Research results (Summer 2019) of what appears in LinkedIn Home feed. Type of posts, frequency of ads, The real value of Like and Comments and hashtags

1. What do you
REALLY see in your
LinkedIn Home Feed?
Table of content
• Why did I undertake this research?
• The research and methodology
• My framework
• Your Framework
• The helicopter view
• Company Page Status Updates, a paid story
• Getting Personal
• What types of posts are you seeing?
• What can content creators learn from this?
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

2. Why did I undertake this research?
There are a lot of whitepapers and blog posts
available about how the LinkedIn algorithm works.
These articles always view the algorithm from the
content creator’s point of view and they do have
certainly their value. However, I have not seen
any studies or papers from the LinkedIn member’s
point of view.
So I have decided during the summer months of
2019 to analyze my Home Feed on LinkedIn in
the hope to draw some conclusions about what
LinkedIn members actually get to see. In this
there will also be lessons for the content creators.
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

3. The research and methodology (Frequency)
I started my analysis by asking my network and beyond
how many posts people usually read or scroll by when
they visit LinkedIn. I also tried to get a sense of the
frequency of visits and platforms.
The audience varied from LinkedIn “addicts” and
occasional users. What I learned was:
People visited once to several times (up to 10) times
their LinkedIn feed
During each session people viewed or scrolled past
about 20 posts which represents about 8 to 15 screens
The mix of platforms is quickly moving from desktop to
mobile but in this research it is about 50/50
People on the app had a higher frequency of visits but
lower view/scroll by of posts. On average they see 10
posts pass by.
“How many posts do you read or
scroll over per LinkedIn session?”
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

4. The research and methodology (sources)
In a second phase, I visited LinkedIn several times per day on my
desktop and app.
I started to keep track of how many messages I did see or
scrolled over and where they came from.
I averaged in the last 2 months 30 posts per session on the
desktop and 23 on the app
I divided the posts into several categories:
👉 Personal Status Updates
👉 Company Page Updates (organic and sponsored)
👉Group posts
👉Other posts
Within each of the above categories (personal and company) I
dug a little deeper and tried to analyze why these posts
appeared in my feed (organic, indirect or paid)
Finally, I tried to figure out for all indirect posts whether they
showed up because of the Like or Comment engagement in the
hope to define what a Like or Comment is really worth
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

5. My framework
It is important to describe the playing field I was doing
my research in. Here are some numbers:
My network has over 9,000 connections and I follow
about 10,500 people (including my connections)
I follow about 100 company pages that are active on
LinkedIn by posting content
I am also a member of 100 groups where I frequently
post and engage content. I am active in about 20% of the
groups.
I analyzed over 5,000 posts that came through my
LinkedIn Home Feed over 2 months
I spread my efforts evenly over both the desktop and app
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

6. Your framework
Consider this as a disclaimer but what you see in your LinkedIn
Home Feed will depend on a number of elements.
The key elements that play into your Home Feed are:
The size of your network
The number of connections you have
The number of people you Follow on top of your Connections
The groups that you belong to
Their activity level
Number of Status Updates done by the above profiles
Their interaction with their network in terms of Likes,
Comments & Shares of Status Updates
Your interaction with your first degree network.
LinkedIn will see who you are close too (somewhat like
Facebook’s proximity level). This is determined by your
interactions on Status Updates. The more you interact with a
profile, the more of their Status Updates and the the posts
they Liked or Commented on will show up in your Home Feed.
Because readers will be spending a limited time on LinkedIn, they
will only get to see Status Updates from people, pages or groups
that are close with the exception of Sponsored Content.
“The size and activity level of your
network and your engagement with
your network defines what you see”
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

7. The Helicopter View
The first thing that is clear is that Status Updates in
LinkedIn Groups and Notifications about your network
(new job, work anniversary, etc.) in your Home Feed are
very limited. My results were 3% on the desktop and
1.5% on the app.
Status Updates from Groups or Followed Hashtags were
barely visible and represent less than 0.5% each!
Conclusion: “Groups are really dead!” But that should
not be a surprise to anyone.
Most of the Status Updates in your Home Feed come
from 2 categories: Personal and Company Page profiles.
Both on the mobile app and on the desktop 76% were
personal updates while 21% (19% on the app) came from
Company pages.
Time to dive in even deeper!
“LinkedIn Groups are really dead!
Post with hashtags you “Follow”
are rarely found in the Home Feed
Visibility goes to Personal and
Company Status Updates”
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

8. Company Page Status Updates, a paid story!
Looking at Status Updates from Pages, we can categorize
them into 4 groups:
👉 Organic Posts
👉 Sponsored Posts
👉 Posts from Companies you FOLLOW but
triggered by a Like, Comment or Share from a
1st degree connection
👉 Posts from Company Pages you DO NOT FOLLOW
but triggered by a Like, Comment or Share from
a 1st degree connection
With around 20% of all posts in you Home Feed, there is
still a long way for LinkedIn to embrace Company Pages.
LinkedIn’s focus is clearly on Sponsored Content (just like
Facebook). You can not escape the 14% of all posts being
Sponsored Content. And marketeers are happy to spend
the Euro’s/Dollars to get visibility at whatever cost.
Desktop
Sponsored
Organic
Page Followed
Page not Followed
App
Sponsored
Organic
Page Followed
Page not Followed
“LinkedIn floods your Home Feed with
PAID Company Page Status Updates”
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

9. Getting Personal
As indicated in the beginning of this survey, most Status Updates
(76%) come from LinkedIn members which comes to prove that
LinkedIn is still a PERSONAL networking platform.
All the Status Updates are organic because LinkedIn does not
offer Sponsored Content for personal profiles.
In the category Personal Status Updates, we can create 3 sub-
categories:
👉 Organic: Status Update from 1st degree connections
including shared posts
👉Engaged: Status Updates from 1st degree connections
but triggered by a Like/Comment of another 1st
degree connection (Let us call this a 2nd attempt for
visibility or virality)
👉 Discovery: Status Updates from 2nd or 3rd degree
connections triggered by a Like/Comment of a 1st
degree connection (LinkedIn’s attempt to let you
discover new people and content)
Here it becomes clear LinkedIn demonstrates its commitment to
promote posts that have engagement (Like/Comments).
“76% of Status updates in your
Home feed come from your
Personal Network: organically or
triggered by Likes or Comments”
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

10. Getting Personal – the power of engagement
On the desktop Organic Status Updates represent 28% of
all Status Updates while Engaged/Discovery posts
skyrocket with 72% of all posts.
On the app is more evenly distributed with about 50%
Organic vs 50% from Engaged/Discovery Status Updates.
Another thing that showed up is that the app will focus
and show more Organic Status Updates than the Desktop
which makes sense because on the app people view less
posts per session and LinkedIn wants to keep your
attention with content from your 1st degree network.
Desktop
1st degree - organic
1st degree - Like/comment
2nd degree - Like/Comment
App
1st degree - Organic
1st degree - Like/Comment
2nd degree - Like/Comment
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

11. How much is a Like/Comment worth?
Diving even deeper into the analysis, we checked out
what, Like or Comment, had more weight in terms of
showing up into the Home feed.
We will tell you nothing new in the sense that posts with
Comments do much better than those with a Like. The
numbers are clear: 49% for comments vs 38% for Likes.
There was little difference between the app and the
desktop results.
Finally, posts that we Shared represented 13% of the
Engaged or Discovery posts.
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

12. What type of posts are you seeing in your Home Feed?
There is a lot material available for content creators on what
of type of content to create. But is this really what people
are seeing in their Home Feed?
As a final part of the analysis, we looked at the
composition of the posts to find out what the best
performing posts were in or Home Feed…
The findings do confirm any a study about what kind of
posts you need to make to be successful.
However, one thing that surprised us was the fact that
Text plus Clickable Link to an article on or off LinkedIn
showed prominently in the feed.
22%
22%
21%
18%
13%
13%
10%
2%
1% Post Types
Text + Image:
Text + Image:
Text + Clickable image (Link to post)
Text Only
Text + Video
Text + Shared Posts
Notifications and alike
Miscellaneous
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

13. What can content creators learn from this?
For Content Creator of Company Pages:
• Think Sponsored Content First
• Think Engageable Content Second
• Hope for Organic distribution
For Personal Content Creators:
• Create posts with Text and Visual (Photo + Video)
• Do not neglect “Text Only” posts
• Understand where your audience lives (Desktop/app)
• Create posts that demand “meaningful” comments
• Forget about posting in LinkedIn Groups
Remember that you have limited viewing time with your
readers, so timing and engagement are key!
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019

14. Want to know more or discuss these results?
Vanguard Leadership
Att. Mic Adam
Dianadreef 6
8200 Brugge
Belgium
Email:
info@vanguard-leadership.be
mic@vanguard-leadership.be
Phone:
+32 478 504135
Our services can be found at: www.vanguard-leadership.be
Vanguard Leadership (c) - 2019