Melanie
Welcome to the Monday Morning Marketing Podcast for all decision makers and action takers. Take it away, Esther.
Esther
And welcome back to another episode of the Monday Morning Marketing Podcast. Today, we're talking about generating sales on LinkedIn without being obnoxious. And for that purpose, we have Niraj Kapur with us today. Welcome, Niraj.
Niraj
Absolute pleasure to be here, Esther. Loved to see you, Melanie. Great to see you, too.
Esther
So Niraj, sales It does. Always gets a bad rep, doesn't it?
Niraj
It does. I understand why it does. At the same time, just because it has a bad reputation, doesn't mean you don't do it. And sales is the lifeblood of your business. And if you're a solopreneur or a as a business owner, you need sales for your business.
Esther
And you've even written the book on it, haven't you?
Niraj
Yes, everybody works in sales. That was what I did to launch my business. And the idea was to write that book, become a million, dollar best seller with Simon Sinek and Mel Robbins, and really hang out with them and do events together. And it didn't quite go as planned, but, you know.
Esther
Well, we're glad because it means you get to hang out with us instead of them.
Niraj
I did actually interview Mel Robbins in 2017 for my book, and there's four pages off her in there before she became the Mel Robbins we know today. And I must say she was outstanding. She was really quite brilliant.
Melanie
So sales on LinkedIn, how hard is it to do sales on LinkedIn? Or is it easy?
Niraj
It's getting harder now. I would say four years ago, I started to become well known on LinkedIn. I was a nobody just to every listening or watching those. And I was trying really hard to sell my books and sell my courses. I wasn't having much luck. And that was my fault because I was almost every post was buy my product I buy my services. Nobody really cares about that. And so once I stopped doing that and I started sharing knowledge and I started helping people, all of a sudden you start to get a following. And like I said, three or four years ago, it was easier. Now you have 1.2 billion people on LinkedIn. You have an algorithm which is ever changing. And you have a lot of people, especially Gen Z, now who are becoming very smart in how they promote themselves on LinkedIn. They are very smart copywriters. They are brilliant marketeers. I'm not saying that makes them good at their job, but they're very good at getting attention from themselves. And so the competition now has become ferocious on LinkedIn. At the same And at the same time, I'm still doing business on LinkedIn. It's just not 50% of my income anymore. It's more like 25 to 30 %.
Melanie
Okay, so sales isn't as hard as I initially thought on LinkedIn. So is it down to the fact that it's just all being done natively or is it down to the fact that it's being done more cleverly using LinkedIn ads?
Niraj
I personally prefer native because the people I see doing LinkedIn ads tend to be very well off. And that's not fair in most people who can't afford it. Plus, I don't use LinkedIn ads, so I can't sit here and talk about experience of I have used it, therefore it's I look this way. I always talk about personal experience for myself and personal experience for my customers. The customers I know that use LinkedIn have said it's very, very expensive for what it is. A lot of people think because LinkedIn is a very good B2B business platform, that automatically they should be advertising in it. And those two do not go well hand in hand, just to be clear. So LinkedIn, in order to generate the sales you want. It used to be you wrote very good content and people will contact you. Now you have to do very good content and you have to spend a lot of time in the comments section, commenting in other people's posts. That's currently where the gold is right now. And you need to spend time doing emails, quality emails to people. And you need to pick up the phone now and again. And you've got to have a Zoom on again and you've got to go to a networking event and you've got to do... But there's a whole... Sales is no longer just one thing. It's quite rare. When I see people saying they have six-figure businesses on LinkedIn and they're 23 years old and they've been in business for a year. I don't believe a word they say. Now, of course, there's always unicorns here and there. And you always get somebody now and again who's truly exceptional. But in I have spoken to these people and they openly admit they lie because they feel they have to get attention. They belong to the Instagram generation where they have to show off about their cars, they have to show off about their laptop lifestyle, they have to say they make millions of pounds a year for the clients, even though from their LinkedIn profile, they've only been in business for about a year and they've just graduated university. It's amazing how many of these young kids are making a fortune with zero proof. But sadly, a lot of people who are going through a difficult time do buy into that. Which is very disappointing, but it does happen.
Melanie
So fake it till you make it is back.
Esther
Yeah, that's what I was going to say.
Niraj
All the young kids do. Our generation is different. I'm much, much older than both of you, but my generation would just never do something like that. We just wouldn't. I'm not saying my generation is better, just to be clear, because Gen Z has a lot of great technical skills and technology skills and skills that my generation doesn't have. And I admire them and respect them for that. It's very important. This is not a Gen Z bashing. I would never do that. And I also recognize and respect them. And I have a daughter and two step daughters who are Gen Z. So that's why I want to be very open about it and not take sides. But yes, they have no problem lying their asses off. No problem at all lying their asses off and being dishonest. And they have no problem with that. Whereas my generation, it makes us very uncomfortable.
Melanie
Fair enough.
Esther
Well, we're not going to ask the ladies on the podcast their age, but everyone who listens to us regularly does know that we tend to verge towards the-
Melanie
We're not quite boomers yet, but you know.
Esther
No, we're not boomers, but we're definitely Millennial and Gen-X. So, proudly, I have to say, proudly. Right. So fake it till you make it is back. Everybody's made to feel inadequate. You have to spend 10 hours a day on LinkedIn. That's what I'm hearing from the, you know. Post your content, comment on other people's content, send messages, send emails, send Zooms, phone calls, attend networking events. It's just sell, sell, sell constantly.
Niraj
Yes, but I think when times are more difficult and the competition is ferocious, that is just one of the things you have to do. And I am spending certainly more time prospecting these days, more than I personally want to. I lost a piece of business to a big Fortune 500 company recently. I had two, through their mutual connections, recommended me to And I had a meeting, I had a follow up. They said, look, sorry, we're going in a different direction. I said, fair enough, these things happen. And on Thursday, they posted just a week ago on LinkedIn. And the woman they hired, I mean, she was gorgeous. She was probably late 20s, early 30s, mini skirt, stunning. And she had done exactly what I'd suggested doing. And that really upset me. So a lot of people, sadly, do buy into the young, beautiful, hot. That does work, which is why so many people do it. It makes it very difficult.
Melanie
Thank God, for AI.
Niraj
A lot of really good people on LinkedIn, Melanie, are just not being heard right now. A lot of people who shouldn't be heard on LinkedIn are, just because they shout louder, And that is certainly a concern I have, and a lot of people I've spoken to do have those concerns, too.
Esther
You said, Niraj, that you don't use LinkedIn ads, but what about the verification on LinkedIn? Being verified, paying the subscription to LinkedIn to have the little, is it a blue or gold?
Melanie
Premium.
Esther
Is that your name?
Niraj
The verification is free. I didn't pay for it. Only 10% of people who use LinkedIn have actually been verified. And what I just like so much about it, I did it because I feel, you know what, I'm a top voice. I should lead by example. It took me three attempts to do. It took me almost 20 minutes. I had to upload my passport, all my details, my data. That made me very uncomfortable. So I do regret doing that. And if you want to get verified on LinkedIn, it doesn't mean a thing. Linkedin wants you to do it, but LinkedIn are also owned by Microsoft. Microsoft don't always make the best decisions. I'm sorry, but they don't. They're a big multibillion corporation who care about making money. They don't necessarily have people's best interests at heart all the time. I think that's a nicest way to describe it. In terms of LinkedIn premium, I get LinkedIn premium free because I'm a LinkedIn top voice. But would I pay £600 a month just to send unlimited messages to people and see who's looked at my profile? No I wouldn't.
There are better ways of doing things. So if you look at LinkedIn right now, so many people are bragging, so many people are showing off. A lot of people are paying a fortune to PR companies to be seen in Forbes and Fortune and Entrepreneur magazine, which again is pretty meaningless, but people think it has meaning. So what I've done is I recommend taking a slightly different approach. And some of my best posts have generated leads and sales on LinkedIn have been, you know what? I've had a tough month this month. And the people who wanted to do business with me are stuck with indecision or they went with somebody cheaper. Or you know what? I've just not had many leads this month. Those posts do outstanding and generate leads because they're honest. And there's not that much honesty on LinkedIn. LinkedIn used to be a great platform, but it's getting very challenging right now with more people bragging about how successful they are. And I find that the honest, more real posts are doing very well for And the second thing which is done consistently well for the last four years is video. So I do one video a week for almost five years now.
And I have, without feel, without exception. Christmas week, I'll still do a video because video is what gives you authority It's what creates trust. You keep the video to one minute long. Thirty second videos don't work and nobody has time to watch two-minute videos. So please keep that in mind. One minute videos work very, very well, give or take five seconds. And And I recommend once a week doing this consistently week after week. And that's the thing people struggle with. You have to show up week after week and everybody wants a quick fix. And again, the people who offer quick fixes are normally selling a course of quick fixes. But in reality, it takes time to win business and you have to be here for the long game. You can't just show up and try and win and become big within a month.
Melanie
Okay, so that's very valuable information you just gave there. So what What about the likes of carousels and newsletters? Are they also a good way to add authority?
Niraj
Carousels are good ways to stand out. They're not as popular or as effective, I should say, as video. They don't generate as much leads as video, but they're still effective because people can download carousels. All you do is open up, click Download, you've got the information. So that's why I like carousels. And I finally get shared a lot internally in companies which I like. Email newsletters are becoming less and less successful because nobody really has time in today's busy world to spend between four minutes to six minutes reading a newsletter. My clients will read it. I one or two close friends will read it, but nobody else cares. They really don't. And I have unsubscribed from a lot of newsletters now because I just haven't got time. Unless you're a client or a potential client, I just don't read newsletters anymore at all.
Esther
Does that include the LinkedIn newsletters themselves or is this LinkedIn?
Niraj
LinkedIn newsletters are horrible. Oh, God, I'm sorry, but they're, the people who work at LinkedIn, they don't know how to use LinkedIn. They just don't. And again, I've been to head office enough times to know this. They just don't know how to use LinkedIn. It's all their business is inbound. And their job is to sell people 50,000 pounds worth of LinkedIn premium, £100,000 worth of LinkedIn sales navigator. And the only success people really have on LinkedIn is when they leave and they put X LinkedIn in their profile and they say, hey, I'm X LinkedIn. You want to know how things work? Come and hire me. And these people, sadly, do very well for themselves, even though they haven't a clue how to run a business, and even though they don't know how to use LinkedIn, it says X LinkedIn on their job title. And I know several people who've left LinkedIn, set up their own businesses, and they're making a killing because people actually think they know what they're talking about.
Melanie
Wow.
Esther
So you said you mentioned there just in passing, and you mentioned just briefly that you're a top voice on on LinkedIn. Explain more about how you got it.
Melanie
We said it a couple of times in fairness.
Esther
Well, we didn't go into detail. We didn't go into detail as to how we can get it.
Niraj
I was really proud of that. So what happened was I was a nobody on LinkedIn, as I mentioned, and I wasn't having much success. Instead of just selling all the time, I started helping people. And that's good. But it wasn't enough. So what had happened was, even though I was born and grew up in Northern Ireland, I spent my career in London. And I had a pretty good career. But when I set my own business up, I found it very difficult. And so I sold as much as I could on LinkedIn, wasn't working. Then I went through a traumatic divorce, which knocked me for six after 21 years of marriage. And then lockdown happened. And I was struggling with business and living off bounce back loans because nobody had any money. And unfortunately, I didn't cope well mentally. It's mental health really suffered. The trauma of divorce, not being able to afford therapy and lockdown and living off bounce back loans. As a man, especially, you need a job or a career. You need money, you need an income. Otherwise, you don't really have much. Also, men are terrible at forming friendships. We just are. Women are brilliant at it.
Men are just not good. So there's no support system either. And so, sadly, I had to go live in my parents. I'm moving with them in a small working class town in Northern Ireland. I put everything in storage and went to live with them. And I wrote a post on LinkedIn about shame and embarrassment and failure. And that The post went viral. It surprised me. And a month later, I wrote about loneliness and the difficulty of finding friends in your late 40s. That went viral. And I was inundated with hundreds of messages from people to say, I'm struggling with friendships, too. I'm struggling with loneliness. And by the way, don't worry about divorce. I've had to live in my parents' in my 40s as well. And so many supportive people just came out of the woodwork. It was amazing. And then I started talking about online dating and how online dating is like sales. And all of a sudden, thousands of women started following me. Probably half of them out of nosiness and half of them just genuinely curiosity. And all of a sudden, they started reaching out to me going, I love your posts on LinkedIn. I love your honesty. There's nobody writing the way you are. Can you tell us about how you managed to get so many followers so quickly. I got about 15,000 followers in a year. And LinkedIn saw this and thought this guy is different, he's unique. And they gave me the top voice badge. And that was really cool because I did ask them why. Because there's no real reasons why they give it to, but they to very few people. When I spoke to head office in San Diego and I spoke to one of the creator managers, that was the reason she gave. And I was really grateful for that. It doesn't bring you in the work. It's not like people look at and go, oh, my God, he's a top voice. We must hire him. That rarely happens, believe it or not. Now and again, it does. And I'm grateful. And now and again, somebody will say, We're putting an event on your top voice, would you like to speak? But like I said, it's now and again, it doesn't build your business, really. It doesn't create regular income, but it's very nice for my ego.
Melanie
It's just an illustration to me of people say that sex sells, and to a point, I suppose it does. But I think vulnerability also sells. The relatability that you made of yourself with those two viral posts. It's because you pulled back the curtain. Just like the Wizard of Oz, you revealed what was going on in the background. And that's something that a lot of people are very afraid of doing. And it's not because they're a bad person or anything like that, but it's just leaving themselves exposed, basically.
Niraj
People are generally scared of being judged. Whenever they say to me, we don't want to write about our personal life on LinkedIn, because my personal life is my personal life and my children are my children. I think it's just ridiculous doing that. I said, look, I respect your wishes. I'm here to share best practices with you. And by the way, as a fellow parent, kids are expensive. It does no harm to put their pictures on LinkedIn. Seriously, you got to get something out of it, all right? It does no harm. It really doesn't. You can cover their faces if you want, but it just makes you more human. And the fact is, as a business owner, I'm constantly buying things, whether it's software, whether it's email, whether it's marketing I buy it from people I like and trust. I don't just buy it from people who do business posts. I have to buy into the person. That's me. And the people who buy into me, nobody's ever contacted me and said, I must hire everybody, works in Sales Limited for my business. Nobody. What they've often said is, I just read a post about your engagement.
I got engaged in April this year and that post went viral. So I had nine posts go viral over three years. And I read about your engagement and I just loved how you wrote about that. That was It's amazing. I've been looking for a sales coach and a lot of the sales coaches out there are quite passive aggressive. You seem just like a decent person. Can we have a chat? And that's generally how it goes. And I said, it's a great idea. Let's spend half an hour talking, see if you like me, see if I get you, and see if you trust me. And if we do, I'll send a recommendation across and we can talk further. But that's how sales is done. It's not rushed. And even say to the person, look, you should spend time talking to me. You should spend time getting to know me. And the recommendations I gave you, you should follow up on those people and see who they are. There's 138 people on my LinkedIn profile. Contact any of them and ask, what was the experience like working with me? And it's not rushed. It's not forced. I never said to anybody, look, this is my last space available.Take it now or it's gone forever. I don't like those sales tactics. And again, I find that by being different and by being human and by being genuine, I win business. Yes, it takes longer. It's a much slower process, but I find that what you often do is, A, you attract much better clients. But also those clients often refer you to people in the future. Right now in the world of business, referrals are one of the most important things you can get from anybody. They really are.
Esther
I want to touch on inboxes. So we're focussing on LinkedIn here. So people appear hearing in your inbox. And I said before coming on that I've had some howlers over the last couple of weeks. One guy contacted me a couple of weeks ago, and the first time he had contacted me was 2019. And he starts this next one, and I had never replied to him. He started this next one with, I'll pretend you didn't ghost me.
Niraj
Oh my goodness.
Esther
And I'm just like, I'm sorry, what? And then a week after that, he sent a gif or a jif of a coffin and me waiting till you respond.
Niraj
No.
Esther
I was like, I just don't have words. I don't have words for this. And I haven't blocked him on purpose to see what else he's going to do to dig the whole even deeper. But I also then had a friend request come in or a connection request come in from a woman, and she had written a little message. She said, I tried you on email, and I looked her up on my emails first. And from 18 months ago, I suddenly had appeared on her mailing list. And I have never signed up to the mailing list. And there was no obvious way to remove myself from the mailing list. But at the bottom of every single email, not the first ones, but of the most recent ones, it said, reply, no, or reply I stop. I'm like, I shouldn't have to do that. So I didn't accept her connection request. And I'm just like, things like these, these smarmy tactics, these ick. It happens a lot on LinkedIn, and I think it's happening more because I see polls from other people that I follow on LinkedIn who are always going, has your inbox filled up with all these connection requests or with these random, you've ghosted me messages and things recently. So is this just something that has happened more recently? Is it a trend that we're seeing since the demise of Twitter X? Is it a thing that we're going to see more of?
Melanie
Is there one trainer responsible for all of this?
Niraj
When times are tough, people spam more. That's what happens in business. Right now people are nervous about tariffs. They are very nervous about AI. Ai. A lot of people I know in the last year, I know at least 20 people in the last year who are LinkedIn coaches or business coaches who now have had to take part time jobs or, sadly, close their business down and take full-time jobs. Because a lot of people have become lazy, and instead of investing properly in coaches, using ChatGP to coach them. Which isn't the same thing, just to be clear. I'm not anti-AI. I believe AI can be used properly, but there is nothing in this world that can match your humanity of having a coach that cares about you, has your best interests at heart, keeps you accountable, and looks after you. Nothing. There's no AI yet that can match that. And yet so many people I know are using YouTube to coach themselves. I'm like, YouTube's good. I like YouTube, but I pay a lot of money to coaches. You know who my coaches are. Esther, I told you about them before we started. I pay a lot of money to them.
They're good coaches. That's how you get better. But when times are tough, people default to smile. And emails spam and LinkedIn DMs are what they're doing. Now, that's wrong. But what's also interesting is most of them are men. I find that in sales, self-awareness is at an all-time low. And women generally have more self-awareness than men. Most of the time they do. Men self-awareness is... I don't even think men know what self-awareness are in most cases. They just don't get it at all. And they just don't seem to have a clue how they come across. And a lot of the bad sales messages you receive on email and social media are caused by mammoth no self-awareness. It's caused by people who don't respect sales as a skill, so they send out anything. But sadly, sometimes a lot of managers have no idea how to coach people or manage people, and they give terrible advice that worked 10 years ago, that doesn't work anymore. And that's wrong. And that's why I always say, if you want to be good at anything, you have to spend time learning about it. There's no other way around it. Right now, the most important skills in sales are actually a emotional intelligence and soft skills like being able to listen, being able to ask the right questions. When you get a setback, how do you respond to that setback? These are the most important skills right now. If I can guarantee you, 90% of people are completely oblivious to them because they're either doing nothing or they're frozen by indecision or they're just spamming people or they're paying a fortune to some awful LinkedIn agency to spam people on their behalf.
Melanie
That sounds pretty accurate, actually.
Niraj
That's my experience every day, but also I ask my clients. I work with clients every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Monday, Friday, and some days I do my prep work. And then three days a week, I'm with clients on Zoom or I'm in their offices. So I'm observing demos, I'm looking at cold emails, I'm looking at their LinkedIn DM's where I have nieces. I see this all day long, three days a week. So I see what people go through. And that's exactly what people are going through right now. And because I'm a business as well, I experience a lot of that myself, too.
Melanie
So, Niraj, if people wanted to get your support and consult you, how would they reach you? What would be the best way? And I know it's LinkedIn, but I still need to ask.
Niraj
It is LinkedIn. But here's the thing, on everybodyworksinsales.com or nirajkapur.com, but everybodyworksinsales.com, there's 50 blogs there. Why don't you just look at any of them? There's about 12 blogs on LinkedIn and the rest are on sales and mindset and personal development, emotional intelligence. It's there for you. Go to my LinkedIn profile and click on all posts. You can see every post I've done in the last six months. Look at them, see what's worked well, see what engages with you. Why don't you do that first and then contact me and say, can you support me or can you help me or have a question for you. If you spend the time looking at my LinkedIn profile or commenting on my posts, and you ask me a question, I am much more likely to respond to you than hundreds of people who contact me each month saying, can I pick your brain? Can I have 50 minutes of your time? Or even worse, hi, Niraj, I can help you get 20 leads a week. Here's my county link. Things like that don't work. And by the way, don't lie on LinkedIn either. I think it's a bonus question I want to give you. So many people go, hi, Niraj, I looked at your profile this morning and I wanted to talk about doing business with you. I have LinkedIn premium. I immediately look and go, No, you haven't looked at my profile this morning. So it's amazing number of people now who will just lie straight out with copy and paste automation and say, I looked at your profile this morning, or even worse, I contacted you three years ago, you didn't respond. Question mark. Again, don't do that, please. Just have some self-awareness and just see why can you help people? Sales is helping, sales is serving. And if you come to it with a servant mind mindset and you do it consistently and you follow up, not after two years, but after a week, and you don't follow up going high, what are your thoughts? You follow up with something you've read on my website or with a news story I've done, or you comment on a podcast I've done. If you say to me, Niraj, I just heard you on Melanie and Esther's podcast. I like what you said about XXX. Can I ask you a question about LinkedIn? Even if it takes me three or four minutes to reply to that, I will, I guarantee you I'll reply because you made the effort to do what 99% of people don't do. So again, it's okay to be different. It's good to stand out. Please make the effort and serve, serve, serve.
Melanie
Oh, yeah.
Esther
Brilliant. For those of you that are in and around the Ireland area, Niraj will be speaking at Social Media Fest in Wexford in November. So you can come down and see him there at that and ask him in person any questions that you have. And I'm sure you have lots of other speaking engagements. And you mentioned networking, so people can find you all through the island and in the rest of the UK as well, because you mentioned before coming on air that you'll be going to lots of different things over on the main land, too, as we like to call it here on the island. But, Niraj, I do want to thank you for coming on and giving us your time and your insights and your knowledge and your hilarity as well. Keep us all going this Monday morning. And we do want to thank you for taking time out of your client prep work time that you have with on Mondays. If anybody does have a question for Niraj and you want to contact him through us, we can also send on the information to Niraj. But do reach out and tell him that you heard it first through yourselves.
Melanie
Yes.
Esther
That's it for today, guys. We're back next week with another episode of the Monday Morning Marketing Podcast. Until then. Bye bye.
Melanie
Bye.
Niraj
Bye thank you.
Was that okay for you both?
Melanie
It was absolutely fine. You've now put me off going for my verification, however.
Niraj
Don't do it. It's time consuming and you have to give away your passport and your data. It's just ridiculous. Because don't forget, LinkedIn make a fortune selling your data onto other people. They make an absolute... Well, most companies do. And they shouldn't. The way they did it was very unclear.
