Leads Over Likes

If you’re building a service-based business, a year from now you won’t care how many new followers you gained. But you’ll care how many deals you closed, clients you served, people you impacted, and relationships you built.

Instead of creating generic content and chasing followers, focus on targeted content that speaks directly to your ideal clients. Start new conversations, connect with your ICP (Ideal Client Profile), and make it a habit to send DMs each week to find your next client.

The truth is, posting content and commenting for 2 hours a day won’t get you far—at least not by itself and not in the next 24 months.

Entrepreneurs hear things like “audience-first” and “you are the niche” then they try to build an audience around things they aren’t credible to talk about. Or worse, things they don’t even like talking about but they just do it to get attention.

The goal of your content strategy as a business owner should be to attract qualified leads that can turn from strangers into clients, not to become a social media celebrity sharing photos of your smoothie.

So how do you create a content marketing strategy that works?

The 5 Elements of a Successful Marketing Campaign

To create a content strategy that drives business growth, you need to understand the fundamental elements that make a successful marketing campaign.

Every successful marketing campaign focuses on communicating:

1. What the product or service is

2. Why it's different from others

3. Why they should care about it

4. Why now is the right time to buy

5. Why it's smart and safe to do so

This doesn’t mean every piece of content must cover all five elements. But they should be ingrained in your strategy to generate qualified leads and drive business growth.

So if you have a few thousand followers on social media and they don’t know what you sell and what makes you different than the competition, you have a problem to fix.

But first, you have to understand the shift in social media algorithms.

The New Algorithm

Social media platforms are shifting from ‘social graph’ algorithms (content based on who you follow) to ‘interest graph’ algorithms (content based on your interests).

The algorithm is now much better at serving the right content to the right people, so niching down and creating highly relevant content will increase your chances of being seen by the right people.

Platforms like Instagram, X, LinkedIn, and YouTube are increasingly recommending content from small accounts that match the type of content you usually engage with.

So, if you're interested in yoga, and a small YouTube channel posts a relevant video, the algorithm will show it to you—even if the creator is relatively unknown.

The New Opportunity

This shift creates a huge opportunity for new creators who focus on niche content. Algorithms are no longer just prioritising large, established accounts.

They're looking for content that aligns with users' specific interests.

So, if you're creating high-quality, niche content, even with a small following, your work can be recommended to a lot of people who are interested in that topic.

This gives you the chance to reach a highly relevant audience, grow your following organically, and build an engaged community in your niche.

So here’s what you can do to capitalise on this:

1. Get absolutely clear on who your ideal customer is. If you have an ICP (Ideal Client Profile) document, it’s time to update it. If you don’t, create one.
   

2. Schedule time for recreating your content strategy. The direction of your content ideation should be geared towards addressing your ICP’s most painful problems. Focus on the main problem that your offer solves.
   

3. Make sure every piece of content has a specific objective and a clear CTA (Call-To-Action). Find new ways to integrate soft CTAs in your content. Aim for clarity so that your prospects can quickly grasp how you can help them.
   

4. Engage with relevant accounts only and don’t waste your time commenting on posts that your ICP doesn’t care about or engage with. Make a conscious decision to be more targeted and selective.
   

5. Promote yourself and your offer frequently. It could be at the end of every post in your content, or a piece of content specifically made for promoting your offer. And reach out to prospects directly, build rapport, and offer to help them.

The goal is simple: move from broad to niche, from hopeful to effective. Shift from generic to specific content by creating with your ICP in mind, and from passive to active by sending connection requests, DMs, and follow-ups.

Try this for the next 90 days and see what happens.

If you enjoyed this, share it with a friend.

Until next time, keep creating!

Omara

If you want to grow your brand and attract new clients on LinkedIn, I can help you save months of trial and error. Reply to this email or book a call here.

"Before I met Omara, I struggled to find and convert leads into paying clients. One month later, I had more leads, paying customers, and increased my revenue by 50%. He's my go-to LinkedIn marketing expert." —Venzo Chaar