How a simple campaign achieved a 58% reply rate

Let me tell you about our friend Aidan who, without the help of a fancy marketing department or a budget that requires its own zip code, managed to get 295 people to actually talk to him on LinkedIn.

This strategy involved just two components:

1. Finding the right people
2. Not immediately trying to sell them something (a strategy I wish the guy at my local electronics store would adopt)

The results were bonkers:

For targeting, Aidan simply found 5-6 posts about AI SEO, exported the people who engaged with them, and dumped them into HeyReach.

His campaign was refreshingly uncomplicated:

Step 1: Like someone's post, then wait 3 hours

Step 2: Send this connection request with a message attached

Hey {FIRST_NAME}, Noticed you've been engaging with a lot of AI & SEO content lately.

Curious how you're thinking about all the changes.

I'm working on something in the space and thought I'd connect. :)

If they accepted, the campaign ends. If not, he viewed their profile and sent this InMail 3 hours later:

AI's shaking up SEO pretty fast.

Always interested in how others in the space are adapting.

Even this InMail generated 47 replies on its own.

That's it. The key takeaways, for those of us taking notes:

• Aidan's 58% reply rate happened because he actually tried having conversations instead of immediately pitching his leads. He chose to qualify leads through a deeper conversation rather than on their first reply
• Free LinkedIn accounts have message limits, so consider Sales Navigator if you're planning to streamline this operation
• Targeting matters because you need something in common to talk about. Otherwise, the conversational approach is not going to work

Congratulations Aidan, you crushed it!