Hi! This is Hunting Leads, a newsletter for B2B founders and marketers. If this was forwarded to you, you can subscribe here.

Hi! This is Moby.

51% of people joining this newsletter say their #1 goal is to grow a B2B business.

I won’t pretend I know all about growing a B2B business, but I do want to share what I’ve seen work.

In this email, you can expect:

  • 3 ways to grow your B2B business without spending a dollar

  • When to consider ads (if at all)

  • Weekly roundup: Hail Mary, Afrohouse, Conferences

P.S. My live session How to Get B2B Leads with LinkedIn Ads is now sold out! Next month, I’m hosting Peer Roundtable: What’s Working for You on LinkedIn? for 15 founders and marketers to share what’s working for them. If that’s of interest to you, please RSVP here. It’s free.

3 Ways to Grow a B2B Business For Free

Almost everyone gets their start in B2B with their network, i.e. past contacts + meeting new people + referrals.

It’s classic Business Development.

Some examples of people who’ve grown their businesses this way:

  • One of my first ever clients grew to $1.5M ARR

  • Someone I just met turns over a $2.3M yearly profit

  • A close friend built his $500k/year solo business

  • I personally started my own freelance business

So how do you do the same? So how do you get business from past contacts?

I see it in 2 ways:

You deepen relationships with those you know, and let them know what you offer.

You meet new people and deepen relationships, and let them know what you offer.

There’s 3 things you can do to develop business:

  1. Post about what you know AND yourself on social

  2. Have 1:1s with people you know (and just met)

  3. Meet new people at events and conferences

Here’s how👇

#1 Post regularly on social

Pick a channel (YT, IG, TikTok, LI, anything) that has your audience.

And a channel you are comfortable on (very important).

Commit to posting X/week, and do it.

For example, I post 5x/week on LinkedIn. I like LinkedIn. I’m comfortable on it. I find it less distracting than TikTok/IG. I’m not good at YT. My market is also on LI. So it works for me.

I want 70% of content to be sharing what I know that might be useful which would be

  • Tips

  • Stories

  • How-tos

  • Frameworks

  • Industry news

  • Lessons learned

  • Mistakes to avoid

The rest can be (relevant) memes, personal (but not too much) stuff, polls.

Pointers:

  • Yes, posting is cringey

  • Nobody is truly comfortable

  • Posting makes you better at posting

  • Getting better at posting makes you post more

  • Engagement is nice - but don’t worry too much about it

  • As long as what you’re sharing is useful, you’ll eventually find engagement

#2 Have 1:1s with people you know (and just met)

When I was starting out, I reached out to someone who ran a very successful consulting agency about how they get business.

Them: I literally have a list of everyone I know, and reach out to them to catch up twice a year.

I now try to have 50-100 catch ups with people (a year) that I know (and just met) by asking for it. Examples below.

The goal is not to sell to my network (that makes me very uncomfortable), but let them know what I offer so referrals may come.

#3 Going to events & conferences

This is gold. I recently talked to an entrepreneur who books 5-10 meetings from every conference he goes to.

Going to 2-4 conferences a year might be just what you need. This year, I plan to go to Drive by ExitFive, Spryng by Wynter, New Media Summit, and Industrial Marketing Summit.

As for events, I frequent:

Just going and meeting people is enough to keep pipeline steady over time.

SOLD OUT + New Event!

My live session, How to Run Successful LinkedIn Ads for B2B SaaS and Services, is now sold out.

Next up: I’m getting 15 B2B founders and marketers together for Peer Roundtable: What’s Working for You on LinkedIn?

The idea is for us to get together and share what’s working for us.

It’s also free to attend. Register here before slots fill up.

Attend B2B Peer Roundtable

When You 100% Should Run Ads

Here’s when you add fuel to the fire.

When to consider LinkedIn Ads

  • You’re targeting midmarket / enterprise

  • You have a niche B2B market like

    • Fleet managers for 3PL companies

    • CFOs at CPG companies

    • Operations functions at grocery stores

  • You’re already active there posting and commenting

  • You’re already seeing traction from your organic presence

When to consider Meta Ads

I don’t talk a lot about Meta here, but a lot of the success I’ve driven for clients is from Meta.

Here’s what you should really consider Meta ads:

  • You’re targeting freelancers, solopreneurs, agencies, SMBs, small business owners

  • You’re willing to spend money to book your sales calendar, and have the sales capacity to take those calls (and follow up with no-shows)

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Weekly Roundup

🗣️ B2B Chatter

🤝 Conference Season is here

  • Heading to New Media Summit in a few weeks, which is for newsletter / podcast folks. I’m new to the game, so looking forward to learning!

  • It’s followed by Industrial Marketing Summit, co-hosted by my ex-employer Gorilla76. Pumped to see the team again. Good people.

📚 Book Corner

  • I just finished Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir (he wrote The Martian) because there’s a movie coming out

    • I liked it, but it got slow in the middle with the sciency stuff. Had a solid ending.

    • One thing I appreciated is that while this character did have some snark, he felt different from the one in the Martian. Well, as different as a smart scientist male in space can be from another smart scientist male in space.

  • Throne Hunters 4 came out. It’s a classic dungeon-diving series, but with a mythical + political twist. Good read, and something about the writing just makes me keep frantically reading.

🎵 Music & Games

  • I’ve been on an afro-house kick recently: Your Side and Awgazi are bangers I’ve probably listened to 20 times this weekend each

  • Really enjoying playing It Takes Two (the same team that made Split Fiction). It’s truly made to be a 2-person game, and a lot of fun.

- Moby | Austin, TX | Connect with me on LinkedIn

P.S. I work with 6-7 clients at a time to make their paid ads programs profitable. If that’s of interest to you, grab a time with me here.

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