France
Deutschland
España
USA
Return
Who is LinkedIn Influencer and Millionaire Justin Welsh?
Key Takeaways
- After his burnout in 2019, Welsh quit his job and started working as a solopreneur, consultant, and supporter for one-man entrepreneurs .
- Welsh offers online courses where he talks about his tips for success in his online ventures.
- He developed the so-called “Creator Funnel” which helps you build rapport, gain trust, and ultimately generate sales.
He is an entrepreneur, mentor, presenter, founder, and LinkedIn Influencer. Moreover, he is “no ordinary person,” according to author Scott Stockdale. So who is he? Who is Justin Welsh? How did he manage to accumulate a fortune of 1.28m with courses that cost only $150 each? We get to the bottom of these questions and also take a look at the overall trends for influencer marketing in 2023 on LinkedIn in this article.
Justin Welsh, the Solo-preneur
Calling himself a “diversified entrepreneur,” Welsh shares on LinkedIn how creative professionals can post every day about “[their] brand, [their] thoughts, [their] products,” while promoting mutual help: “Behind every successful LinkedIn founder is: ignored content, self-doubt, money worries, failed product launches. It’s important to help each other.”
But back to the beginning: Within ten years, Welsh helped build two companies with more than $50m in revenue and raised more than $300m in venture capital. As a result, he experienced burnout in 2019 and decided to quit his job. His idea was to build a following online, focusing on attention as the new currency for businesses and entrepreneurs. After six months, he already had 20,000 people following him, which is why he started his own business in August 2019, helping small internet businesses grow.
His portfolio on LinkedIn states
- Investor in GTM Fund and early-stage B2B SaaS companies.
- Advisor to SME SaaS companies in healthcare technology and LATAM through the 500 Startups mentorship program.
- Developer of 7-figure and 6-figure digital products.
His results, as Welsh presents them on LinkedIn, are also impressive. He now has more than 320k people following him on LinkedIn, more than 8k on Instagram, and more than 230k on Twitter. In the last four years, he’s had more than 375m impressions and generated more than $3m in revenue – without ads. To share his success with others, he offers online courses.
Justin Welsh's Digital Course and His Recipe for Success
In 120 minutes, Welsh’s THE OPERATING SYSTEM DIGITAL COURSE explains in detail how LinkedIn works and how we can all make it work for us and our businesses. So far, probably more than 8.5k students have already completed the course and rated it #1 onLinkedIn.
In THE CONTENT OS DIGITAL COURSE, which is 85 minutes long, Welsh introduces his idea of the 8-part Content Creator Funnel to help create ten to 15 high-quality pieces of content each day.
Welsh advises creating a well-constructed, so-called creativity funnel that followers go through. With just a few steps, you can increase the likelihood that your online audience will turn into potential customers. He says the funnel has helped him grow his business.
Graphic via Justin Welsh
Of course, if no one discovers you, there is no creator funnel. Consequently, you first need to create content that appeals to many people online. One way to get discovered as a (new) brand or to reach new target groups is influencer marketing. You should always keep in mind that you want to generate added value for your followers with your content. The easiest way to do this is by starting where people are already consuming, aka social networks.
Welsh recommends four types of value-added content to do this:
- This person teaches me
- This person entertains me
- This person makes me think
- This person understands me
Therefore, LinkedIn Influencer Welsh posts twice a day on LinkedIn and Twitter, through which he was able to garner more than 160m impressions in 2022.
The ultimate goal of the Creator Funnel is to get your audience to trust your expertise. You want to become the number one go-to person by communicating your expertise in longer content. For example, through newsletters, how-to guides, and step-by-step videos.
Welsh directs his followers from Twitter and LinkedIn to his newsletter with a twofold goal:
- Show people how he thinks on a deeper level (trust)
- Move the closest followers to his email list and off social media
Relationships are built as follows:
Image via Medium by Justin Welsh
This way, Welsh creates a private community that trusts him and has developed a close bond with him. To that end, he even has a Slack channel with 600 motivated creatives who exchange ideas, share experiences, and even meet in person. This community is no longer just made up of followers, but is a “captive audience” that you can reach out to directly – no algorithm, opening hours, or competition standing in your way.
Platforms Welsh uses and recommends are:
- Social media publishing tool: Hypefury
- Newsletter creation tool: Typeshare
- Google Chrome plugin for Twitter: Twemex
General Trends for Influencer Marketing in 2023 on LinkedIn
In terms of influencer marketing campaigns, LinkedIn is sometimes treated stepmotherly. Wrongly so, because the social network for business professionals and job offers is attracting more and more players, especially from the B2B sector. Through collaborative formats, such as webinars and live audio and video events, experts can address an ever-growing target group. In addition to business-focused topics, lifestyle content is also on the rise on LinkedIn.
For example, the law firm Lexelians had been working with influencer Amélie Favre Guttet, who is followed by more than 252,000 people on the platform. She communicates HR issues and focuses on telecommuting. Thanks to Guttet’s expertise, the firm received 400 likes for one post.
In Kolsquare’s Influencer Marketing Trends in 2023 study, we explain in detail what marketers can expect to see in the industry next year. Forecasts show that the value of the influencer marketing industry will reach $41.8b by 2025 – so investments will pay off. Save or invest in influencer marketing now and request Kolsquare’s free demo today.
Kolsquare, a data-driven Influencer Marketing platform, helps brands to optimize each step of their Influencer Marketing campaign with help of data and Machine Learning. The solution facilitates the identification of the right profiles for a campaign amongst a catalog of over 3 million KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders), and enables the measurement and performance analysis of each campaign. Kolsquare is a team of thirty experts who accompany you throughout the year in the implementation of your influencer strategies, to help you build effective campaigns and increase your knowledge of the Influencer sector through studies, barometers and enriching insights.