Custom Made Tailored LinkedIn Posts

Michael Frackowiak faced a very uncertain future for his tailor-made suit business when the Pandemic hit last year...then he found LinkedIn!

Now his business is thriving! Listen to hear Michaels amazing story of how he uses LinkedIn to drive 90% of his sales.

This article has also been recorded as a podcast;

Linkedinformed on Google podcasts / LinkedInformed on Apple podcasts

But first…

Data of 500m+ LinkedIn users put up for sale on the dark web!

This story sounds worse than it actually is. LinkedIn have commented as follows;

“We have investigated an alleged set of LinkedIn data that has been posted for sale and have determined that it is actually an aggregation of data from a number of websites and companies. It does include publicly viewable member profile data that appears to have been scraped from LinkedIn. This was not a LinkedIn data breach, and no private member account data from LinkedIn was included in what we’ve been able to review.”

— LinkedIn

LinkedIn instruct Lea Turner to remove an emoji from her name field - She responds by changing her name by Deed Poll!

LinkedIn have always indicated that they disapprove of emoji’s in name fields, I tend to agree - there are plenty of other places in our profiles for branding and I think it looks tacky, but you can’t deny it is eye-catching.

For years people have been getting away with doing it but presumably, Leas’ profile was reported (by at least 5 people) and so she was asked to change it. At this point, I would have just complied - I know from experience that it is never a smart move to fall out with LinkedIn, especially when your livelihood depends on the platform! Lea however decided to bravely fight back and changed her name so that the Rainbow emoji could be allowed (LinkedIn state that a name field should only be used for your real name and nothing else).

This was subsequently picked up by the national press and as a result it became a big story.

LinkedIn realised this would be bad press and quickly backed down!

I know LinkedIn and this is exactly how I would expect them to react. It’s not worth having a public fight over a small issue such as this but they will now be looking closely at everything that Lea does and will pounce on her at any given opportunity!

Lea did a noble and brave thing in standing up to them and I admire her for doing that. Would I advise you to do the same?..not a chance!

Does this set a precedent? No, the policy hasn’t changed and they will still ask people to remove emojis - when the profile is reported.

LinkedIn should add a laughter emoji!

I love this campaign by Jeremy Nicholas. LinkedIn can be a fun place so why are all the emojis so serious?

Michael Frackowiaks Story

Click on the above view the profile

Below is a brief summary of my conversation with Michael, if you want to get the full picture I strongly suggest you listen to the podcast.

Michael left his native Poland in his early 20’s and came to the UK. He couldn’t speak English and found it difficult to get a job, he tried various roles including a role as an Engineer where he used to turn up on site dressed in a bow tie! He became known for this and he started to understand the power of personal branding.

Eventually, Michael ended up working as a Tailor, fashion has always been a passion of his and managed to secure a role with a company in Liverpool where he could learn the trade.

After just six months he started up his own bespoke tailoring business.

He grew the business, focussing a lot on wedding suits. He used YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram to develop his brand until Covid-19 struck at the beginning of 2020.

All weddings were put on hold and Michael could see his business about to crumble around him. What to do?

Michael had created his LinkedIn profile some years before but had never really used it but now he started to see potential opportunities on the platform. People like the ‘Shoe Guy’ Simon Bourne appeared to be getting real success with a similar product and customer profile so he embarked on an online course to teach him all the basics of how to use LinkedIn to generate leads.

He started posting every day from March/April time with very moderate levels of success, then in August this post went viral;

From that point onwards he started to gain real success by adopting the following process;

• Post daily - mainly images of models in suits and dress shirts
• Every post is written with a question to provide the opportunity for the viewer to express an opinion.
• Reply to every comment
• Send an invitation to connect to everyone who reacts to his post - this invitation includes a message thanking them for engaging with his post and is crucially signed off as ‘Michael Frackowiak, Bespoke Tailor from Liverpool’.

This is an unusual action on LinkedIn and as a result, many people reply. This increases his relevance to those people who are then more likely to see his next post!

Michaels post on the day of our interview

Summary. The key points we can learn from Michaels experience over the last year;

• Daily posting can be very effective. It’s important to point out that Michael has predominantly posted images with very little text, just a short question and this requires very little preparation, provided you have a large portfolio of images. For most of us, however, effective posts require more thought and creative writing so daily posting often leads to poor quality content. That said, it’s an interesting example of how consistent daily posting clearly leads to fantastic organic reach.
• “People love to express their opinions” is a simple, yet very insightful observation from Michael. Are your posts allowing your followers to express their opinions?
• Inviting everyone who engages with your post to connect is a great way to build relevant followers. It’s time-consuming and potentially dangerous because LinkedIn may consider this behaviour to be ‘bot like’ and they also measure your acceptance rate so this strategy could land you in trouble with LinkedIn. In addition, there are strong rumours that LinkedIn will be further restricting the number of invitations we can send each month as part of their push to encourage followers over connections.

Post Of The Week

This is a first for LinkedInformed…our first ever post of the week from Mexico!

Congratulations to Juan for the following post which ticks a lot of boxes for successful content;

• It’s a personal story with a personal image (not a stock image) - it’s authentic
• It’s a personal, business-related story
• Topical subject - how a business has dealt with the challenges of the pandemic
• A positive uplifting message of hope.
• Juan has liked and replied to every comment

That’s it for this week, I hope you enjoyed Michaels story. Please get in touch if you have any questions about it.

There won’t be a LinkedInformed next week but I will be back the week after.

Take care

This article has also been recorded as a podcast;

Linkedinformed on Google podcasts / LinkedInformed on Apple podcasts