I am Charles Schwartz Show - Million-Dollar LinkedIn Profile in Minutes

Episode Date: October 16, 2024

In this episode, Charles dives deep into the world of LinkedIn mastery with Matt Cretzman, a digital alchemist who's turned personal tragedy into a thriving career of connection-building. Matt unveils his blueprint for transforming a static LinkedIn profile into a dynamic, opportunity-generating powerhouse, offering a masterclass in the art and science of professional networking. From his early days in non-profit work to becoming a LinkedIn strategist, Matt's journey is a testament to the power of authentic relationships and strategic online presence. He dissects his evolution from a LinkedIn novice to a networking virtuoso, revealing the DNA of his "Pipeline Principle" that's kept him at the forefront of digital relationship-building. Charles and Matt engage in a candid conversation, exploring the game-changing potential of AI-powered profile optimization and the crucial distinction between a sales pipeline and a relationship pipeline. They unpack the counterintuitive approach of "showing your homework," the magic of creating compelling LinkedIn content, and why understanding the psychology of your connections trumps following trends in today's competitive professional landscape. Matt's insights crackle with practical wisdom as he breaks down his unique LinkedIn strategies, from the innovative "LinkedIn Event Hacking" to the revolutionary concept of LinkedIn Newsletters. He challenges conventional networking wisdom, advocating for a radical shift from surface-level connections to deep, strategic relationship building that resonates with professionals on an authentic level. KEY TAKEAWAYS: • Uncover the secret sauce of Matt's "Pipeline Principle" and how it can transform your professional network • Learn why "showing your homework" is crucial for building credibility and trust on LinkedIn • Discover how AI tools can supercharge your LinkedIn profile without losing your authentic voice • Understand the power of strategic content creation in attracting the right connections and opportunities • Explore strategies for optimizing your LinkedIn presence across different features, from posts to newsletters Head over to podcast.iamcharlesschwartz.com to download your exclusive companion guide, designed to guide you step-by-step in implementing the strategies revealed in this episode. KEY POINTS: 8:04 Life-Changing Accident: Details a tragic van accident that reshaped Matt's life trajectory. 10:34 Relationship Building: Emphasizes the importance of genuine connections in professional growth. 12:50 Orphanage Initiative: Shares how a personal project led to unexpected professional opportunities. 16:32 Overcoming Adversity: Discusses navigating personal and professional challenges through relationships. 19:01 Skill Acquisition: Highlights key skills necessary for success in the digital age. 20:40 Profile Optimization: Offers strategies for enhancing LinkedIn profiles using AI tools. 23:58 Digital Networking: Provides tips for effective online relationship building. 25:50 Credibility Building: Explores the role of social proof in establishing professional authority. 29:34 Authentic Outreach: Stresses the importance of genuine communication in networking efforts. 31:11 Relationship Focus: Reiterates the value of prioritizing relationships over sales in networking. 34:11 Outreach Strategies: Shares effective techniques for initiating professional connections. 38:16 Success Story: Presents a case study demonstrating the power of strategic LinkedIn use. 40:51 Avoiding Pitfalls: Warns against common mistakes in LinkedIn networking, particularly spamming. 42:27 Newsletter Utilization: Explains how to leverage LinkedIn newsletters for increased visibility and engagement.

Welcome to the IAM Charles Schwartz Show. Today, we're cracking the code of LinkedIn mastery with Matt Kretzman, the wizard behind countless digital transformations. Matt's journey from tragedy to triumph is a testament to the power of authentic connections and strategic online presence. In this episode, Matt unveils the secrets

that turned his LinkedIn profile into a client generating machine. From AI powered profile optimization to the game changing pipeline principle, he's about to flip your LinkedIn strategy. You'll discover why your current approach might be leaving money on the table and how a simple mindset shift can turn cold connections into hot business deals. Matt's tactics are practical, proven, and ready for immediate implementation. So, if you're tired of being a LinkedIn lurker and ready to become a lead generating powerhouse tune in

Matt's insights could be the turning point your professional life has been waiting for the show starts now Welcome to the I am Charles Schwartz show where we don't just discuss success We show you how to create it on every episode We uncover the strategies and tactics that turn everyday entrepreneurs into unstoppable powerhouses in their businesses and their lives. Whether your goal is to transform your life or hit that elusive seven, eight or nine figure mark, we've got the blueprint to get you there. The show starts now.

All right, everybody, welcome back. I'm excited about today's show because this one talks about tragedy all the way to radical success. So Matthew, thank you so much for being on the show. Oh, no, it's my pleasure, Charles. It's gonna be a lot of fun. It's gonna be meaningful conversation.

And for those that are listening, I think we're gonna take you on a ride today. Absolutely, let's start that ride. You know, you've been through some stuff and most people have no idea who you are. And for those of you who are paying attention or don't know, go get some tissues. There's gonna be some stuff here.

So this is, this hurts a little bit. So let's get into it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm actually, right now where I'm reporting from is this little town called Buddha, Illinois, which is, it's two hours outside of Chicago. I'd never heard of Buddha until one of my best friends moved here.

And I just wrapped up visiting my parents and doing a conference over in Toronto and wanted to route through here. But as we kind of get into the backstory, my life has been always about relationships. One of the leaders in my life that I admire, he said, your destiny is defined by your relationships. And so John Maxwell says,

you're the sum average of your five. Who are your five that you're spending most of the time with? And as I look back on my life, that's always been the constant. Like the biggest decisions that I've made in my life was because somebody spoke into that or somebody had influence over me. And I, I, I, I no liked and trusted them. And there was a lot of respect.

So back when I was young, I went on a couple of trips to a few different countries and fell in love with, um, fell in love with travel. I mean, I grew up watching Indiana Jones, right? That we were, I think we were from that era. Um, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Like, man, is that a job? Like, cause I want we were, I think we were from that era. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, like, man, is that a job? Like, cause I want to be that.

Can I do that? Yeah, yeah. Did you know with Indiana Jones, it was originally not going to be him. It was going to be the guy from Magnum PI. It was going to be Tom Selleck, the original person who was cast, but the TV show wouldn't let them out of it.

So they had to bring in Harrison Ford, but now I can't imagine anybody other than Harrison Ford doing it. He's so iconic. He's so iconic. I know, yeah, yeah. And the young Indiana Jones Chronicles, I don't know if you ever watched that.

All this stuff, yeah. It's so good. Yeah, so I mean that, you know, travel. Anyways, yeah. That's what I grew up watching that stuff. And I was like, man, I just love the adventure, the travel, the pursuit of, you know, beating the bad guys and winning.

And so when I took trips, you know, like trips overseas and throughout Latin America as a young kid, my first trip to Mexico was 2001. My first trip to the Dominican Republic was 2003. And coming from Canada and Toronto, you know, growing up in suburbia, it just, it blew me away. I was like, how are people living in these conditions?

How is this, like, this is what is actually, what most of the world, I think, is actually experiencing as life. And so from a young age, I was like, man, I really want to do something to help these people this is what is actually what most of the world I think is actually experiencing as live. And so from a young age, I was like, man, I really want to do something to help these people and just make an impact on their lives and kind of improve their situation. So very young, like that was inside of my heart. And that was my focus and my goal. So later on, just to accelerate the story, ended up getting married in 2007. Had my first kid in 2008. I was 21 when I got married and I was a week 22

when I had my first child. Her name was Aslan. She was born eight days after I turned 22 and she made me a dad and it was super special. I love being a dad. I ended up having three girls, so I have no clue what it's like to raise boys. Maybe a little bit because I am one,

but from this perspective, I'm a girl dad through and through. And so I had Aslan in 2008 at the time I was working as a as a used car salesman though I was not that used car salesman okay I was an honest used car salesman that might be an oxymoron that might it might be I'm you know trying to be upstream man I mean not so much you know I'm changing I'm trying to change the trend um it sounds like a campaign, you know, like, you know, there you go. And so, yeah, I was doing that. And then it came to time where I was like, I'm ready to do this thing.

I'm just going to launch out. So I started a nonprofit organization in January 2010, quit my job, packed up everything, put a bunch of stuff in storage. This was in Southern Ontario. And I was like, I'm going to do this. I'm going to go and live in Latin America. I ended up setting my sights on Dominican Republic and being a Canadian was pretty easy for me to get into Cuba. Whereas Americans, it's a little bit harder. We can't do it.

Complicated. Totally different. Yeah, exactly. Side note, there's actually 11 provisions that allow Americans to travel to Cuba. Yes, yeah, we'll save that for the bonus episode. Bonus episode. Bonus episode.

So, you know, as I was traveling, just kind of presenting my mission to people all over the U S I went up traveling to 45 different states and I've been all over the place and people loved my vision. Like, you know, we get it. Um, we're gonna, we're behind you, we're gonna support you and everything was going great. It was, uh, it was super special. Uh, October 20th, 2010, Maddie was born. And so the height of my travel, which was 2010 to 2013, I had a two-year-old and a newborn. And it was tough. We grinded.

I can tell you many, many stories. Again, bonus episode of driving all night, just pulling over at pit stops and falling asleep in the same bathroom stall that I had just driven three months prior because I was so exhausted. That's real talk. But when you're starting an early stage, even company or organization, that's what you got to do. You got to put in the grind and you got to put in the work. And for me, I was very mission driven and focused. I really wanted to make a difference. So it kept me going up until up until one event that just so radically

changed my life. And I still feel the ripple effect of what that was even to this day. So to set the stage, Maddie loose Maddie and Aslan Aslan was three Maddie was 18 months, we had pulled over in North Carolina, we were traveling to Ohio for a conference. And, um, as I was driving through Northern North Carolina, Mount Airy, other side note, fun fact, um, Andy Griffith show was filmed in Mount Airy, North Carolina.

And that's, that's really old. I know I'm not even that old, but I know that stuff. It's good to know these things. There you go. You're driving through. I was driving through, yeah, North Carolina. And being a Canadian, this was February in

North Carolina. And I wasn't that concerned about the snow because I grew up in the snow. But what I learned that day and since is not every state or place has the same infrastructure to deal with inclement weather, such as snow as Canada does. And so as I was driving north with my family, we were driving along, and I'd see a car in the ditch here and a truck in the ditch over there. And I was driving the speed limit, being very careful.

And Aslan, she was falling asleep, and so was Maddie. And we came to a bridge just before Mount Airy. And as we drove over that bridge, our tires actually hit black ice. I didn't see it. And so they stopped. You know, they just lost traction. The back of the van started to swing out. Kids were asleep. Thank God.

And I remember my wife at the time, you know, just woke up, just screaming as we're just careening out of control. And so what ended up happening was the van spun off in the middle between the north and south highways, there was this large green space. And in the green space, there was this big interstate pole and our van came to a collision halt right on Aslan's door a collision halt right on Aslan's door on that interstate pole. And so a bunch of smoke, glass shattered. I was a little bit disoriented.

The airbag punched me in the face and it kind of fractured my nose a little bit. And it was just, it was a scene out of a horror movie. It was unreal. And so I ended up, I drive with my shoes off, so I wasn't even wearing my shoes. My phone went flying. So I jumped out of the driver's side window

and came around to the other side of the van. And that's where I looked. And I mean, that side of the vehicle is just a complete disaster. It was a wreck. Like it blasted the door. As long as they're kind of slumped over. And imagine like being a dad. Like at that moment, I'm like, I

don't know what I do. Do I pick her up? Do I not? Do I, you know, where's my phone? I can't call nine one one. Um, and so I was just frozen and I remember just, you know, shouting out, you know, God, don't take my child. I was like, you know, just don't take my child.

And, and I remember scooping her up and holding her and her body kind of heaved a little bit. I was like, oh, thank God she's alive. What ended up happening later on was I found out that that was actually her body just expelling all of the air that was in her lungs. And I held on to her to the last minute. And so there's a lot that I could tell about that story.

That's not for this podcast, maybe a bonus episode, but there were so many miracles that happened after that event that just brought so much healing and meaning, I would say, to what was a tragedy. As it obviously ended up passing away, the community wrapped their arms around us and just blessed us immensely immensely people donated burial plots They covered the funeral cost it was it was actually live streamed on the local news wxii

NBC affiliate so many people tuned into the live stream Charles that it actually it froze and and shut down And it just caught the it caught the local local news It just went around and now because of you know, the nature of my organization, all of our supporters, which there were hundreds, if not thousands of them, they were all tuning in. And one tweet that I sent out was really what set it into motion. That was the one Domino. I remember laying in the back of the ambulance and I had my phone in my left hand and I sent out a tweet and I was like, we were in an accident.

Don't know if Aslan's going to make it. Please pray hashtag retweet. And that got retweeted a number of times. And that's what kind of set the domino in motion. And, uh, of just all these people around the world, just loving on us and helping us and supporting us now we carried on. And since this, I think one of the main themes of this, this talk we're going to have, uh,

is relationships. And so one of the relationships that came into my life, um, was somebody who, he was a pastor of a church in North Carolina and he had been helping people in India for 30 years. And he had a great organization doing great work in India. Um, he invited me to come to India and I'm like Indiana Jones style, yo, let's go. You know what I'm saying? And so I went to India and it's again, like I'd been, I traveled a little bit, but when I went to India, that's when another, another shock, I was not prepared for what I was about to witness. Um,

and I didn't know there are 35 million orphans in India. Um, and the condition that they live in is, I mean, it's horrific. It's unbelievable, it's horrific. And so I went, one of the guys that I met, he was the one that was in charge of kind of managing our itinerary and driving us around. His name was Danny. We went on the trip to India.

We became friends just because we were, you know, side by side that whole 12 day trip. And at the end of the trip, he kept bugging me like throughout the trip. It's like, hey, let me know when you have a few minutes because I wanna come and show you something that I 12 day trip. And at the end of the trip, he kept bugging me like throughout the trip. It's like, Hey, let me know when you have a few minutes because I want to come and show you something that I'm working on. And so we were just so busy. But at the end of the week, he had a window and I was like, cool, let's do it. So I jumped on a scooter, drove over to this, this place, maybe a mile down the road. And I pulled up to this tiny

building, this tiny house that was clearly under construction. And what he ended up telling me was he and his wife took out a loan from the government because they were so so burdened about caring for the orphans of India that they were willing to take out a personal loan to build a building, build a small house and care for as many as they possibly could. And he just shared his vision with me. And I took a picture, a few pictures that day, I still have it, I reflect back on it. But what what ended up happening eight months later, as we continue to have, you know, a friendship and build a relationship and a level of trust. He called me one day. And he said, Matt, I'd like to ask you a question, can we I'd love to team up with you to build this orphanage. I'd just like to know if you, would you mind if I named it after your daughter? And I was like, you know, tears just streaming, like I would love to, man.

It was a dream someday, a bucket list. If one day I could, you know, have an impact like that and just do something so incredibly meaningful and it came much sooner than I thought it would. At the time I was probably 26, 27 years old and had young kids, I had Lucy in 2013. And so I had like two young girls and to find such meaningful fulfillment through something like that, it has become one of the greatest honors of my life

to help these kids. And the interesting thing I'll say about where I'm reporting this from right now, I'm actually in a city where another one of my closest, dearest friends that walked through all these seasons of life with me. He lives here in Buda, Illinois. So I'm here hanging out with my friend, Chanta, who's just been such an amazing anchor for me throughout my life. And so to speed up the story, I ended up moving to the Dominican Republic in 2013 to 16. My heart grew for India so much more. I was like, I need a better home base. I can't base out of the Dominican

if I'm going halfway around the world with my family. And so essentially spun the globe and I'm like, where should I live? Dallas looks great. And so I settled on Dallas, moved to Dallas with the intention of continuing to serve and love and help grow our organization in Asia, really in India. That's when real life hit and the van that was spinning in 2012 felt like it continued to spin. In 2016, when I moved to Dallas and I had

my two kids, that's when my wife left. I was now full-time single dad and I had lost almost everything except my kids. I lost, um, I lost my, my organization cause I couldn't travel anymore as a single dad. I lost my sense of identity because I had done that my whole life and the cost with which it came. Um, I, I felt a great sense of grieving over all the blood, sweat and tears and the life that it cost for me to build what I had built. That was then taken away.

My self-respect was taken away. I was used to being flown over to conferences and speaking in front of hundreds, if not a couple thousand people. And I had really settled on where I am in life and I'm very happy and I'm content. I'm excited about my future only to have all of that taken away. And in 2016 to 18, those are what I call my wilderness experience, where I was just wandering and I was searching for what's the next thing.

I don't know. And I would assume that there's no doubt somebody who's listening to this podcast that is either going through that experience, they've come out of that experience or they're about to go into a period of time like that, a season, life comes in seasons and there's going to be a season like that where the unexpected happens and it may be very difficult. So you've gone through all these things, which most people will never

experience in their lives. They've never experienced loss on that level where life happens and then a community rallies behind you and then you build these relationships. And then even after all this healing, you know, life just continues to happen. There's a 67% failure ratio of all marriages in the United States. That's just, it is what it is. It's a better change. I wouldn't get on a plane that had a 67% failure ratio, hence

why there's no ring there. Um, so in that you started thinking about, Hey, relationships matter and how we can leverage relationships and there's different platforms and there's different ways to do it. I know you've written a book about that on how to jump into those relationships and how to kind of influence and connect in those relationships. When you're doing that and you're going into that, what have you learned? Tell me more about your book on how you can leverage this. Because everyone thinks that their tragedy, whatever's going on, is the worst that ever happened.. And for them it is. It's kind of like when you've got little girls, when they first start crying that first time because they, you know, they hit their hand or they

touch something warm. That's the worst pain they've ever felt in their lives. So yeah, there's other people who have inoperable bone cancer, we're going through much more, but to that individual child, it's the worst they've ever come across. So everyone's pain they're going through is the worst they've ever gone through. But when you have the ability to look at other people saying, Hey, you lost a daughter, you lost a wife, you lost everything, you know, all of these things. And yet you're still done this. Okay.

How do I get out of that hole? How do I get, get back up and running? And you've always said it, you know, relationships are core of that and how to access this and leverage this and make sure that you present yourself in a way that you are engaged with. So tell me more about that and the platform access this and leverage this and make sure that you present yourself in a way that you are engaged with. So tell me more about that and the platform you use and the book and all that.

I love this. I love this. Then thank you for the segue. This is this perfect. So there 2019 was was another year that changed my life. And for the better that was that was the pivotal moment where in that year, I figured out a couple things. And it set me on a different trajectory. And I will say like you know the mindset that I had all through those years, though there were certainly highs and lows and ups and downs and I felt good one day and horrible the next day as I was just on this constant pursuit for what's next. 2019 I met somebody

who became a mentor to me and so I always tell for people that are going through a tough season or they're looking for a transition who are the people that are where you wanna be. Who have who's gone through what you gone through they've come out successful and they are the level of life that you want to experience reach out to them and ask them for help. You know and maybe you know there's some that will accept that and be open to that and some that might reject that fortunately for me came through an intro was at. He's like, hey, you seem to have some marketing skills. You've done a number of marketing things. Let me connect you to Brad who runs a marketing company and see if he's got a spot. And so I met Brad, talked to Brad.

He offered me a spot, hired me. In 2019, I figured out everything that had to do with starting a marketing agency and running a business. And these are the skills. And this is what I love about where we're at in society. We live in the gig economy. We're in a skill economy. Where I went to school meant nothing.

It had no bearing on my success in business and into the next stage that I was going to step into. It was 2019, all about learning skills. For me, and there's a lot of skills that you can learn. There's more skills than ever that you can learn. So what are some of those skills that you learned that you got to leverage into? Because a lot of people are going to want to have some really practical tangible, what do I do?

How do I get out of this? I get, yeah. Yeah. Finding a mentor. One of the things that we get in, we get to that point. Yep. Yep. Okay.

So for me, the skills that I learned, uh, LinkedIn became, you know, for whatever reason, I had a draw to LinkedIn, a poll to get into LinkedIn. So I jumped in on LinkedIn. My perception of LinkedIn was a place that I would spruce up my profile if I needed a job. It was essentially a digital replica of my resume. What I didn't know, but soon discovered was, LinkedIn is, it is, in my opinion,

one of the biggest gateways to unbelievable opportunities, more so than any other social media platform in my experience and for a number of different reasons because on LinkedIn it is yes now it's become a content hungry platform 0.5 of the total user base on LinkedIn consistently create content and they're approaching a billion users that's a lot of empty space right like LinkedIn wants people to fill that empty space but the second thing and why I love LinkedIn the most at least initially was it's a platform to connect with people.

It is a business first platform where people are expecting and get on there to do business. And that business is done through relationships and it's also done, those relationships are formed by having the right conversations. And so what I learned was, and to get to your question about what skills, my skills set that I developed was I became really, really good at finding and starting, finding the right people and starting the right conversation with the right person in the right

way. And we're talking about total strangers. So that's really the question. And I think through this all the time with my clients, like, how do you find the right person and start that conversation at scale that doesn't make them feel like they're being spammed or they're a sales target or they're just a number, right? And I think that's why, you know, only 0.5 percent or whatever it is. And LinkedIn actually creates content and pushes it out because they don't know how to do that. So if I'm in a situation and one of the things we love going is getting really tactical. If I'm sitting there and go, listen, I thought LinkedIn was just my resume in a different format, which is what most people think that LinkedIn is. How do I present myself so that it is in a way

that is going to get that engagement, that is going to build that relationship? What are some of the things that people can do that are tangible that they can sit down and say, oh crap, I just heard Matt, this is awesome. I'm going to pull over. I'm going to do this on my phone. I'm going to do this right now on my laptop. I'm going to stop listening to the podcast. I'm going to write down, I'm taking media action. What are some of the things that they can do immediately? Here's a step.

And I just did this. Here's a process. Very, very tactical. And I just did this with my dad two days ago. Okay. It took us about two hours. And you're probably going to need to be on your laptop to do this because I don't think LinkedIn lets you do it

from your phone, but you know, listen to this later and follow the process. Step one, go to your LinkedIn profile and you can download your profile as a PDF. Download your whole profile profile as a PDF. Step number two, sign up for a Claude.ai account. It's free. If you pay the $20 a month subscription, you're going to get access to Claude projects, which I'm a big fan of go and do it. It's 20 bucks. It's totally worth it. Okay, that's step number two.

Step number three, you're gonna go and upload that PDF onto Claude, right? And then you're gonna tell Claude, you're gonna tell Claude this, because the first thing that's really important for you is your profile. Your profile is, it's your digital billboard. You gotta have a dialed in profile, right?

And you're like, oh, I'm not a good writer. I can't think about how do I position myself as an ex-pupil? You don't have to do that. Exactly. Exactly. So take all this stuff, go into Claude, give it your PDF and tell Claude in just like you were talking to a human. Hey, Claude, my name is so and so I've given you a PDF for my LinkedIn profile. I want you to help position me as an expert. Look at my experience. And here are some things that I'm passionate about. Let's work sequentially through my profile so that it comes. I can produce something that's highly optimized and professional. Enter. Boom. Claude's going to analyze all of it. It's going to do all the hard work and it's going to spit out this amazing copy for your headline, your about section, your experience, maybe even like your, uh, you know, your banner and just work through it, go back and forth. Hey Claude, I like this, but I don't like that. Tweet this, fix that, whatever.

Just like you were talking to an editor or a graphic designer and it'll do all the work. And then you can go to Canva, you know, Canva of course, like update the banner and stuff like that, clean up your profile and you'll be amazed. Like you'll be amazed what happens when you just do that one thing, you'll feel better and that will give you the confidence,

which I think is the reason why most people shy away from being really active on LinkedIn is because they're either insecure or they don't feel like, you know, they present themselves in the right way and they don't have any clarity on, you know, what's my authority? What's my expertise? I love that you started with that. And because I've had this conversation with people all the time, they're like, okay, what do I say to someone? I was like, listen, if I told you the absolute perfect thing to say in a networking environment, and you walked in naked, covered in dirt, with your hair messed up, having bed head,

I don't care what you say, it's probably not gonna convert. I love that you said we gotta start with your profile. We gotta clean you up, because if you're walking into a room, this is digital networking. You've gotta present yourself in a way that integrates and connect in a really, really high way.

So using Cloud AI, and I am, there's a lot of people who are nervous about AI. I'm not nervous present yourself in a way that integrates and connect in a really, really high way. So using cloud AI and I am, there's a lot of people who are nervous about AI. I'm not nervous about AI in any way, I think it's the greatest tool on the planet is a virtual fleet of employees for me. I use it all the time. I absolutely love it. Do I think it's going to take thing, take over a bunch of different stuff? I don't know. I don't cross the ball. All I know is that for a lot of companies that I've worked with, like content creators and all that, I'm like, you guys might want to get more skill sets because it's gonna hurt. Things are gonna change. You know, ghost

writers got eaten alive, eaten alive. Yeah. Almost 100%. It's over. It's over. Sorry, guys. If you're a ghost writer right now, contact Matt. He'll teach you some new skill sets. That's right. You're gonna need them. That's what it is. Like, sorry. It's like the people used to be the window knockers back in England. They would knock on your windows in the morning to wake you up. And then alarm clocks happen. You're like, well, sorry.

You gotta pick. It is what it is. Sorry. It is what it is. Sorry. Yeah. So, okay, so someone goes in, they use Claude, they've redesigned this.

A lot of stuff that people run into that as a problem is, how do I connect? I mean, we connected over LinkedIn. How do I connect? How do I reach connected over LinkedIn. How do I connect? How do I reach out? How do I do this? On? Obviously, the best way is just to send naked pictures. No, that's not right. So that's Instagram. That's that's only fan or something. But I also love what

you said that, you know, LinkedIn is specifically designed. They're there for a specific reason. You know, you go to an event that's all about knitting, you don't go and talk about how to make sushi. It's a knitting event for God sakes. Same thing here. It, they're here to do this. There's so many people who try and do business on Instagram. And I'm like, it's a little harder guys.

Go to the path of least resistance. So if you're sitting there and you've gone through cloud and you've optimized your profile, how important is social proof? You know, I know you've written a book. I, I remember him as well. How important is social proof? I know you've written a book, I've written them as well. How important is social proof now? Yeah. So the time old formula and it's never going to change is no like and trust. And so you got to put yourself in the other person's shoes and look at you from an objective perspective.

If I see me on LinkedIn or in town, do I trust? Right? Is there any evidence of my expertise? That's essentially it. You know, so I love these, you know, these philosophies or, you know, approach to life that's like building public, right? Show your homework. And there's never more an important time for you to show your homework and work in public, build in public than now. It is the proof of your work, right? So that's that's super important. There's a couple easy ways to do that. One of which, you know through content. So let me give you again, like really low hanging fruit, easy takeaway, super tactical. And again, I did this with my dad two days ago and I do this all the time. So this works. All right. So now that you've gone to Claude and you've cleaned up your profile, the next thing that you can do with Claude, and here's how I juggle Claude with ChatGVT. I would then go to Claude and say, based on all this information, what would you say are some topics that I should be talking about to build the right audience? Boom, it'll give you topics. If you wanna take it a step further

and build the roadmap to LinkedIn Voice, which I've done, go to Google, LinkedIn Voice, top LinkedIn Voice topics. You'll come up with a website, grab the website, give it the chat GBT and say, and actually I would compare both with chat GBT. Copy all that, get the website, grab the website, give it the chat GBT and say X and actually I would compare both with chat GBT copy all that get the PDF give it to chat GBT with that link and say I want you to blend my expertise with LinkedIn top voice topics and tell me what I should be speaking about on LinkedIn. Boom, it's going to make sense of all of it make it super easy. If you want to take it

a step further with chat GBT, which is great for research and strategy, then tell chat, GPT, hey, what are some newly published books on these topics and authors that I can use to create content or possibly reach out to? And here's the magic, right? So now it gives you all of those books, the authors, it'll even link to them. You can click those. And if you're really smart,

you're going to find those authors on the sleepiest channel to connect with high performance ever and that's LinkedIn. Right? Yeah, you see where I'm going with that. I've done this multiple times. Yes. And it works. Exactly. Not only does it work, it's a game changer.

I remember there was an individual that we wanted to come out for an event and I reached out to him and I said, hey, I'm gonna buy 500 copies of your books and give them away. Do you wanna come speak at this event? And he's like, I'm sorry, what? And I was like, I'm going to, I was like, I'm going to give away for free. It would be great if you were there, if you want to sign them, if you want to

do a remote thing, he's like, I'll come out and I'll speak. And he's like, okay. And all it costs me instead of having to pay him to come speak, I just bought 500 copies of his book. And we got the author's price, which is very, for those who haven't published the book, um, we authors get a very different price than you do. So like my book is the cheapest, I can make it, which is like 14 bucks, 15 bucks. My author's copy costs me $4 free shipping. So just, we will, whenever I go speak at events, I will literally ship boxes of my books to the event and just give them away. Because if you're in the process of writing a book on a complete little tactical tip, books are nothing more than a sales funnel. They're your social proof to create your sales funnel. It's building KLT, which Matt talked about earlier, which is no, like and trust,

but it has to be written in a way, which is feel felt fixed. I feel what you've gone through. I have felt it too. This is how I fixed it. And that has all your content needs to be done. And if you're not doing these things, it's brutal. One of the things that you mentioned also that I think it's just, I love it. I think we need to bring back the age of authenticity, the ability to sit there

and say, Hey, I'm doing this live. For example, I sat there and we were doing an event. I'm like, I'm the Beyonce of podcasts. They're like, I'm sorry, what? I was like the Beyonce of podcast back in when she was on star search and she got kicked off because she had no idea what she was doing. I'm the Beyonce of podcasts. I have no idea what I'm doing, but it hooked enough that people were like, Oh, and I was self-deprecating enough to be honest. Like, I don't know, I was doing another webcam. You and I talked before we started recording. I was like, I don't know math. And you're like, really?

You're gonna love it. I don't understand how to do anything. So having that authenticity is a huge factor. When you do this outreach, what are the ways, do you have templates? Do you have normal ways that you do it? So, hey, this is how I'm gonna outreach. How do you do it?

Yeah, depending on the type of the campaign, right? Like the campaign strategy, I tell people like tools, tools and data, both of them are a commodity nowadays. I don't use whatever tool you want, right? They're all going to do a good job. If you want to use our tool, LeadStore, may I go for it? Like, but they're all there's a ton of them. They all do a good job. Data is everywhere. You know, don't buy lists from people just go get like a, you know, like a $99 subscription. Thank you. Thank you. Leads, go to warp leads, it's 49 bucks and you can export unlimited contacts at warp leads. Okay there you go that was free. So that doesn't really matter it's your strategy and what we do and when we're talking about outreach is we look I do at least and you probably do too

right we look for commonality. What's the commonality between me and them and some and this is what I teach you know called uh this is like my pipeline principle, which most people, they think about pipeline and they hear sales. When I think about pipeline, I hear relationships. Yes. How do I, how do I fill my brain? I think everyone listening to this needs to stop thinking sales and start thinking relationships. Correct. Your network is your net worth and the better relationship you have with them, it changes it. So yeah, I love that you have that dimension. That's it. And I even say, you know what, a little bit, a little bit of a tangent. I don't say you're not, I'm gonna redefine that one. You're, I don't think

your network is your net worth. Your network is your fund is, is your conduit to expose your net worth because my net worth doesn't come from people around me. My net worth is intrinsic to who I am, but my network is necessary for me to express and exchange that value. You know what I'm saying? It is, it's a way for you to spend those dollars and, you know, do business in the economy. But no, you're right. And your net worth does increase with the quality of relationships, which is really important.

So you look for commonality and some easy ways to do that. There's a couple of different hacks that I've used over the years and they continue to work well. Alumni campaigns are easy, right? Did you graduate from a certain university? You know, like we did one for president of a basketball team. He graduated from Notre Dame lives in Dallas. And we just, you know, Notre Dame peeps in Dallas, hey, I'm

holding a luncheon, I love for you to come. Super easy. Like that one works commonality. And the other one could be, you know, beliefs or values go to, you know Go to maybe organizations they may be a part of, where you might view the world the same way or care about the same topics. Do you volunteer or part of an organization? The other one that works really well is LinkedIn event hacking.

So go into LinkedIn in the search bar, put yourselves in the mind of your ideal client. What events would they attend? Put that in the search in LinkedIn, filter by events. You can do it from your phone and then you're search in LinkedIn filter by events. You can do it from your phone and then you're going to scroll through all the events. If you put, you know, sales, they care about sales, they have problems with sales, you're good at sales. Boom, there you go. Now there's thousands of people that are looking for what you're

trying to offer and they care about leveling up. So those are like, you know, little strategies that I'll use. And then as far as templates, depending on, okay, go ahead. That's where I was going. I was like, so I get how you find the people and get stuck like, okay, I find someone who wants to do personal growth, wants to do sales, wants to do whatever, how do I do outreach? Because it's interesting, because some of the people I work with are like, well, how do I find people that I like-minded,

that I wanna date? I was like, it's not that hard. Where do you wanna hang out? It's the same idea, it's the same commonality. Where are they going? And then go to those events and you're gonna find like-minded people. Apps, not a good idea because you're just pissing in going? And then go to those events and you're going to find like minded people. Apps, not a good idea. Because you're just

pissing in the wind. So when you do this and you say, Hey, I found Bob, Susie, whoever it is that I want to connect with. Yep. What does the outreach look like? What does the template look like? How do you communicate in a way that's effective? Yep. If I'm going to do the event hacking one, for instance, I like to open up my connection message, which by the way, if you put no connection message in your connection request, about 30 message, which by the way, if you put no connection

message in your connection request, about 30% are going to convert anyways, if you have a really clean profile, so have a really clean profile, reach out, you'll get that connection work, you'll get that success, especially if your profile speaks to what they care about. And they're like, oh, it's super obvious, right. But if you're going to put a connection message into your request, I like to open up with a question, or with, you know, a relational value statement for request, I like to open up with a question or with, um, you know, a relational

value statement for events. I usually start with you attending event name to first name, question mark, really cool bumping into somebody else who cares about growing, you know, leveling up in sales or leveling up in whatever, right? Cause that question psychologically, the human wants to answer the question. So we've seen that one worked really well. Um, you might even say it's, it's a little bit cheesy, but it still works if you're reaching out to people that do fit the, you know, the ICP ideal customer profile, you still working at company name, first name,

question mark, right? Just to clarify, and cause not everybody updates their LinkedIn profile, they may have moved on and you don't know about it, so they're not a fit anymore. So that clarifying statement, we've seen it, crazy, crazy good metrics just with that one question in the connection request. Sometimes even 80% will accept the connection request

and maybe 40% will just directly reply without even accepting the connection request with things like, yes, I am, why do you ask? No, I'm not, or whatever. And it just starts the conversation. You know, it's just a conversation starter. So that's the easy way. I don't think there's any substitute for the manual,

like highly, highly personalized. Like I'm going to do it myself. I don't think there is a substitute for that. The next best thing is a bunch of sophisticated tools like clay.com and, you know, hyper personalization, as we would call it, um, as the intro message, subsequent messages. I'm big on video, put a video in that second message, getting up as early as you can get people to see you and build rapport through video, the better your campaign is going to

perform. Because I'm curious when you do that, there's this weird thing called KLT that seems to come into play when you send a video. It's weird. it's wild. Yeah, it's just- It's wild, crazy. One of the things that, even on Instagram, because there's different things at different platforms,

whenever I try to do outreach to someone, if it's on Instagram, I'll send a voice message. I'll never type it. Now all day long, because voice messages get opened on an exceptionally higher rate. And also I hate typing. I can barely spell my own name. So it's just easier for me to go blah, blah, blah, blah,

blah, blah, blah, blah, and just fire them up and just rocket fire those. Those convert on such a higher level. And you're not gonna get it all the time, which is okay, but they convert on a higher, at least their team's gonna get it. That's correct. Same thing on LinkedIn.

I do the same thing. A great little hack. Shout out to my friend Morgan Ingram. He's got 160,000 followers now and it's on LinkedIn. He's crushing it. I've learned a ton from him over the years. And here's the one hack that he's always been teaching and I learned from him. Voice message on LinkedIn, followed by this sentence, any thoughts on my message above, push them back to the audio message, get them to listen to it. That's really the same thing with video thoughts on my video, Buster Mark, leave it ambiguous so that it forces them to listen to it. It's a great, it's a great little

hat. It's beautiful. Very tactical. Yeah. So they're going through and we all know the basics of the profile. Like, you know, have a picture, look at the camera, so on and so forth. Some basics up there, which I don't do. I don't think I've logged into my LinkedIn. My team does for me. So I might need, yeah, we'll have need a conversation about that. Yeah. That's a lot of trust right there. I might focus at the moment, but as they're going through this and okay, I've got this relationship going, my profile is updated. Are we sending out lead magnets? Do lead magnets work? Do you want to have booklets there? Do you want to send a website? How long do you want to keep them on platform? Those are kind of beautiful. Yep. Here's how we think about lead magnets.

Put a lead magnet. And again, not everybody knows this, but your LinkedIn profile, you can add additional features on your profile. So if you're looking at it, there's a button that says add section. Look at section. And then if there's another section that says recommended, click that one. And then it's going to go featured section is one recommended, which is another, your banner and then the featured section are the two biggest parts of your profile.

But lead magnets in the featured section, whatever your top of funnel thing is, put it right there, make it easy and enticing, design it so it's really nice, get people to click it. The second place that you can put lead magnets, I think it's right below your headline, you can actually put a custom URL. So, and that's an additional feature.

Go into the settings, add a custom URL, and you can actually change the words, and then there's a hyperlink behind the words. So I would say something like, grab your free whatever here. So that's the next question. What is the free whatever? Cause people are gonna be like, do I want a video?

Do they want a course? Do they want a checklist? What is the free whatever that converts the highest? Great, and the third place where you're going to do lead magnets is in your content. So to answer your question, good segue lead magnets work unbelievably well in content. Here are some very simple ones that you can do. Listicles work really well. Come up with a list of, you know, whatever thought lead, hey, top 10, whatever here, you know, best templates for this most successful that like listicles are great case studies are great, right? Depending on what industry you're in, like for instance,

AI or automation, like AI, it's like, Oh my gosh, I don't even know where to start. Clarify for people by putting together a case study. Here's what I did to use this to help this company over, you know, overcome this and achieve that. Put that case study in there. Um, uh, the other thing that you can do is like, uh, you could do, uh, carousels work really good. Of course, uh, walkthroughs. If what you're doing is, you know, involves software or tech. Put a walkthrough together. Here's how I use these tools to accomplish this.

And that's clarifying. Um, if you wanted to do like a mini, you know, a mini course, I see people launch these all the time on LinkedIn and they're great. Whatever, whatever extremely valuable time intensive thing that you can create and give away and put a call to action at the bottom of it and say, if this helped you or will help somebody in your network, please share. And you will get people, cause they feel good, right?

Like they're now like, they're the dealer. They're just like dealing out good resources to their network. So, yeah. Because a lot of them are being a tad bit lazy in creating their own content and their own lead magnets. And they're just gonna appropriate your stuff, which is absolutely fine.

Don't mind at all. So these are some of the things that work really, really well. What are some of the things that people make mistakes that are like, oh God, I just, if I don't mind it all. So these are some of the things that work really, really well. What are some of the things that people make mistakes that are like, oh God, I just, if I don't do these five things, just please for the love of everything, don't do these five things, it'll convert better.

Cause I know there's only have so much time with you. What are the five things that are like, oh, I wish they would do this? Yeah, things that they shouldn't do. Correct. Or like, I see this all the time, these are common mistakes. List them, what are the five things? I think, I mean, look, I see this all the time. These are common mistakes. Listen. What are the five things?

I think, I mean, look, I mean, the big number one, the big number one, please just don't spam people. Just don't, just don't. If you think, if you think quantity is better than quality, you are dead wrong. So just, just, just don't. If you think, you know, like LinkedIn is a numbers game to an extent, but it shouldn't be like it's different, right? You want to come with a sniper. You don't want to come with a, you know, an Uzi. So just, just don't get that automation tool. It's cheap and easy and whatever. I don't really care. Don't you're going to burn, burn more bridges, uh, then you're going to build. So just, you know, number one, don't do that. Um, the second thing that I would say is, um, um, man, don't, don't be a lurker. Don't be a lurker. I think a lot of people I see, they're fearful of getting on camera or just putting themselves out

there and don't, just overcome that fear. And you'd be amazed at how many people will just rally behind you. Yeah. I think it goes to a point that you said earlier when you found, I believe it was Danny, who was a mentor who came up and connected with you. find a map, find the people out there that are already done it, who can say, listen, I know you're scared.

I've been there before. I know where the rocks are. I know how to walk across this. It doesn't take a lot of energy. You sit down and you have that conversation, get the buildup of it. Because there's so many, as you said, he, what 0.5% of the people are actually doing anything on LinkedIn. And this is basically like going back to Instagram a decade ago. there's so many, as you said, you know, 0.5% of the people are actually doing anything on LinkedIn.

And this is basically like going back to Instagram a decade ago. This is the only this opportunity of a lifetime is only going to matter in the lifetime of this opportunity. It's not going to be around much longer, especially as we walk into a massive recession, which is going to be brutal. Everyone's going to start optimizing their world in LinkedIn. And they're trying to get this and they're trying to fix this exceptionally fast. Yep. Two other things that I'm going to add to that just to jump in. Two other things. LinkedIn, if you pull up the app, the app on LinkedIn,

if you look at the bottom, and this is an SEO strategy too, we use this, we've used this for years. If you want to figure out what does this platform, whether it's Google or LinkedIn, want me to contribute, go into the platform and maybe put a little search term on Google and it'll show you images, videos, maps, articles, whatever order that is. That's what it wants. Google wants in order for you to rank on LinkedIn. It's the same thing. Open the app, look at the bottom, home,

video, network, notifications, and then profile. So LinkedIn is making it very obvious. We want you to create videos. And now you have TikTok style videos on LinkedIn with that feed. So LinkedIn is making very obvious, we want you to create videos and now you have TikTok style videos on LinkedIn with that feed. So it's definitely video hungry. The second thing that I'll say that it's highly tactical and I do see this all the time and I wish people would stop,

not cause it's a bad thing, but it's not the smartest thing is if you're gonna post an article or a long form post on LinkedIn, but especially an article, do it under a newsletter because a newsletter is form post on LinkedIn, but especially an article, do it under a newsletter. Because a newsletter is very easy on LinkedIn for you to build subscribership.

And so brand your newsletter towards your audience, publish the articles under the newsletter, and here's the cool thing, okay? There's lots of benefits. I could talk a lot about newsletters on LinkedIn, but number one, you can embed long form videos off LinkedIn's platform in an article on a newsletter and LinkedIn won't slap you for it.

So if I wanted to embed a YouTube video in an article, I could do that in an article. You can't do that on a post, they'll penalize you for it. The second thing is subscribers to your newsletter, they get a push notification on their phone whenever you publish an article. Nice. Dude, do you know how valuable that is to like creep up on that?

All of a sudden you pop up on someone. Huge. There's so many of these little secrets and these little hacks. And I know you've written a book about it, but there's so many of these little things that we could probably talk for five or six days just on this. And there's a reason you coach people into this. If someone's listening to this and all of a sudden they're like, Holy crap, this, I didn't even know that you could even do with a newsletter. I didn't even know about, you know, Claude. And I know about all these things.

How do people track you down? How do people get a hold of you and say, listen, this was great. I understand how much I don't know now. I need to book some time with you. I need to figure this out. I need to get access to you. How do people track you down? How do they find you? I love it. You know, the obvious would be LinkedIn. Surprise. You know, it's surprise. It's right. Number two. Yeah, the book, the LinkedIn advantage.

We didn't get to talk about as much as I would like, but but I would say like the book is incredibly special. It's with a co-author of mine. He's written 100 books and found him through LinkedIn. Like my life has changed because of LinkedIn and I get to write an amazing book with a guy like Tony Giri. But yes, that next step, if they wanted to reach out and get started, go to LinkedIn, thelinkedinadvantagebook.com and that's a good place for you to get started.

You can look up information about the book, but the best thing there is the assessment I developed. It's called the LinkedIn power score. It's free. Go to the book, but the best thing there is the assessment. Um, I developed, it's called the LinkedIn power score. It's free. Go to the website, take the score, see where you're at, and then you can figure out where, how to, how you can improve. Love it. And then it's, so they reach out on LinkedIn directly to you and it was your Instagram

or emails or anything like that. You want to have them track down to, or is that always the best bet? Yeah. Snapchat, you know, uh, my only, no, I'm just kidding. I'll just give them on, man. I, you know, uh, my only, no, I'm just kidding. I, I appreciate it. There were so many things you gave in this that people were like, okay, I've got it. I go to how much I didn't know. I've got a couple of things to get me going.

There are things that I need to change on my LinkedIn as well, man. I really appreciate you coming on. No Charles. It's, it's a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you so much. Yeah. Reach out happy to help, you know, any way that I can. And that's a wrap on our LinkedIn Masterclass with Matt Kretzman. We hope you're as fired up about your LinkedIn potential as we are.

A massive shout out to Matt for pulling back the curtain on his LinkedIn success strategies. His journey from rock bottom to relationship building guru is nothing short of inspirational. To all you LinkedIn warriors out there, your hunger for growth and connection is what keeps this show going strong.

Want to put Matt's LinkedIn magic into action? We've got you covered. We've distilled this episode into a power-packed action guide. It's loaded with Matt's top tips, from AI-powered profile optimization to turning your newsletter into a client magnet. Grab your free guide at podcast.iamcharlesschwarz.com. Remember, as Matt hammered home, LinkedIn success is all about authentic relationships

and consistent value. Now go out there and turn those connections into opportunities. Your LinkedIn revolution starts today.