LinkedIn Search: Secrets To Finding Architecture Clients and Partners

👋 Shout out to Elizabeth whose question on one of my LinkedIn posts last week sparked the topic for today’s newsletter!

Business partnerships are a like a cheat code for business growth and sustainability.

Instead of focusing on bringing in one new client at a time, you can develop relationships with other businesses in the AEC industry that (1) need/work alongside your services and (2) work with your ideal clients.

For example:

• Developers

• Construction companies

• Real Estate brokerages

• Engineering firms

By developing strong partnerships with other businesses, you can bring in multiple projects at a time with high-quality clients.

And LinkedIn provides amazing, free tools to help you develop these relationships.

Let’s jump in:

01 // Identify companies

Let’s pretend that you’re a North Carolina-based firm looking to develop relationships with regional construction companies.

The amazing thing about LinkedIn is that it allows users so many valuable search filters for free. But most people don’t know where to find them or how to use them. And, frankly, LinkedIn doesn’t make it super obvious. Ready to learn some LinkedIn secrets?

Begin by searching for “Construction” in the search bar. This will make the first round of filters visible.

Since we’re looking for companies, click on the “Companies” filter. You’ll notice the second round of filters become visible. Use these to filter by location, industry, and company size. In this example, I selected “North Carolina”, “Construction”, and 200 employees or less, respectively.

The steps above should look something like this:

By narrowing our search using these filters, we’re able to get very granular with the companies that are worth pursuing. You’ll now have a nicely filtered list of regional construction companies. Hooray!

02 // Identify decision makers

Now it’s time to dive into each company and identify the best people for you to engage.

Click on a company that looks interesting to you.

You’ll notice that every company pages has different tabs along the top, including a “People” tab that lists all employees. Even better, after you click on that tab you can search for a specific person or title - let’s try “Owner” because I want to speak with individuals that have the authority to make business decisions.

If you follow the above process, it will look something like this:

You’ll now have a list of decision-makers at a company that could be a great partnership for your firm.

03 // Reach out

Obviously, this is wasted effort unless you use this information to build new relationships. Here are 3 ways you can try to connect with the decision-makers that you’ve identified:

1. Call the company number: Most LinkedIn pages include a button at the top that you can click to visit the company website. The website usually will include the company phone number on the “About” page, “Contact” page, or in the footer. And if that’s fruitless, you can always try searching the company on Google maps, which usually includes a phone number. Feel free to use my cold calling script to help you get in the door.

2. Connect on LinkedIn: This is a good thing to do regardless of whether or not you want to use LinkedIn as your primary outreach channel. Send the individuals a connection request (don’t include a note in the request because they decrease acceptance rates) and then you can send them a direct message after they accept the request.

3. Send an email: There are a lot of free Google Chrome extensions that allow you to scrape email addresses from LinkedIn pages. Two popular options are GetProspect and Email Hunter. Once you have the email address, you can send a message to get the conversation started.

Regardless of which channel you choose, don’t forget the golden rule:

Make every conversation about them and not about you.

Don’t lead with a pitch. Instead, ask intentional questions to better understand their current challenges and whether your services can be of value.

TL;DR

Business partnerships are cheat codes. And LinkedIn has the capability to help you identify and develop new business partnerships. Just follow three simple steps:

1. Identify companies

2. Identify decision makers

3. Reach out

If you spend just one focused hour each month identifying and initiating new business relationships, you’ll help your firm grow and sustain a healthy pipeline.