After a while of hearing rumors about LinkedIn’s plan to focus on content, the day has finally arrived! If you’re lucky enough to be a part of the early roll out, you might have noticed new suggestions on the left side of your feed. But before you run to check it out, remember that us marketers have a history of abusing very useful tools; let’s try to treat this one differently.
When clicking on one of the hashtags on the left side of your screen, you don't only get a list of content by others using the same hashtag, but also additional content suggestions on a new bar that comes up on the right side of the feed. Take a look:
What People Are Talking About Now
The stories you see under the label ‘What people are talking about now,’ are the top professional news stories and conversations of the day. LinkedIn explains, “The topics are selected based on data on and off LinkedIn". But it's the on-platform conversations that are of most relevance and value in a LinkedIn marketing context.
So What Does this Mean for Marketers?
LinkedIn is putting much more emphasis on organic reach! With other channels decreasing the reach pages get organically, this is definitely a refreshing turn of events. After closing the option to post on groups through APIs, LinkedIn seems to be offering us a different way to get our content out to as many people as possible - this in addition to promoting group content on our feeds.
By utilizing the hashtags and content suggestions, now we can see first hand what people in our industry are “searching” for. This allows us the opportunity to share valuable content and further connect with our ideal prospects who are already hanging out on LinkedIn. As LinkedIn continues to populate the news feed with industry-relevant news, blogs, and resources, we are able to directly engage with our target audience, demonstrating the value and services we bring to the table.
Newsjacking has been a proven marketing method for a while; here’s our chance to jump on that wagon daily. So when you come across a relevant topic or piece of breaking news, you can immediately join the conversation by adding the trending hashtag with your insights as a status update. In the heat of the moment, provide your expertise on a topic people are talking and reading about - even including a link to a video, blog post or any other resource you have handy that relates to the topic.
Just remember, no spamming!
