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Case study
ABILITIES · Hired-in construction and project managers, Denmark

37 meetings from LinkedIn outreach in 9 months.

ABILITIES hires out experienced construction and project managers to the Danish building sector. Until we started, new business came only from the partners' own network. We opened that up to developers, consultancies and building owners they had never spoken to.

  • 9 months
  • 2 partner profiles
  • Denmark
Services provided
  • LinkedIn outreach
  • Profile optimisation
  • Targeting and list building
  • Message copywriting
  • A/B testing
  • Automated lead tracking
  • Monthly reporting

Who we targeted

1Audience

  • Developers and building owners
  • Architects and engineering consultancies
  • Concrete, timber and steel manufacturers

Contractors and smaller companies were taken out of the audience after we reviewed which leads fit best.

2Industry

  • Architecture and planning
  • Civil engineering
  • Building construction
  • Real estate

3Company size

  • 30+ employees

4Job titles

  • Managing director
  • Project director
  • Head of department
  • Construction manager
  • Project manager
  • Property director

5Countries

  • DKDenmark

All messages in Danish.

The numbers

From network-only sales to a steady flow of new conversations.

Results from the lead partner's LinkedIn campaign data and lead tracking over 9 months.

37

Meetings booked

The goal at the start was one meeting a month.

934

New connections

Decision makers in Danish construction and property.

161

Interested prospects

Replies that showed interest in hired-in project managers.

75

Referrals

Contacts who pointed us to the colleague who decides.

Before and after profile optimisation
64%acceptance rate, up from 21%

We rewrote the partner's headline to say exactly what ABILITIES delivers and linked the profile to the company page. Two months in, three times as many people accepted.

Month 1 · 112 requests, 24 accepted21%
Month 3 · 151 requests, 97 accepted64%

Acceptance rate is new connections divided by requests, lead partner's profile.

ChallengeA business that only grew through people they knew

ABILITIES had five consultants out on projects and room for fifteen. Every new assignment came from the partners' own network, and they had never tested a way to win work from people they did not already know.

Their market works a lot like interim recruitment. Buyers say it is expensive, that they have no need right now, or that they already have a supplier.

The goal: one meeting a month with a new decision maker.

SolutionA warm, personal message and a cup of coffee

We built audiences of developers, consultancies, manufacturers and building owners in Denmark, and ran connection and message sequences from both partners' profiles, all in Danish.

Every message offered something low pressure: a coffee and a talk about the projects ahead. We rewrote the partners' headlines and linked their profiles to the company page, and acceptance tripled from 21% to 64%.

From month six we ran a message test every month and narrowed the audience to the companies most likely to hire in project managers.

ImpactMeetings well beyond the target

From the lead partner's profile alone, 934 decision makers connected and 354 replied in the first seven months, and 37 meetings were booked, against a starting goal of one a month.

Beyond the meetings, 161 prospects showed interest and 75 pointed us to the right colleague.

The friendly, low-pressure coffee invitation worked best throughout. Every reply was sorted automatically into a shared lead tracker, so the partners could follow up fast.

How we helped

What we did, and when

A workshop, two profiles live in the first month, then monthly tests and reports.

  1. Month 1

    Strategy and targeting

    Strategy workshop, two target audiences of developers, consultancies, manufacturers and building owners, and four Danish message versions.

  2. Month 1

    Launch

    Outreach went live on both partners' profiles with a low-pressure invitation to a coffee and a talk about upcoming projects.

  3. Months 3 to 7

    Testing and optimisation

    New headlines and company page links lifted acceptance on the lead profile from 21% to 64%. Monthly message tests followed, and contractors and smaller companies were taken out of the audience.

  4. Month 9

    Results

    37 meetings booked, 161 interested prospects and 75 referrals from the lead partner's profile.

Month by month

Profile work tripled acceptance, and it stayed high.

After the profile changes in month 3, acceptance never fell back to where it started.

Connection requests and new connections

Lead partner's profile.

RequestsNew connections
  1. 11224
    M121%
  2. 13830
    M222%
  3. 15197
    M364%
  4. 300163
    M454%
  5. 445239
    M554%
  6. 427226
    M653%
  7. 395155
    M739%

How we count. M1 to M7 are months 1 to 7 of the engagement, when all messages offered ABILITIES' project managers. Requests, new connections, people messaged and replies are the monthly figures and totals for those months from the LinkedIn campaign data for the lead partner's profile. The second partner's profile ran in months 1 to 5 and is not included. Acceptance rate is new connections divided by requests. Reply rate is replies divided by people messaged. Meetings, interested prospects and referrals are replies with that status in the lead partner's lead tracking, counted over the full 9 months.

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