When Preparation Meets Opportunity on LinkedIn ... Luck Happens!

One of my fascinations with social media is that I am always surprised by what triggers what. While we can often predict certain results that will be predicated on specific actions, then again, sometimes we have to ask ourselves … is this the hand of God, pure dumb luck, or maybe even both? It might even be something else …

The harder you work, the luckier you get!

Luck really is nothing more than where preparation meets opportunity. This means that:

You persistently and doggedly pursue your goals even when immediate results are not achieved.
You constantly look for any opportunity to expand and to fine tune your skills.
You move proactively and with urgency. By staying ahead of the game (and your existing projects), you will find yourself with the time available to seize on new opportunities when they present themselves.
Everything that you do on social media creates a ripple that you can surf to new opportunities.

I have long stressed the importance for salespeople to blog but, very few do. The fact is, you would think that with the verbal skills that most salespeople have, writing would come naturally but, it generally does not. Honestly, blogging can be tedious work. In other words … some people just can’t stand to do it! I can’t recall exactly where and when I was first told this but …

“The only difference between a successful person and an unsuccessful person is that the successful person will perform those unpleasant tasks that the unsuccessful person will not perform even though the successful person also finds them to be unpleasant.

The difference is that the successful person is motivated by the results whereas the unsuccessful person is motivated by the activity (pleasant or unpleasant) itself.”

The classic sales example is cold calling. If you were to tell me that you love to cold call, I would be forced to ask if you if you lie about other things as well. Nobody, and I mean nobody, likes to make cold calls. However, the successful salesperson holds their nose and does so anyway because … making calls will deliver measureable results. It’s only the activity that stinks.

Take this for example …

Several months ago LinkedIn decided that is was no longer going to display your shared updates as a part of your personal profile and I was pissed. I liked the fact that when somebody went to my page, they could see what I talked about. It was also beneficial to be able to go to other peoples’ profiles in order learn more about types of things that they share. For me, this is a critical part in the “connect or do not connect” process. I’m still burning about the loss of LinkedIn Signals which allowed you to search updates.

Yes, LinkedIn now allows you to display media (slideshows, YouTube, etc.) as a part of your profile and, while that’s great, I’m enough of a whining baby that I always want the new toys but, I also get very upset when you take any of my toys away. We all know that he who dies with the most toys wins 🙂

Thirty to forty-five days ago LinkedIn then announced that “publishing”, something that had been available to a super select group of the rich, smart, and famous, was now going to be rolled out to all members. Essentially, publishing is blogging directly on your LinkedIn profile but, it is also shared with your connections, can be shared on other social networks, and your articles are also searchable within LinkedIn. Here’s how it looks.

If you are already an active blogger, doing so on LinkedIn will require absolutely no learning curve. In fact, it’s a damn nice interface! So nice that, with absolutely no experience on any blogging platform. you can be publishing on LinkedIn, and even making your articles look great, with little to no difficulty. LinkedIn will notify when this capability has rolled out to your account.

Preparation does meet opportunity!

And you get lucky in the process! This might seem like a simple thing, a very small thing but, I believe that this may be one of the most significant announcements that LinkedIn has made. Think about this:

Websites highlight your products and services and, ideally, include a blog. Your LinkedIn profile and company page highlights your products and services and now includes a blog.
Websites rely on visitors finding you and/or you direct them to your pages. While both are applicable with LinkedIn, you are also automatically sharing your articles with your closest connections and that stream is probably one heck of a lot less congested than Twitter.
Your LinkedIn connections should also be your best sources for business and referrals and a you could make the case that they now occupy a space within your LinkedIn website.
With LinkedIn’s recent enhancements to their contacts interface (tags, reminders, notes, etc.), you could even argue that you also have an integrated CRM built right into … your LinkedIn website. #Sweet!

Toss a rock into the social river!

I was recently asked In a podcast interview … “When did it hit you that social media would be big for business?” I don’t really know the answer to that other than it didn’t come overnight. That being said, practice the fundamentals, work your program consistently, worry less about immediate results, and your hard work will pay off! Do those things that unsuccessful people won’t do. You need to toss some rocks if you want to cause ripples.

Still, I’ve done a lot of things where I have expected immediate results and those have ended up being significantly below (or an absolute zero) my expectations. Does that mean that they don’t work? Absolutely not! Little things do add up. 99.999 % of UFO sightings may be fake but, what about that .0001% that are true? That’s all it takes and you have intelligent life on another planet. Those 10,000 tweets that you send out will look a helluva lot better when that one lone update returns a $1,000,000 opportunity! It happens.

How about you? Do you have some examples of where your persistence has paid off or have you taken on a task that others have refused to which resulted in a great win for you?

This post was written as part of the IBM for Midsize Business program, which provides midsize businesses with the tools, expertise and solutions they need to become engines of a smarter planet. I’ve been compensated to contribute to this program, but the opinions expressed in this post are my own and don’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.

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Craig M. Jamieson

Managing Member at Adaptive Business Services

Craig M. Jamieson is a lifelong B2B salesperson, manager, owner, and a networking enthusiast. Adaptive Business Services provides solutions related to the sales professional. We are a Nimble CRM Solution Partner. Craig also conducts training and workshops primarily in social selling and communication skills. Craig is also the author of "The Small Business' Guide to Social CRM", now available on Amazon!