This introduction shares how this automated LinkedIn lead gen system came to be and gives an overview of the approach. (If you're excited about hearing all the details, you can watch the full 47-minute walkthrough of this on YouTube!)

In the next few setup guides, I'm going to show you how to build a complete AI system for building an audience on LinkedIn and turning it into high quality leads. The strategy is simple: write great content, attract your audience to you, then interact with them when they engage. Don’t worry, this approach will not include any cold DMs or any AI-generated slop!

I’m confident that the approach works because this is the exact system that has become our company's #1 channel for generating customers by far. It took me from about 3k to about 55k followers in less than a year, with tens of thousands of engagements from target users.

How this system came to be

The wrong way to get leads on LinkedIn

When I started working to get leads on LinkedIn, I did what I thought I was supposed to do. It was the obvious way to sell on LinkedIn. It must work for a lot of people, but it didn't work for me:

1. Purchase Sales Navigator

2. Create a list of prospects in your ICP (Ideal Customer Profile)

3. Write a cold message sequence

4. Start sending messages

After doing this for some time, we had to conclude it wasn't working. First, as a horizontal platform tool, our particular business isn't a great fit for this strategy, and therefore we weren't getting as many leads as we wanted for the effort.

Second, and more important, I hated doing it. I had dozens of negative interactions every day with people declining my sales-y questions. I wasn't enjoying myself. I also didn't want people's impressions of me to be annoying or unhelpful, which could harm our brand.

If this approach works for you, great! But if you're looking for a way to get leads without so much mass cold outreach, you're not alone.

A better way

I credit my friend Parthi Loganathan with his guide to a better way to getting leads on LinkedIn. It's a simpler way to use LinkedIn to attract business, and it was a much more natural fit for our business and the way I want to work:

1. Turn your profile into a landing page for your business

2. Attract an audience by writing great content 3x per week

3. [Optional] Cold connect to your target audience

4. Watch as leads come to you

It certainly takes longer than the standard outreach method to get paying customers because you're not having sales conversations. But we found it to be a more sustainable (and enjoyable) approach.

A year of testing and iteration

I've been doing this "better way" approach for about a year and a half, but it was a journey to hone the system into something the works and that I can recommend. I tested and iterated over many months to find what worked.

Over time I learned to track posts and engagement, what kind of posts worked, what didn't get engagement (answer: self-promotion, feature announcements, and reposts won't get you a following), and importantly, how to lean into AI for a whole host of things, from post topics to post writing to coaching to lead enrichment.

And that is the system I want to share with you!

The AI LinkedIn lead gen system

To set this system up for yourself, here are the seven things you'll do:

1. Track the posts and engagement of the top content creators in your area

2. Research what content is performing best in your area to give you inspiration

3. Track the engagement with your posts

4. Coach you based on which elements make your posts succeed

5. Draft ideas for 3-5 posts each week based on (a) top performers, and (b) your historical success. You will need to edit and customize these drafts to make them great.

6. Manage the comments on your posts, auto-replying when possible

7. Enrich and qualify all of the leads that engage with your posts and add them to your CRM

Tools you need

You need two fundamental tools to make this all happen:

1. Database: A database or CRM tool for tracking posts and leads, like Google Sheets, Notion, or Airtable

2. AI agent builder: We'll use Relay.app (but the principles apply to other AI agent builder tools as well)

If you don't use a database tool yet, you can build a simple one in a free tool like Google Sheets, Notion, or Airtable. We'll be building straightforward tables in Google Sheets to track your posts, influencer posts, post drafts, comments on your posts, and leads.

Relay.app has a generous free plan (sign up at www.relay.app). When you need more steps, AI credits, or users than are included with the free plan, you can upgrade to a paid plan.

For an AI agent builder, we'll be using Relay.app to build several AI agents, including an influencer tracker, content researcher, post engagement tracker, post coach, post drafter, comment manager, and lead enricher.

Let's go!

Each lesson in this starter pack will walk you through how to set up the necessary table and AI agent to put your system in place.

👉 Important: Make sure you do these setup guides in order. These agents work together and depend on each other or the same databases.

Let's get started.