How to Sell on LinkedIn Without Cold Pitching Anyone

There seems to be a very strange idea about selling on LinkedIn.

Either you send cold DMs to strangers and ask if they have 15 minutes for a “quick chat”...

Or you don't sell at all.

You post helpful content. You engage. You build your network.

And then you sit there hoping someone eventually figures out that they can actually hire you.

Neither is a particularly great sales strategy.

Because yes, you absolutely can sell on LinkedIn without cold pitching people.

In fact, that's how I prefer to do it.

I call it permission-based selling.

Instead of pushing your offer onto someone who hasn't asked for it, you create opportunities for people to raise their hand.

And once they do, you help them take the next step.

Here are five ways you can do that.

1. Use your Direct Messages - just don't use them like this

I know LinkedIn Direct Messages (DMs) have a bad reputation.

And I understand why.

We've all received that message.

Hi Josefine, I came across your impressive profile...

Followed approximately 17 seconds later by a pitch for something I have absolutely no need for.

That's not what I'm talking about.

Your DMs can actually be one of the best places to sell on LinkedIn - when the conversation starts with permission.

Let me give you an example.

I recently hosted a presentation and invited the participants to connect with me afterwards. I also offered to take a quick look at their LinkedIn headline or profile.

One of the participants, Jessica, took me up on it.

She asked for feedback on both.

So I looked at her profile, gave her some initial feedback and then told her there were essentially two ways she could continue.

1) She could watch one of my free YouTube videos and work through it herself, or

2) If she wanted my eyes directly on her profile and wanted to work through it together, she could book my paid Personal & Profile Intensive.

She booked the intensive.

No convincing. No awkward pitch. No pretending to start a conversation when my actual intention was to sell something.

She asked for help. I helped her. And then I gave her permission to choose how much help she wanted next.

That's permission-based selling.

2. Host a webinar, workshop or live training

This is probably one of my favourite ways to sell.

And not only because you can reach more people at once.

When someone registers for your webinar, they have already raised their hand.

They've essentially said:

“I'm interested in solving this problem.”

That's very different from picking a random person from your LinkedIn network and deciding they must need what you sell.

But there's something else that's changed.

A few years ago, you could host a webinar, make an offer at the end and get sales.

Today, trust takes longer to build.

People might discover you through a LinkedIn post, register for your workshop, watch a YouTube video, read three emails, come back to your profile two weeks later and THEN decide they're ready to work with you.

That's why I don't see a webinar as one isolated event.

It's part of the relationship.

Talk to people before it.

Follow up afterwards.

Answer their questions.

Pay attention to who is engaging.

Have actual conversations.

Your webinar gives you permission to continue a conversation that they've already started.

And that is incredibly powerful.

3. Give people an easy way to get your free resources

Freebies can be another brilliant way to identify the people who are interested in what you do.

But please don't make people jump through 14 hoops to get one.

You don't need to manufacture engagement just for the sake of making a post look popular.

I'd much rather have 20 people download something because they genuinely want it than 200 comments from people who just want to play the algorithm game.

Your free resource should make the next step obvious and easy.

They discover something useful.

They raise their hand.

You help them.

And now you have the beginning of a relationship.

Not just another vanity metric.

Want a LinkedIn strategy that actually leads somewhere?

This is exactly what we work on inside LinkedIn Breakthrough.

Not simply how to post more content or get more followers.

We work through the complete journey - from your profile and visibility to your content, conversations, lead generation and follow-up - so that LinkedIn becomes part of a simple system for turning the right people into clients.

And without cold pitching strangers or turning yourself into a full-time content creator.

Explore LinkedIn Breakthrough Here

4. Go live

I know. 😁

This is the one where a lot of people immediately think:

“Absolutely not.”

But hear me out.

Going live gives people something that's increasingly difficult to create through perfectly polished content:

A feeling for you.

How you think.

How you explain things.

How you answer questions.

What it might actually be like to work with you.

And yes, when you first start, you might have three people watching.

Or one. Or possibly your mum.

That's okay.

You don't need hundreds of viewers for a live stream to work.

You need the right people.

Pick a topic your ideal client genuinely cares about. Teach something useful. Answer questions. And have one clear CTA. Not five.

Maybe you invite them to your upcoming webinar.

Maybe you point them towards a free resource.

Maybe you invite them to book a call.

Whatever it is, make the next step obvious.

5. Let your LinkedIn profile do some of the selling for you

This is the one people forget.

Someone sees your comment.
They click on your profile.

Someone hears you on a podcast.
They look you up on LinkedIn.

Someone gets your name from a colleague.

Guess where they go?

Your profile.

And at that point, they're already interested.

So please don't make them work out what you do, who you work with or how they can take the next step.

Your LinkedIn profile should be working for you 24/7.

That doesn't mean turning it into one giant sales page.

It means making sure that when someone arrives, they can quickly understand:

• Who are you?
• Can you help them? 
• Why should they trust you?
• And what should they do next?

Pay particular attention to your About section and Featured section.

These are perfect places to give people different ways to continue the relationship.

• Maybe that's a free resource.
• Your YouTube channel.
• A workshop.
• Your email list.
• Or a way to work with you.

Again: you're not forcing anyone down a funnel. You're simply making the next step easy to find.

You don't need to do all five

In fact, please don't.

This is where we tend to make marketing unnecessarily complicated.

We discover five things that could work and immediately decide we should implement all five by Monday.

Instead, choose one.

Pick the strategy that feels most natural for you and your business and test it properly.

I'd give it 90 days.

Not two weeks.

Not three posts.

Not one webinar where only seven people showed up and you decided webinars clearly don't work anymore.

Give yourself enough time to learn how to make it work.

Because ultimately, selling on LinkedIn isn't about finding the perfect hack.

It's about creating enough opportunities for the right people to discover you, trust you and - when they're ready - take the next step.

You don't need to chase them.

And you definitely don't need to cold pitch them.

You just need to make it very easy for them to raise their hand.

Prefer to watch instead?

I go deeper into all five of these permission-based LinkedIn sales strategies in the related YouTube video - including examples of how I use them in my own business.