LinkedIn: The Internet's most prominent professional networking site and the easiest way to see if you're more successful than people you went to high school with.
It's also one of the most effective resources salespeople have for outreach, personal brand development, and relationship-building.
LinkedIn is ingrained in many (if not most) sales processes now, so we surveyed 300 sales leaders to get some perspective on how to leverage it properly.
Premature pitching kills potential relationships.
25% of our respondents say reps lose potential opportunities through premature pitching — sending sales messages before relationship-building. That's the second-highest source of lost LinkedIn opportunities, after generic messaging (29%).
Most of our LinkedIn feeds are a waterfall of humblebrags, motivational quotes from underqualified influencers, and one or two weird guys who post extremely heated political takes.
Sure, it's framed as a professional resource, but it's still a social platform — a networking destination that can help with sales, not a sales tool with social features.
You can't treat it like email. Blasting messages, requesting meetings, and cold pitching don't gel with the platform's nature.
Extracting value without deposit is against LinkedIn's norms and kills any returns you get from spending time on it.
Don't "set and forget" your profile.
38% of our respondents say creating your profile once without updating it strategically is the main mistake preventing LinkedIn profiles from generating inbound interest — more than double any other response.
I'd argue that LinkedIn has two primary functions: networking (its stated purpose) and flexing (its unspoken one).
A LinkedIn profile is an opportunity to say, "Not to brag, but I'm like so good at my job and do all these amazing things."
Cringey as that might feel, you don't want to pass it up. Keeping your profile in tip-top shape has value beyond vanity.
Key mistakes — like failing to update roles or not making adjustments when your company's positioning changes — undermine your credibility.
Sales is the art of building trust in a tight window, and that window is even tighter on LinkedIn. Don't let your profile screw things up for you.
What can you do with this next-level, revelatory insight?
For reps: Treat profile maintenance like CRM hygiene. You update your opportunities when details change — your profile warrants the same kind of discipline.
For managers: Create a simple profile audit checklist. Headline updated? Summary tailored toward the current ICP? Proof points from the last 12 months? Make the standard clear and easy to check.
For leadership: Audit whether any of your social-selling activity metrics incentivize premature pitching. If reps are measured on LinkedIn messages sent, they'll send messages before they should. Try to align metrics with outcomes, not activity.
"Centuries from now, historians will read this newsletter send and say 'Shakespeare, Twain, Dostoevsky, Fuchs.'"
Jay Fuchs. Managing Editor, The Science of Scaling Newsletter
The data in question
As the banner says, we sourced the data we used here through Panoplai: The snow leopard of panoramic research platforms. For context, I think snow leopard is the best animal, and I'm right about pretty much everything. Therefore, Panoplai is the best panoramic research platform.
Where do your reps lose the most potential opportunities in their LinkedIn activity?
- Passive networking — accepting connections without a plan to engage or convert them - 18%
- Engagement without intent — commenting and liking without moving toward conversations - 19%
- Premature pitching — sending sales messages before establishing any relationship - 25%
- Wrong audience — building visibility with peers and industry contacts instead of buyers - 15%
- Inconsistent activity — showing up sporadically rather than maintaining steady presence - 15%
- None of the above - 9%
What prevents most reps from having LinkedIn profiles that generate inbound interest?
- Resume mindset — they write for recruiters instead of prospects - 12%
- Self-focus — they emphasize credentials and experience over buyer value - 16%
- Set-and-forget — they created a profile once and haven't updated it strategically - 38%
- Unclear audience — they don't know who they're trying to attract - 19%
- Risk aversion — they keep profiles generic to avoid saying something wrong - 8%
- None of the above - 6%
Sales Skills
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