Bonus: LinkedIn Masterclass Session Three

And welcome to this, with the 3rd session of the Unnoticed LinkedIn Masterclass with Simon Chapazot, the LinkedIn maestro based in South Africa, and me, Jim James, here in the UK, the student. Maestro, what are we going to do today?

Hey Jim, thank you, thank you for these kind words. Uh, big, big title. Um, yeah, today, uh, we're gonna go back to what we spoke about last week, quickly check in, and then we will talk about— let me quickly share my screen— we will talk about— I have a little challenge for you. So, I will force you to comment on posts to give you a change of perspective.

Okay.

And that is always a great way to get a sense for how to write and how to write in a way that it's engaging for people. And then we will look at a couple of your posts from the past week, and I give you a bit of comment feedback on these, and you can ask me things, what you could do differently. And I think that will give you a good idea for the coming week on what to focus on.

Sounds perfect. Well, let's dive in.

Let's do it. Let's Go to your profile.

And, um, so for those of us joining for the first time, this is a 12-week program where Simon's helping me improve engagement because I'm nearly 11,000 followers, but I'm getting less than 1 or 2% engagement. So I'm doing something right, but also a lot of things wrong. So that's why Simon's kindly volunteered to jump in and help me to get this sorted out.

Absolutely. So here is your profile, and I think the beauty is now we look at the profile like an outsider would look at your profile. So we don't see all the data and the stats in the profile. Should come up.

Testing your South African internet there, I think.

It's very slow. Thanks to Eskom. So here we are. Okay. So since the last time we spoke, you already did a couple of changes. You changed the header banner, now presenting the book, the nice coloring, the black, the red on black is Very strongly headshot. It's a nice front face, front view of your face. And one thing that you haven't hadn't changed last week was the header line here. And I challenge you to find something that is more inviting for people to reach out to you. So last week it just read Champion of the Unnoticed Entrepreneur, which I think is a fabulous headline. And you now added if you need more recognition. Then let's talk. And I think that's great because it touches on the core theme that you have, which is helping entrepreneurs to be more noticed in their work.

Great. Thank you.

Yeah. So well done. And where is the about text? You changed the about text here. So this is the about text, which you have also changed. And you did the following changes. You made it much more personal, which is great because people want to see your personality. And you highlighted a few pivotal experiences in your life, like when you realized that jumping out of an airplane might be a good idea to raise funds, which sort of planted the seed of good PR and your mind. I won't go into the whole profile in detail, but I will say one thing, which is it is still quite long. And I would challenge you until next time to sort of try to really cut it down to half the length and also try to have a call to action at the end. It's sort of now almost a story, and it'll be nice to have an ending where you say, like you did in the headline. If you want to get noticed or if you want to talk with me, please book a call here or call me or send me an email, something. But to sort of like create a jumping board where people know how to get in touch with you.

Okay, great. I mean, more like a tombstone than sort of a university Article. Okay, perfect. Cool.

Then let's go to your postings or to the challenge that I promised you. And then what I want you to do here is to just— let's look randomly at posts that come into my feed. And the idea is that you try to sort of mentally write a comment to that post. And what I want you to sort of pay attention to is to see how easy or how difficult it is to say something on a post because the whole idea of you, me, us posting is that people engage with what we say. So we try to write engaging and to write interesting things. And what we see on LinkedIn is a lot of people just don't write in a way that you know what to say. So I will show you now like sample posts here and I will ask you to come up with something to say and for you to experience how sometimes it's easy and sometimes it's hard and the difference will give you an idea of what is good post writing. So that's Let's start with the worst of the worst. And I'm— I don't want to be biased here, but it's an ad, BlackRock. And it reads, 08 Feb, #ATWAT. Are we entering the final lap of the tightening cycle in developed markets? Senior Market Strategist Laura Copper Unpeck. So what do you think? What do you make of this, Jim?

Yeah. Well, first of all, the thumbnail image at the beginning is not very inviting. It looks like a black hole. And I'd have to be in the know, I think, you know, for what @W80 is. And I'm a bit confused by the final lap of the tightening cycle in developed markets. It's sort of a mixed metaphor really, because final lap is like a race. A cycle is also a race, but then markets are not normally compared to racing in that sense. So, yeah. So overall, I don't know whether I would answer yes or no to that. I think I'd probably skip it.

Exactly. And then to add to what you said with, you don't know what the 08F blah, blah, blah is. You don't even know what to say there. And also, it's sort of like creating hurdles You have to click the video to know what she's talking about. And so you're asked a lot to even get to the point that you know what this whole thing is about. And so we want to sort of make that as easy as possible so that with sort of one quick glance, you know what this thing is about and what you possibly can say. So Sean, Sean, the most powerful form of self-care isn't a spa day or a yoga session, it's the Wim Hof Method. What do you make of that?

Well, it's a statement, isn't it, really, with a picture? And I could say, if I had a view on it, I could agree or disagree, give it a yes or no, I suppose. But again, Um, it's a— it's an assertion, isn't it? It's not a question, and therefore it doesn't prompt any response from me unless I particularly don't like Wim Hof Method or have got time on my hands.

Exactly, exactly. It's, it's sort of— yeah, I think the whole thing builds on the Wim Hof. If you know Wim Hof and you know the method, then probably you're drawn in. Uh, in this case, Sean is a business coach, uh, Wim Hof is very well known in business owner circles, so probably they might resonate with it.

But also, from an image point of view, that may just lead me to think about global warming rather than anything else. But, you know, I'm more worried about the ice pack melting.

Yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. Let's jump to the next one. Jake Ward is a content writer, copywriter. Stop doing content rewrites. There's a high chance you don't need to. Instead, focus first on optimizing SEO power factors.

Yeah, again, it's visually not very inspiring, but also again, they're making a statement. Um, but I can also see they've got 92 comments and 2 reposts. So I might read more just to see if I've missed something or maybe he put something interesting. So the sort of social proof thing about having all those other people commenting might lead me to take a chance to invite, be involved with it.

And that, yeah, that's a great point you made there, the social proof. And I think that that is something that's, uh, not a lot of people think about. Yes, I mean, we all want likes, but having social proof really sort of makes a post more interesting. And as you said, visually not very enticing. Jake Ward is known in his circles. So I guess who knows him or who follows him is more prone to open that post and read more. And as we can see, he probably has a lot of fans and followers who then like to engage on that. But then That's a very interesting observation that you need, or that likes can serve as social proof. Yeah. And let's do as a last one, Ethan Stern.

Yeah. Again, as we're seeing in LinkedIn, so many more people sort of making a statement and to some degree showing that they've nailed it. You know, but I don't know what's in it for me if I'm not a young guy that's into extreme sport, right? So again, because I'm interested in people getting noticed and so on, um, and the business side, I would probably pass on it. Although again, you see a lot of people have said it's nice, um, because maybe it's light relief. Well, Cool.

So, I think we see, or you can see, one thing is we basically have only the headline. There's one line or 2 lines at the top of a post to grab somebody's attention and give them a reason to click here. And I think that is sort of the number one rule to make a post better is to really think about, okay, what is this thing that I want to write in the first line that is clear, concise, compelling for the reader to click see more and then sort of to unwrap the whole thing. And if that is nailed, then that's a great start to engage with readers. And yeah, as we saw with this ad here, it's— if you don't know what's it about, you're probably not going to click and indulge in that piece. So did that give you an idea of, um, sort of—

Yeah, and it should. That's right. Maybe definitely think about, uh, these objectively rather than sort of if you've got time browsing. So, and absolutely very helpful, Simon.

Yeah, the way I like to think about it is always imagine you are on the London subway between 2 stops and you're scrolling through the feed, assuming there's Wi-Fi or a data connection. You need some— yeah, your reader is very distracted, so you really need to grab them with one thing that is interesting to them. And if it's not in the first line, they are probably not going to check out the rest of the post.

Yep. So actually, you need to think of it more like advertising. Right, actually, than just all copywriting in that sense.

Copywriting, yeah, advertising in the sense of being sort of really clear with what you can get and what you can't get.

Yeah, and arresting. Yep.

Okay. I don't know what it's doing.

You know, Simon, as well, this raises an interesting point. You're in South Africa complaining your Wi-Fi is having trouble. Um, the assumption is always that everyone's Wi-Fi is good. You know, and so for many people, it's not good. And so people must think about posting things that somehow are not going to be heavy duty on people's Wi-Fi as well, right?

Exactly. And videos would be a good example that videos usually have a lot of data associated with that. So what we see that the top posters, the top LinkedIn creators, Very often they only do text posts, which is not visually as appealing as you might hope for, but definitely they're the easiest to load and the easiest to read compared to video posts that are very heavy or slideshows.

Okay, I feel like we should have some sort of musical intermission while we're waiting for your internet to load. I can do a— while we do this, I can do a— Maybe you heard that. We'll put that on the— there you go, Simon. You have to keep that on Riverside. Well, whilst I wait for you to get your internet going, okay, where are we up to now?

So now we're going to look at your posts, your posting history. And, uh, you already did a couple of changes since last week. We spoke last week and I said, um, that you have like— you post a lot And that the frequency, if you do like 2, 3, 4, or 5 posts a day, you cannibalize your own reach. And that is not a good thing. 'Cause if you have a great post, you want people to see that post ideally for 24 hours before you do the next post. And so if you do 3, 4, or 5 posts, You basically have sort of a contingent of like views that you can get per day, and then you sort of like lower the reach of each post because they're sort of like, if you, if you, yeah, if you have like 1,000 views per day and you have 5 posts, every post technically gets 200 views. If you only have one post, you get 1,000 views with that one post. So it's always better to sort of rather do fewer posts There are too many posts. So this is something you posted yesterday. And so coming back to what we just saw in terms of like the opening of the post, what you do here, you open the post with 3 lines that are a bit heavy on your eyes because it's sort of like dense text. You might remember that some of the samples that I showed you, there was a an open line between the first and the third row, and you have 3 rows filled with text. So again, London subway, you're scrolling, that's a bit taxing on the eye to read this whole thing. Also, you introduced this in this article of the Unnoticed Entrepreneur. Aaron Kleimer talked about how he built Dataclima from a startup to an enterprise of 50 people and a visible market leader in less than 6 years. Then you added URL, and I'm forced to click see more, which is great. But you haven't really given me a reason why I should click see more unless I know Aaron, and I know whatever Aaron says is interesting, or Data Climber. Then I might have a reason. But it would have been better if you basically tell me why that thing is worthy. Of my time by saying something that he has achieved that, that I can learn from, or something that stuck out to you that was impressive, that, that is a, an example to others. So it's always thinking in, in the sense of what is it that, that, that's in it for me? Why should I care to read this? What do I get out of this? And you, you introduce the speaker, you introduce, uh, the company, um, but I don't really get a reason why I should read that other than I know Aaron. That doesn't make sense.

Yep, no, absolutely. That, that's reflected in the kind of engagement that we're getting. Every now and again we have a post where the company of the person that, um, interviewee is on kind of gets engaged with it, but otherwise it can, it can just languish.

Okay, I guess. Yeah, it's Aaron that, that has reposted this thing. It's, um, Kitcaster. Kitcaster. Dave. Dataclima.

Okay. That's the podcasting agency. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Cool. So one post, another one here, very similar picture. You see it's again like dense text, 3 lines filled with text. The other thing that you do that is also sort of makes it harder for the eye to read is to have hashtags. in the intro because it's harder for the eye to read the word with a hashtag. And as an aside with hashtags, very few people actually use hashtags on LinkedIn. It's not really helping you a lot to have a lot of hashtags because it's sort of a way to search for text. But I think 4% of LinkedIn users actually use hashtags to search for information. So you can—

Wow.

As well leave it away. and just do a clean intro, first line text, empty space, second, third line with a good reason why I then have to click see more.

Okay.

So, but now let's look at a great post that you did last week. And I'm very excited that you had that post, which is here. You talked about your previous company, East West PR, and you opened with a great, I think, great headline, Afraid the brave is calling— the grave is calling before, uh, someone is ringing to buy your business. So you, you ask a question, um, it's provocative, um, maybe a bit uncomfortable, uh, to speak about death, but it's a good point to make. And, um, it's, it's all that I have to see. And then you have— you've created the cliffhanger, which basically forces me to see see more, and then sort of it's very easy for me to click here, and then I have a nice article. And this is not just theory. We can see that this post actually did quite well compared to usual posts. You have 40 likes, 41, and 16 comments and 1 repost, which I think is great. And you can see a lot of comments. So clearly that hook line has resonated and invited more people to actually read the text. What you then did really nicely is to have a structure. You have bullet points so I can really get these nuggets broken down into 3 sections. And you have used emojis which again lighten the load on my eyes because it's easier to read the text. So I think that's a great example for a well-written post.

Thanks, Armin. Well, thanks to you for your guidance. I really looked at this very differently and caught myself not just sharing the news that I've sold a business, but thinking, well, what have I learned that I could share? And then my news is actually the, if you like, the evidence to support what I've written rather than being the main story. So thinking about it differently made a big difference.

Yeah.

So thank you for that.

And you said something quite interesting. You sold your business and you could have just spoken about, hey, look how cool I am. I sold my business, the usual story. Nobody would've cared about it. But you turned that around and made it into a personal experience share that people can relate to because you're giving something of value to people that are thinking maybe about this. That is what people like.

Yay! I could do a— There we go. Round of applause for Jim.

Exactly. Well done. So what is, what is on the table for next week? What, what are we gonna focus on? And I think you've started in a good direction. Focus on a daily post, not more. And if possible, if you have a new podcast episode that you want to introduce, Try to sort of lead with a thing that is of interest to the audience. Don't talk about the person unless it's a superstar that everybody knows, because if they don't, it's not really interesting. Sorry to all the guests that are great but not superstars. So really lead with an idea that is interesting to the audience and try to pull them in so they click to see more, which, by the way, is a very strong indicator for LinkedIn for the quality of a post. So everybody out there who thinks it's all about the likes, there's a hierarchy of interactions you have on a post. And the like is basically the least popular one and the least valued one. The see more is very interesting because it shows LinkedIn somebody is interested, interested enough to see more, to click that. And then the next thing on the hierarchy is people leaving a comment, which actually shows somebody's taken the time to really think and invest their effort. So that's an even stronger signal to LinkedIn that this post must be good. So if it's a good post, let's show it to more people. And that is why it's important to sort of have people click to see more so LinkedIn shows it to more people of your network.

Okay, so I think, is that us done then for today, Simon? Until I get my homework for next week?

Exactly. So one post per day, not more, and try to open the post with a strong opening line, leave an open line, and then sort of have the third line with a call to action, which is, hey, read more.

Oh, sorry, I went too early. Okay. Sorry, Simon, just repeat that.

Um, yeah, first line, open line, third line with a strong reason why people should click see more and always try to lead and sell with a nugget that you took from the show and not with a lead, with a guest or with like the topic.

Okay, so I'm gonna try that again using Riverside and the media. Let's see if I can add this in. Um, but thank you to Simon Chapizot for his guidance today. And, uh, you see, we're making some progress each week. Yeah, so thank you to Simon. And you can find Simon's contact details, of course, in the show notes and in the links below. If you like it, please do subscribe. I realize you're supposed to do this sort of thing. And, uh, that's from me, Jim James. Look for me on LinkedIn, join and make comments, and share with us as we do Build in Public for this Unnoticed Entrepreneur LinkedIn Safari. Thank you from me, and thank you from Simon in South Africa. Have a great day. Thank you. Right, I can't make that work, Simon, on the, on the noise one. They say, they say white men can't dance. All right, Simon, thanks a lot.

Thanks.