team is invisible, whatever. Then we're bolding. Like the very first word, your very first, you know, bullet number one. It's like bolded and we go in a little bit more detail. Everything is like one or two lines together and then a space.
- [44:06]
A
I didn't even know you could do that. Is that something that you can do natively on LinkedIn? Bold stuff.
- [44:10]
B
You can't do it natively. You have to use a tool. You could literally like go in and type in LinkedIn, text tool, text formatter, and it will pop up. There's tons of free tools, tons of fascinating. Yep.
- [44:21]
A
So, okay, what part of your posting strategy now are these text based posts? Like, what's the percentage of the pie chart?
- [44:27]
B
It's funny. So I'm glad you asked that because I'm little. I probably shouldn't. I'm not going to get on to myself now for saying this out loud. It needs to be once a week and I have been so crazy busy the last two weeks that it has died because I posted all of them that we made. And then Dylan's like, you need to make more of these. I was like, I know, you're right. And I haven't.
- [44:47]
A
Is this all that you're posting though?
- [44:48]
B
No, no, no, no, no, no. I post tons of. I post more videos than anything, to be honest.
- [44:52]
A
That's what I'm looking for, the pie chart. Like, what percentage of your post is this kind of stuff?
- [44:55]
B
Here's ideally what it needs to be and what's going to start happening as of next week. It's going to be one post a week is going to be like this. And I post minimum five times a week, so I don't always post on the weekends.
- [45:07]
A
So one in five is what I'm hearing you say?
- [45:09]
B
Yeah, let's just say one in five.
- [45:11]
A
But if you're not posting five times a week, then maybe it should be one in two or one in three potentially. Right?
- [45:16]
B
Yeah. Well, if you're trying to get leads right now on LinkedIn and you should be posting this weekly, in my opinion.
- [45:21]
A
Right.
- [45:22]
B
You know, but sprinkle it in with some other things because we also got to show the human side of you. Like, I do a lot of posts showing me who I am as a human, and that's what makes people. You know, the organic people that led to the 10k, they were following me already. They knew who I was. Right. But I'm also getting leads right now. That's. I'm also getting cold leads from these exact same posts. Not just warm. So it's working for both warm audience that have been lurkers that were following me forever. And then all of a sudden they're like, yeah, I've been following you for years. And that post really resonated with me. And I was like, I've never seen your name before. Huh. Okay. You know, I'm like, this is the post that got you to reach out to me. Like, that's fascinating because I've been posting tons of other what I thought was awesome content. Apparently not, you know, and then new people that don't even know that I exist are also. This is working for them as well.
- [46:08]
A
Okay. If people want to connect with you, I'm assuming LinkedIn is a preferred platform.
- [46:12]
B
Yes.
- [46:13]
A
Is there any other Mandy McEwan's on LinkedIn or is it just you?
- [46:16]
B
No, I'm pretty sure it's just me. I'm pretty sure.
- [46:18]
A
Yeah. If they want to check out your AI thing or some of the other stuff you've got going on. Where do you want to send them?
- [46:23]
B
Yeah, so you can test out one of my free custom GPTs. Right now. You can go to Golumi IO free. I know you can put the link in here too, but it's Go L U M IO free. And you will get access to some. A lot, actually. It's kind of a free program videos checklist, and then one of my point of view GPTs. That's amazing. So you can go and test everything out and then you'll learn more about how to get access to the rest of them. There's just Reach out to me.
- [46:50]
A
Love it. Mandy McEwen, thank you so much for sharing your behind the scenes, like, how the heck you're doing this stuff. I know a lot of people are going to find a lot of great value in experimenting with it. Thank you again.
- [46:59]
B
Yeah, for sure. Also, I've been posting long form YouTube videos every week so @MandymondGrill if you want to hit me up there too. Pretty much any social channel I'm posting weekly. Lots of tips@mandymodgirl. So choose, pick your poison, whatever you like.
- [47:11]
A
Which platform are they going to find you on for that one? Is it YouTube or is it Instagram?
- [47:15]
B
YouTube. But I'm posting the shorts everywhere. TikTok Instagram like pretty much and the handle is all the same. Mandy Mod Girl Awesome.
- [47:21]
A
Thank you so much Mandy.
- [47:22]
B
Thanks Mike.
- [47:24]
A
Hey, if you missed anything, we took all the notes for you over@social mediaexaminer.com 686 if you're new to the show, follow us. If you've been a listener for a while, give us a review. And also let your friends know about this show. And do check out our AI Explored Podcast and the Social Media Marketing Talk Show. This brings us to the end of the Social Media Media Marketing Podcast. I'm your host, Michael Stelzner. I'll be back with you next week. I hope you make the best out of your day and may your marketing keep evolving. The Social Media Marketing Podcast is a production of Social Media Examiner. This is the year to finally come to Social Media Marketing World 2026. Grab your tickets right now by visiting social media marketing world.info.