Episode 319: Starting Trust-based Conversations with Your 2nd-degree Connections

Intro

0:00:18 – (Bob Woods): Welcome to the Making Sales Social podcast featuring the top voices in sales, marketing, and business. Join Brynne Tillman, and me, Bob Woods, as we each bring you the best tips and strategies our guests are teaching their clients so you can leverage them for your own virtual and social selling. This episode of the Making Sales Social podcast is brought to you by Social Sales Link, the company that helps you start more trust-based conversations without being salesy through the power of LinkedIn and AI. Start your journey for free by joining our resource library. Welcome to the show.—

0:00:00 – (Bob Woods): LinkedIn is a, is pretty much custom-built for what we’re actually going to talk about today, which is starting trust-based conversations with your second-degree connections. In other words, your warm network. So I think the best way to start off with today’s free wheel and discussion is to probably define what your warm network is. Welcome to the Making Sales Social podcast featuring the top voices in sales, marketing, and business.

0:00:31 – (Bob Woods): Join Brynne Tillman, Stan Robinson, junior, and me, Bob Woods, as we each bring you the best tips and strategies our guests are teaching their clients so you can leverage them for your own virtual and social selling. Enjoy the show. Welcome, sales and marketing pros to making sales social live. Coming to you from the social sales link virtual studios. I’m Bob Woods, and I’m joined by my SSL teammates, Brynne Tillman and Stan Robinson. How are y’all doing today?

0:01:07 – (Brynne Tillman): Great, Bob.

0:01:08 – (Bob Woods): How are you doing? Very, very well. And I’m glad that Stan got the memo about the pink shirts, too. That’s absolutely perfect. Yeah. Oh, that’s. Yeah, you have.

0:01:19 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): We’re close.

0:01:20 – (Bob Woods): More red, but, yeah, we are all in warm. Is pink considered a warm color? Pink is considered a warm color. Yeah, that’s the important part. So we’re just going to go with that. So let’s get into today’s subject, which is, you know, LinkedIn is a. Is pretty much custom-built for what we’re actually going to talk about today, which is starting trust-based conversations with your second-degree connections.

0:01:47 – (Bob Woods): In other words, your warm network. So I think the best way to start off with today’s free wheel and discussion is to probably define what your warm network is. And if you’re on LinkedIn, no matter how few or how many connections you have, you do have a warm network. Isn’t that right, Brynne?

0:02:10 – (Brynne Tillman): It is. And, you know, we talk about the warm network is really your first and your second degrees, right? So your first degrees are the people that you are connected to that and mutually connected. You can’t have a one-way first-degree connection, right? So you’ve asked them to connect and they said yes, or they’ve asked you and you said yes. Your second degrees are your friends of your friends, right? They’re the connections of your connections.

0:02:37 – (Brynne Tillman): And often salespeople look at those second degrees and think, oh, this is a great list to cold call, but really, we don’t want to be out cold calling these folks. These are our friends of our friends. So we’re going to talk today, as Bob mentioned, on ways that we can start these trust-based conversations with our friends of our friends on LinkedIn. So I’m really kind of excited about that. Stan, do you want to add anything to this?

0:03:06 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): Just that LinkedIn is such a powerful network because it actually shows us who the friends of our friends are. It’s like, have. Well, I was going to mention a Rolodex. I realized that some of us remember the days of the Rolodex, but for those who do, it would be like being able to see who your Rolodex connections or your prospects’ Rolodex connections are connected to, which is very powerful.

0:03:32 – (Brynne Tillman): You know, I don’t care who doesn’t know what a Rolodex is. It’s one of my favorite analogies. So I love it.

0:03:38 – (Bob Woods): Yep. Yeah. So, Brynne, why don’t you tell your Rolodex story real quick? Because I do think it applies here.

0:03:46 – (Brynne Tillman): Yeah, I mean, I started in sales, 1990, right out of college, and I worked for Dun and Bradstreet, and I started in an inbound call center, taking 100, 120 calls a day. Then I went to an outbound call center where I got my cold calling chops. I absolutely did my fair share of cold calling, but I fell in love with sales when I made it to the field. And I did not love the cold calling part. It was worth it to build the relationships at the time, but I really wished there was another way.

0:04:20 – (Brynne Tillman): And I recall sitting across from a client staring at, thank you, Stan. His overflowing Rolodex, thinking, if I could get my hands on that for 20 minutes, I could identify who he knew that I wanted to meet, ask for introductions, and I wouldn’t have to cold call again. But this was 1992, and it was exactly politically correct to say, hey, Mister Klein, can I thumb up your address book? But to your point, right, like, this is what we have with LinkedIn. It’s the ability to search and filter our connections. Connections. And it’s so powerful because, you know, when we’re cold calling, that’s pretty much as low bar as we can come into somebody’s radar, right? Is a cold call.

0:05:05 – (Brynne Tillman): But if we come in through a shared connection, a referral, or even with permission to name-drop a shared connection, we’re starting these conversations at a much higher level of credibility. Therefore, to your point, Bob, we’re starting those conversations from a trust-based perspective.

0:05:26 – (Bob Woods): And that’s so important, the trust-based perspective, when you get these relationships started, because with a cold call, you know, you do have a chance of starting a relationship. And there are people who are very good at doing that at cold calling, but most of us aren’t, most of us don’t like to do it. So why do it? Essentially? Why not use LinkedIn and second-degree connections through a referral, through some of the ways that we’re going to be talking about from a first-degree connection to get to these people who you think you can honestly help with your product or service and then, you know, start that non-salesy initial conversation to see if there is in fact something there that you can actually help them with.

0:06:14 – (Brynne Tillman): Yeah. So the question normally pops up now is like, well, how do I start a non-salesy conversation when I want to pitch my stuff right? And that, you know, that’s the now typical conversation. And I, so I just want to start with leading with value, earning the right to get this new person interested in having a conversation. And a lot of this stems from, you have to make sure that your profile is positioned as you, as a thought leader and a resource because they’re going to vet you right away. The first thing they’re going to do is click through and read your profile.

0:06:54 – (Brynne Tillman): And yes, you came in through credibility because of your shared connection, but they’re still taking a look at do I really want a conversation with this person. So the profile is really an important piece here. The next thing is, how are you starting the conversation? You’re gonna say, Stan, thanks so much for connecting. Bob had such great things to say. He thought it made sense for us to chat, whether or not we decide to work together.

0:07:21 – (Brynne Tillman): I’m pretty confident I can share insights around X, Y, and Z. Is this an area you’re exploring or? I’ve got a really great blog post that I’d be happy to share with you prior to our call, is that something that would be of interest to you?

0:07:38 – (Bob Woods): Yep.

0:07:39 – (Brynne Tillman): Right. And so all of this is, how can we earn that right? How do we just simply earn the right number one to get the first conversation? And just the referral isn’t enough, right? The referral is great and I love that. And so when they talk to you and they like you, they like you even more because you came in from a referral. But simply saying our mutual friend thought we should talk may not be enough. We need to bring value and start earning that right. So I’m going to pass the baton to Stan on that one if you want to add to that.

0:08:20 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): I just think what you mentioned about leading with value instead of leading with your solution, which is what so many people do is so powerful. And the fact that when you do come in with an introduction, as you were saying, how it positions you in the eyes of the person you’re talking to is so different from a cold call. It just puts you at an entirely different level. So it’s like skipping several steps but in a positive way.

0:08:51 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): Not shortcuts, but leveraging relationships.

0:08:57 – (Brynne Tillman): Yeah. Qualifying to the next level pretty quickly. The other thing, Stan, that you just triggered in my head is, you know, as we’re doing this is trust-based. It’s not just trust-based. With that new prospect, we need to stay in a trust-based relationship with the person that we’re name-dropping or has referred us. So sometimes I’ll say, you know, Stan, thank you so much for your willingness, for allowing me to mention your name. When I reach out to them, my goal is to make them look really good.

0:09:33 – (Brynne Tillman): Right. I’m really hoping at the end of my conversations with them, they come back and thank you for making that introduction. Right. So it’s so important that the trust of your first-degree connection is more important than all the prospects that they happen to know. Right. So that relationship, you need to keep that intact. You have to make sure. And I realize my name is Bob Woods at the bottom of the screen. I don’t know how that works.

0:10:07 – (Bob Woods): Oh, yeah. Get that changed real quick. But, yeah, absolutely.

0:10:13 – (Brynne Tillman): I have more hair.

0:10:17 – (Bob Woods): It’s very true.

0:10:19 – (Brynne Tillman): Yeah. Anyway, so I’m going to go in. Yeah, anyway, so that, that’s, I got, I’m very, like, distracted by shiny objects. So apologies.

0:10:29 – (Bob Woods): Yeah, no, that’s fine. Because there’s, because there’s something else that I’d like to add really quickly. When, when it comes to change, yeah, when it comes to establishing that relationship, establishing that trust by leading with value. So in my mind, that’s really important. Besides everything else that has just been mentioned, it’s really important to do that because it goes back to one of my favorite phrases. Stop talking about how you help people and just help people.

0:11:00 – (Bob Woods): When you lead with value, you are hopefully helping someone. And when you do that, the person who is on the receiving and hopefully we’ll think, wow, this person is actually helping me out. And I, you know, depending on where you’re at in the relationship, I barely know this person or I kind of know this person. Or no matter where you’re at, your status with them will go up higher because you’re showing that you truly care about whatever situation is that, that they’re in and how you can help them personally, whether or not it’s through a product or a service that you sell. Or, you know, that part doesn’t really matter. It’s your knowledge that you’re bringing in as a thought leader, as an expert in your field, that you’re just offering to help this person out with this value.

0:11:44 – (Bob Woods): Oftentimes, you know, before you even have that initial conversation. And then obviously, once you have the conversation, you can even continue that with more value, with more insights that you may have with another piece of content that you could share, maybe even with a podcast episode that you were listening to that you’re not even involved in, but you thought, you know, hey, this person might benefit from hearing this podcast. So leading with value is always very, very important.

0:12:14 – (Brynne Tillman): Just to piggyback on that, because that’s brilliant, is value is in the eyes of the consumer of the content, not in the sharer of the content, 100%.

0:12:24 – (Bob Woods): Yeah.

0:12:25 – (Brynne Tillman): Right.

0:12:25 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): So true.

0:12:26 – (Brynne Tillman): Yeah, Stan, talk about that a little bit.

0:12:29 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): It’s funny. I was gonna. I was gonna mention something. I’ll come back to that. But I had a thought that I didn’t want to totally forget about here. What you mentioned earlier about the importance of the person giving the referral is so powerful, because that’s easy to forget. One of the main reasons that people are reluctant to make introductions is because they’re not sure if you’re going to make them look good or look bad.

0:12:59 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): So if you take the. If you already have the relationship and you take the trouble to reassure them, then my goal is to make you look good. That helps to set them at ease.

0:13:12 – (Brynne Tillman): Yes.

0:13:13 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): So that is something that I just wanted to mention now if you want to. While I was saying that, I just forgot what you asked about value. So bring me back to that, because I went, you know, I chased the shiny object right there, a very important.

0:13:29 – (Brynne Tillman): One, and I don’t even remember what we said. So we’ll play it back later and have you put it in show notes. I don’t know.

0:13:37 – (Bob Woods): Exactly.

0:13:38 – (Brynne Tillman): We could keep moving on, and then maybe one of us will remember. But I also want to share the trust-based side of things, because salespeople don’t have the best reputation out there, right? Because, you know, in the words of our friend Larry Levine, you know, they can smell commission breath even over Zoom. Right? Like, unfortunately, so many people are so hungry to make the commission that they forget about the solution.

0:14:16 – (Brynne Tillman): They forget about what matters. So one of the things on LinkedIn that we say all the time is to detach from what the prospect is worth to you and attach to what you are worth to the prospect. When you go in there thinking, oh, this is a great opportunity. Ooh, we could, this could be a $15,000 sale. And you haven’t figured out how you’re going to help them yet, or you haven’t even identified what their challenges are, why they wanted to connect with you, what the value is that you bring to them.

0:14:55 – (Brynne Tillman): You can turn them off pretty quickly and you can lose really great opportunities because you’re so hungry for that commission instead of hungry for helping them succeed. And I can’t tell you how many people will reach out. I have a prospecting call, and we’re not a fit. They might be looking for some things that we just don’t do, particularly career profiles do makeovers, Bob, particularly for sales professionals and anyone responsible for leadership. But I can’t tell you how many people reach out and say, hey, you know, I’m looking for a new job. Can you help with the profile?

0:15:39 – (Brynne Tillman): There are people like Lynn Williams who do a great job with their LinkedIn profile. Right? Like so. So it’s not about making every sale. It’s about helping the person in front of you succeed. And when you can do that, it comes back tenfold, 100fold. It’s just really good energy that you’re putting out there. I know I’m ranting for a minute, but I’m going to share one more thing about that really good energy.

0:16:08 – (Brynne Tillman): I am a true believer that mindset creates everything in your world. Do I believe in the power of the secret? I don’t know exactly. But I do believe that what you focus on, you create in your life. Right. So if you focus on I want to help as many people as possible, you will get the opportunity to help as many people as possible. But when you focus on I want to make a sale, and that’s what repels. Right.

0:16:44 – (Brynne Tillman): You’re focusing on what mat. You’re not focusing on what matters to your buyer. So really think about how many people can I help. How many people can I bring value to? And if it leads to a sale, great. And when you can come from that perspective, we’ll go back to the name of this, which is we’re starting trust.

0:17:05 – (Bob Woods): Based conversations, and that’s what it’s all about. So next, let’s talk just a little bit about how the heck you find these people. You know, how do you find these second-degree people on LinkedIn? So that’s actually pretty easy to do when you go to your, and I’m going to be looking at my screen here when you go to your LinkedIn main page, just click into search and then actually hit return or enter on search.

0:17:33 – (Bob Woods): And then you can click the people tab. And then you can go to second-degree connection. There are several ways to do this I’m sure Brynne will have. Yeah. Then you can go to all filters. And then one of the filters in that all filters section is connections of. So you can type in a particular person who you jibe with pretty well. And I, you know, this person may be able to provide me with some connections. So, if you start typing their name in, it’ll pop up. You can only obviously do this with 1st, 1st degree connections.

0:18:16 – (Bob Woods): And then you can show results. You can also use some of the other filters in that all filters area to, um, to really narrow down your search more if you want to as well. From, then you’ll get some results. Uh, you can look through those results and see,, who you want to meet. And then Bryn’s going to take it from here with the strategy, with the way to actually approach someone and ask for referrals.

0:18:45 – (Brynne Tillman): Okay, sure.

0:18:46 – (Bob Woods): Yeah. Like how I did that and then.

0:18:49 – (Brynne Tillman): Yeah. And then I’m going to toss it to Stan to talk about how to do it in sales navigator.

0:18:53 – (Bob Woods): Yeah, that’s great.

0:18:54 – (Brynne Tillman): Yeah. But ultimately, here’s the goal, right? I search Bob’s connections. He’s connected to 27 people that I want to meet based on location, title, and industry. And I say, hey, Bob, you know, I really am so glad we’ve been able to help you do x, Y, and Z. I hope you don’t mind. I noticed you’re connected to quite a few people that I’d love to get in front of. Do you have five minutes where I can quickly run these names by you?

0:19:21 – (Brynne Tillman): Now, I notice did not say, hey, can you introduce me to all these people? I just want to have a quick conversation. So, Bob, thanks for jumping on a quick zoom. I’m going to run through these names real quick. You let me know who on this list should I not reach out to?

0:19:38 – (Bob Woods): Mm-hmm.

0:19:39 – (Brynne Tillman): Right? If I say, who should I reach out to? I’ll get two or three. If I say, who should I not reach out to? He’ll take out two or three. So, you know, go through. Yeah, that’s fine. I don’t really know them, but you could reach out. Okay. And then, oh, yeah, she’s great. Oh, how do you know her? Great. So now I have notes. I know who Bob knows the most from that list. And I can either say based on these nine people, is there anyone on this list you feel comfortable introducing me to?

0:20:08 – (Brynne Tillman): I no longer do that. What I say is, thank you so much for your insights about these folks. When I reach out, can I tell them that we chatted, that you’re my client, and that you said hello? Sure. So now I reach out. Stan, Bob Woods, and I were chatting the other day. He says, hello. I’ve worked with him for the last six months on x, y, and z, and he thought I could bring some value around a, b, and c. If you’re open, let’s connect.

0:20:35 – (Brynne Tillman): Then we connect. Stan, thanks for connecting. Based on Bob Wood’s recommendation, I’d love to loop you in a little bit about x, y, and z and a, b, and c. And even if we don’t work together, I’m confident I could bring insights around me. Right? Please let me know your preferred way of scheduling. If it happens to be via calendar link. Here’s mine. And then we schedule. Now, remember, the goal is not to sell Stan. When we get on the call, the goal is. Stan, thanks so much for jumping on the call.

0:21:12 – (Brynne Tillman): Here’s a little bit of how we were working with Bob. Tell me a little bit about what’s going on around x, y, and z, and I’m happy to bring some insights and even some actionable steps that you can implement even if we never work together. Oh, okay. Yeah. So now I do one or two discovery questions, and then I add value. Don’t do a whole list of discovery questions and then not value. When you promised value.

0:21:38 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): Yes.

0:21:39 – (Brynne Tillman): Ask a question, you can go one deeper on it and then provide insights and then test. So, Stan, does that resonate with you? Does that align with what you’re seeing? Do you see how that could be helpful? Would you like me to go a little deeper into how you could do that? Right. And then, and so at the end of this, I want Stan’s head to be going, oh, my gosh, this was brilliant, right? I taught him new things that he could implement even without me.

0:22:12 – (Brynne Tillman): And then. So now you may say, well, how do I turn this into a sales call? This is where I think it can be incredibly dangerous if you do it the wrong way. But it could be very effective if you do it the right way. So I go through this, and I’ll say, and keep in mind, what you’re about to hear is permission-based. Stan, thanks so much for sharing that with me. Here are some of the things that we talked about. Here are the takeaways that you mentioned that you thought were very valuable.

0:22:46 – (Brynne Tillman): You know, this really reminds me of a client that we worked with a couple of years ago. Can I tell you that story? And now I’m moving it from providing value. It’s not a bait and switch. I’m not jumping into my sales pitch. I’m asking permission to tell a customer story. And when they say, okay, I tell the story. I’ve practiced the story. If you’re in sales, this is to get your stories down. I’ve got my stories down. I can do them inside and out, upside and down. Some of them are seven, or eight years old, but they’re good and they work. So I keep telling them. Right, so you have your stories, and if you don’t have stories, go talk to your CEO or go talk to other salespeople. You can use their stories.

0:23:35 – (Brynne Tillman): It doesn’t have to be your story. It has to be a story that’s connected to the solution your company brought to the table. So for new sales reps, just go collect other stories. Can I tell you, this reminds me a lot of a client that our company worked with. Can I tell you that story? It’s that simple, right? So now we tell the story, and at the end of that story, and you’re getting like, oh, that’s interesting. Hopefully, you’re getting that engagement. It’s just not a one-way storytelling moment.

0:24:03 – (Brynne Tillman): And at the end you say, hey, Stan, you know, I don’t know if this is of interest to you, but would you be open to exploring how we might be able to help you the same way? And it’s permission-based, and I’m taking like, hey, I don’t know if this is right for you, but are you open to exploring at that point because you’ve built that trust, because you’ve built that value, you’ve earned the right for them to listen to how you can help.

0:24:36 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): Yeah, exactly.

0:24:38 – (Bob Woods): Yeah. Very good. Very good. So, Stan, let’s talk really quickly about sales navigator and doing it in sales navigator. I have one thought to wrap things up, and then we’ll wrap up the show.

0:24:51 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): Good. Well, for those that have advanced or advanced plus subscriptions in sales nav, you do have the team link option, which expands your ability, and actually gives you the ability to see the connections of other members of your team, even if they’re not in your network. So that is extremely powerful. Then you can ask them for introductions, and there’s even a version called team link extend for those with a higher level subscription such that even if someone is not on sales Navigator, as long as they allow you to, you can see their network as well.

0:25:35 – (Stan Robinson, Jr): So lots of ways to expand your network, and get warm introductions.

0:25:42 – (Bob Woods): Yeah, absolutely. So we’ve talked everything about being one way before. So when it comes to actually the initial conversation, when you’re with that first degree and you want to get with that second degree, also offered to do the reverse of what you’re asking for and then, you know, give them access to your second-degree network, although you don’t have to give them, they’ll, they’ll already have it, but still do that so that they can look through your network and then they can ask for the same thing that you’re asking from them. So definitely give reciprocity here.

0:26:24 – (Bob Woods): You can even show them, especially if you’re on Zoom or even if you’re in person, you can show them how to do that on LinkedIn through, through the method that we talked about before. It’s really simple to do. You’re probably also going to teach them something about LinkedIn that they didn’t even know they could do on LinkedIn. So your credibility is going to go up with them as well. So, you know, reciprocity is always important. You don’t want to appear like that. You know, you’re, you know, gimme, gimme, gimme, without, without, you know, giving, giving stuff away, too. So you always come in with reciprocity in mind as well.

0:27:03 – (Brynne Tillman): Papula Smith all right, Bob, take us in for a landing.

0:27:06 – (Bob Woods): We are, we are going to land here. So thanks again for joining us for this episode of Making Sales Social Live. If you’re with us live on LinkedIn or any of the other socials that we go out to right now, we do this every week, so keep an eye out for our live sessions. If you’re listening to us recorded on our podcast and you haven’t subscribed already, go ahead and hit that subscribe or follow button, whatever it is on the platform that you’re on so that you can access all of our previous shows and be alerted when new ones drop, more info about our podcast is [email protected].

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Outro:

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