Hi all. I'm planning to apply as an experienced hire for consulting firms (US) over the next 6 weeks.
I intend on contacting former business school alum that are currently working in target firms (some are direct friends, but most are simply new unknown contacts I found on LinkedIn). My goal here is to informally network over email, then lead them to a phone call, and subsequently ask for a referral.
I've heard conflicting information about the best approach for reaching out to people not already in my network:
- Some people have recommended signing up for LinkedIn premium and sending InMails to target contacts.
- Others have suggested sending out cold emails to those people (by either looking up their firm's email format and taking a chance with their email format/name, or some other unknown method).
I've found varying suggestions on different forums. But I'm curious whether anyone here has had luck with either of those approaches above. And if you used the email method to make initial contact, how did you source your target's actual email?
Any other informational networking advice would also be appreciated :)