The Exact LinkedIn Strategy That Grew 50K Followers in 12 Months, with Mischa Collins

My whole career business, being able to travel and work from anywhere and come to the US has all been from LinkedIn. Gone, took talk, you're competing with really cute dogs and celebrities. Instagram, you're competing with world class, comedians, or ever-unlinked-in, you're competing with CEOs. I like suck at posts. Yeah, if you stay silent, if you're not posting on LinkedIn, if you're not sending any messages, if you're not commenting on any posts, how's anyone supposed to know what you do? How's anyone supposed to know how they can work with you? So you have to put yourself out that's become visible and attract these opportunities. We all see AI Slop LinkedIn posts every single day. Welcome to Built in Public. I am your host, Courtney Johnson. I've been a full-time contocreator in a personal brand strategist for seven years, and I really built my career sharing the process, not just the outcomes of personal brand. Built in Public is about what it actually looks like to build a brand, a business, and to build real leverage in the creator economy. We're talking strategy, systems, audience growth, monetization, and that uncomfortable middle ground between I have an idea, and this is actually working. I'll be sharing what I'm testing, what's working, what's not, and I'm going to be bringing on people who are building their careers and companies out loud too. If you want honest conversations, practical insight, and zero BS, you are in the right place. Let's build in Public. Welcome back to Built in Public. Today I'm sitting down with Misha Collins. After being laid off in 2024, she completely rebuilt her career in Public on LinkedIn. And now she helps other founders and operators do the same. In less than a year, Misha grew her LinkedIn audience to over 50,000 people. Guys, that took me eight years to do. It took Misha literally a year to do. She turned that visibility into inbound opportunities, a very loyal community, and a profitable business. Not through hacks or viral tricks, but through clarity, strategy, and messaging. She has such incredible, nuanced information and ideas around LinkedIn strategy. Totally opposite than me. Guys, I am like, host every day, it doesn't matter what it is. Misha comes at LinkedIn from a very strategic perspective, which I love, and you are going to love too. It's so complimentary. In fact, Misha co-hosts "Love Love" on LinkedIn with me. Misha doesn't just teach you how to post. She really helps you align your content with whatever you're building long-term. So in today's episode, we're talking about what actually drives growth on LinkedIn. How to think about authority without pretending to be an expert, and why having a clear strategy makes content so much easier? Not harder. Let's get into it. My book, "Career Cheek Codes" comes out on April 14th, and pre-orders are now open. Oh, I'm so excited. If you have ever gotten value from any of my free content, from listening to this podcast, whether that be YouTube, Spotify, My Post, My Free Trainings, and Masterclasses, and webinars, anything I've shared online, pre-ordering the book is one of the biggest ways to help this mission of ungatekeeping the gatecap, and this mission of giving people all of the autonomy that they need in order to create their dream in their life. Pre-ordering the book is just the biggest way to help these ideas reach beyond this audience in this community. Pre-orders actually don't count as like early sales. They actually signal demand to retailers, so like pre-orders ride or what's riding on. The retailer's wanting to carry the book, so it plays a really, really big role in how widely the book is seen once it launches. So this book is really the most complete version of what I've been aiming to teach for years. You know how to build leverage, how to understand the real rules of the game, how to understand what's gatecap, how to build your personal brand, and create career mobility on your own terms. Guys, I'm so excited about this book. Like, it has been such a journey, and I pack as much value as I possibly can to transform your career. And if somebody else comes to mind like a friend, a sibling, a mentee, a coworker who's navigating their career right now, it could also be a really meaningful gift. You can pre-order career cheat codes. We're gonna give a link in the show notes. We would really, really appreciate it. And I know you're just gonna love it. Misha, welcome. Thank you. I'm so happy to be here. And welcome to the States. Yeah, thank you. This is your first time here, right? Yeah, yeah. No, not my first time. So actually, I've been to the, I've actually been to America quite a lot, but it's my first time kind of coming as a grown woman and being able to do it in my type of style. That's amazing. Yeah. It's also like reigning in LA today. So I'm sad you don't get to see like the sunny, I know. I brought that. I brought the rain with me from England. And yeah, was this going to be cloudy too? I think it's supposed to rain across California. You know, we haven't had a single, apparently in the UK since 2026. There's not been one day where it hasn't rained. How are you not fighting indeed efficient? Yeah, I don't know if I've won the same thing. Are you probably are? I actually do take bit Visman D. Yeah. Or maybe it's just like your, I don't know, maybe your body like adapts to it. Because every time I travel anywhere in the UK, I'm like, I'm so tired. Leave me. It's so miserable. But I did have some days of sun the weekend was gorgeous here. So I was kind of just like, I'm the only person in LA who's like walking around in the t-shirt even in the sun. Yeah. It's cool. I'm like walking around a full jacket. I'm so excited to chat today. And something I find really interesting is that we have, we have one thing, well, we've a lot in common. But one of the things we have in common is that we didn't have this big like crescendo of I'm quitting my job, I'm betting on myself, I'm going all in on my personal brand. For both of us, we were laid off and that kind of pushed us into our personal brand. So I'm curious to hear about your journey and what kind of made that switch of like, instead of scrambling for a new job, I'm really going to lean into my personal brand. Yeah. I think it's really interesting and it's a question that I get asked a lot because I will be completely honest. I had no intention ever of running my own business. I never wanted to be an entrepreneur. I never wanted to be a business owner. I've always had really high ambitions for my career and I've always really wanted to be successful in my career. But I never had the dream of building something for my own. I was always very happy building something for someone else. And like I said, I wanted to do really well in my job. I wanted to be the best I could, but not necessarily building my own thing. And I think when I got let go from well, the last full-time role that I had, I had given so much to the company and I'd felt like I'd really given my heart, my soul, everything and really helped build their marketing department. And when I was let go, it kind of made me realise how fragile we are. And that was for a small company. It was a startup. I think there was only 20 employees at the time. And I was still a number on a spreadsheet type thing. I didn't mean anything. And that's a small company. I can't even imagine in these big corporations. So when that happened, I just, I kind of had this feeling of, I don't want that to ever happen again. I don't want to build something for someone else. Why am I putting so much time and energy and effort into building someone else's dream when I can build my own? And that's when I started building my personal brand. I think from a desire of really just wanting to have something that was mine, which no one else could take away from me. And even when I started building my personal brand on LinkedIn, it wasn't with the intention of running my own business. I always thought, I'll do this in the meantime and I'll build a profile so that then, if I get a full-time job and this ever happens again, I've got the security. So it was never with the idea of going full-time on my own. But yeah, I think it was just wanting to take control and to have ownership of something. When did you decide, like, okay, this is actually turning into a business? So I went freelance. So I started posting on LinkedIn, went freelance. And that was, it immediately went really well. I was very fortunate in terms of, I picked up a lot of traction on LinkedIn very quick and managed to sign quite a few clients which allowed me to go freelance. I was working part-time for a marketing agency up until last May. So, you know, eight months ago maybe. And I think it got when it got to May and I stopped working at that marketing agency. That was when I thought, okay, this is something that I want to go all in on. And it was going really well and I was excited by it and I was enjoying the work that I did. So it was probably, it took maybe a year in for me to think, now this is really what I want to do long-term now. Yeah, I love that you had that transition of like, you worked part-time. You did kind of this other gig that wasn't a full commitment, but it was like a transition. I think that can be a lot less scary for people than just jumping in. Because some people think like, oh, I need to quit my job on Monday. And by Tuesday, I need to have my business running. And there's really a lot more transition that goes into it. Yeah, definitely. And I think it's really nice speaking to other people. I actually had a conversation with a woman yesterday. And as you said, so many people think that this is like big, wow moment where it's like, I'm going to quit my job. I'm going to do all this. But actually quite often you can just fall into things and you can just see how it goes. And that is okay. I get messages all the time that I cannot respond to because I don't have this experience. But all the time I get these DMs, I don't like, well, Courtney, this is all easy for you to do because you're American and you're so boisterous and loud and whatever. But like, I'm from another place. I'm for actually a lot of people say I'm from the UK, really. I'm from somewhere in Europe where I, it's just, it's not acceptable to be all about me, me, me to build a personal brand, whatever. Like, did you have that feeling? And what would you tell those people? - Yeah, definitely. And I think that as Brits, we are, we're so, we find compliments so awkward. We find self-promotion so cringey. It is just not in our DNA. And it's amazing when I've come over to America, I've obviously not been here that long, I've only been here four days. But everyone's so positive. And it's kind of that feeling of even if things aren't going well, people are just like putting on a brave face and being positive about that. You don't get that in the UK. People are generally quite negative. We're always complaining. Whether it's about the weather, it's either too cold or too rainy or it's too hot. There's always something to complain about. And I think naturally as a country, we are very, we find promoting ourselves incredibly awkward. So when I first started talking about myself and making, and being so vulnerable and being so open online, it was a really scary experience. And I remember I'd go to parties with old university friends and they'd say, "Oh, I've been seeing you post on LinkedIn "and I'd die inside." - You're like, "Oh my God, oh God, you see that?" And then I blocked you. - Yeah, but I think you just have to disassociate in a way. And eventually, it's always cringe until it isn't. And it feels cringe at the beginning and it feels really awkward. And then those same people who are making fun of me or saying, "Oh, we see you all the time." Are genuinely people who reach out to me now wanting advice and wanting to know how they can do the same. So I would say you've almost got to just treat it like an out-of-body experience. Just kind of disassociate from it, just get it done. And then eventually it will become second nature and it will become habit. And also I do think it's something that people are becoming a lot more comfortable with. So, and you've just got to take, like, own it. If you're doing well, own it. We should be more comfortable talking about RM successes. - Yeah, in a way that you can start creating content, you don't have to start creating content talking about yourself. You can start creating content and build the habit talking about someone, other people, right? I see a ton of people, their whole personal brand, they started on an analyzing marketing campaign. And there are other people's campaigns. Or I'm talking about people that inspire me and it's other people's quotes and other people's stuff. So if you're really feeling the cringe and you want to take the focus off yourself, you can do that. I don't think that builds like the most effective personal brand long term. I think obviously vulnerability and connection does. But just to get the habit and get the reps in, it can take the pressure off. - Agreed. And you talk a lot about, say, curation. So you can take your top 10 books, which I've helped you talk about that type of thing. Another really useful tip that I have is if you are nervous about posting online, whether that's on LinkedIn or Instagram or anything, schedule the content. Because when you schedule it, you can't go back on it. And I used to find at the beginning, I would sit there editing and editing. And even if I had the post ready, 10 minutes before I was about to post, I'd be freaking out editing the post. Whereas when you press schedule, it's just gone. You know it's happening. And it's a good way to just kind of get over that fear. So I would say trying to like pre-plan and then just getting it scheduled. It really helps. - Yeah, I agree. Then especially if you schedule something out for like, again, if you're just starting, I'm gonna put this like on a Sunday. So I don't even see it. I totally forgot about it. And I just wake up on Monday and there's some likes or whatever. The truth is, like your first couple posts are gonna suck. Nobody's gonna see them anyway. So you just gotta get the reps in. - That's what I told someone the other day said, "If you get really embarrassed that your content got no likes, don't be embarrassed because no one's all right." - Yeah, I know what nobody's hired. It doesn't matter. When you decided to build your personal brand, why did you choose LinkedIn as your main focus? - I think I chose LinkedIn. So as I said, I'd been working for a company full-time and LinkedIn was a huge focus for us. So it was a B2B marketing company. So naturally our ideal customer was on there. And I spent a lot of time building the company page at the time company pages were still pretty important. And I also helped the founders and people within the company develop their personal brands. And so we really became known. And this was four years ago, three years ago. We really became known as a company for constantly posting. We're kind of everywhere when you went on LinkedIn. And that had major success for us. So it was a platform that I was very comfortable with. And I always liked the idea of being known in a professional element. So even though you get to know a lot about me and like you said, you know, being vulnerable and being open about things is really important, which I was at the very beginning. I kind of always wanted it to be tied to my career. So I thought LinkedIn was the best place to do it. And to be totally honest, the barrier of entry is so much lower on LinkedIn. When I first started posting consistently two years ago, TikTok was already majorly saturated as is Instagram, your quality of content and level of content has to be so much higher. Whereas LinkedIn, it's definitely getting there. It's much harder to grow now. But the battery of entry was way lower. Didn't have to be groundbreaking content. - Yeah, totally. - So I was on TikTok, you're competing with like really cute dogs and celebrities and like Instagram, you're competing with like world class comedians or whatever, on LinkedIn, you're competing with like CEOs that like suck at posting. - Yeah, exactly. - It's like like robotic voices. Yeah, it's like really a low barrier to entry, which I love. Why do you think LinkedIn is especially powerful right now? - I think LinkedIn is really having a moment. It's really interesting to see because I actually first started working in the fashion industry. So when I first went into work, I was working in fashion. And LinkedIn was a lame platform. Even when I first started posting properly two years ago, it was still kind of lame. And now it's really funny because I go to events. I went to an event the other day and the MD or an MD in head of brand from Look Fantastic, which I don't know if you have it over here, but it's essentially a beauty platform. It's where an online beauty platform where you can go and buy all your beauty products from makeup to skincare, everything. Super popular in the UK. They were there. And they were saying, oh my gosh, LinkedIn is something that we really need to put more attention in. We've been wanting to do it for ages. And I was kind of mind blown because that never, ever would have been the response. Even a year ago, if I'd have said I worked in LinkedIn, people would have been like, okay. Whereas now people within the fashion industry but within the beauty industry, they see the power in it. And it is because every, pretty much every single ideal audience, every single ideal customer is on the platform. Whether you are a window cleaner, most people in LinkedIn live in the house, they have windows, whether you're a lawyer, a lot of people on LinkedIn need lawyers, whether you're a personal branding expert, obviously LinkedIn is now helping people grow these personal brands. All ideal audiences are on there. And it's a really easy way, especially if you work in corporate and you want to target people who are within the business realm, that is the platform that they're on. And they're checking it every day. So it's just a really rare find that you can have that amount of people who would be willing to buy from you on one platform. Yeah, one girl that went through level up on LinkedIn last year. She's a terror reader. And I was a little nervous because I was like, he's kind of her level up on LinkedIn, your terror reader. Like I can pretty much guarantee I can give people success on level up on LinkedIn, but I'm like, she's making me nervous, right? Like that's a little crazy. Well turns out she got like a year long contract with Apple. No. To go do their holiday parties. They're pop up events like all of this. Yeah. And now literally she's full time employed with Apple as a terror reader. Oh my god. I love that. I think her official title is like a vet marketer talent or something, but she just says, yeah, it's crazy. It's so cool. But truly anything, I also have some clients and friends that are personal stylist and they were also a bit hesitant to go on LinkedIn, but it makes so much sense. Yeah. Personal filing for executives for seekers. And I actually recently started working with a personal trainer. And he's like a personal trainer to high performing people. It's the perfect place for it because everyone on LinkedIn is in that world. So a lot of people come to me and they say, "Oh, do you think it'll work?" I'm in this industry and I reply with pretty much everyone in every industry is on that. So yes, if you get it right, it will work. Yeah. Some other funny industries on LinkedIn, one, anything that's in gray space, drugs, weed or psychedelics. They're all on LinkedIn because LinkedIn-- Yeah, they are. Yeah, LinkedIn doesn't have rules against it where other platforms do. And I actually, I used to have a yoga mat company and so I started on LinkedIn, posting about yoga and fitness and stuff. Very good. Yeah. And it was really, I mean, I was like, it yoga. Who's going to want to talk about yoga mats on LinkedIn? I ended up getting a ton of corporate deals where hotels would bulk by yoga mats, events, retreat coordinators and that was all from LinkedIn. - Yeah, just 'cause I was adding these people on. So it was really, it was majorly successful just because of LinkedIn, even though it's not traditional. - Yeah, exactly. And I did, yeah, I see the craziest things on LinkedIn. And you might not have tons of engagement. You might not, 'cause I actually spoke to someone who, I was working with someone who helps people in recovery. So when they have drinking issues, or it is mainly alcohol recovery. And I said to her, I was like, look, you're never gonna get tons of engagement on your posts because people aren't gonna raise their hands. - They would do it. (laughing) - And say, I have a problem. But if you do all the other things, if you're adding the people, if you're DMing them, if you're engaging with other people's content, you will see success. It just might not be that you'll get a huge following on it. - Yeah, I have a client that's also, she's a recovery coach. And she has an interesting LinkedIn English. She's kind of talking about like the non-alcohol beverage base. - Oh, nice. - It's been interesting. She's had some opportunities to like consult for some of these non-alcohol beverage bases, like retreat stuff like that. So it's, yeah, I mean, literally any space you can maybe work on on LinkedIn. It's really cool. If somebody wanted to grow on LinkedIn, they're listening to this and they're like, yeah, I wanna grow on LinkedIn. I just don't know where to start. Where it's like first starting point, they finish listening to this podcast, they go do this one action. - So controversially, I always say that I think the advice of just post is a bit rubbish because I think, and don't get me wrong, breaking that barrier of feeling of being scared of visibility and just hitting post and getting out there, it's really, really important and it's a great thing to do. But I also think if you are going to put the time, effort and energy into posting on LinkedIn, then you wanna be doing it successfully and you wanna be setting yourself up for success. So I always say that you've got to lead with strategy. And the reason why I'm so passionate about this is because I actually was posting on LinkedIn for, probably two or three years before I started to see success. So I probably have been posting on LinkedIn consistently. So when I say consistently, I mean most days for about a year and a half, prior to that for maybe three years before, I was posting ad hoc with no strategy and shock, I didn't get anywhere. I didn't get any results. I didn't get anywhere. And as soon as I thought I'm gonna do this properly, I'm gonna take it seriously and I created a strategy for myself and start being consistent, that's when everything changed. So I would say that the one thing that you should do, if you're listening to this podcast and you wanna start posting on LinkedIn, is you wanna really get in touch with your mission and the reason why you are doing it. And we talk a lot about this. We say, we kind of have a very similar view on it. You can say, oh I wanna post, I wanna grow a following on LinkedIn because I just wanna be famous. Oh, I wanna have speaking opportunities. But you need to go deeper than that. So why do you wanna be famous on LinkedIn? Why do you wanna have the speaking opportunities? And it's really good exercise to be really honest with yourself. So maybe it's that I wanna be famous on LinkedIn because I didn't have very many friends at school and now I wanna show the world that I can be popular and that type of thing. Or maybe it's that you wanna have speaking opportunities because you want to be seen as a thought leader and you wanna provide, you wanna make money so that you can provide a better life for your family. I think it's really, really important to be honest about why it is that you're doing it and to really channel into your mission because that's what's gonna help you stay consistent and help you continue to show up on LinkedIn. Authentically as well. So what I'm hearing is like the way to figure out that base point for the strategy is figuring out your mission. And that's like why do you actually wanna do this? Because if you're listening to this episode and you're curious about LinkedIn or you're already posting about LinkedIn, you're doing it for a reason. Like even if that's subconscious, you gotta dig down a little bit, you're not doing it accidentally, right? You wanna make a certain impact, you want to accomplish a certain goal, you wanna change the world in some way or maybe it's like, you wanna be like, fuck you. But when you get clear on that, it becomes easier the direction. Exactly. Yeah. So I think optimizing your profile and connecting with people on LinkedIn is so helpful. Like yesterday a random student in my town connected with me and I saw that she spoke Spanish that she worked for like medical devices and she was like an intern. And just by seeing those things in her headline, I mess a turn on as a K.My friend is looking for like a intern for medical device, whatever right now. And so even just if she'd never sent me a connection request, I wouldn't have seen that and she wouldn't have bought the opportunity. So also, yeah, it's turning to expand your network. Yeah, and I think you can start slow. So maybe it's that you don't feel ready to post on LinkedIn. So start commenting, start leaving, you know, set yourself a task of, I'm gonna comment on five people's posts today and I'm gonna send out 10 connection requests. And even that starts to flex the muscle. It starts to get you comfortable with a K.M. Putting my opinions out here, I'm allowing my voice to be seen to other people. I always recommend starting small. So many people think, oh, I'm gonna give LinkedIn a go and I'm gonna post every single day for the next three months. And you're almost setting yourself up for disaster because it's really hard to achieve those goals if you've never done it before. So set yourself a realistic target. Maybe it's that you're gonna start with comments. Maybe it's that you're gonna post once a week and then stick to that. Set yourself a realistic achievable goal, stick to that and then you'll get that quick win. You'll build up momentum, you'll feel good about yourself and that will then help you want to keep going. - I know a lot of you guys are founders and a lot of you guys are looking to hire talent. And I give messages all the time of being like, Courtney, how do I find somebody to hire? How do I hire this type of person? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And guys, I don't know shit about hiring. I've literally like manifested every single person I've hired. No joke, like crazy coincidences. I've never done a traditional hire, but obviously if you're starting a startup, you can't just like twinkle in fairy lights, manifest everybody. So I wanna talk about my friend who actually graduated level up on LinkedIn. Her name's Holly Maglin, that's H-O-L-L-Y-M-A-G-L-I-N like go at her on LinkedIn right now. And she helps you recruit early career talent for your startup. Holly's has this idea that like the traditional career fair is dead. If you're a founder or a lean startup team that's trying to find your next star hire at like a campus booth career fair, you're lost. If you have a team with a small budget, you don't need a bigger budget. You just need a better strategy. Like especially when you're hiring Gen Z, like they're not looking for this glossy 90s brochure career fair. Like there's a totally different strategy. Gen Z really wants authentic connection. I think hiring people right out of college is so awesome 'cause you get to kind of develop them, you get to get a new fresh perspective. Anyways, so Holly Magelyn, she created the Holly Magelyn method. And it is such a cheat code for modernizing how you hire. Even if you're starting from scratch with like zero experience hiring. If you need a full audit of your current plan, if you need ground up of a new strategy, Holly has got you. Okay, again, if you guys are startup founders, you're looking to hire early career talent. Go add Holly Magelyn on LinkedIn. Right now, she's even sharing a free campus engagement, execution matrix with all of our listeners to show exactly how she does it. She can get her entire strategy for free. Anyways, just wanted to throw this in there because I know a lot of you guys are hiring. I know a lot of you guys need support right now and Holly's just an amazing woman. And I wanted to offer this free resource. For those that are listening that are like, I need some examples. I find it helpful to give people examples of like what you've actually accomplished. So I love to say like we live an inbound life. You know, our life is inbound. We don't have to go outbound to find opportunities where things come to us. So what are some opportunities that you've gotten inbound? Maybe you're LinkedIn DMs by building your personal brand? - Yeah, I mean, literally everything that's happened to me. I am really bad at outbound. I will put my hands up. I don't do much of it. I really sure that my business could probably be way bigger if I did. But I, yeah, I don't do much of it right now. And so pretty much every single opportunity that has ever come to me since starting my own business or even going through freelance has been through inbound. So when I first left my full time company, I posted about it on LinkedIn. Two of the, I did two posts about it. And they both went pretty viral. And from that I signed three clients. So three freelance clients, which then allowed me to go freelance. I've had a billion dollar marketing company that I had planned in my DMs. When I only had, I think I only had like 13,000 followers on LinkedIn then. So it wasn't even a huge amount. I had them land in my DMs because they wanted me to do LinkedIn content for their CMO, CFO and their VP. And they're a huge, huge, huge company. I genuinely thought I was, I thought I was being pranked. I was like, no, this can't, this can't be true. I was Googling at being like, does this person actually work there? Major imposter syndrome. The reason why I'm in America, that is all through LinkedIn. So I work with a company called Stan, John, who the co-founder, DMed me on LinkedIn. He messaged me. That's how I started working for them. That's why I'm in LA. I went to see them in their office. I'm also going to work for another company next week, which was from a LinkedIn DM. So honestly, everything, my whole career, business, being able to travel and work from anywhere and come to the US has all been from LinkedIn. And on top of that, like way more amazing things, like just making friends with people and making friends with people who I genuinely get so inspired from and motivate me. And I think that's something that's been huge for me because I've always kind of capped my potential. Or, you know, I think you're so good at like dreaming big and like we talk about it now in terms of like having these like dilulu dreams, like you want to dream so big that it almost feels crazy. I was really bad at that. Whereas because of the people I now surround myself with who I met mainly from LinkedIn, it's allowed me to think, no, I can do more and I can achieve more and I can dream bigger. And you have to have, you have to unlock that to even get that stage of life. Yeah, that's so important. That's something I haven't consciously thought about, but you're so right. Like there's just the people that you meet from LinkedIn, the people that you get to surround yourself with that you that you get to be friends with. Yeah. Almost like level you up because they're normal is like the thing that you're dreaming about, right? Like maybe you get to be around people who of course they have their own company or of course they got funding or of course they're booked out for a year and they're free lands. Like, duh, that's just part of their life. And when you see that and you see those people accomplish those dreams and goals and it be so normalized, it becomes normalized to you and you can accomplish so much more. Yeah, exactly. And I think LinkedIn is a really unique place where I had kind of a list of probably ten people who I was obsessed with on LinkedIn and would dream of being friends with. And I would probably say out of those ten people, I've definitely spoken to every single one of them and I'm probably friends with at least half of them now. And it's because there are much less people posting consistently and there's a lot more people less people engaging on LinkedIn. You know, if I did that on TikTok, I think that'd be way hard for me to get into like my dream person on TikTok. The stepping stones to get to them is so much harder. Whereas LinkedIn, if you show up consistently on these people's profiles, commenting, engaging with them, you naturally do form a bond. And it's much easier to become friends with these people. And I think as you said, that has completely allowed me to level up because I've seen people do all these things and it be normal. And that's then encouraged me that I can do it too. And up. Yeah. You messaged me on LinkedIn. I know. Three times that air. Literally. What is your dream? Oh, it's really funny because I think when I first started building a business, I was like, oh yeah, I'm just going to go down the solar pranjo route. I don't really want to grow anything bigger than myself. That's too stressful. Whereas now I definitely want to expand. And I want to build a proper business with employees and people who work with me. And I want to build something bigger than just myself. A big dream of mine this year is I really want to move off LinkedIn. So I'd quite like to grow a following on or I shouldn't say I quite like to. I will grow a following on other platforms. So I'm going to take on TikTok and Instagram. And also just get. Build my personal brand to a bigger scale. So do more speaking opportunities. And kind of, yeah, I don't want to just be. Corned into LinkedIn. I don't just want to be there. I want to be across channels. Yeah. What's really great about that. And I did the same thing too. I was on LinkedIn for probably two years before I joined TikTok. And then it was like two more years before I got on Instagram. What's amazing is you have so much content already. Like you can just recreate a lot of those. Use them as video scripts. Recreate them as carousels. Like you really don't have to start from scratch on any other platform. What are you, what are you starting with? What are their platform? So I'm going to start with Instagram. Okay. Yes. Exciting. I'm excited. I actually created. I've got the profile. I just need to now stop. Start creating the content. Okay. Very exciting. Yeah. Just come to content club. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I need to. No, I'm excited. I also, I feel very, I enjoy being on camera. I enjoy chatting. I enjoy, I don't have that awkwardness of, oh God, I can't film myself for anything like that. So, and also I think even though I started on, it's funny because we were talking about it. Even though I started on LinkedIn because I wanted to keep it professional and I obviously do still want to be known for my career and that type of thing. I want people to see a bit more of me because there's it because I really channel my personality. Three, my LinkedIn content. I think you have to. If you want to be successful, you have to be very authentic. But it's easier to do that on video and on other platforms. I think you'll see a more real side to me. Yeah. Oh, I can't wait. Yeah. Because video right now on LinkedIn, at least for me, like isn't forming as great. No, it doesn't perform well. But it performs really good on every other platform. What do you think people overthink on LinkedIn that actually doesn't matter that much? I think people overthink. Oh, so this is my one, the one thing that people always get wrong on LinkedIn is the fear of repetition. So they overthink repeating themselves and they overthink the type of content they're creating. And they think, oh, I posted about that a month ago. I can't possibly post about that now. But people can't remember what they had for dinner last night. They do not remember what your LinkedIn post was a month ago. And you have to repeat yourself. You have to be repeating the same messages, the same stories, the same lessons to become known for something. I think that's something people really get in their heads about. They really overthink it. And they don't like repeating themselves. But it's literally necessary if you want to grow a following or if you want to grow any form of personal brand because you have to stand for something. And if you stand for something that has to be shown through your content consistently. Totally. Yeah. Let's say that you were, I don't know, a school teacher and you transitioned an attack and you always wanted to get into tech. Now that's a story. How you transitioned from being a teacher into tech that you can say over and over and over and over and over and over and over again in multiple different ways, right? And yeah, I actually had a ghost running client that would be like, oh, well, I can't post about that lesson I learned from my dad because I posted about that six months ago and I can't post about empowering women because I post about that three months ago and I can't post about this like sports analogy because I posted about that a month ago. And I'm like, girl, you got to post about all of those things literally 100 times. Exactly. Because also that well, there's lots of reasons for it. A, if you're doing well, you should be continuing to add followers to your account in which case those people haven't heard those stories. Also, LinkedIn, you know, a good LinkedIn post kind of gold standard is 1000 engagements. If you're consistently hitting 1000 engagements, you are doing that's, you know, top, top class standard 1000 isn't that much. So there are lots of people who are logging on to LinkedIn and they've not seen that story. Even if they are following you, they've not seen that story. They've not seen that message. So you have to be repeating yourself so that if they haven't seen it before, they know I'm for all new followers. And also it's the memory of it. You know, you can't people need to hear things so many times these days to remember it. So repeating yourself is essential totally. And yeah, I think this is an important tip. It's also on LinkedIn. The numbers are kind of lower. Like for me, 1000 on LinkedIn, 1000 engagements is really good. On Instagram, I'm like 10,000. Yeah. So if you start posting on LinkedIn, you're like, oh, I'm only getting 25 likes and 10 comments when I'm starting. That's actually really, really great. I get that when you post your bachelor at pictures on Instagram, you get like 500 likes and like I get that it's more, but LinkedIn is like, there's just more people that are watching and lurking than actually commenting. And if you think about your own behavior, maybe you spend 30 minutes on Instagram every day commenting on your friends posts and liking, maybe you lurk on LinkedIn. So also you don't need to be discouraged if you're starting and you're getting 10, 20 engagements. Totally. That is a lot lower. And like you said, there are so many lurkers on LinkedIn. And it's really funny because when you start posting, you'll notice that because people always message me saying, oh my god, I love your LinkedIn content. Oh, I saw this. I'm like, why the hell are you not liking it? Yeah. So worried to comment. Especially you see someone in person and they're like, it's great. And you're like, I'm, where are you? What do you mean? It's like a me. I, there's like a meme on TikTok, which I always say, which is like, if you're my, if you're my family and you're seeing my TikToks and not engage with it, like you're dead to me. So real. No, same. I'm like, you have to like all of my content. Yeah. Also different industries is different engagement. I find that like marketing, sales, HR, just people who are on LinkedIn a lot, you're probably going to get a lot more engagement. I manage a personal brand for my partner. And he's in like the medical world. They just don't. Yeah. Yeah. And like legal. They don't do it. Like I, there's just certain industries where it's going to be lower. Now you're still going to get the same opportunity is like, he, we go to a conference and everyone's coming up to him. I love your LinkedIn getting speaking and consulting. But you're not going to get as many likes and comments. And that's okay. Don't compare yourself to other industries, especially not marketing itself. Yeah. Exactly. And the stuff, you know, I post about LinkedIn content and how to create good content in which case, I'm in the perfect niche for engagement. Like if you're on LinkedIn, you want to learn how to grow and you want to learn how to post. And it's you're, I'm setting myself up for success. But as you said, if you're in the medical world, that might be a bit harder. I also, I manage a personal brand for the M. of a psychahome work company. And we track success a lot on the messages that he gets. So last week he had like a really low week for engagement, which is quite rare because actually his stuff gets really good engagement. But he sent me four DMs, four screenshots of DMs from people being like, this was amazing. I'm so happy that you said this and this was super thought-breaking. And to me, that's actually way more successful than a like. If someone's taking the time out to send you a DM to say, we love your content or you've inspired me, you've done this, that is like a sign that you are doing. Yeah. Right. Yeah, because that's like such depth in that relationship with that person too. Like that, that's planting a seed that is going to blossom into something. Yeah. Sometime. How are you using AI with your personal brand in with LinkedIn? And how can you use AI as a tool that's not in a boring way? Because we all see AI slop LinkedIn posts every single day. Yeah. So this is something that's been really playing on my mind recently because LinkedIn has become extremely, well, that was probably a bit much, but LinkedIn has become a little bit negative. And it's mainly negativity around AI. So I see so many posts from people complaining about AI comments and AI generated content. But for me, and I'm actually, I should do LinkedIn posts on this. For me, it's it's bigger opportunity to stand out. If you've got a load of AI slop, like you said, if 90% of people are creating crappy LinkedIn posts, which you can tell AI generated, that is the perfect opportunity for you to stand out. So you want to be using AI to help create the content, but you always need to be injecting like your special source or your personality into the post. So a tool that I absolutely love and we were talking about it just earlier is Stanley. It's an incredible tool for creating LinkedIn content. It matches with your profile, it downloads your tone of voice, and it really does kind of take on your voice. It is amazing. So I love using that. Would I ever post direct, would I ever ask Stanley to create a post and then post it directly on LinkedIn, never, ever, ever, because you can always add tweaks of things that Stanley doesn't know. You know, so maybe something that happened to you yesterday or maybe it's a certain word that you like to use. So what I use, what I tend to do is I either use AI to help me with ideation. So I might be send it a load of thoughts and say compile this into a post. So I might say, you know, give me some ideas for a post. And then I'll get it to do the first draft because that's always the hardest. And then I'll always tweak it. And my biggest piece of advice to everyone is read your LinkedIn posts out loud. So before you hit publish, read out loud. If there's a word in there that feels uncomfortable, if there's a way that you've kind of said something that doesn't feel right, change it. And you know, add abbreviations, like add stuff like Tbh or what else, slay or add the things that you say because that's what shows your personality and makes your, makes your content still feel authentic, even though you're using AI. Yeah, one of the biggest edits that I always make is I'll like not misspell thing, but I'll turn it from like yay to like yay. Yeah, it's like 10 lies because that's actually how I would like, it's like how would you text your friend about this? Would you say Tbh? Would you like add bullet points? Would you kind of misspell something to be funny? Yeah. Or would you like change that? Like it wouldn't be such proper uppercase, lowercase periods, right? Like you would make it a little bit more casual. How do you think about LinkedIn engagement in your strategy? Like comments, DMs, etc? Yeah, so I think engagement is as important as posting. It kind of is almost more important because you've got more opportunities to be seen with engagement. So if you think about posting, you should only really post once a day, like some people do post twice a day and that's just crazy. There was actually an algorithm report came out at the beginning of this year that showed that if you're posting twice a day, it negatively affects, negatively affects your impressions. You get low, you get low reach. It's just not what LinkedIn wants. Yeah. So if you are posting once a day, you're giving yourself one opportunity of being seen. If you're leading leaving 10 comments a day, you're having 10 more opportunities of being seen. Because if you comment on something, that's going to pop up on my news feed. So you're getting more eyeballs on your name and your thoughts and your opinions. So when it comes to engagement, again, I think you need to be really strategic. So put the strategy in place for creating your content. You also want to be strategic with engagement. Because otherwise you can spend hours, doom scrolling and not really getting anywhere. My advice would be choose, and this is if you're at the beginning, so you don't want to go too hard, choose 10 creators. They could be a mixture of peers. So people who are on a similar level to you, or people who you know who you've worked with, they can be big creators. So people with more followers than you, and they could be maybe an ideal customer if they're posting on LinkedIn. And what you want to do is you want to be commenting on their posts daily. So maybe you choose 10 people and every day before you hit post, you go on to those people's profiles and you comment and engage with their LinkedIn posts. And the reason why it's important to be targeted is because you want to be engaging with the right people because you want your name, as we said, to be showing up on the right news feeds. And also it really helps with that networking piece. So if you're consistently showing up in my comments, and I see that you're liking my content every day and you're in there leaving really great comments, I'm then going to know you. I'm going to get to know you. I'll probably send you a DM saying thank you so much for supporting me. Like I've noticed that you're always in my comments section and you start building that network and that those friendships that we were talking about at the beginning. So that's one of the biggest reasons why I think it's important to be strategic. And then again, there's more stuff that you can do like send five DMs a day. Maybe it's just maybe you're not trying to sell anything. Maybe it's just trying to build a connection and it's saying something as simple as like I loved your post earlier. This part really resonated with me. And we always talk a lot about how compliments always work when you're sending a DM. People love an e-code stroke. So if you're going to reach out to someone giving them a compliment always works. Yeah, the opportunity that can come out of it are really amazing. I DMed somebody a few weeks ago just being like, "Hey, I really like your content. It's great. I'm happy to be connected. We ended up in a conversation. We went to dinner twice over the last few weeks and now we might do a collaborative offer together for like the certain industry." And it's just really cool what can come out of just a conversation. Especially like there becomes a point where it's inevitable. It can't like statistically not happen. Yeah. Like if you're sending a message every day of just like, "Hey, I want to connect. It's great to chat with you. I'm really happy that we're following each other. Thank you for commenting. It's really cool what you're doing here. Like giving them a compliment. You do that every day for 365 days. Ten of them are going to turn into a client, an opportunity, a speaking gig, a paid thing, a job. Like just statistically it's bound to happen." Totally. And you're right. I actually, this happened to me yesterday. I reached out to someone. "Oh, someone sent me a DM saying, "I wanted to connect because we're both female founders. We hopped on a call yesterday." And then she said at the end of the call, "Oh, I'd really love some support with LinkedIn content." And now I'm going to help her with LinkedIn content. And that all came from, it wasn't a sales EDM whatsoever. It was just her reaching out saying, "It was a coffee chat that we were essentially going on." So these opportunities do really come from those messages. And that's why it's important. Yeah. In level up on LinkedIn, we have some scripts around this. But one of my favorite things is just asking people how you can help them. Like, "Hey, Misha, I love what you're doing. How can I help you?" And be genuine. You might be like, "You can comment on my post." Or, "I actually really need help with this thing." Or, "Could you refer me to this person?" I see where mutual connection. Like, "Vute genuinely. Just reach out to people and be like, "How can I help you?" It's again, it's going to turn into something. Totally. And I think it's that positive message. Like, a big thing that I used to go to my old company was we would encourage kind of if we couldn't help them directly with our service, it might be, "Okay, well, could I introduce you to someone?" And I almost kind of think it's a level of manifestation as well. When you're DMing people and you're putting yourself out there, well, I saw something the other day which said that apparently, well, it was saying that creating content is almost like the highest level of manifestation because you are literally putting yourself out there into the world. You are saying, "This is what I'm doing. This is what I'm here for." And that then allows the positive energy to attract you. And I think that goes for everything. When you're DMing people and you're messaging them and leaving compliments or asking how they can help, you are putting yourself out there and you're moving one step further to kind of making your goals happen. If you stay silent, if you're not posting on LinkedIn, if you're not sending any messages, if you're not commenting on any post, how's anyone supposed to know what you do? So you have to put yourself out there to become visible and attract these opportunities. Yeah, I have some people that will message me on Instagram and they'll be like, "Kornia, it's so unfair. I can't get a job. I've been looking for months and months and I'm like, go do these things and if you still can't get a job, you can come back and complain to me." Yeah. I can't complain about doing these things. I'm like, "Here's what you're gonna do. You're gonna optimize your profile. You're going to post consistently. I'm gonna reach out to one person per day." Like, that's it. If you're not actively reaching out to people right now, it's really fucking hard to get a job. - Yeah. - You gotta be networking. And networking doesn't have to be this dumb. Like, "I'm going to this networking event." No, you can actually do it like in your PJs from your bed. Just message people, say hello, connect. Like, it doesn't have to be this big formal thing. You can literally just be like, "Hey, Misha, how can I help you?" Or, "Hey, Misha, I'm looking for a job right now in marketing. Is there any way you could help?" - Oh, like, yeah. - Still, like, you get to be forward with what you want and there are people out there that are willing to help you. - I work with loads of people who slid into my DMs. My graphic design is I work with. Like, a lot of the people who I work with now are people who just, - Shoot the shot. No, same, I don't, I don't put out job applications. - Yeah. - If I'm a higher someone, it's 'cause they DM me something. They DM me. Hey, like somebody DM me the other day. Courtney, I think your newsletter could use some work. I would improve it in these three ways. I was like, "Okay, send me a proposal." - Oh my God, I love work. - I didn't put out a job application for a newsletter writer. - Yeah, exactly. And that happens all the time. That genuinely happens all the time. And I think it's giving the value, isn't it? Saying something like, "I could help you do this," or, "I've seen this isn't quite right," or, "offering you like a free example." But coming back to the job point, something that really blows my mind is a lot of people, they apply for a job. And then they don't really think to do anything else. But reaching out to someone on LinkedIn, whether it's the hiring manager, whether it's the lead of that team, is such a good thing to do because it shows that you're going above and beyond. It shows that you're really wanting that job. And this literally happened to a friend of mine the other day. She applied for a job, didn't hit anything back for two weeks. I said, "Why don't you message him on LinkedIn and say, "I've applied for this job." She messaged the marketing manager, or whoever it was who was going to be hiring for that role, and she got an interview that day. - Wow. - And so few people are doing it. And yet you're applying for these jobs which have thousands of applicants, and you're expecting people to sift through your CV, and then reach out to you. You need to be doing more to get in front of these people. - Yeah, I have a level up on LinkedIn alumni that gets international paid speaking gigs multiple times a year. I'm talking like every month she's flying to a new place. And she came on my podcast, and I asked her, "How are you getting so many speaking gigs?" Like you're applying to these. How are people saying yes to you? And she's not the most qualified. She says, "Oh, I just messaged him on LinkedIn." Hey, I just applied for that speaking gig. She's like, "It can be that simple." But she says consistently, she's the only person messaging after the application saying, "I applied for this speaking gig." - Yeah, exactly. And then that also just shows the employer, whoever's organizing these speaking opportunities. Okay, this person really wants it. She's gone and followed up. - Yeah, exactly. I have a problematic tip on how to get engagement on your own post on LinkedIn. It only works if you're a young woman. And I haven't posted about this on social because it's problematic, but I'll talk about it on here. So what you're gonna do is you're gonna find, you know how sometimes you have just these random guys from India in your connection request? - Yeah, I see. - You have to accept them. Then you have to send them a nice message. It's so great to be connected with you. You're so amazing. And then they're gonna comment on all your posts and be like, my beautiful princess. - Then a booze engagement. (laughing) - I love that, yeah. Don't let us not fuck right about that on LinkedIn. - No, I'm not gonna. (laughing) No, no, no, this is a secret hack. - I was gonna make an Instagram post about it, but I'm like, no, this is gonna be very a bit of podcast, 'cause it is a good tip. - That is a really good tip. - But it's a little problematic. - I also think that something that people don't tend to understand is when we were talking about that I worked with as earlier, is on LinkedIn, the chances of your ideal audience, or your ideal customer, sorry, not audience, your ideal customer commenting on your posts, is probably, depending on who you work with, is probably quite low. - Right, it's gonna be like your friends. - Yeah. - I typically work with founders or see sweet senior executive companies, they're not commenting on my posts, but they're still seeing them. Most of the people who are commenting on my posts are people in a similar industry, or people who just wanna be my friends. - Oh my God. - Or people that wanna sell you. - Yeah. - People that wanna sell you are gonna be commenting. Let them. - Yeah, let them. - Be like, hell yeah. - It's so slow. - It's kind of a mystery. - Yeah, exactly. What would you tell someone that feels like they're running out of content ideas, or they don't know what was a post today? - If you don't know what's a post today, well, I think this is why it comes back to strategy P. So I spoke about the mission at the beginning, I build it on a thing called a map. So you've got your M, which is your mission, A, which is your authenticity, so, or your authority, so what makes you uniquely you and why someone should follow you over someone else who's in a similar industry, and the P is your content pillars. So you need to be choosing around three to four content pillars that you're always sticking to. And it's really, that's one of my biggest pieces of advice if you're running out of content ideas, because it leans itself into that repetition side of things. So if you choose four content topics that you know you have to be posting about each week, it removes the friction and the decision making or decision fatigue of knowing what's post about because you've already chosen your content pillars. So I would say always go back to your content pillars if you're not sure what you want to post about, but also just think about what's happened to you over the past two weeks. One thing that I've noticed be really successful LinkedIn is lived experience. So recent lived experience. So if I start a LinkedIn post with yesterday, I spoke on Courtney Johnson's podcast, that's most likely going to do well. Or you know, it can be something as simple as two weeks ago a client said this to me. I think the reason why that's become really popular is because it's stuff that AI doesn't know. It's stuff that you only know it's storytelling. So I would just genuinely think about, okay, what's happened over the past week or two? That would be interesting to my ideal audience and most likely something will be there. - Yeah, document. - What, it's already happening. - Yeah, I'll look back on photos. - Yes, that always helps. - I love that. Well, if you guys want us, Misha and I to work together to help you build your LinkedIn, you can join Level Up on LinkedIn. I'll put all the info for the next one in the show notes and Misha, where can people follow you? And let's all go spam your Instagram. Let's spam your Instagram as you're growing it. - Please do. - Okay, you can follow me on LinkedIn. Misha Collins, you know what? I've actually forgotten my Instagram. (laughing) Just Google, and this Misha Collins something. I'll send it to Courtney and you got it in there. But yeah, please go follow me on Instagram and ask Courtney said, we're doing the next Level Up on LinkedIn and everyone in this cohort loved it. - Yeah, we've never had, I mean, everyone was so engaged and they really went for it. So if you want to grow your LinkedIn, it's a perfect place for it. - Amazing, see you guys in Level Up on LinkedIn. See ya then. - I do have an ask for you guys before we go. If this podcast has benefited you and anyway, if you have gotten a tip that you've really loved and you've implemented it, if it's given you some sort of inspiration, if it's given you some sort of motivation or clarity, my ask is that you leave a five star review. I would appreciate it so much. It helps spread the message. It really helps the show grow and it helps more people get access to this information. My deepest desire is ungatekeeping shit. I wanna ungatekeep information. So anybody that desires to build a personal brand, to build a business, to create this success in their life and to live their dream, I want them to have all of the information and I don't hold shit back on this show. Okay, we are not holding shit back. So in order to get this message to more people in order to get these resources and tips to more people, your reviews go a long way. I appreciate you so much. Thank you.