Jillian Richardson is a Linkedin ghostwriter and runs “Make LinkedIn Weird”. Before degenerating into Linkedin work (I’m allowed to say this because I do Linkedin work), she did standup comedy and 6 years of improv training, which is where she gets her inspiration from. In this episode, we talk about why you should be weirder on Linkedin, how to find your flavor of weird, whether you can say the word F**K on Linkedin, and more. This one’s for you if you feel like your writing is too boring or you’re not able to get your full personality on paper. --- We discuss: * Why “Linkedin is the fakest place on earth” is the best news for anyone willing to be weird * The benefits of allowing yourself to be weirder * How to find your flavor of weird * Jillian’s envy-disgust matrix * The three-pass editing routine (this one was eye-opening to me!!) * Can you say f**k on Linkedin? Should you? * How to become funnier --- This post is sponsored by Thormeier.co Thormeier.co is my LinkedIn & Founder Brand advisory where I’ve worked with 30+ SaaS and AI founders grow faster on LinkedIn, build a stronger founder brand, and drive more pipeline from it. If you want to understand how I work with founders, book a call here. --- Show Notes: Connect with Jillian: Jillian’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thatjillian/ Make LinkedIn Weird: https://www.makelinkedinweird.com/ Jillian’s website: https://www.thatjillian.com/ Connect with Finn: Finn’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/finnthormeier/ Thormeier.co - Founder Brand & LinkedIn Advisory: https://thormeier.co/ Mentioned in the episode: Upright Citizens Brigade Comedy Improvisation Manual: https://ucbcomedy.com/product/upright-citizens-brigade-comedy-improvisation-manual/ The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron: https://juliacameronlive.com/register/the-artists-way/ The Writing Life by Annie Dillard: https://www.anniedillard.com/books-annie-dillard.html Kait LeDonne: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kaitledonne-personalbrandingexpert/ Matt Barker: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattjbarker1/ Jasmin Alić: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alicjasmin/ --- Full Transcript: Finn Thormeier: All right, my guest today is Jillian Richardson. She is a ghostwriter for solopreneurs and executives, and she helps people be weirdo on LinkedIn, which I love. I think much needed. The platform can use it. Her message resonated with me. I found you like a couple weeks ago on LinkedIn for the first time, stumbled upon my feed. So I wanted to have her on to learn from her and maybe get a free consultation for all of us here. So Jillian, thank you for joining the pod. Jillian Richardson: Thank you so much for having me. Finn Thormeier: Cool. Let’s maybe start with making the case for why people should be weird on LinkedIn. Jillian Richardson: Okay, so I’m someone, I go to a lot of dinner parties, a lot of places where I meet new people, and I say, you know, I’m a ghostwriter for LinkedIn, and the faces... It’s very telling of, I think, what LinkedIn’s brand is in the world. Like people are like, oh, LinkedIn, like LinkedIn is horrible. It’s so fake. It’s everyone just talking about how accomplished they are and their career milestones. And it’s just the fakest place on earth. Finn Thormeier: LinkedIn invented slop before AI slop were the thing. Jillian Richardson: Yes. Like even before AI, it was slop. Why would you ever want to write content for that platform? And so then I get to say to them, well, imagine if you didn’t fit into that mold, how happy people would be to see your content because the bar on LinkedIn is not very high and there’s so much room for creativity and humor and personal stories. And it’s pretty easy to make yourself stand out if you actually have a point of view and you have a little bit of fun with it. So that’s my case for it. Everyone knows LinkedIn doesn’t have the best reputation. And so if you can make it a little bit fun for people who are slogging through LinkedIn, trying to get a job, make a business contact, whatever, they will love you and they will remember you. Finn Thormeier: Is it fair to say that being weirder on LinkedIn is the same thing as showing your personality? Jillian Richardson: Yeah, I would say so. I think being weird, showing your personality, I say because I teach a class on this, it doesn’t mean you have to be posting memes every day or only telling jokes. I think everyone has their own brand of what I call weird, but it’s really just your personality. And so it might be sharing takes in your industry that a lot of people disagree with, sharing stuff about your personal life that you’re comfortable sharing, sharing hard moments in your business. But for whatever reason, the framing of weird seems to help people think about things in a new way. Yeah. Finn Thormeier: And I mean, I would say it comes at a time where it’s most needed for the platform because there is so much AI. I think LinkedIn just won the award of the platform that has the most AI slop Jillian Richardson: on it. Wait, what do you mean? I didn’t hear this. Finn Thormeier: Yeah, I think someone published, I think it was some major publication that did an analysis and it was like 43% of all of LinkedIn posts was categorized as AI slop. However, that was being categorized and it was the highest compared to X and Instagram and Substack and all the other platforms. But I think having a personality, showing your personality, being willing to show up the way that you are, maybe not fully, but more so, has always worked. But now, given that there’s so much AI-generated content, which I think, one, means there’s just a lot more content and a lot of the content just looks and sounds the same, just because everyone basically has the same ghostwriter now. Jillian Richardson: Yep. Finn Thormeier: I guess that’s why it’s even more needed right now versus, I don’t know, two or three years ago. Jillian Richardson: A hundred percent. And the thing on AI, I don’t know if you saw that there’s now a new button on LinkedIn. It sounds like AI slop, which is fascinating that LinkedIn decided to add that to the platform. Like three weeks ago, they had an AI rewrite feature, but, uh, If people are going to use some sort of ghostwriting tool, now that there’s that button, you have even more of a reason to work with a human ghostwriter. Finn Thormeier: It’s almost like signaling to everyone, but just having one weird sentence in there that’s like, this is really me. I actually wrote this. Jillian Richardson: Yes. A person wrote this. Finn Thormeier: Now, um, you also, I think on your website, you list kind of some benefits of being weirder. Jillian Richardson: Yeah. Finn Thormeier: What are some of the benefits of showing up weirder? Jillian Richardson: So honestly, the biggest one I would say is that the more fun you have with your writing, the more you are likely to actually show up because so many people ha it’s kind of like with exercise. If you do a form of exercise that you super, super, super hate. You’re going to be less likely to go to the gym than, you know, if you sign up for a Zumba class and you’re like, oh, I love Zumba and I have all my friends there and it’s my favorite part of the week. So if you can actually see it as a creative writing exercise, a way to get to know yourself, a way to get to know the world, then you’ll show up and you’ll do it more. And consistency is what builds a social media presence. Finn Thormeier: Okay. And I guess it’s, I mean, that’s one of the benefits, consistency. I mean, the other benefit I feel like is, and again, feel free to talk to other ones, but if this is actually you, you just have stronger bonds with people, with your audience, right? Because it’s... Jillian Richardson: I totally agree with that. Because there’s this bizarre thing on LinkedIn where... People will hire a ghostwriter and then they’ll get some sort of AI commenting tool that’s like commenting and also in their DMs. And then I’ve heard this from a lot of people I work with. They have this bizarre experience of feeling like they know a person and then they get on Zoom and they’re like, wait, this person doesn’t seem at all like the person I was interacting with. Was I even interacting with the person at all? And a lot of the times it turns out that they literally weren’t. And what a terrible way to interact with your customer, that their first impression of you is, actually, I don’t know you at all. Finn Thormeier: Yeah. Well, it can also, I mean, it goes both ways. I think oftentimes people will realize if you don’t allow yourself to show that weird or Weird side of you or that personality of yourself that on the call they’ll be like, you’re actually more interesting than I thought. Yes. Jillian Richardson: That’s a great point as well. That’s a good flip side of, oh, actually I enjoyed talking to you more than I thought I would. Finn Thormeier: Yeah. No broetry. You don’t speak in one line sentences. Jillian Richardson: Yeah. Yeah. Finn Thormeier: Okay. I want to show, do you have a favorite example of a weird person? Post or being weird on LinkedIn. I’m going to share my screen here. I’ll just show one here. So like one example, let me make this big. Do you just see my LinkedIn now? Jillian Richardson: Yes, I can see it. This is my like pièce de résistance. Finn Thormeier: Exactly. Yeah. So this is kind of, it’s a good example of a weird post because it’s also your post where you make the case that people should be weird. This is the post how I found you. It started with, I am on my knees begging, be weird on LinkedIn, 10% weird, 100% weird if you had a good breakfast. It’s already clear that this post has personality. This is a hook that no one would use on LinkedIn. It’s a very bold choice to start a sentence like that and no one sees that on LinkedIn. Then
