Eager to have your content hit the social media limelight? LinkedIn suggests that you rethink your strategies.
“Whenever content goes viral on LinkedIn, it generally triggers our attention as this isn’t something that’s typically promoted within the organization,” explains Dan Roth, LinkedIn’s Editor in Chief.
So, what is it that LinkedIn truly treasures? The answer has been constantly reshaping over the past few months due to the substantial changes that LinkedIn has brought to the workings of its news feed. As a result, some content gets boosted visibility, some witness a decrease in reach, and the presence of self-portraits has notably decreased.
For the multitude of entrepreneurs who actively engage or interact on LinkedIn, it is crucial to understand the implications of these changes. (A note from the author: I am a frequent poster myself.) For a clearer understanding, I connected with Roth and his colleague Alice Xiong, the Director of Product Management responsible for LinkedIn’s search and discovery products.
To digest our in-depth conversation, listen to this episode of my podcast, Problem Solvers. In the following parts, I have summarized the main points. We’ll delve into:
- The prominent changes in LinkedIn’s news feed
- Ways to Amplify Your Post’s Visibility on LinkedIn
- LinkedIn’s distaste for “viral” content
Before we get into it, let’s clarify what drives LinkedIn:
Addressing LinkedIn’s Challenges
LinkedIn has seen immense growth in activity in recent years. The company reports a year-over-year increase of 42% in shared content from 2021 to 2023, a 27% increase in viewed content, and an impressive rate of three new professionals joining every second.
Roth highlights that due to the pandemic, users’ posts on LinkedIn took a very personal turn. As work and personal lives merged, users began sharing pictures and family moments that are usually reserved for platforms like Facebook.
Moreover, users began to leverage common social media behaviors — like gaming the algorithm to gather maximum likes and followers.
In reaction, a considerable number of LinkedIn users voiced their dissatisfaction. “Users were expressing their wish to shift away from such content, preferring to learn ways to enhance their skills,” Roth articulates.
As a result, LinkedIn started an initiative to make the news feed more relevant and informative rather than purely engaging. After these changes — discussed in detail below — the company has observed an astounding 80% decrease in user complaints about irrelevant feed content.
The Two Key Changes in LinkedIn’s Feed
At its core, the changes include:
- As a LinkedIn user, your posts are now more likely to be seen by your followers.
- Why? Because that’s what users want.
“Users have conveyed that they find the most value in content that’s grounded in knowledge and guidance,” observes Xiong, “and they favor content that comes from familiar sources.”
Since these changes, LinkedIn has observed a 10% increase in people viewing posts from those they follow.
- Posts that disseminate “wisdom and guidance” are now prioritized across the platform.
- This is the second part of the change — and it’s a vital way your posts can reach people who aren’t your followers.
LinkedIn’s system now evaluates whether a post holds valuable insights and then shows it to users who might find it relevant and beneficial. “The key question for us is whether we believe we’re aiding our members in being more productive and successful?” Xiong says.
Since the changes, Xiong notes, LinkedIn has seen almost a 40% rise in “users exploring and viewing content that’s rooted in knowledge from people outside their network.”
Identifying ‘Wisdom and Guidance’ on LinkedIn
This is where it gets really interesting — how can an algorithm determine when a post is filled with genuine knowledge and guidance?
“Our goal is to highlight content that fosters a community based on the sharing of expert knowledge, especially in areas where your expertise is uniquely authoritative,” Roth clarifies.
While Roth and Xiong didn’t disclose all the metrics used, they did mention a few:
Roth explains, “Each piece of content has a unique potential audience. It’s important to think about who you’re trying to reach.”
LinkedIn considers this aspect as well. Its system reviews each post to determine its relevance.
For instance, if you’ve posted about your family, the system decides it’s relevant only to your close connections. But if you’ve posted about B2B marketing, the system starts showing it to individuals within that community.
“Creators should ponder on what insights they can provide to help others,” Xiong advises. “Content of this nature tends to connect you with the appropriate audience.”
- The author is writing within their primary field of expertise.
- When you post on LinkedIn, the platform doesn’t just assess your post’s value, but also evaluates you — and whether you’re an expert on the topic you’re discussing.
“Given we have the professional record on file,” Roth says, “it helps us ensure that we’re delivering the right content to the right people.”
- The post generates “substantial comments.”
- Previously, LinkedIn would boost posts with a high volume of comments. This led to the creation of “engagement groups” — users agreeing to quickly like and comment on each other’s posts to increase visibility.
LinkedIn wanted to stop this.
Now, it rewards posts that Roth describes as having “substantial comments,” where users are not just posting hollow comments, but are genuinely responding to the content of the post.
LinkedIn also takes into account the profiles of the commenters — are they random users, or do they belong to a certain group? Suppose you post about marketing. If several marketing professionals comment on your post, LinkedIn sees it as a positive signal.
- The post holds a viewpoint.
- To understand how LinkedIn evaluates posts, I shared one of my own with Roth and Xiong — a post where I shared advice on feeling empowered after an insult, drawing from a humorous sign I spotted in a coffee shop. The post did well, gathering over 2 million impressions. But why?
