Disruptive Influence: The Business Storytelling & Brand Communication Podcast · Jeff Abracen

How to Design an Inbound Business with Nick Broekema

·1 hr 4 min·4 clips

Nick says it took nine months to build a fully inbound business from LinkedIn.

1. Disruptive Influence: The Business Storytelling & Brand Communication Podcast centers on Nick Broekema and how he built an inbound business through content design on LinkedIn. 2. Jeff Abrason hosts the conversation with Nick Broekema, who is described as a design and LinkedIn creator with 85,000-plus followers and a growing offer stack. 3. The episode asks how Nick turned design and posting into lead generation, positioning, and a sustainable business model. 4. Nick says he did a modest agency exit in 2018, then worked with startups and a Series B scale-up in Amsterdam before quitting because he no longer felt independent. 5. He explains that he wanted a passive income stream, but a coach pushed him to think about what he would actually do with his time. 6. The first step was talking to freelancers and people in SaaS through surveys, with questions about pain points, goals, desires, current reality, and past attempts. 7. Nick says his first LinkedIn post came from those interviews and showed people what he had asked and what they had said. 8. He says the early period involved randomness, posts about productivity, pricing strategy, and SLPs, and then a later shift toward selling through content. 9. Nick says his first two weeks included a carousel every day, which burned him out quickly and pushed him away from visuals for a while. 10. He defines a carousel as a cover slide with a hook, context slides, a breakdown, a recap or bonus section, and a final CTA slide. 11. Nick says the carousel format can include problem, pain, solution, myth-busting, or case-study breakdowns, not just “five tips.” 12. He links his content approach to website design, saying attention is scarce because people keep competitor tabs open and leave if the page feels clunky or boring. 13. Nick says content design is about visualizing and simplifying expertise through tactical writing and tactical design. 14. He says his one-to-one and cohort work includes ICP definition, positioning, offer creation, sales, and engagement. 15. He describes a client named Magalie, whose offer was reduced from about 12 deliverables to three pain points and three complementary solutions. 16. Nick says that simplification improved clarity, reduced ghosting, and lifted conversion because people could explain the offer in one sentence. 17. He says he wants clients to be about 60% happy with an offer before rolling with it, because over-planning keeps people stuck in analysis. 18. Nick says the goal is to validate quickly through posts, profile views, comments, and DMs rather than waiting for perfect certainty. 19. The tone is practical and conversational, with Jeff pushing for examples while Nick answers with timelines, frameworks, and specific client stories. 20. Listeners who build offers on LinkedIn will likely get the most value, while people wanting abstract branding theory may skip it.

As heard by us

A focused look at how clear positioning and LinkedIn can turn attention into inbound demand.

Nick Brukema talks through the slow work of turning a personal brand into something that brings business in on its own. The focus stays on the basics: defining the ICP, sharpening positioning, shaping the offer, and keeping the content simple enough that expertise is easy to…

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You want a real blueprint for making LinkedIn stop feeling random.

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