LinkedIn has over 645 million members, who post on average 2 million posts a day, so it’s no wonder that not all your posts get seen, even by the people you are connected with.
Like Google and Facebook, LinkedIn has a closely guarded secret algorithm, which determines which posts get shown to whom. LinkedIn explains that it aims to prioritize “People you know, talking about things you care about”, and to do this it seeks to feature content relevant to the reader which is likely to promote engagement.
So how does a LinkedIn post work?
Being connected isn’t the silver bullet!
Personal connection – LinkedIn seeks out your interactions with people, common interests & skills, common connections and work experiences to determine who your post might be of interest to.
Interest relevance – LinkedIn analyses affinity groups, language, hashtags, groups followed and companies, people and topics a person has engaged with to determine whether your post is relevant to them.
Engagement probability – LinkedIn assesses if a person is likely to share, comment or react to a post based on their previous activity.
The LinkedIn algorithm runs a “Post quality assessment” before deciding how widely to share your content. If you’ve used poor grammar or your post isn’t easy to read, your content will not be shown to many of your connections.
LinkedIn then trials its assumptions for the first hour after you post. If you get more reactions than it had predicted in “Golden Hour”, LinkedIn will show your post to more people in your connection list.
As long as your post keeps getting engagement, it will continue to be distributed.
10 tips for improving your LinkedIn post reach
- Post content which is relevant to your audience. It’s tempting to broadcast your thoughts, but if you aren’t talking about topics which connect with your contacts LinkedIn won’t show it to them.
- Include an engaging / impactful image. Posts with images get 2x the reactions to those without.
- Promote your posts by @naming people and using #s. Anyone named will see your post, so make sure they are likely to respond. Your post will also be considered higher for relevancy for anyone using the same # as you. Avoid using more than 5 names, 3 #s, or multiple site links to avoid LinkedIn thinking you are trying to game the system.
- Actively encourage engagement – ask questions!
- Keep your content narrow and deep. People scan read posts, but when they stop to read a post, they are interested enough to read more than the headline.
- Post at the right time to maximize Golden Hour. Consider times when your audience is likely to be scrolling – e.g. during a commute, at lunchtime, at the school gate, kids tea time.
- Build your network. The more first connections you have, the more likely people are to be shown your content. Be wary of simply collecting connections though – LinkedIn does look for signs of interaction between you when deciding whether to prioritize someone to see your post.
- Respond to anyone who engages with your post. LinkedIn sees Post-Engagement-Response as a sign of a more genuine connection.
- Analyse your results. Monitor which types of post connect with your audience best and which day / what time of day people are responding to each type of content.
- Keep it authentic. Yes, LinkedIn is a business platform, but always remember that people do business with people.
Want to know more about improving your LinkedIn profile or about Social Selling? Talk to us here at WSI Digital Advisors.
