LinkedIn is officially the oldest social media platform on the block (18 years old in 2021!) and throughout these years, it’s actually become one of my favorite social media platforms. It’s also become an essential part of our marketing strategy at LCG, and we’re just one of the 30,000 companies that actively use LinkedIn (over 50 million companies have profiles on LinkedIn). LinkedIn drives a significant amount of engagement, website traffic, and leads for our company and that’s just with posting once a week! If LinkedIn hasn’t been on your radar yet, the thirteen reasons below should convince you that LinkedIn is worth your time.
LinkedIn is the biggest network for professionals. Although LinkedIn’s overall user base is somewhat small (740 million members) compared to other social media platforms (Facebook, for example, boasts a whopping 2.80 billion monthly active users), it represents a community packed full of professionals that with the right content, can be highly engaging. In addition to representing niche and hard-to-find audiences, this is THE social channel if you’re a B2B business attempting to reach and engage other business leaders. In fact, LinkedIn is the most popular platform of B2B marketers, followed by Twitter.
LinkedIn allows you to reach and engage with decision-makers. LinkedIn has calculated that there are 61 million users that are senior level and of them, 40 million are in decision-making positions. Said in another way, four out of five LinkedIn users drive business decisions at their companies.
LinkedIn has advanced targeting capabilities. LinkedIn ads offer more than 200 targeting characteristics, and it’s the only social media platform where people actively update their job titles, workplaces, and skillsets. So if you’re trying to target high school principals on the east coast, you can do that easily with LinkedIn, and you can do it while trusting that you’re targeting professionals with the most accurate listed professions. LinkedIn ads can be expensive though, so we’ve found it best to work with experts to get the biggest bang for your buck. On the plus side, LinkedIn's lead conversion rates are three times higher than other ad platforms, including Google Ads.
LinkedIn posts don’t die within minutes. The average lifespan of a LinkedIn post is 24 hours. Although that may not seem like a long lifespan, it comes ahead of Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok. (Twitter has a lifespan of only 15 minutes!) This means that if your content is good and gets recent engagement, it may reach more of your target audience during a longer duration of time than on other social media platforms.
LinkedIn is trusted. Two years after the Cambridge Analytica scandal, LinkedIn has emerged as the most trusted network in the US. While Facebook has created some features that allow users to have more control over the privacy of their data and the ads they see, its reputation around data privacy has proven hard to improve. User trust can contribute to the erosion or increase of active users.
LinkedIn is gaining traction. Generally, you want to put your effort into social media platforms that are growing and not declining. LinkedIn continues to grow. Currently, more than half of US. marketers use LinkedIn in 2021 and LinkedIn sessions reportedly increased 31% year-on-year in Q1 2021. What’s more, is that 96% of B2B content marketers use LinkedIn for organic social marketing and more than half of US marketers are projected to use LinkedIn in 2021.
LinkedIn drives traffic. LinkedIn drives 46% of social traffic to B2B sites and is considered the most credible source of content. Even more important, LinkedIn traffic is known to convert leads at a higher rate than Twitter or Facebook. In fact, traffic from LinkedIn has been found to generate the highest visitor-to-lead conversion rate at 2.74%, almost three times or 277% higher than both Twitter (.69%) and Facebook (.77%).
LinkedIn thought-leadership content influences decisions. LinkedIn allows you to share a variety of different types of content (articles hosted on LinkedIn, links, slideshows, newsletters, and videos) which can build your thought leadership presence with your target audience. This type of thought-leadership content can be very influential to decision-makers. According to LinkedIn, 75% of potential B2B buyers say thought leadership helps them prioritize which vendors to engage with.
LinkedIn content is relied upon by company leaders. A whopping ninety-one percent of marketing executives use LinkedIn as a content source. In addition, only 15% of marketers currently create content for LinkedIn (or only 1-2% of LinkedIn users are actively creating content on the platform), which means that there is significantly less content in comparison to other social media platforms and thus, a bigger opportunity to gain the attention of your target audience.
LinkedIn is THE place to source top talent. LinkedIn is the biggest professional networking site, period. Since 85% of jobs are typically filled by networking, LinkedIn should be your go-to site to source and engage top talent. Need more convincing? Currently, three people are hired every minute through LinkedIn and 40 million people use LinkedIn to search for jobs every week. That’s not all, employees sourced through LinkedIn are 40% less likely to leave the company within the first 6 months. As a brand, a programming strategy that excites prospective employees to join your company and potentially even provide them value can help you attract and retain top talent.
LinkedIn users have high incomes and a high education level. LinkedIn usage increases with the level of education and with income. 49% of LinkedIn users take home more than $75,000 per year, which is above the national median in the US. Also, 50% of college graduates in the US are LinkedIn users.
LinkedIn hashtags are more versatile. Hashtags are essential on Twitter and Instagram and even Facebook is planning on upping its hashtag game but hashtags on LinkedIn have a lot more features that can increase your reach and engagement significantly. With LinkedIn hashtags you can:
Follow a specific hashtag and once followed, content with the hashtag you follow will be surfaced up in your LinkedIn feed.
Search for hashtags that are included in posts and just recently, you can also search for comments that include hashtags.
Create your own branded hashtag and build a following of your hashtag, which can allow you to reach even more people in different ways.
LinkedIn users consume a lot of videos. LinkedIn rolled out videos for users in August 2017 and since then, video usage has exploded. 1 million hours of LinkedIn Learning content is watched per week and in Q4 of 2020, professionals watched 2X more LinkedIn Learning content than the year before. Also, LinkedIn Live streams have increased by 158% since February 2020.
Whether you work in a B2B or a B2C business, I hope these reasons have helped you at least consider LinkedIn as a future social media channel where you consistently program valuable content and engage with your target audience. Remember — being on social media is a commitment, so if you choose to create a presence on LinkedIn, do it right, which includes crafting a programming and engagement strategy that will not only attract top talent but will also refer traffic to your website, along with leads that convert!
