Episode 63: Finding Companies on LinkedIn Where You Already Have a First-Degree Connection

Bob Woods  00:00

Greetings everyone out there and welcome to Making Sales Social Live! I’m Bob woods, the LinkedIn Sherpa, and I’m joined as always by the LinkedIn whisper that is… That’s tough to say three times. How are you doing Brynne?

Brynne Tillman  00:16

Good Bob! How are you? I’m so excited about this topic, you’re going to tell us about!

Bob Woods  00:21

I am too because it’s brand new to LinkedIn, finding companies and accounts where you already have 1st-degree connections. 

Introduction 0:33

Welcome to Making Sales Social Live! As we share LinkedIn, and social selling training, strategies, and tips that will have an immediate impact on your business. Join Bill McCormick, Brynne Tillman, and me Bob Woods every week, Making Sales Social Live!

Bob Woods  0:51

Now that sounds like something you should have always been able to do and to be fair, you could have, but it was a tedious job, that always took a lot of work. Now, though, LinkedIn has added some features to its Company Search Filters, that make locating these connections both more simple and more strategic too right, Brynne?

Brynne Tillman  01:12

I love that! And you said that so perfectly. So I’m going to talk little tactics and then we’ll talk about how to really use it strategically. So tactical and you doing this audio without sharing screens is always an interesting feat. If you go to your search bar at the top and hit Enter, there is a tab that says “companies” when you click on that, and then click all filters. From the right-hand side, you’re going to get a little pop-up that has all kinds of fun filters, including two filters that are game-changers. And this is actually, although we could have found the 1st-degrees before, we weren’t able to filter by company size. And this to me is by far, one of the most wonderful parts of this new feature. So there are few filters. There are three: industries, company size, and 1st-degree connections. So I’ve been playing with this all day knowing that we were going to talk about it. And when I really filter out to our ideal prospects, I’ve got over 700 companies that I already have a 1st-degree connection to (Bob: Wow) I know that are exactly the industry and company size that we go after. So this is really Bob, a huge game changer for search list. So just one last thing that I’m gonna throw to you for a tip when you click through to the company page, and you click on “All Employees” You can choose 1st-degree and 2nd-degree. So you want to look through in this case, you’ll have a 1st-degree but as you can see, there are also 2nd-degrees and really buyer map out who you want to know inside of that company. So if your 1st-degree is not a decision maker, but an influencer, maybe you can leverage that relationship to get introduced to your ideal buyer. (Bob: Absolutely!) Any quick tips on this one?

Bob Woods  03:25

Yeah! I mean, just in terms of industry, So we’re kind of moving away from companies a little bit and doing a little bit more of industries. But yet you can find a 1st-degree connection to. Now back when I was doing like more general sales, as opposed to what we do now, I always found myself gravitating towards a couple of specific industries that I already knew of because of past experiences, you know, whether work or just knowing people in the field or whatever. You can use that here just by you know, not only thinking of the industries that you feel more comfortable but also, you know, I would suggest taking inventory of your top clients and your favorite clients as well and seeing if there’s any kind of natural industry or a couple of industries that they fall into there too. And then what you do is you go to LinkedIn, and you go to the search that Brynne just talked about and you can search by those industries as well. I’d suggest only taking them one at a time unless you know just not a lot pop up in there. But if you’re especially in like a territory, or you’re only able to go after certain sizes of companies, that’s when the other filters come in that Brynne mentioned too. So you know if you have all of Florida for example, as a sales territory, but you can only serve larger industries in this area. You know within Florida you can obviously, those were probably gravitate towards larger cities. So you probably do like Tallahassee and Orlando, and Tampa, and Miami and maybe one or two others, and then select the specific sizes that you can go after too. Click the 1st-degree, click search, you’ve got the beginnings of a really great list at that point, including the industries that you feel comfortable with or if you can only do just one industry as well.

Brynne Tillman  05:25

So I love that and you mentioned something that I forgot about, right, which is location. So now in LinkedIn, where it used to only hone the greater city area. Any town that has a zip code (Bob: That’s right, I forgot about that) We can actually put in small towns and really hone it as you mentioned, by industry, and I love your idea of taking inventory, what are industries that you’d love to serve that are great company size, 1st-degree connection. And guys, you are going to be blown away that if you’ve built a network over the last few years on LinkedIn, you are connected to quite a few most likely quite a few prospective companies where you have a 1st-degree connection. So Steven Farber says, “This is fantastic information and on the free LinkedIn.” That’s the genius of this. (Bob: Yep) Now currently in Sales Navigator, that 1st-degree filter is missing.

Bob Woods  06:27

Yeah, that’s interesting.

Brynne Tillman  06:29

Yeah! I’m assuming it’s coming back but right now this search inside of the free, LinkedIn is more powerful than the one on Sales Navigator. Let’s fingers crossed they bring back that filter…

Bob Woods  06:43

Yeah and that’s literally as of today, too. So if you’re listening to it later, and it comes back, then that goes away but right now, yeah.

Brynne Tillman  06:52

Well, Bob my last two cents on this, right is if you’re listening to this, and you’re looking to build a list of companies that you want to go after and leverage your social proximity, who you already know, this is such an easy search. And all you need to do is reach out to them with a little message, you know, “Hey, Bob, I hope you’re doing well. I was researching your company and I’m really interested in learning a little bit more. I’m wondering if you have 10 minutes for me.”  And then once you talk with them, if you buy your map out, you may have three or four names that you can bring up where they can provide some insights and you may even ask them for permission to name drop.

Bob Woods  07:40

Yep. And then also, always be sure to at least offer to do the same thing for the other person.

Brynne Tillman  07:46

Absolutely. Open up your network. So smart. Well, Bob, this was fun.

Bob Woods  07:51

Yeah, this was, this was great. So thanks again for joining us on Making Sales Social Live! I kinda feel like we need to re-word whenever we say live, (Brynne: LIVE, LIVE, LIVE, LIVE, LIVE) So if you’re with us LIVE on LinkedIn right now, we do this every week. So keep an eye out for our LIVES. And if you’re listening to us on our podcast, we invite you to subscribe to access all of our past and you know, future episodes of not only Making Sales Social Live but our Making Sales Social interview series where we talk with leaders and experts in sales, marketing, business and many more. If you want more information on that, go to socialsaleslink.com/podcast Always a pleasure Brynne. These are so much fun, love them.

Brynne Tillman  08:37

Yeah! And when you guys are out and about make sure that you’re making your sales social.

Bob Woods  08:42

Bye, guys. Bye, everybody! Have a great day!

Outro:

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