Prospecting used to mean cold calling phone numbers and hoping someone answered.
Today, most people ignore unknown calls. Even if they do answer, you’ve interrupted their day.
The shift in “spam calls” has forced many sales professionals to rethink how they start conversations.
In our most recent episode of the Grow Rogue Podcast, Reade Milner spoke with financial advisor Mike Kipniss about how prospecting has evolved.
After more than 40 years in financial services, Mike describes the shift simply: sales has moved from a calling business to a typing business.
Meeting Prospects Where They Already Are
Instead of relying on cold calls, Mike focuses on starting conversations through LinkedIn.
The approach is simple:
Send a personalized connection request
Follow up with a short message
Invite the person to a quick conversation
The goal isn’t to sell immediately. The goal is to begin a conversation.
One tactic he recommends is offering two specific meeting options. For example: Tuesday at 10 or Wednesday at 2. Instead of asking someone to “check their schedule,” it makes responding easier.
Small changes like this dramatically increase the likelihood of getting a reply and actually putting a meeting on the calendar.
Why Personalization Still Wins
Many companies try to automate LinkedIn outreach with AI-generated messages and large-scale automation, but that approach often backfires.
Mike takes the opposite approach. He reads profiles, looks for shared connections, and references something specific in his outreach—like a shared city, an event, or a common professional network.
That small effort signals something important:
There’s a real person on the other side of the message.
The Compounding Power of Consistency
Mike spends about 60 to 90 minutes per day on LinkedIn maintaining relationships, congratulating connections, and starting new conversations.
Over time, those small interactions compound.
More connections lead to more conversations. More conversations lead to more meetings. And more meetings create new opportunities.
Prospecting hasn’t disappeared. But the way it begins has changed.
Today, the most effective salespeople aren’t interrupting people’s days.
They’re meeting them where they already are: online.
Listen to the full episode with Mike on the Grow Rogue podcast and be sure to connect with him on LinkedIn.
