The Founder’s LinkedIn Guide
Things I’ve learned from founders about how to actually use (and win at) LinkedIn.
I was in a call with a founder friend who had just closed a six-figure enterprise deal.
He didn’t cold-email the VP. He didn’t run ads. He posted on LinkedIn, and the VP reached out.
That’s when I realized: most people treat LinkedIn like a digital business card. But the smartest founders I know treat it like a distribution engine.
Over the past year I’ve sat in office hours, DM threads, and late-night voice notes with dozens of founders who’ve turned LinkedIn into their primary growth channel.
This is their playbook.
LinkedIn is (Mostly) a Network Graph
LinkedIn’s feed isn’t TikTok’s “For You” page. The most obvious part of the algorithm is far simpler, driven by your connections’ interactions. Most posts you see are “[Person you know] liked this” or “[Person you know] commented on this.”
That means you need to think about three things:
Think about who engages with your post
One like or comment from your ideal buyer can expose your post to dozens of similar prospects. Depending on your goal, one ICP comment > 100 random likes.
A founder I know got 27 likes on a post and generated a six-figure deal. The key was the 10th like from an exec he’d never heard of. That single reaction pushed the post to folks in their network with similar titles. Two booked calls. One signed.
Think about why someone is engaging with your post
People don’t interact with your post to help you. They engage because your post either:
Teaches them something interesting, or
Makes them look smart to their network.
That’s why social proof is everything. Public engagement = public co-sign. Your post has to be:
Valuable enough to justify engaging publicly,
Smart enough to signal they’re informed,
Safe enough not to make them look bad
Post even if you don’t think it’s working
Every post is a lottery ticket. Some will flop. Some will work. And despite what you may think, people see what you’re posting. The only way to win is to keep posting. Consistency beats perfection, and it pays off faster if you follow the rules below.
Practical Tips on How to Post on LinkedIn
Post in the work hours of the day of your ICP. Usually this means post during the weekday during early work hours (of their local time). For example, if you’re aiming for software engineers or big tech execs in San Francisco, you should post Monday to Thursday sometime from 9AM to 12PM (PT).
Write from your personal profile. Writing from a personal account is more genuine and likeable than writing from a company pages. Case in point, founders Marty Kausas from Pylon and Tanay Kothari from Wispr write from their own accounts, not their company accounts. People trust humans, not logos.
Hook in the first two lines. That’s all anyone sees before “…see more.” Treat it like the opening line of a novel; grab them or lose them. It’s hard to nail every time (some hooks feel cheesy), but study founders whose posts you stop for. Copy their pattern, not their words.
Add visuals that amplify your post. A picture is a thousand words. Use images, market maps, infographics, memes, short videos, or selfies to tell a story. Anything that forces a pause and makes someone want to read your post more.
Make your post relentlessly relevant (to your ICP). Speak directly to your ICP’s pain or curiosity. Share a raw personal story, some unique insight, or breaking news they actually care about. If you give information they could have Googled or would have known about otherwise, they will not pause. They will pause for:
“We lost 40% of our pipeline in 72 hours. Here’s the fix we shipped in 48.”
“The hidden flaw in [tool your ICP uses] that quietly cost us $200K.”
“I just watched [competitor] launch X. Here’s why it obsoletes half the market.”
(Technically) engagement bait is against LinkedIn’s guidelines… but it works. LinkedIn discourages asking for likes or comments: “Don’t do things to artificially increase engagement with your content. Respond authentically to others’ content and don’t agree with others ahead of time to like or re-share each other’s content.”
That said… early engagement matters. If you’re willing to bend the rules, ask a few trusted friends to like and/or comment if they think your post is valuable. People are more likely to engage with posts that already have traction.
(Optional) After you post personally, use the company page to reshare or comment to keep your brand in the conversation.
Why I Care About This
I’m an investor at Bloomberg Beta, and LinkedIn has become critical for many companies in our portfolio. I’ve sat through enough office hours to see the pattern: some founders turn LinkedIn into their primary pipeline source. Others post for months and get nothing.
The difference isn’t creativity or effort. It’s understanding that LinkedIn doesn’t (directly) reward the best content; it rewards content that spreads through the right networks. Once you see it that way, everything changes.
I wrote this guide because I kept having the same conversation over and over, sharing what I’ve learned from founders who’ve actually made this work. If it saves you even a few weeks of trial and error, then it’s done its job.
I’m still learning what works too. This stuff evolves, and every ICP is different. But these fundamentals have held up across dozens of conversations and I hope it helps you too.