LinkedIn Strategy — brief, cadence, newsletter

Three decisions, in this order. Out of order is why most LinkedIn efforts produce a feed of unrelated observations and stop in week five.

Workflow

1. The brief — an editorial constitution, not a wish. Walk the five questions one at a time, each with a recommended answer, then validate:

python3 scripts/positioning_brief.py --input brief.json --output human

It refuses on the two things that make everything downstream impossible: an objective that is not one of the six real ones (career-change, consulting, thought-leadership, hiring, fundraising, community), and an audience too broad to exclude anyone. It also refuses fewer than two exclusions — a positioning that excludes nothing is availability.

Pillars: two to four, shares summing to 100, at least one backed by proof that already exists, at least one at 10-20% as the experimental slot. Every pillar needs a "why you"; if anyone could post it, cut it.

The script emits observable 90-day criteria. Follower count is deliberately absent — it moves for reasons unrelated to whether the objective is being met.

2. The cadence — priced against a bad week.

python3 scripts/cadence_planner.py --minutes 240 --stage starting --target-posts 3 --output human

Exit 0 fits / 2 below the 90-minute floor / 3 over budget with the overage named. Every activity is priced in minutes including the reply window, which is part of the post and not an extra. Allocation shifts with stage: from a standing start 60% of the budget belongs in other people's comment sections, because a post published to nobody reaches nobody.

Below 90 minutes a week it refuses to plan a posting schedule and returns a comment-only week: a cadence abandoned in week five is worse than one never started, because the abandonment is visible on the profile. Every plan ships with a minimum viable week.

3. The newsletter — only if the promise can be paid.

python3 scripts/newsletter_planner.py --followers 1800 --cadence biweekly \
  --minutes-per-month 420 --pillar "..." --output human

Refuses below LinkedIn's published 150-follower evaluation floor, and refuses a cadence whose six-month cost exceeds the budget. Emits a 12-issue arc rotating issue types across pillars, and a stop rule written before issue one.

Rules

• One objective. Two objectives serve neither; the audiences overlap less than they look.
• The exclusion list is the positioning. Refuse to skip it.
• Price the week from a bad week, not a good one.
• Consistency over volume. A skipped week is fine; a skipped month resets you.
• Review the brief quarterly, not weekly. A brief revised monthly is a mood.

Scripts

References and assets

• references/objective_to_pillars.md — the six objectives and the pillar arithmetic (7 sources)

• references/cadence_and_consistency.md — what a post really costs and why the floor exists (7 sources)

• references/newsletter_playbook.md — eligibility, cadence as a promise, the stop rule (7 sources)

• assets/positioning_brief_template.md — fillable brief

• assets/example_brief.json — a passing brief, for the validator

Distinct from

• linkedin-content — drafts and lints individual posts. This decides what they are about and how many there are. Posts without pillars are noise; offer this first, never chain silently.
• linkedin-analytics — tells you what happened. This decides what to do next.
• marketing-skill/content-strategy — company-level content marketing. This is one person's own presence.

Version: 1.0.0