This case study covers a Social Selling project on LinkedIn for a custom fintech software development company entering the MENA and European markets. ModumUp managed the personal LinkedIn profile of the company's founder. The project included expert personal branding, relevant content, targeted audience growth, and networking messages in one-to-one conversations.

Social Selling is the use of a company expert's personal social media profile to attract customers, partners, and employees.

MQL (Marketing Qualified Lead) is a target contact who shared their contact details and requested a product presentation.

SQL (Sales Qualified Lead) is a call or meeting with a potential customer.

The client is a custom fintech software development company that planned to enter the international markets of MENA and Europe.

The client set two goals for ModumUp: attract potential customers in MENA and Europe and build brand awareness among the target audience. The company's founder had the strongest industry experience, expertise, and recognition, backed by 20 years in senior roles at major banks. The company chose to develop the founder's LinkedIn profile for the Social Selling project.

ModumUp tested the response from several fintech audience segments to find which groups were most likely to accept connection requests.

Identifying the most responsive segments mattered because the speed of adding relevant contacts to the profile affected the rest of the lead generation funnel and the performance of Social Selling.

For midsize fintech companies, the team added founders and CTOs. At major banks, the audience included senior executives and IT leaders, including open banking specialists. At systems integrators, the team targeted partnership directors and leaders of financial services practices, including those in the local European offices of global companies. At large IT companies that build products specifically for fintech, the audience included CTOs and heads of software development.

The geography included Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Poland, and other markets across MENA and Europe. Over eight months, ModumUp tested audience and regional hypotheses in stages and added 1,998 target contacts to the founder's LinkedIn profile. The Connection Rate ranged from 25% to 39%. The highest rates came from industry conference attendees contacted after an event and from fintech professionals in Saudi Arabia.

As the target audience grew, ModumUp published expert content on the client’s profile to build trust in the company.

The content covered three themes: fintech, banks' digital transformation, and the founder's personal experience. The posts showed the founder's extensive practical experience in banking.

Several of the client's posts had a View Rate above 100%, meaning they went viral and reached people beyond the founder's existing connections. The post with the highest reach discussed JOMO, or Joy of Missing Out. JOMO is the choice not to react to every new market trend, in contrast with FOMO, or Fear of Missing Out. The post received 16,101 views and a 370% View Rate. Company tags and active replies to comments also helped extend its reach. Each new comment brought more views and engagement.

Another top-performing post was a personal story about an Executive MBA. The founder considered whether the time and financial investment were worthwhile and shared his own experience. The post received 12,168 views and a 487% View Rate. The audience responded to both the topic and the personal photos included in the post. These photos helped the post attract attention in the feed and stand apart from other publications.

Another high-reach expert post analyzed the ThoughtWorks Technology Radar, a report on software development trends used by IT and fintech teams when selecting architecture and tools. The post received 8,939 views and a 224% View Rate. The analysis and fintech-specific takeaways attracted professionals from the target audience. Tagging ThoughtWorks also increased reach: the company responded to the post, which brought it beyond the profile's followers.

Alongside expert content and the founder's personal stories, ModumUp launched a LinkedIn Newsletter from the client's profile.

A LinkedIn Newsletter is a series of articles on a set topic that gives an author more space to share ideas and experience. Its formatting options also make articles easier to read. Authors can add subheadings, quotes, hyperlinks, images, infographics, and videos.

This LinkedIn format helps position the author as an industry influencer because the articles go into more detail than regular posts and give readers a clearer view of the author's expertise.

Profile followers can subscribe to the LinkedIn Newsletter separately. Subscribers receive a notification for each new article through push notifications, email, and LinkedIn.

By the end of month eight, 711 target contacts had subscribed to the founder's Newsletter. Issues were linked to the company's webinar topics and expert analysis of Embedded Finance, B2B software development, and related subjects.

LinkedIn Live events were another way to build long-term relationships with the target audience and increase brand awareness in new markets.

LinkedIn Live is a live broadcast format where an expert speaks to an audience in real time, answers questions, and discusses professional topics. These events show expertise through live conversation and help build a closer connection with the target audience than text content alone.

ModumUp held two webinars in this format. Together, the two broadcasts received 1,891 video views.

After each broadcast, the team sent connection requests to attendees who were not already connected to the client's profile and matched the target audience. This segment had a 60% Connection Rate, which is a very strong result.

Profile content and LinkedIn Live events supported demand generation, but effective Social Selling also required proactive one-to-one outreach to the target audience.

ModumUp used short networking messages without a sales offer in the first touch and suggested a call for a professional introduction. The founder's fintech focus and banking background matched the interests of the audience, giving contacts an opportunity to discuss the industry with a peer.

During calls, the founder learned about the professionals' priorities and company needs and shared relevant industry experience.

Follow-ups played an important role because many SQLs came after several one-to-one messages. The messages needed to be low-pressure, brief, and useful to the target audience. They could include a relevant industry report, research, a recent case study, or an event invitation.

The client's team regularly attended industry conferences in person. After each conference, ModumUp sent connection requests to attendees. Once a request was accepted, the team sent a message suggesting a call to continue the conversation and discuss the contact’s priorities in more detail.

This kept the new contacts in one place: the founder's LinkedIn profile. It also made it possible to stay in contact with the target audience and build long-term relationships. Messages sent to conference attendees had a 40% Response Rate, a strong result for this approach.

Through active one-to-one networking with the target audience, ModumUp generated 49 SQLs, including calls and meetings with potential customers, and 102 MQLs, including target contacts who requested materials or expressed interest in working together, over eight months.

The networking activity also produced a measurable commercial result. A CTO at a fintech company in Cyprus, first contacted through LinkedIn, signed a software development contract. During the eight-month project, the client turned a LinkedIn introduction into a closed deal and earned back its Social Selling investment.