How to Use Your Comments as a Prospecting Tool

To get in front of ideal prospects on LinkedIn takes more than trolling the home page and giving a thumbs up like to random posts. Leaving a comment on a post when done with a strategy can be your best tool for prospecting.

Everyone is busy, so let’s get that off the table. Scrolling your LinkedIn home page and leaving an occasional Like does in fact help the person who created the post by elevating their posts reach to more people. But think about it this way, how has it helped you?

As one of my colleagues says, Liking is easy and the equivalent of nodding your head, but leaving a comment helps people get to know you.

Think People First

Put yourself in the place of the person who created a post, wouldn’t you learn more by hearing from that person who read your post and engaged with you by means of a comment? We’re all yearning to be heard as human beings and you are acknowledging this with a comment. And when your comment adds value to the discussion it generates visibility for you.

Commenting as a Prospecting Tool

Commenting increases visibility and authority when you add your unique insights and your expertise to the conversation. Others who are engaging with the post will be drawn to your perspective and naturally want to know who you are. That means you will receive more profile views and connection requests.

Develop Your Authority Status

When you create a post, think about the people in your network that you want to influence. Is your post relevant and does it engage people?  There are many forms of content you can share, but you always want to ask yourself if your post actually adds some value and is it structured in a way that would engage either through asking a question or ending with an actionable call to action.

According to an article featured in Convince and Convert,  “People are likely to trust authorities or experts in a certain industry or on a particular topic. The quality of the content you share and produce, as well as the advice you share when joining conversations, shapes your authority.” 

As you continue to develop and post content that your network engages with you will elevate your authority often giving you a competitive advantage over others in your niche.

How LinkedIn Views Comments

LinkedIn’s algorithm favors comments because their goal is to keep the members engaged and staying on the platform as long as possible.
They favor comments because they want members to be engaged with one another and when a post received comments, that post is rewarded by extending its reach in the network resulting in more people seeing the post.

When people who are 2^nd and 3^rd degree connections comment, now that post can reach their networks expanding the reach of a post further!

Strategize Your Comments

Using comments as a prospecting tool requires you to possibly think differently about how you spend your time and with what intent.  Here are some tips to help you prospect and get to know those people you most want to influence.

1. Search hashtags and keywords for posts that are relevant to your expertise and where you could add the value of your expertise to a conversation. Posts show up in order of when they were posted and are always shown in real-time.
2. Filter your searches by 1st-degree connections (warm leads) where you can find people you are already connected to that could be potential customers. Engage in their posts and reconnect for conversations.
3. Filter your searches by 2nd and 3rd-degree connections offering you opportunities to get in front of people you don’t already know.
4. Always leave insightful comments on a client’s post. This lets them know you are acknowledging them and when possible add to the value of their post.

Schedule and Measure Your Results

One of the biggest complaints I hear from people is that they never have enough time. I want to challenge that excuse and say if you have time to log onto LinkedIn and you believe your ideal prospects would be LinkedIn users, then you simply need a better strategy.

First, think quality over quantity.  If you left 2-3 comments a week on posts that mattered, that small action could get you in front of an ideal prospect perhaps making a new connection – how do you value that?

A fellow trainer, Richard Bliss suggests to sales teams they use a 3×3 approach. Leave three comments on three different people’s posts on three different days.  The watch your stats on ‘Who’s Viewed Your Profile.’  Richard said his clients regularly see a 300% increase in profile views in the first week!

Conclusion

Having a content strategy builds trust and influence. You want people to comment on your posts positioning your expertise. In addition, when you are strategically commenting by adding insightful thoughts and further expanding the conversation with questions, people view you as an authority and often someone they want to know and network with. So, I challenge you to leave three comments this coming week on relevant posts and then leave me a comment below on how your results have changed!

Need help with a content marketing strategy?  Let’s chat, schedule a call with me today.