How to follow up on LinkedIn after Web Summit or any conference

Short answer: invite the person on LinkedIn the same evening, with one detail from the conversation. Then send at most four messages: day 1, day 3, day 7 and day 14. Each one adds something new, and the last one says you will stop. Any reply ends the schedule.

The usual mistake after a conference is waiting. You come home with a pile of badge scans and cards, the week fills up, and by the time you write, the person no longer remembers the stand or the sentence that made you worth answering.

Why speed matters more than polish

At a conference the other person talked to dozens of people in a day. What they remember a week later is mostly a face and one topic. A message the same evening still has that context. A message two weeks later has to start from zero, and it reads like a cold message from a stranger.

So the first job is not a clever sequence. It is a short invite on the day itself, while the detail is still fresh.

Sort your contacts first

Not everyone needs the same follow-up. A simple split we use for event contacts:

Tag	Who	Next step
A	Asked for something (a demo, a map, a quote)	Send it within one working day
B	Interested, not now	Same-evening invite, then a slow schedule
P, I, M	Partner, investor, press	A personal note within 24 to 48 hours, not a sequence
C	Nice to know	A LinkedIn invite, nothing more

Write the tag next to the name before you sleep. It takes ten seconds and saves the "who was this?" problem three days later.

The schedule

Day 0, same evening: the invite. Send it with a note this time. You have actually met, so the reason to connect is real, and the person has a face to put to the name. Keep it under 300 characters and include one specific thing they told you.

Hi Anna, good to meet you at Web Summit. You told me you were hiring your first sales person in Q1. I'll send you the example we talked about tomorrow.

This is the opposite of our advice for cold invites. For people you have never spoken to, we send a blank invite, because a note is usually a pitch in disguise. After a real conversation the note is not a pitch, it is a reminder.

Day 1: what you promised. If you said you would send something, send it, and keep the message about that thing and nothing else. One link, one sentence on what it is, one easy next step.

Day 3: a short nudge. Not "did you see my message?". Ask a smaller question about the thing you sent, or offer to change it. A message that is easy to answer in five words gets answered.

Day 7: a new angle. Add something they did not have: a fact about their market, a result, a follow-up thought on what they said at the stand. If you cannot think of a real one, skip this step. An invented connection is worse than silence.

Day 14: close the loop. Say you will stop writing, and that the offer or link stays valid if timing changes. This message often gets the most replies because it removes the pressure. After it, do nothing. If you want to stay in touch, put them on a monthly note, not a fifth nudge.

What every message needs

• One detail from the conversation. Not "great chatting!", but the sentence they actually said. If you did not write it down, you will not remember it. Take notes between conversations, not at the end of the day.
• One ask. Never two.
• Readable on its own. Assume they did not read the earlier ones.
• No pitch in the first message. See don't pitch in the first message.

Stop when they answer

Any reply, including a polite "not now", ends the schedule. Someone who said no should never receive the day 7 message because it was already queued. That also holds if the same person appears twice in your list. More on this in how many follow-ups to send after no reply and when AI outreach should stop.

If you met more people than you can write to

Twenty-five cards in a day is normal, and writing twenty-five good messages by hand on the evening is not. Two honest options: write to the A and B tags by hand, and leave C for a plain invite; or run the B and C contacts as a small campaign with approval turned on, so each message is reviewed before it leaves. What does not work is sending the same template to everyone, because the one detail from the conversation is the whole point.

And the people you did not meet

Everyone who was at the event but did not stop at your stand is a different problem: you do not have their name. One place to start is the public trace they left, such as comments on event posts. How that works is in find leads from Web Summit LinkedIn posts.

If you sell B2B and want to know how many of your buyers are on LinkedIn at all before you spend a week writing, request a free Client Map.