By Zivko Dodovski, Founder & CEO, DoneMaker · Updated September 2026
Progress Guru, Robert Sefman’s business consulting practice, wanted a steady stream of conversations with startup CEOs. Manual LinkedIn outreach booked 55 calls in 6 months, from 150 engaged prospects, at a 31% connection rate. Here is how the engagement ran.
The client
Client: Robert Sefman
Company: Progress Guru
Industry: Business consulting
Ideal client profile: Startup CEOs
Robert Sefman runs Progress Guru, a consulting practice for startup CEOs and business owners. His buyers field pitches all day and guard their calendars hard. The challenge wasn’t awareness — it was engaging this senior audience well enough that they’d give a consultant a meeting.
What we did
Our standard engagement: a dedicated team on the account, manual LinkedIn outreach, no automation tools.
- Targeted outreach in Sales Navigator. Lists built around startup CEOs and business owners, with messaging tailored to the problems they actually carry.
- Personal, contextual messages. Every interaction customized to the prospect’s business and sent by a person — no sequences fired from a tool.
- Qualify, then book. The outreach specialist stayed in every open conversation until the CEO either booked onto Robert’s calendar or closed out.
- Data-driven refinement. Engagement reviewed weekly; targeting and messaging tuned continuously across the six months.
Results: 6 months of the campaign
55
Booked calls in 6 months
150
Engaged prospects in 6 months
31%
Connection rate
A deal opportunity is a prospect who expresses clear interest — asks questions, opens an email exchange, or books a call.
Why it worked
Sustained consistency with a senior audience. A 31% connection rate held across six months of outreach because the targeting stayed disciplined, and 150 engaged prospects became 55 booked calls because each conversation was personal enough for a CEO to take seriously. That’s the difference between a campaign that spikes and dies and one that keeps a consultant’s calendar full for half a year.
Want to see what this looks like for your firm?
20 minutes — we’ll tell you honestly whether LinkedIn outreach fits your business before anything else.