How Catalina and Julia built a steady client pipeline from LinkedIn (and $98K in revenue!)

If you’ve ever wondered whether LinkedIn can actually bring in clients for your consulting business, you're going to want to read Catalina and Julia’s story.

By pairing a clear profile with a relationship-driven approach, they built a system that turned casual LinkedIn connections into $98,000 in sales—and a steady flow of new leads. Let's dive into how they did it.

Catalina Parker and Julia Devine are business partners who together run Relatable Nonprofit, a women-led business that helps early-stage nonprofit consultants—typically earning under $100K—launch and grow their businesses.

In Spring 2024, they wanted to sign more clients into their Mentorship Program. At the time, most of their clients came from referrals, but they knew their ideal clients were spending time on LinkedIn. So, they knew that it was therefore a valuable marketing channel to pursue.

They wanted the shortcut to using LinkedIn to get clients, as they'd never used the platform in this way before. They weren't interested in DIY approaches. They wanted to move quickly.

They heard me present in a private membership community and immediately resonated with my approach to marketing on LinkedIn. This differed from the more transactional approach they had heard from other coaches, where you pitch early in the conversation and send a lot of unpersonalized messages, rather than building a relationship.

A few weeks later, they reached out and booked their done-for-you profile optimizations and signed up for my coaching program, Leads on LinkedIn.

You can learn more about how these programs work in this deep-dive blog post, where I share the exact features of the program and what results clients get.

First, we turned their profiles into client-attracting landing pages.

Catalina and Julia hadn't used LinkedIn since applying for jobs right out of college. Therefore, their profiles didn’t communicate their offerings with their new company, Relatable Nonprofit, nor did they communicate the value of their Mentorship Program.

While they decided that Catalina would be the main person who posts on LinkedIn, we made sure both of their profiles were optimized, since Julia's profile still gets quite a bit of searches (such as from partners and potential clients).

(By the way, I loved this approach! When I work with clients, I don't want them to spend more time than needed on LinkedIn. By focusing on Catalina's presence instead of both of theirs, I knew we'd attract leads while staying efficient and not burning them out .)

When we started my Profile Optimization process, I sent them my comprehensive onboarding questionnaire, which they filled out in ~30 minutes so I had everything I needed to write their LinkedIn profiles. They sat back and relaxed while I got to work, rewriting key sections of their profile, including their headlines, about section, and experience section.

We made sure that when a prospect lands on their profile, they knew exactly what action to take: to join their email list. We knew growing their list would directly lead to more sales (and it did... more on that soon!).

Learn what an optimized profile is, and why it matters in this detailed blog post.

Then, we created their simple and repeatable direct messaging and posting strategy.

Once their profiles were in place, Catalina learned how to build a consistent, relationship-driven marketing rhythm through my Leads on LinkedIn coaching program. We focused on two primary skills: LinkedIn posting and direct messaging.

Since Catalina is a business coach, these skills weren't new to her, but she had never used LinkedIn as a lead generation tool. For example, I taught her how to transition from asking questions into pitching a discovery call. In addition to learning new tactics, she resonated with the way I explained the concepts (and remarked that she incorporated some of the approaches into her coaching with clients moving forward!).

Catalina became comfortable writing LinkedIn posts. In the early days of using LinkedIn, right after we started working together, she used my plug-and-play post structures so she didn't have to stare at a blank page. She also sent her posts to me for feedback, so she could learn to write more effective copy that resonates on LinkedIn.

We also developed a direct messaging strategy, so she knew exactly who to message and how to follow up. On our calls, we sent direct messages "live". She loved this part of the program, as she started to hear my brain when sending messages, which made her more comfortable sending them on her own.

If you already send direct messages but don't get as many replies as you'd like, you'll love this blog post about how to get more replies on your direct messages.

Catalina and Julia immediately started getting leads on LinkedIn.

While we were still in the middle of the coaching program, Catalina started practicing the messaging strategies I taught them, and immediately closed a prospect without a sales call! This particular deal brought in $3,500 in revenue, so they had already nearly doubled their investment. And we were just getting started.

They host webinars regularly, so I provided them custom follow-up strategies to follow up from their webinar strategy.

Further, they started proactively sending connection requests, using the specific search terms I prepared for them, and posting twice a week from Catalina's page. As you can see, we layered numerous LinkedIn strategies so we could figure out which one(s) work best and compound their results.

LinkedIn quickly became a consistent source of leads.

Since working together, LinkedIn has become responsible for 40% of their Mentorship Program members, representing $98,000 in revenue. Before working together, they could attribute 0% of their program members to LinkedIn.

Even more importantly, they built a repeatable system that works for them over and over: clear profiles, friendly and effective direct messages, and content that builds trust and interest in their program.

Here's what they said about the program:

“[Sara] gave us a doable roadmap that did not overwhelming. It was just the right amount of tactics. We could turn around and start taking action the next day, and we didn't need to hire someone. Everything you taught us was free to do, and this has paid for itself again and again. Otherwise, we would have just been throwing spaghetti at the wall for a long time."

Outside of getting leads, they experienced several other benefits, too.

They increased their authority and trust, as people in their network began recognizing Relatable Nonprofit as a leader in the consulting space, thanks to Catalina's well-crafted posts.

They also found clarity through the process of posting, as they refined their own ideas and thought leadership.

“After working with Sara, LinkedIn has became our most reliable way to attract the right people—without spending hours online or running more ads.”

How you can build your lead-generating LinkedIn strategy

The last thing I want to leave you with is an invitation to join my program, and the steps needed to develop a practical, repeatable LinkedIn system that gets you results, just like Catalina and Julia got.

Step 1: When I start working with a consultant, we always start with a done-for-you LinkedIn Profile Optimization so that you clearly explain your credibility, who you serve, how you serve them, and what action the profile viewer should take.

This process takes under a month from start to finish, and provides you a profile that captures the attention of your ideal clients and gets them to take action.

Step 2: Once your profile is optimized, we then create your LinkedIn strategy so you can get visible to the right audience and attract more interest in your offerings through my coaching program, which I've described in detail in this blog post.

This coaching program takes two months. We focus on two main skills - LinkedIn posting and direct messaging. These skills bring the right clients into your orbit so you can consistently grow your business without relying on time-consuming strategies like video and expensive strategies like ads. 

In the first 30 days of the program, you'll have identified and contacted 30 prospects for your business. You'll have the skills and systems to do it again whenever you want an influx of leads. And, this rinse-and-repeat process gets more effective every time you do it!

Learn more and start getting leads on LinkedIn here.