Social selling, leadership and AI – My biggest lessons from the last 90 days, Tim Hughes

The last three months have been a whirlwind, podcasts, panels, books, and conversations with some of the most brilliant minds in business

When Adam and I started DLA Ignite, our mission was clear:

To use social media as a force for good, helping disadvantaged people unlock its power to create better lives for themselves

To do that, we needed to build something commercial, sustainable, and impactful

Afterall we have mortgages to pay and food to put on the table for our families

That’s how our social selling methodology was born

Solving a solution to a problem businesses have struggled with for decades:

❌ Nobody wants to be cold-called
❌ Nobody enjoys spam emails
❌ Nobody appreciates being pitched to on social

We all know that the results from cold calling and sending emails have fallen off a cliff

So when an AE contacts us and says he's creating 8 x high quality ICP meetings a week with new clients, everything falls into place

It's now down to business to see that an AE creating 8 or maybe 5 meetings a week should be the normal for every company

Now onto my other quarterly highlights

Quarterly Highlights

Social selling maturity assessment

We have developed a free online survey so you can see (and measure) your social selling maturity

This is based on over 10 years of working with businesses to empower them to social sell, from huge global enterprises down to SMEs

Your score is a good indication of how effective you are at using social in relation to sales and it also shows you where the areas of weakness (and therefore quick wins for improvement) are

Why not spend 10 minutes of your day to see how you fare as a social seller

Link here

My podcast #TimTalk conversations keep inspiring me

This quarter, I past the 9th anniversary of #TimTalk as well as the 600th interview

You can check out all of the interview on my youtube channel here

Speaking & Events

I was honoured to be chosen as a judge for Fast Company Turkey’s Digital CMO Awards – a great opportunity to see innovation in marketing up close.

In June I got to speak on AI sustainability and responsibility thank you to Dinis Guarda for the invite

I spoke with the Academy of Experts on personal branding

Continued to work with Institute of Sales Professionals (ISP)

TEAM LEWIS Foundation, Summer Garden Party

WINN’s annual LinkedIn takeover

Annual trip to watch the tennis at Wimbledon

TDX at Agentforce World with Salesforce

Books That Shifted My Thinking
I read 10 books this quarter and these are the last 10 I read, all with book reviews

Key Lessons from Q3

💡 Lesson 1: Social selling is winning — cold calling is losing
Teams that build trust and influence online are booking 8X more meetings than those relying on cold calls. The shift is real, human connection is the new pipeline

💡 Lesson 2: Leadership is About Creating Space for Others
From my podcast guests to the founders I coach, I’ve seen again and again that the best leaders aren’t the loudest, they’re the ones empowering others to step up

💡 Lesson 3: AI is a Tool, Not a Threat
The businesses that thrive will be those that embrace AI with responsibility, focusing on model transparency, ethical use, and augmenting human potential

What’s Next

In Q4, I’ll be speaking more about AI for Entrepreneurs, sharing insights on how to transform your sales team with social selling, and continuing to bring you conversations with the brightest voices in leadership, CX, and innovation

If you want to join me on the journey, subscribe to the podcast or follow me here on LinkedIn, there’s a lot more to come