Prospecting

Research, not legal advice; Karl Foster to confirm before use (D20).

The rules.

1. Referral, inbound and network first; outbound only on researched trigger accounts. Outbound tends to pay only from about $15,000 a year in contract value (Predictable Revenue). Nine seats at £69 is £7,452 a year, so volume outbound does not pay at our price.
2. No bought lists and no bulk outbound until D20 clears. Bought or compiled lists, and any agency working one, are RED until then.
3. No LinkedIn automation: no automated connection requests, message sequences, auto-likes or auto-comments, by us or any tool. Our reading of LinkedIn's User Agreement is that it bans bots and mass messaging, whatever PECR allows.
4. Never build a prospect list from engagement data, ours included, until D1 clears. Replying by hand, in LinkedIn, to someone who commented on your post is a conversation; turning engagers into a target list is not.
5. One person, one message, one researched reason, written by a human. No fear and no false urgency.

The law in plain words. Email and LinkedIn messages both count as electronic mail under PECR.

• Limited company, LLP or Scottish partnership (corporate subscribers): no prior consent needed, but say who you are, give a working opt-out, and honour opt-outs permanently on a suppression list.
• Sole trader, or a partnership other than an LLP or Scottish partnership (individual subscribers): consent is needed, unless the soft opt-in applies (you got their details in the course of a sale, or negotiations for a sale, of similar products, and gave them a chance to opt out then and in every message). Common in recruitment and traditional law partnerships.
• Phone calls: never call a number whose owner has told you not to; keep your own do-not-call list; screen against the TPS (individuals) and CTPS (companies) shortly before calling (the ICO's practice is within the last 28 days; Karl to confirm); say who you are and give an address or freephone number if asked. A TPS-registered personal mobile used for work is still protected.
• UK GDPR applies to every named person, even in a business capacity and even when public: you need a lawful basis (usually legitimate interests, with a short written assessment), you must give privacy information (every template carries a privacy notice link), and an objection to marketing is absolute. PECR fines reach £17.5 million or 4% of global turnover since 5 February 2026 (ICO). Check legal form on Companies House before messaging anyone you have not spoken to.

Trigger events. Keep a finite, written target list per segment (Weinberg). An account goes on it only with a trigger: a partner, star biller or senior consultant leaving; a new head of BD or marketing; a practice, office or service launch; a tender or panel review; a managing partner publicly asking why the firm's LinkedIn is quiet; a risky post by someone at the firm; new regulator guidance (the SRA's August 2026 generative AI notice); a group of new joiners; an agency retainer up for renewal. Outbound aims only at access: a conversation, not a demo or a close.

Power statement. Weinberg structure: headline (Maktura is a social media management and intelligence platform, built for one job: getting a whole team visible on LinkedIn, in their own voices, inside the firm's rules), who you help, their issues, the offering (Holly), differentiators (a voice for every person; approvals and rules for the whole firm; one team calendar; ideas from your news and meetings; one licence per person with the software all in). The 45-second spoken version uses two issues and one differentiator, then asks.

Message rules.

• Premise first (Holland): a researched observation from their own material (a post, a launch, a hire). Never a fake compliment or an invented connection.
• 25 to 50 words for a first message, mobile-friendly (Lavender, vendor data).
• Shape (Braun's 4T): truth (an observable fact); think (a neutral question they may not have considered); third party (a true one only: our own business or a sourced statistic, never an invented "most firms"); talk (a low-pressure ask).
• One question; no links or attachments in a first message; an easy no.

Templates (all recipients invented, at limited companies or LLPs).

First email, recruitment

Subject: new starters on linkedin. Hi Dan, Saw the two new consultants joining on 2 November. In our own recruitment business, new starters stayed invisible on LinkedIn for months because nobody had time to help them post. How are you planning to handle that? John Cooper, Maktura, [address]. How we use your details: [privacy notice link]. Reply "no thanks" and I won't email again.

"Let them off the hook" (after silence on a live conversation): Hi Morag, I may have misjudged whether fee earner visibility is a priority this quarter. If it isn't, no problem: I'll close my notes. If it is, reply "later" and tell me when.

Brush-offs: ledge, disrupt, ask (adapted from Blount).

(The 6.5% figure is DSMN8, 2026: vendor data; also a competitor, never name in social or marketing copy.) Activity: prospecting this month fills the pipeline about 90 days out, and you replace each closed or lost deal at the rate of your close ratio (practitioner rules, teach with caveat). Set your numbers from your own qualified win rate after your first 20 qualified conversations. Count conversations held, not messages sent.