A common gripe from marketing professionals who attend my LinkedIn trainings and workshops is the fact that the LinkedIn company page – now just called your LinkedIn Page – does not have the same level of functionality, offered from individual members’ LinkedIn profiles, to reach and engage with key target audiences.
While it’s still the case that LinkedIn’s undeniable draw and therefore effectiveness is based on the idea that business is about relationships between people rather than brands, LinkedIn’s formerly named Company page has been frustratingly lacking in features that can assist in developing brand awareness and engagement.
But things are a changing….
If you haven’t checked out your organisation’s LinkedIn page since your last post about the company’s Christmas party 2018, now might be a good time to have another look, because LinkedIn has added some really useful new functionality that will help page administrators to:
- Know and grow your audiences
- Join the conversations that matter most; and then
- Engage with your different audiences
Some of this new functionality is still being rolled out across the platform, so I’ll be reviewing different features over the next few months. Today I’m looking at the new ‘Content Suggestions’ feature.
So, as a LinkedIn trainer, I’m always being asked – “What sort of content should I be sharing from my LinkedIn (company) page?”
Well, the short answer is: content that is relevant, of interest and/or resonates with what matters most to the audiences that you’re trying to engage or build relationships with.
And here’s where a new LinkedIn (company) page feature can assist.
Content Suggestions feature: What is it?
As a LinkedIn (company) page admin, one of your most time-consuming responsibilities is sourcing interesting, relevant and engaging content that helps build and reinforce the key relationships you want to develop – ie: with your company page followers.
Now, using LinkedIn’s ‘Content suggestions’ feature, admins can quickly discover content that their target audiences are currently interested in or engaging with on LinkedIn and then offer that content (or original content on those same topics) to their own followers.
Where can I find the Content Suggestions feature?
To access the ‘Content suggestions’ feature, go to your LinkedIn (company) page, using the drop down from the ‘Me’ icon (top menu) and make sure you’re in admin view. The ‘Content suggestions’ tab is located on the top navigation bar – see below:
How to use the Content Suggestions feature
First, you’ll need to set it up (this can be edited easily at any time).
Click on the ‘Content suggestion’s tab and a really simple filter box will appear (see below). Select your target audience based on location, industry, and seniority. When making your selection you’ll see an ‘Audience size’ figure at the bottom left of the window. Make sure to keep that number as large as possible to get the most accurate results and then, click ‘View content suggestions’.
In the next window you’ll see three areas: the audience filter; trending content; and recommended articles.
Use the audience filter on the left rail to further refine the target audiences you want to focus on. Select either All LinkedIn Members; (your) Page followers; or (your) Employees.
NB: Remember that the chosen filters need to select an audience that numbers more than 300 in order to pull up any results.
‘Trending content’ (top right column) lists the specific topics your selected audience has engaged with over the last 15 days. Click on one (or more) of these topics and articles on that subject matter will appear below as a list or add your own topics to test your target audiences’ interests.
Finally, LinkedIn, very helpfully, records the percentage rate of engagement for each article (ie: number of unique engagements divided by unique impressions for the selected audience) to indicate its level of popularity across the selected audience.
Is it worth using?
If you want a time-saving way to source content that your target audiences are currently most interested in, and thus boost your LinkedIn page engagement and grow your page followers, then I think the new ‘Content suggestions’ feature is definitely worth investigating.
Not only does it offer you invaluable stats on what articles are getting the most engagement across your selected audiences, but of course you can either use that knowledge to identify your own content to share, or you can make it even easier by re-sharing the articles themselves.
So, if you’re a marketing professional tasked with administering your company’s LinkedIn (company) page, I’d say this was a significant step forward.
