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What Does LinkedIn's Algorithm Update Mean for Recruitment Marketers

Over the past 12-18 months, LinkedIn has been busy tweaking its algorithm to increase the number of valuable conversations taking place on the platform whilst reducing the number of viral posts that appear in users’ feeds.

 
 

Its recent announcement regarding these changes, follows similar moves by Facebook and Instagram as social media platforms shift the focus of their news feeds away from being mass broadcast channels to ones that encourage meaningful interactions between users.

 
 

And with LinkedIn being such an important platform for the vast majority of recruitment firms, these changes will have a huge impact on the way content is seen and engaged with. So what do recruitment marketers need to know about LinkedIn’s updated algorithm?

 

Changes to LinkedIn’s algorithm

LinkedIn has stated that the changes to its algorithm are in response to data which revealed that whilst its platform had received record levels of year-on-year engagement, these increases were heavily weighted to posts by what are known as its top 1% ‘power users’. These are global influencers, such as Bill Gates and Richard Branson, rather than your average nine to five working professionals who it notes were ‘receiving less engagement than ever’.
 
 

To help solve this problem, LinkedIn has tweaked its algorithm to redistribute this uplift much more evenly among users and company pages as it looks to ensure that ‘valuable conversation’ appears higher in the feed as part of its new ‘People You Know, Talking About Things You Care About’ framework.

 
 

According to LinkedIn’s Pete Davies, this is broken down into three distinct segments:

 
 

People you know…

LinkedIn analyses user data to understand who you know on the platform and are most likely to have online discussions with. To do this, it looks at your connections, colleagues, who you have interacted with recently, and your profile information to understand the interests and experiences you may have in common.
 
 

It also looks at users who would benefit from hearing from you, and may rank a connection’s post higher if it feels that their content is high quality and is in need of more engagement.

 
 

Talking about…

The algorithm also looks at the level of depth of discussions that are taking place, with those generating long form comments and back and forth conversations being prioritised over those that fail to generate this level of activity.
 
 

… Things you care about

Alongside your profile information and your connections, LinkedIn looks at the company pages you follow, groups you are a member of and the hashtags you follow to gain further insights about what you are into. These will also appear in your feed and, for example, if a connection uses a hashtag that you follow, their post will receive an extra boost in your feed.
 
 

Essentially LinkedIn is focusing on bringing to the fore the most relevant and insightful conversations that are happening across your communities on the platform, whether that’s from your connections, colleagues, groups you’ve joined or the people, pages or hashtags that you follow.

 
 

How can recruitment marketers benefit from LinkedIn’s updated algorithm?

Davies also shared some tips on maximising reach and engagement, which I have expanded upon for recruitment marketers to make use of:
 
 


Try and generate discussion

Rather than simply posting from your company page that your latest blog has gone live, why not pose a question at the end of the post which seeks input from your audience?
 
 

Utilise the most appropriate content format for the topic

Interestingly whilst video seemingly dominates the feed, LinkedIn has denied that its algorithm favours certain formats over others. Therefore, it is essential that you choose the most appropriate content for communicating your message. For example, if your post is on the latest sector trends, then an infographic highlighting some of the key statistics is likely to be highly engaging.
 
 

Mention others in your posts

Try tagging in colleagues, peers and even some of your clients into your posts if you feel that they will have something valuable to contribute as part of the discussion. However, LinkedIn recommends mentioning no more than five people in your posts as overdoing this could see your content flagged as spam.
 
 

Engage in the conversation

Take time to craft personalised responses to individuals who have replied to your post rather than taking the easy option and clicking ‘like’ on their comment. You should look at what their initial comment is and how you can further the discussion. For example, can you hone in on something specific they said in their response and ask them about that?
 
 

Use niche hashtags

Hashtags have fast become an essential tool for discovering relevant content on LinkedIn and according to the platform, its data shows niche hashtags generate higher quality discussions. So, for example, if you’re an agency specialising in sourcing marketing talent and are sharing content on digital marketing then targeting followers of #DigitalMarketing rather than the broader #Marketing is likely to produce better engagement.
 
 

Is your recruitment firm looking for social media marketing support?

Get in touch today to see how we might be able to support you.

 

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