Master LinkedIn: How to Get Freelance Clients from LinkedIn

There’s one social media channel that freelance writers really can’t afford to miss out on right now.

You might have guessed LinkedIn.

Why?

Because LinkedIn is business-focused. People come there for thought leadership, ideas, and connections that can help them with their goals.

If you can establish yourself as an expert and build a strong personal brand around your business and what you do on LinkedIn, it will open up a whole bunch of doors for you.

So if you want to have a successful freelance writing business, it’s time to master LinkedIn.

I have five strategies to help ensure you’re managing your time effectively and giving yourself the best chance for success on this platform — updated for what’s actually working right now.

Sound good? Keep reading.

And if video is more your thing, watch below.

What Matters Now

Before we get into the strategies, you need to know that LinkedIn’s algorithm has changed over the years. A lot of old tactics stopped working.

Here’s what the algorithm rewards now:

• Comments over likes: A post with 50 thoughtful comments will outperform a post with 500 likes. LinkedIn wants real conversations.
• Saves and sends: LinkedIn added these metrics to post analytics. This tells you what they value content worth saving and sharing privately.
• The golden hour: The first 60-90 minutes after you post determines everything. LinkedIn shows your post to 2-5% of your network first. If they engage quickly, it expands. If not, the post dies.
• Native content wins: External links now get roughly 60% less reach than posts without links. If you’re linking out, put the link in the comments.

What gets penalized:

• Engagement bait (“Comment YES if you agree!”)
• Engagement pods and round-robin commenting groups — LinkedIn detects these now
• Clickbait, vague storytelling, and overly promotional posts

With that context, here are five strategies that work now.

Five Strategies to Master LinkedIn

If you aren’t on LinkedIn yet, it’s time to jump on the platform.

To do that, check out this post.

LinkedIn has become the top platform for inbound leads from freelancers. Most of the freelancers I talk to say LinkedIn is where they’re getting the majority of their clients these days — more than job boards or cold pitching.

If you’re not there building a presence, you’re leaving work on the table.

1. Write to Potential Clients, Not Other Freelancers

I see this all the time: people go to LinkedIn, join freelance writing communities, and network with other freelance writers.

That’s great for building relationships with peers. But it won’t get you clients.

If someone scrolls through your LinkedIn page, they should know exactly what you do and who you’re targeting.

How to Do It

First, look at your last 10 posts. Count how many are about freelancing tips for other freelancers versus content that would interest your ideal client. If most of your posts are aimed at writers, you need to shift.

Second, identify three to five topics your ideal clients actually care about. If you’re a freelance medical writer, you may want to talk about regulations, new research, or common content challenges brands in this industry face. If you write for financial services, it might be compliance, fintech trends, or customer experience.

Third, write posts that show your expertise in those areas. Share an insight from a recent project (without naming the client). Break down why a company’s content strategy is working. Offer a take on an industry trend.

The goal is that when a marketing director lands on your profile, they see someone who understands their world, not someone who only talks to other writers.

LinkedIn’s algorithm prioritizes relevance over reach.

If you consistently post about a specific topic for a specific audience, LinkedIn recognizes your authority in that niche and boosts your content to more people in that space.

2. Overcome Your Posting Anxiety

You don’t need to post every day. A lot of conventional wisdom says you need to put yourself out there constantly to have success.

That’s overwhelming, and it’s why so many freelancers I know don’t have much of a LinkedIn presence. They don’t know what to say. They feel imposter syndrome. So they post nothing.

The truth: posting once or twice a week consistently over a few months can have massive results.

How to Do It

Pick a cadence you can actually maintain. Every Monday and Thursday works. So does just every Wednesday. The consistency matters more than the frequency.

Block 30 minutes on Sunday to plan your posts for the week. Write them out, schedule them using LinkedIn’s native scheduler, and then you’re done thinking about it.

If you don’t know what to write, start with these formats:

1. A lesson you learned from a recent project
2. A mistake you made early in your career and what you’d do differently
3. A breakdown of why a piece of content you admire works well
4. A contrarian take on something everyone in your niche assumes is true
5. An article you like and your thoughts on it

Text posts with strong hooks and clear formatting are getting the most reach right now. You don’t need fancy graphics or video. A well-written post with a compelling first line works.

3. Focus on Engagement

If you want to master LinkedIn, realize it’s a long term strategy. A marathon. It will take a while for people to find you.

But you can speed things up.

Commenting on other people’s posts and sending connection requests to prospects is more important than posting.

Sarah Greesonbach calls this “walking the marketing dog.” Just like you’ve got to take your best friend out for their daily stroll every day, you can do the same with your marketing.

How to Do It

Make a list of 20 to 30 prospects: marketing directors, content managers, editors, or founders at companies you’d like to work with. Follow all of them.

Every day, spend 15 to 20 minutes scrolling through their posts. When you see something worth commenting on, leave a thoughtful comment. Not “Great post!” or “So true!” Those get ignored. Instead:

• Share a related experience: “I saw something similar when working with a fintech client last year…”
• Add a useful resource: “This reminds me of [specific thing], which takes this even further…”
• Ask a real question: “How did you handle [specific challenge] when implementing this?”

Do this consistently, and your name starts showing up in front of the right people. They see you in their notifications. They click your profile. They remember you.

Ed Gandia has a technique called the 3-2-1 method: send 3 connection requests, make 2 comments, and write 1 post a day.

If that feels like too much, pick a smaller number.

Do three things on LinkedIn every day. Three connection requests. Two comments and a post. Or just three thoughtful comments.

4. Optimize Your Profile for Clients

Your content should be client-focused. Your profile should be too.

Go back to your profile, edit it, and treat it like a sales page. You’re selling yourself.

How to Do It

Start with your headline. Don’t write “Freelance Writer.” Write something that tells prospects what you do for them: “I write content that helps B2B SaaS companies convert leads” or “Financial services content writer | [Company 1], [Company 2], [Company 3].”

Rewrite your About section in second person. Address the reader directly. Tell them what problems you solve, who you work with, and what results you’ve gotten. Include a call to action at the end.

Highlight the clients that you’ve worked with, talk about wins you’ve gotten for them, share testimonials with people that you’ve worked with who have been thrilled with the results, link to your portfolio website, and show how you can help others.

Add your best work to the Featured section. Pin two or three pieces that show the quality of your writing. If you have a case study or testimonial, pin that too.

List specific clients in your Experience section. “Wrote 50+ articles for Client A covering AI in banking, payments, and credit card strategy” is better than “Wrote articles for various clients.”

Most job applications, and even freelance writing gigs, want to see your LinkedIn page now. Brands and hiring managers check it before reaching out.

Make sure it’s working for you.

5. Build Your Idea Brain

Remember how I said so many people get stuck because they don’t know what to post?

Here’s a solution: write down 10 ideas every day in a notebook or notes app.

Most will be bad. But at the end of each week, if you have 70 new ideas, probably 5 to 10 of them will be worth developing.

How to Do It

Set a daily reminder. Every morning with your coffee, or every evening before bed. Open your notes app and write 10 ideas. They can be post ideas, article ideas, things you learned, questions you have, anything.

Don’t judge them. Just write. The goal is volume.

At the end of the week, review the list. Start the ones that feel worth developing. Turn those into posts.

But if you’re really stuck?

Turn to AI writing tools like ChatGPT. Writer’s block should never be a thing anymore.

Open it up and ask for ideas for 10 LinkedIn posts about your niche. Then, ask for more if you need to, and you have a starting place to tap into your own thinking to expand or riff on what AI gave you.

Twenty to Thirty Minutes a Day on LinkedIn Can Make a Huge Difference

If you can spend 20 to 30 minutes a day on LinkedIn as a freelancer, it will pay off.

Most freelancers I talk to now say LinkedIn is their top source for inbound leads. A few years ago, it was job boards and cold pitching. But the platform has shifted.

And it pays off in different ways. Getting clients is great. But you also build a bigger network with other freelancers, which means more referrals and more job security. The bigger your network, the more stable your income.

Don’t delay getting on LinkedIn any longer. Put in the time and effort, and it will pay off.

Sean Ogle

Sean Ogle is the Founder of Location Rebel where he has spent the last 12+ years teaching people how to build online businesses that give them the freedom to do more of the things they like to do in life. When he's not in the coffee shops of Portland, or the beaches of Bali, he's probably sneaking into some other high-class establishment where he most certainly doesn't belong.