"I just don't have the time to post on LinkedIn™️. It's not that I undervalue the benefits, it just takes me far too long because I overthink it"

This came from a delegate on a course I delivered recently and it hit me right between the eyes...That's why so many people find it hard to find the time to post content, they overthink it!

Also in this episode;

• Feedback on pods and direct messaging.

• How demure and mindful is your profile? I found out and got roasted!

• More changes coming to video content and Livestreaming...potentially.

• A heartbreaking post of the week

Serious question...why do you do it? 

What are your objectives and are you achieving them?

This week I received a message which challenged my views on posting content on LinkedIn™️. I disagreed with the points made but that doesn't make them wrong or inappropriate, just different and a good challenge to my thinking.

So I thought I would share my thoughts in this weeks episode.

That plus;

Drafting a post with AI✧

Premium perks

Forwarding DM's

More thoughts on organic reach (the lack of)

Post of the week

It's a common belief that the answer to poor (and getting worse) organic content reach from a company page is employee advocacy. So why are so many organisations getting it horribly wrong?

That plus;

• The new video feed and how it impacts the videos we post.
• Multiple image posts - new dimensions
• Images on external links are shrinking and it really doesn't matter!
• An outrageous post of the week

I was chatting recently with Lynnaire Johnston about this new feed (she doesn't yet have it) and she made the valuable point that this new style of delivery might necessitate a change in the way a video is produced.

Because the scroll has audio enabled (unlike in the normal feed) it puts more emphasis on the opening few seconds of the video and less emphasis on the words you type to accompany the post - these appear at the bottom of the video in this feed. This doesn't mean that you should worry less about the words because they still play an important role in the normal feed on both mobile and desktop (see image below).

In addition, the new video feed appears to zoom in somewhat which creates an issue with text on the video or even captions if you add them yourself.

As a reminder, this video feed is only enabled once you tap on some video posst you see on the main mobile feed, at the moment this is only for about 40% of the videos I see in my feed. Once you are in this feed you can the scroll to see more videos and those videos all autoplay with sound.

I suspect that LinkedIn will fix the zooming issue but that will probably take some time so it's worth ensuring your text does not go near the edges of your video for now.

The way images are displayed in a multi-image post is beginning to change as you can see here in these example of 2 and 3 image posts;

LinkedIn™️ have provided this helpful document which can be downloaded here.

I've had this change for a while but apparently more the majority of users are now seeing this in their feeds.

LinkedIn™️ have announced that images on posts with external links are shrinking unless you sponsor (advertise) that post, in which case the image stays the same size as it has always been.

Lots of people are up in arms about this!

Why?

External link posts are seen by very few people anyway so not seeing a larger or small image results in the same...it's not seen!

OK I'm being a bit cynical there but honestly guys, have you not learnt yet?....don't post external links, unless you really have to.

Earlier this year I was a panel member on stage at UpLift Live when a question about employee advocacy on LinkedIn was asked. My slightly cynical response was to state that asking employees to Repost or Like a company page post was not employee advocacy in any sense yet that is as far as most organisations go.

I stand by that answer but it did occur to me that it was worth trying to explain what a more productive method would be.

Firstly I am not a fan of the phrase 'employee advocacy'. To my understanding an 'advocate' is someone who promotes someone or something. This leads to a belief that employee advocacy is all about encouraging employees to promote the company that they work for.

And for the most part, that is what happens. Employees either repost company page content or directly promote the organisation that they work for either to other potential employees or customers.

This is highly ineffective.

Below is a classic example. Robert Half have published an article (ironically about employee advocacy) and then asked their employees to post it...so they do!

This is merely a distribution mechanism and, as you can see by the lack of engagement, not a very effective one!

Whilst this might be employee advocacy for some organisations, others 'ask' their employees to post about the amazing work environment or how they are so happy working for them or how impressed they are with the products or customer service etc etc.

It just comes across as forced and hollow...frankly nobody is buying it!

We all know that promotional content does not do well on LinkedIn, it is difficult to attract engagement and so typically achieves poor reach. So why do companies do it? It strikes me as being nothing more than a 'ticking the box' exercise.

"employee advocacy...done!" ✔️

All that said, we know that company page content has extremely limited reach and this reach seems to be getting worse so it does make sense for organisations to use their employees personal accounts for their benefit.

If however the objective is promotion, it simply won't work. The problem is that the objective is wrong, if the objective was greater visibility then employee advocacy could work, if done the right way.

When an employee of an organisation becomes influential on LinkedIn then the organisation will benefit from their greater visibility. To become influential on LinkedIn though, the employee shouldn't be posting about how amazing the company is, that's not great content.

The trick is to identify individuals within an organisation who have the motivation and ability to gain a following and influence on LinkedIn. This does not need to be many employees, just a few with the right mindset and desire.

The second part of this is about what employees are asked to do and many organisations will be deeply uncomfortable with what is the right approach - to encourage employees to develop their own personal brand by producing content that is helpful, interesting, entertaining and focussed on the audience.

This is usually seen as a threat in most organisations and that is the heart of the problem.

In the podcast I also get into the topic of recruitment and how this strategy will impact the sort of people that are recruited.

Tip: Start small by encouraging a few select employees to comment on company page content. Make sure the content is focussed on the audience and not the company and let the employees contribute to it by adding meaningful comments that add value to the piece.

These same employees should also be encouraged to comment of many other posts (not from the company) that are focussed on topics that will be interesting to your target audience.

Let them build their confidence and credibility this way first.

Then give them the tools and skills to start posting great content designed to encourage engagement.

Once they have gained a strong following and influence, they can occasionally post something about their employer or it's products/services but the main objective is to increase visibility and influence.

Ultimately, the power of employee advocacy lies in authenticity. By encouraging employees to share their unique perspectives, you can create a more compelling and genuine narrative for the organization.

This a belter from Lara Bywater and mainly because the topic is just....well, unbelievable really!

How on earth could anyone be so stupid as to think that this business card is OK? Maybe they would defend it by saying it's just harmless banter...if you believe that then just read the comment thread!

It's not clever, it's not funny and it shows a complete lack of empathy or understanding of how a woman would receive this.

The post is also well structured with a great hook line.

Well done to Lara for a great post and for having the courage to call out this sort of behaviour.

That's all for this week.

If you are in Odense in Denmark at Linkedsummit this week, come and say hello!

Until next time...

What changes can we expect and hope for on LinkedIn this year?

In this episode, I will go through my hopes, fears, and predictions for 2022…I think it’s going to be a good one!

Christmas is almost here and this is the last episode of 2021 so let’s take a look back at what’s been happening on LinkedIn this year.

A fantastic new notification feature was introduced this week but does this now require us to look more closely at our notification settings?

LinkedIn have announced the first cohort of 100 creators to benefit from funding and guidance support. I take a look at who they have selected and whether they are deserving of this support or not!

“Why should I bother creating awesome content, when it is arbitrarily limited by my connection network and not the quality of the content?”

I saw this comment in a thread this week and do you know what, it’s a really good point! …I think LinkedIn needs another feed, a feed where content is purely there because the algorithm thinks we will be interested - connecting, following and relevance do not count - just the quality and subject of the content.

Do you want followers or connections? Is a connection more valuable than a follower and can you build relationships with followers without the need to connect?

This week I deep dive into this and explore the relationship between followers and connections

I have been calling for employee verification on LinkedIn for years and LinkedIn have finally implemented it for company page admins…Unfortunately, they have done it for completely the wrong reasons and it doesn’t help at all!

It takes a leap of faith to be authentic on LinkedIn.

More than that, it takes real courage!

But the benefits are massive... it's time to take that hat off!

With the rumored introduction of a LinkedIn digital wallet and the announcement that Events will the first feature likely to utilize it.
I take a look at what features of LinkedIn could be monetized by users and explore whether this would be a good thing for the platform.

LinkedIns new initiative to support creators is now in full swing.

Is it any good?

This week I had a thoroughly enjoyable and thought provoking chat with Copywriting expert and author of the modern classic 'A self-help guide for copywriters' Dan Nelken .

I've been a follower and admirer of Dans work for several years, so I was delighted to finally get him on the podcast to talk about copywriting techniques, LinkedIn™️ and Bunions!

Plus a post of the week about gender equality!

Here are the topics we covered;

Dan's Journey and Overcoming Self-Doubt.

Dan shared his early days working as a forklift driver, his later studies at copywriting school, and his subsequent work as a copywriter at various ad agencies, working with massive brands.

Authenticity in Professional Content

We chatted about how people find it challenging to really be themselves on LinkedIn™️ and how we need to become 'an expert in being ourselves' and why our inner critic is a 'ding dong' - I wrongly assumed this was a Canadian term!

He also shared his struggles with self-doubt and the importance of remaining true to oneself in communication

Balancing Personal and Professional Content

We discussed how sharing personal experiences can effectively engage the target audience by illustrating overcoming relevant challenges. Dan emphasized the importance of authenticity and using language to impress oneself rather than others

"Your audience is you"

We also discussed the trend of using complex vocabulary in professional settings and debated its effectiveness as a means of communication.

Content Creation Strategy and LinkedIn Success

Dan admits to being no expert in LinkedIn™️ content strategies but he has, through trial and error developed a style using images, quotes and carousel templates that resonate with his audience.

He also discussed his 'list and twist technique' as demonstrated in this 2 page carousel post...

AI & Creativity

Dan does use AI and is impressed with it's capabilities but he "prompts it to prompt him to be more creative"...not to answer questions or create for him.

Book Rankings, Deals, and Course Launches

Dan revealed his challenges with the competitive element of launching a book and bestseller rankings and how with that and marketing his course he stuck to his values and accepted that he is not going to appeal to everyone and that being helpful to others is more important than maximising sales.

Embracing Self-Expression on LinkedIn

Everyone has to start somewhere and Dans advice is to start small and develop a habit for content, even if it's just 15 mins a week brainstorming ideas for posts. Figure out who you are and how you want to communicate and develop the habit of creating content ideas.

As mentioned earlier, above really is a very brief summary of a 55 minute conversation so I strongly recommend you listen to the full episode to gain the most from Dan's expertise.

Thanks again to Dan for taking the time to share so many golden nuggets.

Plenty of good nominations this week including this highly impressive video post from Farouk Bacha in support of Lara Acosta

This weeks winner had less impressions and engagement but I've picked it because I think we can learn more from it.

An attention grabbing and recognisable image of a film star couple with a brilliant hook 'My new man!!' followed by...

Well icon…. Well screen saver.. ok not even screen saver… look I took the image from Google!

and then the (now irresistible) 'See more' link

Great structure, a great use of image and even more critical to it's success, an important and potential controversial topic.

Congratulations to Jo (although you would be much easier to tag if you used your full name...just sayin!) and thanks to Katharine Robinson for nominating it.

That's all for this week, feel free to say hi to Dan and let him know what you thought of the episode.

Until next time.

LinkedIn are putting their money where their mouth is regarding their initiative to support creators with the announcement that they are offering $15,000 (c£11,000) grants plus other support to 100 creators in the US. I take a deeper look into what this means and how it might be used in practice.

Welcome to LinkedInformed 336.

This week I chat with fellow LinkedIn Trainer Teddy Burris about the challenges we all face with the posting and engaging…the fear factor!

What stops us from engaging more on LinkedIn? Is it really a time thing, or is it for normally more complex and deeper reasons.

Why don’t they tell us the truth?

Why do LinkedIn keep things hidden from us?

LinkedIn have no obligation to tell us what is going on, they are a private organisation and are perfectly entitled to their secrets…but is it clever to keep your users second-guessing? What impression do we form of a company when they lack authenticity in this way? Does it matter to you?

LinkedIn will continue to evolve but they could achieve so much more by adopting a more open style of communication.

This week I chat with Brynne Tillman about Social Selling and her take on how to conduct a successful outbound strategy without being ‘icky’ or pushy. Those of you who listen to the podcast regularly will know that I favour a more inbound focussed approach to social sales on Linkedin but I have always admired the different approach adopted by Brynne and believed that having her on the show would provide a great balance to what you normally hear…she didn’t disappoint!

The news that LinkedIn were launching a Freelancer booking service similar to the likes of Fiverr and Upwork was originally broken in February this year…since then we have heard very little until last week when a number of people reported a new feature allowing them to ask for reviews of their services.

With the full Marketplace feature planned for launching in Autumn/Fall this year, I thought it was time to start planning for its arrival.

Welcome to your weekly dose of all things LinkedIn. This is the first installment in a new series focusing on the subject of social selling. I believe that we all need to understand this subject in order to succeed on LinkedIn, whether we be directly in a sales role or not. Marketeers, job seekers, recruiters, business owners, and anyone wanting to enhance their career by becoming more influential should master social selling.

In this first episode, I chat with Ian Moyse, an experienced Sales Leader in the Cloud industry who has been involved with social selling for many years, he was even a guest on one of the first episodes of the LinkedInformed podcast back in 2014!

Welcome to this weeks dose of all things LinkedIn.

I've struggled through the heatwave that has hit the UK this week to bring you this episode, I hope you appreciate it!

Having missed last week, I have a number of things to cover but no one topic that dominates this edition, hence why I’m calling it a catch-up!

Welcome to a special edition of LinkedInformed where I debate with Michelle J Raymond the merits or otherwise of LinkedIn company pages.

Michelle is a big fan of Pages and has built her business by helping her clients to successfully win business through their company pages, I say that her clients would be far more successful if they focus the vast majority of their time on developing their personal content, engagement, and relationships…you can make up your own mind as to who won the argument!

LinkedIn content has changed almost beyond recognition from where it was 10 years ago, even perhaps 5 years ago.

We now see pictures and videos of pets, people talking openly about their emotions, and posts designed purely to entertain us so the question I want to ask in this episode is this;

Have we gone too far and where is the line of appropriateness?

Organic content reach is on the decline...again!

"It's inevitable, this is what social media companies do" and "All they are interested in is posting more ads" I keep seeing people comment but it really isn't as simple as that. LinkedIn is not an advertising company like Meta, they are a business that primarily generates revenue from subscriptions so the reasons for the decline in reach is more complex...

Also in this episode;

• Creator mode confusion

• LinkedIn™️ Games

• AI-generated content screening

• The new immersive video feed mystery

• Post of the week

This week I chat with Kim Arnold, the author of the brilliant new book 'Email Attraction' about how to write better direct messages and InMails.

Plus a couple of news items and a brilliant post of the week.

In this episode, I share my views on why taking a more diverse approach to LinkedIn and how it can help us be more successful. I also tackle the tricky issue of profile pronouns!

This week I chat with Greete Eluri from Denmark about how she not only managed to get a new job but also changed careers through the visibility she gained from actively engaging on LinkedIn.

Have you made your cover story video yet? Don’t tell me you haven’t got the feature yet…so what? You can still make your video in preparation for getting it soon.

This week I’m going to give you my tips on how to put together a great cover story video with the help of some great examples.

I asked listeners if they would be prepared to have me critically appraise their LinkedIn posts...Funnily enough, I didn't get many volunteers but all credit to Patrick Twitchett for being brave enough to give it a go.

In this episode, I take a look at four recent posts, two that did well and two that somewhat bombed!

This week I chat with Craig Brookes who runs a home improvement business in Sheffield, England.

Craig has had a huge impact on LinkedIn by being genuine, authentic, and straight-talking.

Need to launch a book or promote an event on LinkedIn?

A great way to do this successfully is to collaborate with influencers.

This week I chat with Gordon Glenister about his new book "Influencer Marketing Strategy'.

Now his business is thriving! 

Tune in to hear Michaels amazing story.

This week I chat with Kelsi Cory, A Recruiter who recently found herself banned by LinkedIn.

Kelsi was just doing her job - no automation or spam! A warning to us all!

This week I focus on one of the best new features LinkedIn have announced in recent times. Video 'Cover Story' profile introductions.

LinkedIn™️ Groups...Once heralded as a cornerstone of professional networking, their prominence has waned over time. However, amidst the shifting tides, could membership in these groups still hold untapped value? Tracy Bedwell certainly believes so. In this compelling episode, we delve into Tracy's firsthand experiences and unveil the strategic tactics she has wielded with remarkable success, shedding light on the enduring potential of leveraging LinkedIn Groups.

Can you generate leads and new business successfully without a sales navigator account?

Native LinkedIn video posts have been around for some time but I still find it a challenge to get my clients to post them. With that in mind, I have decided to create a step-by-step guide for starting out with LinkedIn video.

04.30 - LinkedIn news

25.35 - Video posts

01.02.50 - Post of the week

Welcome to your latest dose of LinkedIn news, tips, and discussion. Thus weeks I’m returning to the subject of Followers, in many respects, these people are the key to our success on LinkedIn so I want to look more deeply into how we attract more of them.

Welcome to this weeks LinkedInformed which is primarily going to be a continuation of last weeks chat with Andreas. I would recommend consuming that before continuing as it will provide you with more context for what is about to follow

A special episode this week as I chat with Andreas Jonsson, the CEO of the LinkedIn analytics company Shield.

Sit back and enjoy listening as we get into all sorts of details about the LinkedIn algorithms, what types of posts engage, and plenty more.

We know LinkedIn groups aren't what they should be and that LinkedIn have left the functionality woefully short of Facebook groups but that doesn't mean that we can't make them work for us.

It's time start taking responsibility ourselves and stop waiting for LinkedIn to pull their socks up.

Dylan Jones is doing just that!

Welcome to another LinkedInformed. This week I want to focus on how we communicate on LinkedIn.

There are lots of ways to communicate with others on LinkedIn and I will cover them all but the overriding principle of effective communication is that it needs to be a two-way process.

One of my first tasks every year involves disconnecting with people who are no longer relevant or adding value to my LinkedIn network. Why do I and others do this and what are the benefits?

Whilst many of us would prefer to forget about last year, I do think we can learn a lot from our experiences on Linkedin across the last 12 months.

With contributions from Mark Lee and John Espirian, I take a look back at 2020

This is the final episode of 2020...and good riddance to it, what a year!

I thought it would be fun to give you my predictions for next year but also to look back at some of my previous predictions to see whether I'm a visionary or not!

We often come across people on LinkedIn™️ who look interesting and produce content we find valuable...so we follow or connect and over time we feel as though we get to know them better.

But do we REALLY know them?

interesting People interviews are designed to reveal more about the background, personal lives and characteristics of some of our favourite people on LinkedIn™️.

This week, it was my immense pleasure to sit down and chat with the UK accountants mentor and speaker MARK LEE FCA .

By reputation, most LinkedIn users believe groups to be the place where people pitch their wares but don't start or engage in round-table discussions.

Is this still true and should we be taking a closer look at groups again?

Native video posts have become a popular way to share ideas, provide helpful tips and build relationships with your followers, and with the recent addition of Stories, where video typically features heavily, I thought it would be worth revisiting the topic.

David Kilkelly is one of my favourite video experts on LinkedIn. I have followed him for some time for a source of inspiration and helpful tips so I thought I would have a chat with him about LinkedIn video. Interestingly our chat was as much about content as it was specifically about video.

What happens after you connect with someone on LinkedIn?

In this episode, I talk through my recommended post connection process.

Plus my rant about the LinkedIn top voices lists and a brilliant post of the week.