The context
IT consulting agency, 27 employees, international presence.
The problem was not a lack of will. It was the structure: project managers ran the projects and prospected at the same time. Two different jobs, in the same day.
A project manager knows how to run a complex technical engagement. They are not a digital prospecting expert, and becoming one is not their job. They had neither the time, the skills, nor the desire.
What was not working
The tools did not talk to each other. Conversations lived on LinkedIn, which is not built for that. Follow-up information lived in HubSpot. Every prospect had to be copied by hand from one tool to the other. The message was on one side, the reason to follow up on the other, and nobody really tracked anything.
No systematic follow-up. Prospects replied "interested, but in two months". Those conversations got lost. The pipeline was leaking from the bottom.
A junior sales rep who could not make it work. Equipped with classic tools like Waalaxy or Lemlist, they could not generate revenue. The result was close to zero.
The setup
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| LinkedIn accounts equipped | 2 |
| People equipped | 1 sales rep + 1 project manager |
| Personas built and tested | 8 across both accounts |
| Length of the engagement | 3 months |
The stated goal from day one: validate the system on two people, then equip the 10 project managers internationally.
Each person keeps their profile, their voice, their targets. The agent works under their name, not under a generic account.
Results over 3 months
Cumulative figures across both accounts, at 820 invitations per month per account.
| Stage | Volume | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| Prospects sourced, qualified and contacted | 4,920 | 100% |
| Invitations accepted | 1,574 | 32% |
| Prospects who replied | 394 | 8% |
| Meetings booked | 23 | 0.5% |
| Clients signed | 5 | 0.1% |
| Revenue signed | €85,000 | average deal €17,000 |
Two deals are still open, for an estimated €34,000 pending signature. They are not counted above.
The ramp-up, month by month
These rates are three-month averages. Month 1 is well below, month 3 well above. This is the most useful part of the case.
| Month 1 | Month 2 | Month 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Prospects contacted | 1,640 | 1,640 | 1,640 |
| Invitations accepted | 246 (15%) | 574 (35%) | 754 (46%) |
| Prospects who replied | 49 (20%) | 138 (24%) | 207 (27%) |
| Meetings booked | 2 (4%) | 7 (5%) | 14 (6.8%) |
| Clients signed | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| Revenue signed | €0 | €34,000 | €51,000 |
Reply rate calculated on accepted invitations. Meeting rate calculated on prospects who replied.
The sending volume did not move by a single message: 820 invitations per month per account, from the first day to the last. All the gain comes from the work done at each stage of the funnel, 15 to 20% gained every month at every step.
The profile, before the message
In month 1, 15% acceptance. One invitation in seven.
The problem was not the invitation message, it was upstream. Prospects open the profile before deciding. Two project manager profiles written for a recruiter, not for a decision-maker you want to approach: banner, headline, About section, everything spoke about technical skills, nothing spoke about the prospect's problems.
Both profiles were rewritten. 15% in month 1, 35% in month 2, 46% in month 3.
Messages, tested persona by persona
Eight personas, eight different ways of saying the same thing. You do not guess it, you test it.
Every week, we read the real replies, spot the wording that gets answers, generalise it, and test a new one against it. A message that works on a large-company CIO falls flat on the head of an industrial firm.
The reply rate on accepted invitations went from 20 to 27%. Combined with acceptance, the number of open conversations went from 49 to 207 per month, at identical sending volume.
The two or three questions that unlock the conversation
In month 1, 2 meetings out of 49 replies. The prospect replied, we presented the offer, they said "interesting, I'll get back to you", and then nothing.
What unlocked it: stop presenting, start asking. Two or three framing questions asked early, which bring out the real topic.
Including budget and timing. In IT consulting, budgets are annual and decisions are made at specific times of the year. A "not interested" prospect is very often a "not the right time" prospect. Without the question, they are lost. With the question, they enter the pipeline with a follow-up date.
From 4% to 6.8% of replies turned into meetings, and above all no more conversations dropped for lack of asking the right question.
The number that really matters: the pipeline
Five clients signed in three months, on an average deal of €17,000, plus two deals still open. In IT consulting, the sales cycle is long: part of what was sown over these three months will sign later.
Of the 394 prospects who replied, a large share said "interested, but in two or three months". Before, those conversations vanished. Today, the agent follows them up automatically, at the right time, with the right message.
40% of their revenue now comes from this accumulated, automatically followed-up pipeline.
That is the difference between prospecting that produces sales in the month you do it, and prospecting that builds an asset producing for years.
Time
| Before | After | |
|---|---|---|
| Prospecting time | 4 hours a week per person | 20 minutes a day |
| Result | Close to zero | 23 meetings, €85,000 signed, a living pipeline |
The 20 daily minutes break down as follows: 15 minutes to approve the replies proposed by the agent, 5 minutes to publish and answer comments, including on competitors' posts.
Four hours a week spent prospecting without a method produced nothing. Twenty minutes a day inside a structured system produce a flow.
The three reasons they switched
- Project managers are not salespeople. They spent real time on prospecting without the skills for it, and without it producing anything. Every hour spent looking for prospects was an hour taken from client projects, the part of the job that actually gets billed.
- Hiring had not solved the problem. A junior sales rep had been hired. With classic tools, no method and no coaching on the messages, they generated no revenue. The problem was not the person: it was the absence of a system around them.
- A flow that became predictable. This is the deepest change, and the one they mention first today. They see calls and clients coming in. No more peaks, no more troughs. They understand their seasonality, know where their prospects come from, including which competitors, and can tell from the first messages whether a prospect is qualified. They have also identified the profile of prospects who book a meeting but never sign.
The essentials
- IT consulting agency, 27 employees: 2 LinkedIn accounts equipped, 8 personas, 3 months.
- 4,920 prospects contacted, 1,574 invitations accepted, 394 replies, 23 meetings, 5 clients signed, €85,000 in revenue.
- Identical volume from the first day to the last: all the gain comes from the profile, messages tested persona by persona, and framing questions.
- From 4 hours a week with no result to 20 minutes a day with a predictable flow.
- 40% of revenue comes from the pipeline the agent follows up automatically.
Your offer is validated and you bill at least €5,000 a month? The free trial lasts 2 weeks, with unlimited campaigns, personas and messages.
Start the 2-week free trialPrefer to talk first? Book a call with an expert.
Frequently asked questions about this case study
Are these numbers verifiable?
Yes. They are the client's real data, taken from the Formula. dashboard on the two equipped accounts, over three months. Nothing is extrapolated or rounded up. The agency's name is not published at its request.
Why is month 1 so low?
Because the system is being built: profiles rewritten, eight personas tested, messages rewritten every week. Volume did not move, it is the rates at each stage that rise by 15 to 20% per month.
Does this case apply to a team without a sales rep?
Yes. Here, a non-sales project manager was equipped just like the sales rep. The agent works under their name, proposes every reply, and they approve with a swipe in 20 minutes a day.