How Sales Leaders Are Using LinkedIn to Build Their Own SQL Machine

Tom Boston: If LinkedIn feels like a place where everyone else sounds confident and you're just trying not to cringe at your own posts, you're gonna love this episode. Because today we're talking about finding your voice on LinkedIn. Not a polished corporate version of you, not a copy and paste influencer. Uh, just you. I'm joined by two people who've done this brilliantly, Will Aitken and Niraj Kapoor. Between them, they've built serious trust, huge audiences and real pipeline by leading into video, personal and being human in a very noisy space. We dig into what actually works, what definitely doesn't, and how to balance personal and professional without your manager panicking. I'm your host, Tom, um, Boston. And welcome to the Surviving Sales Leadership Sessions from my sales coach.

Co-host: Let's get into it.

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Will Aitken: My name is Will, based here in Canada, so I look forward to sharing a few of the ways that I found work and haven't worked with that today. So hopefully you can steal some of my flow.

Co-host: And, uh, hello as well to Neeraj. Do you wanna tell people a little bit about yourself? And you're dialing in from your new office, I believe.

Niraj Kapoor: Yes. Everybody, uh, my name is Neeraj. Um, I spent my career, most of you are doing, uh, which was selling for almost 25 years in London and around Europe and North America. And then eight years ago, I set up my own business. Everybody works in sales, and I spend literally every week going into businesses, observing demos, listening to phone calls, hearing how reps talk on the phone, and then coaching them so they become better. And will, I spent 18 years of my life in Milton Keynes and I miss it dearly.

Co-host: But of course, we're going to be focusing on a couple of things today. And the first one we're going to look at is how do you find your unique voice? We're going to then talk about building a personality LED brand, but then we're going to talk about balance, because we always need balance in life. Right? So let me start with the kind of killer question. Why is personal brand so hot in 2025?

Niraj Kapoor: Because everybody's talking about it. I mean, literally right now, 2025 is a year of the personal brand. And if you look at all these influencers, for lack of a better word, who are doing really well in the consumer world. Now that's transferring to the B2B world. And we're having a lot of software companies and tech companies approaching us saying, will you be a creator for us? Will you represent our brand? Will you do a post about. Because your personal brand is stronger.

Will Aitken: I think it's just a, uh, market share trust that like, like Niraj mentioned that there's so much noise out there. So if you can be one of the first people think. People think of when it comes to a specific topic or when they enter the market looking for something or even just to warm up your prospecting efforts. I shamefully do prospect a lot of the people who engage in my stuff or more so I prospect their leaders and say, look, all your reps are struggling with cold email. Let's have a chat, let's, let's do a workshop on that. Right. So it actually gives you a really warm entry. It's essentially building your own like MQL list, doing your own marketing department. So it's just one more thing that you can control as a sell because I always say just focus on the controllables. If you can start doing your own marketing by building a personal brand and you can take that with you wherever you go as well. So it's invaluable. You know, I've worked at three different companies since I started posting on LinkedIn and it served me very well for every single one of them.

Co-host: Yeah, one of the things you just said that, and I want to kind of dig into that, is that you build a personal brand and the leads just kind of come to you. Now I know that that was tongue in cheek because I know that the both of you certainly do a lot of work in the background when it comes to leveraging your personal brand. Will, do you want to talk to us a little bit about that, what that looks like from your side? You're big video engagement, right?

Will Aitken: Yeah, well, because I post a lot of videos, I go to a lot of these events and people, oh well, I feel like I already know you. So I try to leverage this as much as I can. I was told when I was young I wasn't going to get very far with a mug like this, but now it served me very well so I just send people videos, etc, um, built off the back. Especially if I've seen someone who's within my ICP or an ideal customer engage with my stuff. I also just find this super easy because I've recorded videos every day. So I'm not doing the whole retake, retake. I just do some raw 20 second hassle, this yada yada, and then go on from there. I also found it's not just for prospects. Like when I started posting on LinkedIn, I was an account executive. People who are in my pipeline, you know, stage one, they come in, they have a discovery call, my show bit of the product and I book a team demo. Then like says five days between now and they see three pieces of content from me in that time. By the time they jump on call to, they're like, well, good to see you again, man. I'm like, it's kind of like you're building a bit more rapport, bit more trust with even the people who, who maybe didn't find you through the brand but are now in your pipe. And that's a competitive differentiator as well.

Co-host: Yeah, Niraj, that word trust, right, There might be people on this call who are flirting with the idea of building a personal brand. Do I need one? Do I want one? But surely in 2025, we all want to build trust, right? That's something that every seller wants and needs. Do you want to talk to us a little bit about how you build trust with your prospects through LinkedIn?

Niraj Kapoor: Yeah, certainly. What I do is it's all about the customer, never me. It's all about value to them first. So when I speak to any prospect on Linked, I will engage on their posts at least a few times first and then I will send a personalized invite and when they accept my request, I don't immediately sell to them. I'll engage a bit more and then I will send them a voice note or I will send them a personalized video. And that video isn't, hi, I hope you're well. Here's my candy link. Are you free for 15 minutes? It's actually me sharing some insight about. Here's some of the biggest problems sales teams are having right now growing their brand on LinkedIn. Or here are the problems that 75% of teams are not hitting sales target right now. Here are three mistakes they're making. If you want to know more, I'm happy to share with you. So all I'm doing is sharing insight and value. I never start a conversation saying, hi, I've written three books. The first one was a best seller. Been to LinkedIn headquarters five times in the last year in San Francisco and London. Nobody cares. It's always about the other person. That is how you build trust. You Lose trust by talking about yourself and trying to sell too quickly, which is one of the biggest mistakes I see. Sales reps do great.

Co-host: And, you know, we're already hearing those words there. Um, video engagement, reaching out to prospects through video. On this call today, who's maybe thinking, I'm not really doing that right now. We're already hearing, uh, even just at the beginning of this session that that's something that people who are leading the way with personal brand are doing today. Uh, and I can definitely relate to that. Right. When I would send a video to a, uh, prospect, my aim would be to make them smile. Right? Because salespeople, again, don't really care about that. They just want to kind of make the sale. But actually often just making a connection can result in a, in, uh, a sale down the line. So, yeah, this is great stuff. Right, then let's talk about this idea of finding a unique voice. The, the two of you have done this kind of really well and you've been able to carve out a voice for yourself on LinkedIn. But for someone who's watching this going well. Actually, I, uh, don't know where to start. If you were to begin today, what would be your first, first step? How do you look at carving out this, this unique voice that everybody wants to have? Will, we'll start with you.

Will Aitken: It's quite hard to tell someone how to build a unique voice. I could tell people I did to do find mine. Right. I think it's combining what you're known for amongst your friends, like, uh, Tom, I bet you, you before you Even post on LinkedIn, you're probably one of the funnier in your friend group and in your life as well, right? So you leaned on that, but then you combined it with your professional expertise and interests. Doesn't necessarily have to be something you're an expert at. Uh, let's say if you sell someone here sells to techies, right, you're probably never going to know as much as a CTO about something. But also creating content and combine that with your personality is what's going to make it unique and stand out. But it's going to give you opportunity to learn, uh, more about that. So I don't think you have to be some kind of renowned expert who's written three books, one of which is a bestseller. Wink, wink, Niraj. But like, you don't need that. I think to get started, you can just share your own experience or things that you're learning. But combining that with who you are as a person has got what's going to make it different to everyone else out there? I recently tried to do some content which I was like, ah, someone. You hear all that stuff? Oh, it's, it's too much like Facebook on LinkedIn. So I just tried to do some very straight matter of fact content. I'm like, this sounds like chatgpt. If people wanted this, they could just go to chat GPT, you know what I mean? So, like, it really is what you, who you are and then pushing it together with what you want to talk about or what you're interested in. So, um, shy away from that. I think in sales, if the more you connect yourself, the less exhausted and less likely you'll be to be at burnout and the more fun you'll have as well. Same thing goes with personal brand building.

Co-host: Yeah, love it, love it. And again, not being afraid of the Facebook police. Because one thing about LinkedIn, your content will be policed. Once you embrace that, um, and you understand that those people exist, everything becomes a little bit easier and you can take it less seriously. I'm going to go on to this point here because we kind of touched on it, uh, already will. And I love what you said there. One of my tips is speak to your friends and family, right? What are, uh, my superpowers? Like you just said, if you're known as the person who makes people smile and tries to tell jokes, maybe do that on, on the platform. Right. But if you're not, don't force yourself to go down that route. So my, my tip is to always start with the people that know you the best. What makes me special? What words do you think of when you think of me? How would you describe me when I weren't in the room? Like, these kind of things will help you to understand what your unique voice should kind of look and, and feel like. Niraj, over to you, what would you say is a good kind of kickoff point then? For someone who maybe has a small amount of following, has posted a little bit, but not really seen that success,

Niraj Kapoor: I would recommend a couple of things. Uh, first of all, um, one of the best bits of advice I ever got was find people more successful than you and find out what they're doing and ask them for advice. And if they say no, simply ask them how much would it cost to get your advice? And that's actually brilliant advice. And I still do that, by the way. I ask people for advice if they're too busy. I ask how much will it cost? And guess what? Most of them find the time for me, when I ask that question, because you learn quicker by paying others. That's the advantage of being coached. Uh, it's my 31st year in sales. I still get coached. For all young people watching after 31 years, it didn't start until year 19, but still I still get coached. The second thing I do is I look at what everybody else is doing and posting about, and I went in a different direction. That is actually how I built my business. All I saw were sales trainers. Uh, at the time in 2020, I was really struggling. I just wasn't making the impact I wanted to. And people weren't listening to me because I was selling too hard. And that was my fault, by the way. And I looked what everybody else was doing, thinking, you know what? All these sales trainers are talking about how great they are and how successful they are and how big their deals are. But you know what? I'm really struggling with prospecting right now. I'm struggling with getting ghosted right now. And I'm struggling to pay the bills right now. And that's what I talked about. And all of a sudden, just by having a different voice than other people, I stood out, uh, head and shoulders above everybody else. Not because I was better, but because I was different. And it was being different that got me recognized. So don't feel you ever have to follow a crowd. By all means, be inspired by people. But having your own voice is what's going to make you unique. And your experiences you have in life are the things that are going to make you unique in sales and LinkedIn.

Co-host: I, uh, love it. You're ask because you're not afraid to pull some holiday pics on LinkedIn, right? I see this a lot.

Niraj Kapoor: Well, you know, in April this year, I did a post that did almost half a million views. And all I simply said was I got engaged. Now, after my divorce, I didn't think I'd ever find love again. I was a broken man. I was very lonely. Uh, all my money had gone and I was very cynical and unhappy. And that's not a good place to be in life. And after three years of being single, I met Rachel. I fell in love. Now we're getting married. And that's a really simple story with a happy ending. And, uh, that post went through the roof. And I got contacted by four different bridal companies, two of whom I work for, to teach their staff how to sell. I know nothing about the bridal industry, but that was a great post where I want some business based purely on trust, on vulnerability. And being real. And again, none of my competition are sharing posts like that. And as for even two days ago, my mother's birthday, it was her birthday. Here's three valuable lessons she taught me. Now those valuable lessons, just to be clear, are sales lessons. The first is, you know, never stop learning. The second is learn to forgive because emotional intelligence is one of the most important things you can have in sales and business. Uh, and the third thing is, you know, just be open around people. And those three simple lessons from her. It was her birthday but that took five minutes to write. The post did amazingly well. I've only had one inquiry from that and I'm meeting him tomorrow to discuss potential one to one coaching. So there you go. Personal posts do work on LinkedIn and again your personal story is unique to you. That's why they're so good. It's highly unlikely a thousand other people will do the exact same post.

Co-host: Well, you just said there that your competition is not doing that. But also I would go a step further. They can't. Right, because they're not you and you're the only one that makes you. Makes you you. Let's talk about experimenting because I look at LinkedIn as a place to fail. Will, were you always an influencer or did you um, did you make some mistakes in the past?

Will Aitken: No, uh, definitely made some mistakes, especially early on. You get a bit of an intuition after you've done it for a while but when you start posting stuff there are some flops. But if you, if you look at any failure in sales or in life as a learning experience, it just helps you direct and get more successful in the future. To do the videos I'm talking about Niraj, you could tell me if you did differently. I just use my mobile phone and record them on there and send them directly through the LinkedIn app because that way they're natively there. You can always use tools like Vidyard, Loom, Sensepark, uh, there's plenty out there if uh, you want to send them via email. And my script would sound something like let's just say hey Tom, I was just taking a quick look and I normally do this when I'm walking to keep it really casual and light and give a little pattern interrupt just during your account executive job to add that you're asking people to be full cycle there. A lot of folks are telling me that their accounting executives are really struggling to find time while managing pipeline to affect effectively prospect. Is that an issue for you too? Can you relate to that or are you going to tell me that your account executives are meeting booking machines don't even have a pitch in there, just asking for a response in that uh, and then they don't respond. I'll send a message that has some follow up as context as to why I'm even asking that in the first place. Which generally has a little bit maybe. Oh, this is how I've been helping people. Failure is part of the journey and it's okay to fail. In fact if you never failed, you'd never learn. So uh, even if it's own flops, that means no one saw it. So therefore you don't even have to feel embarrassed because if it doesn't do well then fewer people see it. So you don't have to feel like oh, everyone saw me fail. No, no one saw it. So just informs you going forward as well. Don't overthink those, don't be deleting stuff, don't be second guessing yourself. Just do. And you will learn over time.

Co-host: Yeah, I love it because everyone, everyone's kind of looking for the um, the perfect script, right? So what's the, what's the video I should send? But the reason that Will has learned what to send is because of all the videos he didn't get replies from, right? From all the videos that he sent that got ignored. And over time he's changed it and tweaked it and learned kind of what that rhythm should look and feel like. But I'm sure you'll both agree with me that ult, especially on LinkedIn because let's not forget it's social media, right? Let's keep it kind of light and friendly. All we're looking for is a response, right? We're looking for a simple response that might not be I'm free tomorrow or please give me a call, but that first response could be something that you talk about on a phone call a

Tom Boston: few days later or via an email.

Co-host: So yeah, I always talk about that. You know, if you are looking to make connections with people, just think about what would I reply to, what would get me to respond. You know, put yourself in your kind of prospect's shoes. Okay, so let's talk about um, other creators. So the two of you I'm sure will relate to this as well. You know, learning from what other people are doing, maybe even and dare I say stealing what other people do because I can certainly admit to stealing lots of Will's content over the years. So uh, Niraj, over to, over to you. Is this something that you do? Are you Looking at other creators on, on LinkedIn and maybe getting inspired. Sorry, that's the word I've been inspired by Will over the, over the years. Being inspired by other creators, one of

Niraj Kapoor: the most important things you can do. Actually two of the most important things you can do. Never look at somebody more successful than you and go, why not me? That should be me. Never compare yourself to other people because they're on different journeys. And I see so many people in sales doing that. And the second thing is by all means being inspired. I mean, in 2019 when I was struggling on LinkedIn, I went to Daniel Disney's Full Day social, uh, selling course. It was fantastic. And I got to meet him afterwards. He's a family person as well. I'm like, this guy has all the values I have and luckily we've become really good friends and we hang out a lot and. But he's something I learned from doing video. And he told me, look, you need to do video. I said, I can't do video. I was 45 years old at the time. I'm bald, I have a big nose, I have big ears. No one's going to want to see my face apart from my mother. And he says, look, now just really important you do it. And uh, about six months later we met at a conference he was speaking at. Uh, I was just there to support him and he goes, are you doing video? And I said, no, I'm too embarrassed. People are going to judge me. People are going to. It's going to be so embarrassing. What if nobody replies to my posts? What should I do? And he says, look, you can be successful or you can be right. Oh, oh. And I love that. You can be right or you can be successful. And I thought, okay. And I started doing video. And the first six videos nobody responded to. Seventh video, I got an inquiry. Three videos later I converted that inquiry. I have done over 220 videos on LinkedIn over four and a half years because video gives you authority, it gives you trust. And that's something I learned from somebody whose one day course I went to, who I saw on LinkedIn first, went to his one day course and became good friends with. So that's a great example of learning from somebody more successful than you who was doing video. And I did video as well. I didn't copy his video, I made it my own. And before, the last thing I want to say is, please don't overthink video. I don't have fancy software, I don't have fancy editing. I literally have my Phone like this and I talk into the camera like that. Those are my videos. And, um, the first time you do it, it'll take eight minutes to 10 attempts with multiple rounds of Tourette's. And after you practice it, by the time you do your 10th or 15th video, it'll take two takes. By the time you do your 25th or 30th video, one take. But you've got to keep practicing, practicing,

Co-host: practicing, practicing, and you've got to practice in front of people. You know, the analogy I often use is the, uh, the guitar, right? So if you want to learn to play the guitar, the great thing is you can hide yourself away in, in the back room and nobody hears you're practicing. Whereas LinkedIn video, you have to practice in front of everybody and people are going to hear you hit the wrong notes. You know, people are going to hear when you mess up. But actually growth will come. Before you know it, you'll be strumming away. So let me fire over to Will then. How about you, sir? Um, are you getting inspired by other people on the platform?

Will Aitken: Yeah. Half the stuff I post isn't even mine. I just knitted it from someone else. Uh, no, the main thing I look for is inspiration. Like, I like to call it consuming with intent. Right? So if you go on LinkedIn and you see something, or you go on TikTok or YouTube, right, and you see something you like, then I just sometimes like to take a moment when I'm like, why did I, Why did I stop on this? Why don't I want to read this? Why did I want to watch this video? And I just make a note of that because that's the type of thing you can just take directly from someone and apply but to your own stuff, right? So you're not just taking their idea or whatever it is you're taking. Like, what do you think worked, like, psychologically about the thing? So consumer content intent. What made you stick around and watch the whole video of Niraj's profile? What made you stop scrolling on TikTok and stop and spend some time on that?

Co-host: Right.

Will Aitken: I think that's, that's really the best place to look for inspiration. The hooks. What made you stop in that post? About, uh, I don't know, some. I saw someone recently post about running over. Running over a cat and what that told them about sales. I was like, that's so bizarre. But made me stop. So, like, why? And is that something I want to take or is that maybe something I don't want to do? Because running over cats is not good. But yeah, look for those types of opportunities, I'd say. And um, look what's working everywhere else. People have already done this playbook. So if you're intentional about how you see people's doing this successful, use them as a. What's the word? Role model. Almost. Uh, okay. I find myself quite similar to Tom. How often is Tom doing this? How often does he post whatever it may be? And by the way, someone else said in the chat, how can you use a personal brand for like strategic named accounts? There are so many different ways. This is not just for people who sell to salespeople. Yes, the three of us do, but I've seen people like who work for market research companies. They'll share some data that they've recently found about buyer insights and they'll go and tag their named accounts in the comments and say hey, thought you might find this one interesting. Like they tagged the head of market research at Thompson Holidays in the comments, say hey, this is about Gen Z travel habits. Thought you might like it.

Niraj Kapoor: Right.

Will Aitken: That's like almost publicly getting them out there and that's going to make the conversations, the pull ups or even the conversation you have right there and then actually quite worth it. So you can even do this quite strategically, not just speaking to the masses, but speaking to specific accounts as well.

Co-host: We're going to talk about personality led brand that outlasts your current role. So how can I use my personality to create something that's going to stick around? It's going to be something that I'm going to have for many, many years. And to do that, we are going to have a little bit of fun, uh, if that's okay with the, with the both of you. So we're going to play.

Will Aitken: It's going to be fun. That's planned. Fun is the best type of fun. That's what I always say.

Co-host: That's it. The fun, the fun is starting now. So if everyone, if everyone can start enjoying themselves, that would be great.

Will Aitken: I'm already having a blast. Sorry.

Co-host: We're going to play a game called Help Barry. I am going to get into character of a character I call Barry. He's a salesperson who hasn't hit quarter since 2013. And um, I'm going to get Barry to come to you and I'm going to ask you to coach Barry with some of the problems he's been having. Does that sound, does that sound okay? I see thumbs up, right? Let me just get into character.

Will Aitken: He's got the headset on Go.

Co-host: So now I'm unrecognizable as, uh, Barry. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna start, um, with, with you, Niraj, if that's okay. Niraj. I, I, I posted on LinkedIn. I posted once and I deleted it because it only got two likes. And the algorithm, I think, hates me. I think the algorithm has taken a vendetta against me and is blocking my content from being seen. Please help me.

Niraj Kapoor: Okay, um, Barry, what is it you want to achieve on LinkedIn?

Co-host: I want to be seen. Nobody knows who I am for loving the money.

Niraj Kapoor: And, um, what is it you do?

Co-host: I sell sales coaching.

Niraj Kapoor: And, um, what is it about you? Because there's so many sales coaches out everywhere on LinkedIn. What is about you, Barry, that's different?

Co-host: Well, I keep it real, Niraj. Uh, I tell it as it is. I always have done, you know.

Niraj Kapoor: Lovely. When you say keep it real, can you give me an example of that? How would you say, give somebody advice on LinkedIn by keeping it real? What would you say?

Co-host: Well, I don't, I don't give any bs. I say it straight and I tell people the way that I would like to be told. I'm honest. I'm too honest for my own good.

Niraj Kapoor: That is lovely. Well, thank you so much for sharing that with me. There's a couple of things I'd like to share with you that will help you. In order to succeed on LinkedIn, you have to be posting regularly. You don't have to post every day, but you have to start posting a few times a week. And if you post once and get a few likes and delete it, would you agree with me there's no way you can accurately monitor how well you're doing on LinkedIn?

Co-host: Yes, I agree with that.

Niraj Kapoor: Okay, so what I'd like to recommend is just start off again. Let's say do two posts a week on LinkedIn, see how they go, and then start doing three posts a week on LinkedIn and see how they go, and then gradually build up. Anytime you do anything new, I always recommend doing small steps and then building after that.

Co-host: Okay.

Niraj Kapoor: Does that make sense to you?

Co-host: That makes sense to me. Start small and build up. A, uh, round of applause for Niraj there. He didn't know the question I was going to ask. So, so well done there for some excellent coaching To Barry, and I'm sure he'll be well with on his way now to creating content. Will, are you, uh, ready for the challenge? Will I need some help? The only people that like my LinkedIn content are, uh, my colleagues. I don't care about my colleagues. I want prospects. You know, I also get one, like, from my mum, uh, bless her. But how do I get other people to comment on my posts? I don't want colleagues to say. That's insightful, Barry. Good job, Barry. Nice try, Barry. I want deals.

Will Aitken: I mean, it is nice that you have, uh, colleagues who are willing to support you like that, but I can hear exactly what you mean, seeing that's frustrating. Um, may I ask, who are the people you actually want to engage in this content?

Co-host: I would love to speak to people I can sell to, people who are in my industry. Anyone. Anyone that's not sat next to me would be great.

Will Aitken: I imagine you didn't just start posting on LinkedIn for the sake of it. I'm certain there's someone out there who's probably already doing something similar to yourself right now. Well, what you'd hope to be. Are there any big names or influences in the space that you look towards building your brand towards?

Co-host: Yeah, there's one guy. I can't remember saying it Will. Will something or other. Um, Tom Boston. I mean, I, you know, he's great, but the Niraj Kapoor this guy's been,

Will Aitken: he sounded quite, quite handsome. I hear his AI photo look the best by far. Well, yeah, let's say, let's say. Okay, so it sounds like, Barry, you want to be like Tom or Will or Niraj, Am I right?

Co-host: Yes, please.

Will Aitken: Less of your colleagues like it, more people that they reach. Yeah. So what I would recommend doing is the things that happen here don't happen in a vacuum. The first thing you can do is not just create content. You can also go out there and meet people where they're at already, there's already people showing up the way that you want to be, the people you want to connect with on people like Will, Tom and Niraj's posts.

Co-host: Right.

Will Aitken: So jump in there. Actually network. Like, one of the biggest, most helpful things for me getting into this space is that if you pull up the, like, top 100 sales influences, for lack of a better word, in the world. I probably got 60 of them on Speed Dart. Right. They're my friends. Ah. I'd, uh, uh, meet up with them, I'd help them out and stuff like that. So even if you just show up where they're showing up, support them, they're much more likely to throw that love back at you. And in turn, you'll get some attention from the people who follow them. Also, if you have some Prospects out there, start engaging with them, start commenting on them, tag them in things that you think they might be interesting to you. M. And that way more people will be aware of the fact you're even on LinkedIn to begin with. Because one of the hardest things when you start off and the only people who you're connected with are your mum and your three colleagues who are also, you know, struggling with the same issue that you just describing. Does it sound like it might be a good place to start?

Co-host: I think so. Thank you very much for your help.

Tom Boston: Well done.

Co-host: To Will, round of applause there. What a great insight that was. And Will, I want to pick you up on that. Actually networking with people, right. Actually connecting with people. I know, uh, early on in my journey as an influencer, I did the same with both of you. Right. Kind of reached out and I don't

Will Aitken: want to make it sound like we're transactional because we actually do like each other, right? I'm not doing it. I'm like, oh, I want to be friends with Tom because he's popular. It's just like we happen to connect and we see each other in the, in the sphere and, and have real relationships there. It's not like, as transactional as, like, I'm just going to go comment on Tom's stuff because he's popular and that might make me popular. It's much more than that, is we actually do know each other. To extend, we're in a few group chats, which we're not going to talk about on this webinar today because some shocking things do get shared in, uh, there mostly funny sales dudes on LinkedIn sharing gym updates. It's, uh, quite lame, really. Tom, how's it shared?

Co-host: I don't share my gym updates in there, but maybe I'm inspired every day by the images I see in those group chats. So, uh, uh, let's go back onto our track. This is really great so far. I want to talk because I know Mac had a question previously around the idea of finding the right balance between personal and kind of professional content. So, Niraj, let me start with you because you talked about your success from kind of doing that. What's the balance, right? What's the balance? If you've got, uh, uh, someone on the call who's maybe saying, I've shared some personal posts and now my manager's come over and said, tom, what are you doing? You know, this isn't Facebook. How do we navigate that?

Niraj Kapoor: Okay, so answering that and answering this question here, the right Balance. Um, I do 80% business, 20% personal. And I do personal because it lets people know who I am behind my job title and that builds trust. Recently it has been 50, 50 only because my stepdaughter graduated university, I got engaged, I'm getting married, my mom's birthday. A lot of things by pure coincidence happen recently. But 80% business, 20% personal in terms of your boss. Look, if your boss is paying your salary and you're talking about a charity fundraiser, it's really none of his business. You're doing something for a good cause. But if all the time you're talking about your side hustle on LinkedIn, that is your boss's concern. You're paid to work for your boss, not for yourself. And you have to be very mindful of that. Now what you post the weekends is entirely up to you. Your boss really doesn't have a say on it. But during the week, if you're talking about stuff that isn't business and it's just your personal stuff all the time, the boss unfortunately does have a right to say, you can't do that.

Co-host: Will, what are your thoughts on that?

Will Aitken: Tell them to piss off. No, um, don't do that. Um, I think the question on bosses involvement, I think most bosses would actually like a team of people, people who are out there willing to do the extra work. I've always said if I'm going to do personal brand, I'm going to treat almost like a hobby. It's like a zero sum game. It's nothing I'm going to completely 100% go all in on. It's going to be something I'm going to do because I enjoy it and if I enjoy it, then the content will be good and the content will perform and then it would be like an extra thing I'm going to do alongside my normal task. I think if you're taking half your day out to avoid making the calls or sending the emails that your boss said you have to send and you said posting on LinkedIn, that's their right to step in and say, dude, what are you doing man? I'm asking. You made the calls instead of making your power hour, you're, you're posting a meme on LinkedIn, you know what I'm saying? Um, um, as of the personal balance, I think to Niraj point, I think 20, uh, 20%, one in five posts. I tried to go that way as well. Don't, um, overdo it. I also be very careful because I think that's where a lot of people like post overshare on LinkedIn. You know what I mean? Oversharing sometimes. I think all the examples Niraj said are related to Fresh Award. They're very related to his own thing. But then people share things. They're like, would you even tell your best friend that? Why are you telling LinkedIn it then? So just know that there is a line, one that I've dared to cross every now and again, but knowing, like, I make kind of risky content sometimes where I say the F word. And I've been told by people from the company Salesforce that someone said that the manager says, don't engage with Will stuff anymore because he used the F word.

Co-host: Right.

Will Aitken: So I also understand that the taking the risks and sharing too much or going really high risk with that stuff, it can actually close doors for you as well. I was just lucky in that I now work for myself and don't really care as much. Uh, but be aware of that. There is a, There is a limit, I think, to how far you should take this. I'd just be. Think of that, like, would I tell my grandma this or my dad, you know, and if not, then that's probably a sign that you shouldn't tell the Internet as well.

Co-host: Yeah. It certainly, um, echoes some of the things that I talk about when I'm, when I'm coaching people. Right. So the first one I always talk about is like, speak to your. Speak to your colleagues. Ah. It's very easy to convince yourself that you're getting the balance right between personal and professional. Just ask the person sat next to you. Go and speak to someone, uh, in the Slack group, whatever it might be, show someone your content. What do you think of this? As Will sort of said, there is this too risky, right? Have I got too many F bombs in this post? Like, just, just being open and honest with your team is a really good way to kind of get the ball rolling on getting good feedback, uh, as to getting that kind of balance. Right. And as well as speaking to your colleagues, I always say, speak to marketing. Right. Make friends with the marketing team. What are the messages that we're putting out this quarter? Because I can guarantee you, if you start to align your personal brand with the marketing messages of the organization, you probably won't go too far wrong. It's a good lane to be in to have that kind of alignment piece. My kind of third point on this as well is to think about shareability. And I don't even think I've spelled the word right. Okay. But I really, I'M really kind of passionate about it and uh, however it's spelled. Is that right?

Will Aitken: Don't ask me, mate.

Co-host: That's an E. There's an E in somewhere.

Will Aitken: But he's an I. Share rebility? No.

Co-host: Would the brand page share this? Would this get a repost from the brand? Would my CEO share this? Would they proudly share it? A little bit like Will talked about with his grandma, right? Is this something that they're going to be proud of? And if the answer is no, it might be a time to reflect on what that kind of content looks and feels like. Niraj, over to you, what do you think about some of these points here on the screen?

Niraj Kapoor: Yeah, I think they're a good point. I personally think that resharing or reposting somebody's content is a lovely thing to do. I think it's a wonderful thing to do. Unfortunately, you don't build your brand doing that. People don't really know what your voice is. So my advice to people is always try to write your own content as much as possible. I appreciate there might be a day you're just really busy and it's easy to go reshare, job done. But as much as possible, try to write content. A lot of people ask how do you find time to write content? My advice is to write content first thing this Sunday morning or last thing on Sunday evening because it's peace and quiet. There's no meetings taking place, no emails popping. You get 60 minutes of peace and quiet. That's when I write my content. And the other thing came from uh, Matthew Banks who talked about somebody told me if you close doors being yourself, were they really open? Curious. What do you guys think of that? While I truly believe it is important to be yourself in LinkedIn, most salespeople are not self aware enough to be themselves. So my advice for every salesperson is please work on yourself as much as you work on your business because once you become better, once you know yourself better, once you become more self aware, you will do better. 2025 isn't just the year of the personal brand. I really see humanity coming back into sales in a big way. And all the success I'm currently having, all the success my clients are having are face to face meetings, soft skills and human psychology. Please keep that in mind. Stop asking your bosses to invest more money in AI. Stop saying to your boss can you invest in a better CRM? It is human to human Connection is doing amazing in 2025 so please keep that in mind.

Co-host: Thank you very very I'M very, I'm getting, I'm getting goosebumps here because this human to human connection thing is something I'm all about. One thing I want to talk about though you touched on Niraj is this idea of like bringing your true self, if you like, to, to LinkedIn. One thing I would say about the, the panelists that we've got on today's session is you can probably get an idea about what a zoom call with them might look and feel like based on their content. And again, that's a really good yardstick. Right. So the content that you're putting out online is this representative of what a, uh, discovery call with me is like. And if it's, if it's not, maybe you're not being your kind of true self. Maybe you're not being your kind of authentic voice. Will the marketing team. Do you like marketing teams?

Will Aitken: Okay. I don't think they have bad intention.

Co-host: Okay.

Will Aitken: You should know, um, I don't mind market teams. To your point earlier, Tom, I think market teams can be a great point of, of reference if you're uninspired as well. Right. The challenge is that most people get like the marketing team comes up, this employee advocacy program says share this webinar that we're doing on LinkedIn. And then people just grab and copy and paste the copy and post the link to the webinar or the graphic they've been provided.

Co-host: Right.

Will Aitken: I think if someone's asking you to do that or the company's talking about some, that's where you can start to bring your own point of view to these things.

Co-host: Right.

Will Aitken: And that's where I think the real special source comes in. Like you over at my sales coach. You got, you got, you got Nia, you got yourself, you got Mark Rich, um, uh, uh, Sarah. Um, uh, you've got all these different people who have different perspectives and actually bring their own unique voice to promoting essentially the same thing. But everyone's got their own piece to say on it. The benefits has had to them, the way it's affected them, how they think about it. I think that's, that's really where it's special. And that can also help you learn the topic. Especially if you sell to a Persona like a technical person or lawyers, um, you'll start to build a point of view that they will actually find and respect as well. And those human to human connections that Niraj mentioned there, I also think, um, one of the best things you can get for inspiration, by the way, is just journaling and it comes back To Niraj point of being self aware as well and being true to yourself. If you're just talking about the things that have really inspired you or made you think during the day, let's say you're on discovery call and someone says something that you don't understand or makes you think, you think about a problem a different way or they are surprised by something that you say or insights you give them, well, that's your best read that. That's worth talking about online. All right, so just be aware as you're going through life. Take notes of those little moments, write them down in a little logbook and that's when you can revert back to on a Sunday or a morning or m. Sunday afternoon. Niraj. I wish I was that organized. I just kind of wake up every day and go, oh, what am I going to post today? Uh, but every now and again I get a little bit ahead of it and I feel good about myself and then I'm back to square one again the next week. But, uh, that's a good place to start as well. Look for the inspiration in your daily life because that truly is. Is the most authentic thing to you because it's informed by your experiences and the things you're doing every single day.

Co-host: You know, feeling something, right? That's so important on social media. How can we get our audience to feel something? And in your life, if you have a moment where you feel something, if you're affected, whether you're emotional, m maybe you burst out laughing. I agree with you. Will, uh, make a note of that feeling. How can I bring that feeling to the platform? How can I ask other people what they think? Um, and even, even though you think you'll remember it, you definitely won't. I've certainly had ideas in the shower. I thought, I'll remember that. No, it's time to write that down because I'm going to forget.

Tom Boston: Thanks for listening. There's more where that came from, so don't forget to like and subscribe. Our mission at my sales coach is to help revenue leaders survive sales by building elite sales teams, fixing their win rates, lifting quarter attainment and coaching their teams better.

Co-host: Go and check out our website@, uh,

Tom Boston: mysalescoach.com to find out how we're supporting leaders like you right now.