AI for Sales and LinkedIn outreach · Lesson 2
Finding triggers
Which events 'trigger' an outreach and how to find them with AI.
Why triggers
Random outreach yields 1-3% replies. Trigger-based outreach yields 10-30%. A trigger is a concrete event that makes your outreach relevant right now.
Types of triggers
- Hiring: the company is recruiting for a role that needs your product.
- Funding: a fresh round means money for new tools.
- Regulatory changes: a new law they have to adapt to.
- Product announcements: a new product at the customer means a new pain just appeared.
- Technical events: outages, breaches, migrations.
- Personnel changes: a new CTO/CMO often re-evaluates the stack.
How to find them
- Job boards (Greenhouse, Lever) for hiring.
- Crunchbase, PitchBook for funding.
- LinkedIn for personnel moves.
- Pulse, Apollo, ZoomInfo for aggregation.
- AI aggregators (e.g. a custom GPT with web search).
How to use a trigger
In the first line of the email / LinkedIn note, mention the trigger concretely. Not "I noticed you raised funding!", but "Congrats on the Series B — you're probably revamping the finance stack right now."
Practical exercise
What to do after this lesson
Take 10 ICP accounts. Find at least 1 trigger for each. If 5+ have none, revisit your filter.
Task grader
Take 10 ICP accounts. Find at least 1 trigger for each. If 5+ have none, revisit your filter.
Ready-to-use prompt
Template for this lesson
Copy and adapt to your context. Text in angle brackets should be replaced.
Look for triggers for the account <name>. I'm looking for: <trigger type> What counts as relevant: <…> Where to look: <LinkedIn, jobs, press, regulatory> Give me: a list of triggers with date and source. If there are no triggers, say so plainly.
Prompt sandbox
Common mistakes
What people get wrong
- Assuming "a new CEO" is a trigger on its own. You still need an ICP match.
- Ignoring the trigger's date — a two-year-old event doesn't work.
- Doing outreach with no trigger and expecting miracles.
Pro tips
What works but no one documents
- A fresh trigger (< 30 days) works far better.
- One trigger = one message. Not "I noticed several things".
- If there's no trigger, skip the account — don't invent one.
When to use
Any targeted outreach.
When not to use
Mass mailing — it doesn't work anyway.
Quiz — 2 questions
1.What is a good trigger?
2.If an account has no trigger — what do you do?
Answered: 0 of 2
Discussion
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