Matt Barker

I'm glad I'm thick skinned enough to:

- get rejected a lot
- do repetitive boring things
- fuck up and learn from mistakes

I get hurt by stuff every now and then, of course.

I'm human. I have meltdowns. Ask my wife and she'll reel off countless times that's happened!

But man, if you can just suck it up and:

- publish LinkedIn posts that flop
- send connection requests that get ignored
- give value without expecting anything back

I swear you'll grow faster than 99% of people.

(not just on linkedin, but in your career + life + as a person)

Thick skin → big time hack!

p.s. managed to dig out a picture that my wife took of me as i had one of my meltdowns!! hahaha. i remember she took this and said "i'm going to show you this the next time you have a meltdown to remind you how stupid you're being" or something like that. anyway, here it is in all it's glory folks. laugh away

I said this 1 year ago today. But I still stand by it:

Writing online is THE best confidence hack.

4 years ago I was too scared to go put a business card in a cafe.

(not even lying. ask my wife 😂)

Today I teach ex-Morgan Stanley C-suites, Amazon leaders and 7 figure business founders to write on LinkedIn.

I write on LinkedIn every single day.

Here’s 13 benefits of writing on LinkedIn that you probably wouldn't ever think of, but make a MASSIVE difference to your confidence:

1. You get better at writing → the more you write the easier it gets to say what you really think.

2. You find your voice → writing helps you figure out how YOU like to share ideas.

3. People see your skills → sharing what you know shows others that you’re good at something (aka self promotion).

4. You build a good habit → writing teaches you to stick with something and builds discipline.

5. You see that your ideas matter → when people like or comment on your posts, it reminds you that what you say is actually worth something.

6. You get stronger inside → sharing your thoughts and getting bad/negative feedback builds thick skin.

7. You stop worrying about what people think → the more you write, the less you care about being judged, super freeing.

8. You find your people → writing online helps you meet others who care about the same things you do.

9. Cool things can happen → your posts could lead to new jobs, clients, friends and other exciting chances.

10. You get more creative → writing helps you think of new ideas and look at things in fresh ways.

11. You see how far you’ve come → over time, you’ll notice how much better your writing and ideas have gotten.

12. You learn more about yourself → writing helps you process your thoughts and what you really think of things.

13. You feel good about helping others → your posts might inspire or teach someone else and that is an awesome thing.

Write.

Watch yourself become a more confident person.

✌️

Wanna grow your confidence and write on LinkedIn?

I'll show ya.

I put together this 4 hour training course for you here: https://lnkd.in/ekj8PEhs

But I'm closing it today.

So if you wanna improve your writing / grow your confidence?

Get on it!

I love it when this happens ↓

My coach client wrote a LinkedIn post without:

- mobile optimisation
- silly formatting
- overthinking

He just wrote. He just wrote a real, life update about:

- where he's been
- where he's going
- why he's doing it
- how he feels about it

It's his most engaged post in the last 3 months.

The reason for this:

Because it's raw and emotional.

When you write without thinking about external factors, like formatting or optimisation or what people will think.

The reader FEELS something.

It's almost indescribable. Annoyingly.

My advice to you, for next time you write a post:

Think less. Write more.

See how it goes.

Today, I've got 188,402 followers on LinkedIn.

But if I search my name on ChatGPT:

I’m STILL pretty much invisible.

Can ya believe it? I’ve put the effort in:

- 4 years of consistent posting
- Published 2,578 posts
- Gotten 59.5M impressions

And my personal brand is STILL not strong enough to be the first name when someone searches for “linkedin writing experts” or “best copywriters to follow on linkedin” or “who to follow to learn copywriting”.

So, simple question:

How do my competitors appear in AI overviews / searches over me?

I am absolutely clueless with this kinda thing.

But here’s what I’m gonna do:

1. Sign up to the Ahrefs​ AI Brand Radar
2. See where + how my competitors show up over me
3. Create a plan to make my personal brand more visible
4. Quickly gain more visibility in AI search and start winning

It’s ridiculous to be putting in years of effort:

- growing my personal brand
- attracting more followers
- spending hours every week on LinkedIn

Only to be completely invisible to anyone searching.

If you’re growing your personal brand, check out the AI Brand Radar: https://lnkd.in/ePqpedcW

(don’t even need an Ahrefs​ subscription account btw. totally separate which is cool)

Time to become more visible ✌️

#ad

You should stop using ChatGPT to write LinkedIn posts.

And do this instead:

1. Create a magicpost.in account
2. Go to 'metrics'
3. Select date range
4. Sort by likes/comments
5. Click on your best performing posts
6. Hit 'save as template'
7. Create new post + add fresh ideas and angles
8. Pick your template as the structure

First draft in seconds.

Edit. Tweak. Schedule. Done.

Simple.

✌️

4+ years of posting daily and I could count on two hands how many negative comments I've gotten. It's weird. But I'm CERTAIN i'm in the minority, because:

I see proof of negativity / hate most weeks.

People posting screenshots of crazy, hateful comments they've gotten.

- women getting harassed by creepy dudes
- young people getting blasted for being ambitious
- literally anyone getting hate for posting selfies

It's absolutely everywhere.

I posted about my wife being important to me on here once and I got a woman say I shouldn't be posting about it on LinkedIn because LinkedIn is for business.

It's mad stuff.

And I've always thought:

"Ah yeah, that's normal. Comes with the territory of putting yourself out there."

But I'm starting to wonder...

If I don't get many negative comments, but everyone else seems to...what am I doing differently?

Here's few things that I think about / do when I write my linkedin posts (so you can get less negative comments):

1. I try and be positive with 90% of my posts
2. I never purposely put other people down
3. I don't talk about politics or anything "in the news"

(apart from the time i brokedown copywriting lessons from donald trumps' winning election campaign...yeah 😂)

4. I aim to uplift people with my posts
5. I never want to scare my reader / incite fear
6. I add nuance / context 95% of the time

Ultimately, I just try and be as helpful and realistic as possible.

Maybe I'm just not a very polarising person.

But something for you to think about:

Try being helpful. Try being realistic. Try being uplifting.

Be someone who makes people smile when they think of you :)

✌️

p.s. absolutely pointless picture of me here. lets see if it gets any hate hehe. come at me!

All my LinkedIn writing books, courses and trainings here: https://lnkd.in/eWRj-pd9

This is where LinkedIn's "relevant" feed fails.

And this isn't a moan, just an observation.

Yesterday I was shown a post from 2 weeks ago.

But the post was about halloween.

The hook included the word "halloween" in it. It was written about "today" - "today" being halloween.

When I see this, I'm not interested. Obviously.

And this is where the relevancy feed on linkedin kinda sucks because that post has a shelf life of 1 day / 2 days maximum.

It shouldn't be shown 2 weeks on.

Brilliant that posts are lasting 2 weeks in the feed. LOVE that.

But it actually makes me want to do the opposite:

(and here's the linkedin posting lesson for you)

Write evergreen, not relevant content.

Because your my post lands in someones feed 2 weeks after you post it, you want it to be relevant then, so they read + engage with it.

What do you think?

Relevant feed good or nah?

p.s. the unfortunate example i'm referencing here (below) was this Alex Thompson post. good sign the post was worth staying in the feed, but also shouldn't be hanging around this long if it's THAT seasonal!

Commenting before or after your post goes live will not make it go viral. But this will:

The post ITSELF.

- the topic you write about
- how you write it
- who / how many people it gets pushed to

Yes, there is 100% elements of luck.

If someone likes it who has a bigger audience, it can get pushed into that audience and boom, you get more engagement and reach.

(shout out to all the engagement pods out there!)

I got my lucky break when i was first starting out because a guy with 40,000 followers commented on one of my posts.

And from that point, i was off to the races.

BUT there are 2 things I notice the most with my most viral posts:

1. they're broadly understandable topics - money, relationships, morning routines, ai.

2. the idea and packaging of the post is simple and easy for anyone to read

Here's 6 examples of my most viral LinkedIn posts from 2025:

(check these out and learn from them)

1. https://lnkd.in/et_tgCZm
2. https://lnkd.in/eudJ9Kvi
3. https://lnkd.in/e-Vc3Vhh
4. https://lnkd.in/enaqiQwk
5. https://lnkd.in/euvP4xm6
6. https://lnkd.in/enTSVPjQ

The big takeaway:

ANYONE can understand these posts.

You don't need to know anything about the topic at hand.

What's the worst advice you've heard to go viral?

Hit me up in the comments

This is my 4th December writing posts on LinkedIn.

But each year, I’ve noticed the same thing:

The energy shifts.

- impressions tend to dip a bit
- people are in christmas party mode
- everyone's stressed working before holidays

LinkedIn slows down, a bit.

And most will stop posting.

But the ones who DON'T stop posting, do it differently.

Here’s 3 LinkedIn writing lessons from showing up in December 4 years in a row:

1. It's a good time for Recap Mode

Recap Mode = recapping your year. What went well? What went bad? What did you hate / love? What will you do differently next year? Everyone's looking back at the year in December, so join them!

2. Writing feels easier when you follow the mood

Duno about you but nothing in me feels "strategic" in December. I've got presents on my mind. I've got family, friends, events, things on my mind. I'm winding down not winding up. My advice: follow that. If people are winding down, wind down with them. Don't push square pegs into round holes.

3. Posting less in December does not hurt growth

January is THE #1 month on LinkedIn to post. 50% of people are annoyed about being back at work, doomscrolling when they should be working. The other 50% are buzzing to be back at it, motivated. You'll make up for any lost ground in January.

Takeaway:

Take it easy in December.

I get you want to keep momentum.

But ENJOY your writing. Make that the priority.

If you enjoy it you're gonna want to do it. And it won't feel like a chore / pain over the holiday szn.

It'll feel easy :)

Want some inspiration for December content?

Here's a free 7 minute training for you: https://lnkd.in/evvwVJ8M

Yes. Free. A Christmas gift, lets say

6 years ago:

- Single
- 28lbs overweight
- Living in a 6-bed house share in London, dodging mould and passive-aggressive fridge notes.

5 years ago:

- Met Serine
- Lost 36lbs
- Moved in with my best mate Brad (upgrade)

4 years ago:

- Moved in with Serine
- Moved to Cyprus
- Binned the 9-5

3 years ago:

- Started my own copywriting business
- Started posting on LinkedIn
- Started catching a tan instead of the Northern Line

Today?

- Sun (or shade if it’s 40c heat)
- Health (to my knowledge anyway)
- Love (i married Serine last year)
- Wealth (well, my version of it)

All stuff I didn’t have 6 years ago.

Now? I'm a happy chap.

Funny how fast life moves when you actually back yourself, init?

If you’re ready to build your own version?

I recommend you start with growing your LinkedIn presence.

Here’s how to do that 10x faster than most: magicpost.in.

✌️

P.S. this is day 10 of posting my top 15 best performing LinkedIn posts of 2025 to show you exactly what worked for me on LinkedIn in 2025 so you can model / emulate my best posts for YOUR LinkedIn content, starting January 1st 2026.

This is my 6th best performing post of 2025.

If you want to follow along for the rest:

1. Go to my profile Matt Barker and hit follow
2. Click the 🔔 top right to get notified when I post
3. Wait each day to get notified on LinkedIn (I post at 1pm UK time)
4. Click the notification and open my post each day
5. Read the post and take note of how I wrote the post
6. Save the post so you can model / emulate it in 2026

✌️

5 LinkedIn writing skills to learn in the next 60 days:

1. Writing clear, simple sentences
2. Hook writing
3. Storytelling
4. Editing
5. Speed

Learn these.

Then add magicpost.in in to schedule, analyse and manage your posts.

Unbeatable.

What skill would you add?

Nothing makes me eye roll more than this:

“Don’t schedule your posts! It decreases reach!”

LinkedIn Gurus preach this advice CONSTANTLY.

But the biggest struggle for beginner creators?

Consistency.

Make it make sense.

I'll tell you, after 4 years and 2,394 posts:

If consistency is your enemy → automation is your BEST FRIEND.

I’ve made 2 tasks a non-negotiable, every week, for 4 years:

1. Write my week’s posts in one go → time block every Monday
2. Schedule posts at same time → using magicpost.in

This works for me, might not work for you.

But if your biggest problem is staying consistent?

Thank me later ✌🏼

P.S. be careful who you listen to. a nice guy called Ian McKenzie just yesterday posted (pictured) about a LinkedIn "guru" who, on a live webinar, advised their guests to never repost / reshare anyone's content because it "makes you look like a fan". guess what that "guru" asks their readers to do at the end of every post?

REPOST AND RESHARE 😂

just ridiculous.

My business goal: hit $300k in 2025. I'm at $325k.

Here's the monthly revenue breakdown (so far):

Jan → $17,936
Feb → $19,668
Mar → $12,336
Apr → $22,808
May → $16,614
Jun → $37,206
Jul → $41,286
Aug → $41,413
Sept → $28,101
Oct → $47,441
Nov → $40,757 (with BFCM still to come)

I have no co-founders, team or payroll.

All gone to me, the tax man + a few contractors along the way.

But I use cheap tools I use to save time / make money:

- ThriveCart easy payments for clients / customers
- Kit write and send 5 x emails/week
- magicpost.in to write, schedule, analyse LinkedIn posts
- Loom saves me 20+ meetings and 30+ hours/month
- Zoom to speak to anyone worldwide anytime
- Skool where i host my private linkedin writing club
- Calendly saves hours of back and forth arranging times

It's not always easy. But I love this little business.

Doing it on my terms, in my way.

Growing LinkedIn profiles with fast, easy and fun writing.

What else would you like to know?

I'm 99% confident you'll agree with this:

Writing LinkedIn posts is TIME CONSUMING.

- over editing every single word
- second guessing yourself
- staring at a blank page
- writing drafts + never posting them

Well, I have a dirty lil secret for you:

I don't always write LinkedIn posts from scratch.

Because I repurpose my best posts.

The strategy is simple:

Do more of what worked. Save time writing.

Here's my exact 15 step process to repurpose my best LinkedIn posts (in under 10 minutes):

1. Go to magicpost.in
2. Go to Metrics
3. Select last 30 days
4. Sort by likes
5. Click on a post
6. Click Save as template
7. Go to New post
8. Select Template mode
9. Find the template you saved
10. Click Use this template
11. Select Close similarity
12. Write an opinionated subject, 5-10 sentences
13. Click Generate a post
14. Tweak and edit to make it ‘you’
15. Schedule to post

This saves me hours every week writing LinkedIn posts.

I just need to do more of what works.

But now it’s your turn.

You should try this with magicpost.in if you’re:

- A ghostwriter wanting to grow your client’s profile
- A solopreneur wanting to get more engagement
- An employee wanting to quickly write + post content
- A consultant wanting to scale your LinkedIn posts

Or if you’re struggling for time writing your LinkedIn posts.

(we've all got lives to live and money to make!)

Re-use your best posts → save hours on writing.

P.S. get 70% off the magicpost.in yearly plan and 40% off the monthly plan, for life with code 'MATTBF10'.

After 4 years writing on LinkedIn, I know:

Being 100% original, all the time, is HARD.

- feels like everything already exists
- why listen to me when it’s been said before?
- i’m not creative ALL the time
- my own ideas don’t work as well as other writers’

So I’ll let you in on a little secret.

I’m not 100% original all the time.

Because writing that already worked, is already proven.

So the best strategy is:

Do more of what worked.

Here’s my exact 15 step process to keep writing banger post after banger post and keep getting more LinkedIn post engagement (without needing to be 100% original every time):

1. Go to magicpost.in
2. Go to Metrics
3. Select last 30 days
4. Sort by likes
5. Click on a post
6. Click Save as template
7. Go to New post
8. Select Template mode
9. Find the template you saved
10. Click Use this template
11. Select Close similarity
12. Write an opinionated subject, 5-10 sentences
13. Click Generate a post
14. Tweak and edit to make it ‘you’
15. Schedule to post

This process MASSIVELY increases my odds of hitting another big post.

And I don’t need to be 100% original.

I just need to do more of what works.

But now it’s your turn.

You should try this with magicpost.in if you’re:

- A ghostwriter wanting to grow your client’s profile
- A solopreneur wanting to get more engagement
- An employee wanting to quickly write + post content
- A consultant wanting to scale your LinkedIn posts

Or if you’re struggling for engagement on your LinkedIn posts.

(because who isn’t in 2025, eh?)

Re-use your best posts → get more engagement, faster.

LinkedIn are beta testing a "boost post" feature.

So I asked my email list of 15,432 what they thought:

- "i tried it on sunday $16 for 2 days. no obvious roi yet"
- "tried it and didn't get a bean!"
- "total bs and a waste of money"
- "waste of money"

What are your thoughts?

I run a $300k/year one person writing business.

But I am TERRIBLE at planning. TERRIBLE.

If you asked me:

“Hey Matt, what projects do you have in the pipeline?”

I’d say something like:

“I barely know what’s for breakfast tomorrow. Not a clue. You?”

🙃

I’ve been using Notion since 2022 as a place to:

- keep important numbers for my business
- document and write out business systems
- make free and easy landing pages

And that’s great. It’s helped me a lot.

But…have you seen the new Notion Agent?

It’s an AI Agent at the bottom right of the screen.

I thought I’d mess around with it for 5 minutes.

And what the actual F…

Here’s what I did (and it literally has blown my mind):

(no seriously, my mind is now in 1,759,408 tiny pieces)

1. Opened up the Notion Agent

The button looks like a funny little man with a moustache. Kinda like the Pringles dude. Except it’s not. I clicked that which opened up a chat box.

2. I told it what I wanted

Because I’m terrible at planning, I wanted to create a project dashboard where I can log, manage and progress projects. E.g. launching a new course.

This is what I prompted it:

“i want you to create a project tracking dashboard that i can use to create, manage and progress important projects for my one person writing business. for example, i want to launch a new educational video course in January / February 2026. it’s now october 2025. i will be taking christmas time off (around 2 weeks). but i want to be able to have a dashboard where i can see timelines and deadlines of what i need to execute and by what date so i can launch this course. this project is one example.”

3. I sat back and watched

The moustache dude started doing it’s thing. I literally just sat and watched it. Took a couple sips of my oat cappuccino.

And I sh*t you not…

The images below are what it created for me.

It created:

- a projects master database
- a timeline of projects by date
- a kanban card style drag and drop dashboard
- a full individual task database
- a calendar view with tasks mapped out by day
- another kanban card style dashboard, but for tasks

Do you understand how long this would’ve taken me?

Legit, 2+ hours?

But it took TWO MINUTES with this Notion Agent.

WTF.

Anyway, BRB as I’m now a master planner all of a sudden.

Game changer, man!

You gotta try this: https://lnkd.in/eY3d3JK8

#NotionPartner #NotionAI

I already wrote a Valentine’s Day post today but i deleted it because i hated it.

It was a sarcastic post about how Valentine’s Day is about men, not love or women. I was writing it tryna bait a reaction from people who might think im a complete self obsessed, masogynist.

Tbh, it was funny.

But i also just felt a bit weird about it. It wasn’t performing very well, either. Doesn’t help the case for keeping it live.

So yeah I deleted a post.

2nd time in four years and 2,600+ posts I’ve ever deleted one.

THIS was my real Valentine’s Day today.

We spent the whole day together:

- coffee in the sun
- ikea trip to get a comfy office armchair
- swung by the mall
- lunch at a class Cypriot tavern
- coffee at a friends shop
- chatted for a while

And got her some flowers (I know valentines day is a scam / made up / whatever but it’s really not hard to just get some flowers for the gal ya love!).

Have a great day to all of you with a loved one.

✌🏼

p.s. I don’t recommend deleting posts if it’s not performing very well. but if you just hate the post then delete it. no reason for keeping work you’re not proud of on the internet.

If I can give myself credit for one thing, it's:

Making myself feel GUILTY for not working.

- a friend or family comes to visit us
- we go have fun and do nice things
- i work less naturally to spend time with them

I know I'm not the only one who does this.

But it's not something I'd LIKE to do all the time.

Note to self (and you, if you're like me):

Take the damn time OFF.

Just book it off.

- inform clients / colleagues
- block it out in your calendar
- actually take time off and chill

Don't make yourself feel that guilt.

Do you do this? I can't be the only one!

Last night I spoke to a founder (and new dad) who:

- recently exited an agency
- started his own agency
- wants to use linkedin to get clients

But there's oneeeeee little problem...

He absolutely hates writing content.

It just ain't his thing. He's better at:

- sales
- systems
- strategy

He never had to worry about content before.

He had co-founders who did all that.

But now he's flying solo:

Content's pretttttyy important.

(yes, i'm understating how important)

Because he's the only person responsible for marketing his business and making money.

Here's 5 pieces of advice I gave him:

1. Write from your Lived Experience.
2. Don't go plucking content ideas out of thin air.
3. Let your words flow. Don't try to conform or fit in.
4. Taken proven formats and recycle them
5. Ask "can anyone else write this?". If yes, start over.

You can take this advice for yourself and run with it.

But if you hate writing content too?

I put together 4+ hours of LinkedIn writing + audience building training.

It's a BF special. And it disappears on Tuesday.

Train yourself here: https://lnkd.in/ekj8PEhs

Train yourself to love writing → market + sell yourself, easier.

Yesterday I posted about how my wife supports me and how I think that’s important for men today.

Wild to me that SOME people don’t think that’s business related, or at least don’t have the foresight to see that it is.

Wild to me that some people are so offended by seeing this on LinkedIn, too.

Business is about people / humans / relationships.

Wake the f up, people!

I’m 32 years old. I’ve driven $1.3M+ as a writer in 4 years.

But I’ve done it all without this:

A website with tracking data.

I’ve had a website for 2+ years now. But ask me if I know:

- who visits
- where they come from
- what pages they visited
- what they clicked on

I have absolutely no idea.

I’ve built my whole business using LinkedIn → email list → customer / client. Meanwhile, my website either:

A - sits there gathering dust
B - gets potential clients visiting, then leaving

I may have lost LITERALLY $100,000s in revenue. Insane.

Here’s 5 steps I’d be taking to track website data and increase revenue, if I started all over again:

1. Sign up to Ahrefs​ Webmaster Tools → ahrefs.com/webmaster-tools
2. Connect my website
3. See exactly what pages are bringing in visitors
4. Find mistakes + broken pages wasting opportunities
5. Fix them, then double down on what’s working

It’s mad to:

- spend years building your reputation
- send thousands of people to your website
- work this hard to get attention

Only to be completely blind to what happens next.

Don’t be a fool like me. Don’t make this harder for yourself.

Connect your site and see what’s actually going on.

If you’ve got a website, check out the Ahrefs Webmaster Tools: ahrefs.com/webmaster-tools

(it’s completely free with an account too, which is pretty nuts)

Time to stop guessing ✌️

#ad

I'd like to thank my mum, my dad, my brother, my wife.

I'd like to thank Mrs Nesbit who gave me my first ever paper round job at 14 years old.

I'd like to thank the brilliant, brilliant people of the internet who continue to not understand sarcasm.

I'd like to thank my high school english teacher who showed me what creative writing looks like.

Wouldn't have made it onto LinkedIn Lunatics without ya!

✌️

P.S. tip for ya: you shouldn't lie about stuff on the internet. i don't do that. but one thing i do A LOT is write things in the form of a certain character to make people think and feels things that i want them to think and feel.

for example, writing as though i am an obnoxious linkedin influencer who is famous and deserves to be well known because i have a few followers.

what a fun time to be alive 😂

P.P.S i grew 4,000 followers in january so i created a free training on how i write the posts that grow my followers: https://lnkd.in/d29V4rih. get it before, well, nothing really. it's just really good so get it. it's free too.