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Outbound Sales

How to Build a B2B Sales Pipeline From Zero

··9 min read

Every B2B company starts the same way. You have a product, a few early customers, and zero pipeline. No system. No predictable flow of qualified conversations. Just hustle and hope.

Here's the thing: building a sales pipeline isn't complicated. But most companies overcomplicate it by skipping the fundamentals, jumping straight to tools and tactics, and wondering why nothing sticks.

At Lumos, we've helped 200+ businesses build outbound pipelines from scratch. We've sent over 10,000+ LinkedIn messages and booked 4,500+ meetings. The process below is exactly what we follow with every new client. It works whether you're a funded startup or a bootstrapped agency.

Here's how to build a B2B sales pipeline from zero.

Step 1: Define Your ICP With Surgical Precision

"We sell to SaaS companies" is not an ICP. That's a category.

Your Ideal Customer Profile needs to be specific enough that a stranger could read it and build a target list in 30 minutes. If it's vague, your outreach will be vague. And vague outreach gets ignored.

Here's what a real ICP looks like:

  • Industry: B2B SaaS, specifically project management or CRM tools
  • Company size: 10-50 employees
  • Revenue: $1M-$10M ARR
  • Geography: United States, Canada
  • Funding stage: Series A or Series B
  • Target titles: Founder, CEO, VP of Sales, Head of Revenue
  • Tech stack signals: Uses HubSpot, Salesforce, or Outreach

Notice how specific that is. You're not targeting "anyone who might buy." You're targeting a narrow slice of the market where your solution fits perfectly.

Why this matters: When we build campaigns for clients, the ICP directly determines every downstream decision. The messaging, the channel, the timing, the offer. Get the ICP wrong and nothing else works. Get it right and even mediocre copy generates replies.

Spend more time here than you think you need. Talk to your best customers. Look at the deals that closed fastest with the least friction. Those patterns are your ICP.

Step 2: Choose Your Channels

You have two primary outbound channels: LinkedIn and cold email. Both work. They work differently.

LinkedIn is built for trust and engagement. Across our campaigns, we consistently see 30-37% reply rates and 30-52% connection acceptance rates. When someone accepts your connection request, they're signaling interest before you even pitch. Your profile, your content, your mutual connections all create credibility that email can't replicate.

LinkedIn works best when:

  • Your ICP is active on the platform (most B2B decision-makers are)
  • Trust and relationships matter in the buying process
  • You're targeting senior titles who get flooded with cold emails
  • You want higher engagement per touchpoint

Cold email is built for volume. With proper infrastructure, you can send 30,000+ emails per month across multiple domains and mailboxes. It's the right choice when you need to cover a large total addressable market quickly.

Cold email works best when:

  • Your ICP is broad and you need scale
  • You have a clear, compelling offer that works in text
  • You've already validated your messaging on a smaller channel
  • You want to complement LinkedIn with additional touchpoints

Our recommendation: Start with LinkedIn if you're building from zero. The reply rates are higher, the feedback loop is faster, and you'll learn what resonates before scaling to email. Then layer in cold email once your messaging is dialed in.

Step 3: Build Messaging That Doesn't Sound Like a Sales Pitch

This is where most companies blow it.

The #1 mistake in outbound messaging is being too salesy too fast. You open with your product, your features, your company story. Nobody cares. Not yet.

Prospects respond to relevance, not pitches.

Here's the difference:

Bad: "Hi [Name], I'm Erik from Lumos. We help B2B companies scale outbound with automated LinkedIn and email campaigns. Would you be open to a quick call?"

Good: "Hi [Name], noticed your team at [Company] recently expanded the sales org. Curious how you're handling outbound right now. A lot of teams in your space are shifting to automated LinkedIn outreach. Happy to share what's working."

The second message leads with something relevant to the prospect. It references their situation, not your product. It asks a low-pressure question instead of demanding a meeting.

Key principles for outbound messaging:

  • Lead with the prospect, not yourself. First sentence should reference their company, role, or a shared context.
  • Keep it short. LinkedIn connection requests should be under 300 characters. First messages should be 3-5 sentences max.
  • Sound like a human. No corporate speak. No jargon. Write like you're texting a colleague, not drafting a press release.
  • One clear CTA. Don't ask for a meeting, a reply, AND a referral. Pick one.
  • Test relentlessly. The first version of your message is almost never the best. Plan to iterate.

At Lumos, we use non-aggressive messaging that builds natural rapport. This approach consistently outperforms hard pitches. Our clients see it in their reply rates.

Step 4: Set Up Your Infrastructure

Outbound isn't just messaging. The technical infrastructure behind your campaigns determines whether your messages actually reach prospects.

Skip this step and your emails land in spam. Your LinkedIn accounts get restricted. Your pipeline dies before it starts.

For cold email, you need:

  • Multiple sending domains. Never send cold email from your primary business domain. Buy 3-5 secondary domains and set up dedicated mailboxes on each.
  • SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records. These authentication protocols tell email providers you're a legitimate sender. Without them, you're flagged as spam.
  • Mailbox warming. New mailboxes need 2-3 weeks of gradual sending to build reputation. Start with 10-20 emails per day and scale up.
  • Inbox placement testing. Run weekly tests to make sure your emails actually land in the primary inbox, not promotions or spam.

For LinkedIn, you need:

  • Dedicated residential proxies. If you're running automation, a proxy protects your account from detection and restrictions.
  • Profile optimization. Your LinkedIn profile is your landing page. Professional photo, clear headline, compelling summary. Prospects will check your profile before they reply.
  • Connection limits. LinkedIn has daily and weekly limits on connection requests. Exceed them and your account gets flagged. Respect the guardrails.
  • Warm accounts. Brand new or inactive LinkedIn profiles get scrutinized more heavily. Activity history, connections, and engagement all matter.

This infrastructure work isn't glamorous. But it's the foundation that separates campaigns that generate pipeline from campaigns that generate spam complaints.

Step 5: Launch and Test

Don't launch to your entire list on day one. Start small. Learn fast.

First two weeks: Send to a small batch of 100-200 prospects. Track everything.

  • Connection acceptance rate (LinkedIn): Target 30%+
  • Reply rate: Target 15%+ for email, 25%+ for LinkedIn
  • Positive reply rate: What percentage of replies express genuine interest?
  • Meeting conversion: How many replies turn into booked calls?

A/B test everything:

  • Subject lines (email): Test 2-3 variations simultaneously
  • Opening lines: The first sentence is the most important. Test different angles.
  • CTAs: "Open to a quick chat?" vs. "Worth exploring?" vs. a specific question about their process
  • Follow-up timing: Test 3-day vs. 5-day vs. 7-day gaps between messages
  • Sequence length: 3 follow-ups vs. 4 vs. 5

Small improvements compound. A 2% lift in reply rate across 1,000 messages means 20 more conversations per month. Over a quarter, that's 60 additional pipeline opportunities.

The key insight: Don't fall in love with your first campaign. Treat it as a hypothesis. The data will tell you what actually works.

Step 6: Optimize Continuously

Launching is the easy part. Optimization is where pipeline actually gets built.

We run bi-weekly optimization reviews with every client. Here's what we look at:

  • What's working? Which campaigns, messages, and audiences are generating the most replies and meetings? Double down.
  • What's not? Which sequences have low reply rates or high unsubscribe rates? Kill them fast. Don't waste another week on a message that's not resonating.
  • What's changed? Markets shift. A message that worked in January might underperform in March. New competitors enter the space. Job titles change. Stay current.
  • What should we test next? Always have 2-3 new variations queued up. New hooks, new angles, new ICPs to test.

The companies that build real pipeline aren't the ones with the best first campaign. They're the ones that iterate the fastest.

Most outbound agencies take a "set it and forget it" approach. They launch your campaign and check back in a month. That's not how you build pipeline. That's how you waste money.

Real Example: Sig2 Labs

Here's what this looks like in practice.

Sig2 Labs builds a location-based communication platform for field workers. They were running cold email campaigns that delivered sporadic, unpredictable results. Some weeks were strong. Other weeks, nothing. They had no visibility into what was achievable and no system they could rely on.

We implemented a LinkedIn-first outreach strategy with complete dashboard visibility and a predictable weekly cadence. Through bi-weekly optimization calls, we refined messaging based on response patterns. One key adjustment: we shifted targeting from business owners to operational leaders, which dramatically improved engagement.

The results:

  • 28-30% consistent reply rate maintained since launch
  • 30% connection acceptance rate across all outreach
  • ~12 quality engagements per week with target prospects
  • Predictable weekly cadence replacing sporadic outcomes
  • Quick ROI that made continued investment obvious

Sig2 Labs didn't need a bigger budget or more tools. They needed a system. A defined ICP, the right channel, tested messaging, proper infrastructure, and continuous optimization.

That's the playbook.

Start Building Your Pipeline

Building a B2B sales pipeline from zero isn't about finding a silver bullet. It's about stacking fundamentals: precise ICP, right channels, relevant messaging, solid infrastructure, disciplined testing, and relentless optimization.

Every company we work with at Lumos starts here. The specifics vary, but the framework doesn't.

If you want to see how other companies have built their pipelines with this approach, check out our case studies. If you're ready to explore what a done-for-you outbound system looks like, take a look at our pricing.

Or if you want to talk through your specific situation, book a free consultation. We'll map out what a pipeline-building system could look like for your business.