the linkedin thing actually works if you stop dming people

Been watching folks in b2bmarketing complain about LinkedIn outreach for like two years. Everyone's doing the same thing: find someone, send a cold DM, get ignored, repeat 47 times, burn out.

The shift that worked for us was treating LinkedIn like a publication. Stop treating it like email.

Here's what actually happens now. Monday morning, spend 20 minutes finding posts from people in your ICP. Not their profile — their actual thoughts. What they're worried about, what they're building, what they're complaining about. Then write a comment that's actually useful. Not "great post!" but something that shows you read it and have a take.

The comment sits there. Sometimes they reply. Sometimes they don't. But here's the thing: if they do, you're not a stranger anymore. You're someone who understood something they cared about.

We built this into a workflow because doing it manually is tedious. You find posts, draft comments in your own voice (this part matters way more than I thought), and follow up if there's engagement. No DM spam. Just systematic presence.

Honestly, not sure this scales the same way for everyone. Might depend on your ICP, your industry, how much you sound like a robot when you write. Still rough around the edges too.

But the 3 or 4 actual conversations happening now feel different than the cold DM pile. They actually know what we do before we talk.

What's the ratio for you guys? How many comments before you see a real reply?