I run courses and coaching on how to make people influencers.  Some people come to me where we work out what they need to do and we get them where they want to be.  Some people have already put in the hard work and they just need a few tweaks and then it works for them.

Usually it's about people making money in some shape or form, from speaker gigs, book deals, consultancy etc.

I can do this on all social media platforms apart from one.  LinkedIn.

Why? Because Linkedin chooses who are the influencers on its platform.

LinkedIn problem when compared to other networks

Linkedin now has one billion people on the network, but the problem is, people don't log in very often and when they are there, they don't do much and don't stay for long.

When compared to say TikTok, where people may come daily and want to create their own videos. Talk to people and being “a TikTok influencer” holds more qdos than a “Linkedin influencer”. Sorry LinkedIn. 

That said, in a recent article by social media today they said “TikTok’s still struggling to establish firm footing is in creator monetization, and ensuring that its top stars are able to maximize their popularity through direct income from their TikTok clips.

At some point, the biggest stars will focus their energy on wherever they’re going to make the most money, and right now, for most, that is not TikTok, which has already seen a lot of its biggest names switching over to YouTube and Instagram instead."

So What is LinkedIn response to this?

They have created their own influencer / creator program and it's invite only.  They won't tell you what the criteria is to get in or the criteria that might be holding you back. 

There are two programs, Linkedin top voice, these are people that get the blue badge.  This tends to be for certain celebrities.  There is also the “new” Linkedin [insert subject here] top voices.

To be a top voice you have to be given permission to answer certain questions. If you haven't been given permission, by LinkedIn. You cannot answer the questions and so become this new type of influencer.

There is a problem with this question answering on a number of levels, basically people leave trite or promotional answers. Let's not forget, the measure is how many you answer, not if the answers are any good.

For example, one question is “what do you need to do to start a podcast?”, the answer being, “just start it”.  But a podcast producer answered it as “you must speak to a podcast producer”. of course they are going to say that. Classic self promotion. It does not help. 

As Dan Pardoi, recently said in an article. “LinkedIn Makes Me Feel Crappy About Myself” on medium these article on Linkedin, “The articles were painfully bland.”. He points out that as a contributor, he keeps checking back and that's what Linkedin wants, people keep logging into the platform and leaving a comment. 

Most of answers IMHO are just crass.  If people are betting their business on the answers, it's pretty scary.

Let's dig a little deeper

One of my team was awarded the Linkedin influencer award (the blue badge) and was called into a meeting in London where he met a team from LinkedIn. LinkedIn took him through a number of slides about his account and gave him hints about the algorithm. For example, always do video in portrait not landscape or what parts of your profile to change to be the most algorithms friendly.  All very useful stuff. 

On the way out he said he wasn't getting the engagement on his posts that he wanted so Linkedin agreed to turn his profile up.  Those that have got this far, will have twigged that this means they can turn the algorithm down if they don't like you.  Not saying they shadow band people, but they can turn your profile down so you are not heard. 

LinkedIn then put you through a 6 week course on how, in their opinion you need to use the platform.  It was interesting that a friend of mine resigned from this course after the second session as she said that anybody who had been on social media for ten years would know what they taught you.  She also mentioned that the other people on the course didn't have the business acumen to implement what they were being taught.  Her inferous was that there was no “older people", maybe Linkedin don't think people over 55 understand social? 

She  thought it was a “how can Linkedin by more TikTok” course.  Linkedin is not TikTok.

But there is more discrimination by Linkedin

They have created a program where if you are a Government organisation or a large corporate you can verify you account by using your email.

Question is, where does this leave all the Entrepreneurs and the small, medium enterprises that don't have these resources?  

Where does this leave LinkedIn?

First and foremost an inclusive platform like Microsoft must stop being in the situation where they are right now that they are being discriminatory. 

LinkedIn certainly need to get more to the platform, and they need to have more people create content. But they need to balance the human with the banal.  My colleague was told they were going to detune “broetry” but it's still common. 

They also need to support the people that have an are supporting the platform, regardless of who they are.  If they choose who is an influencer, where are the people going to place their efforts? On other social media platforms I would guess. 

The big issue for LinkedIn, is that they make money from spam and the spam, I know pushes people away from the platform.  The challenge for LinkedIn will be to work away from this revenue stream, the money is nice I'm sure, but they are cutting their own throat.  There are other, better ways of connection and having conversations with people, without the need for spam.  If Linkedin embraced this, then maybe they would see more take up of the platform. 

Want to know more about social selling, check out my new book

"social selling techniques to influence buyers and changemakers - 2nd edition".

In this brand new edition, I have updated all the text, I have also got 15 practitioners, so people who are doing this already to explain how they are get (practical) business benefit. From the CEO that has been running a digital business for over 18 months to sales leaders who use social selling every day.  

Articles on how these business have and are implementing digital, from Mercer, Telstra Purple, Ring Central, Cyberhawk, Namos, Ericsson, DLA Ignite and more.

What does Mark Schaefer, Marketing guru think of the book "social selling - techniques to influence buyers and changemakers - 2nd edition"? watch the video here

It's available on Amazon worldwide.  Link to Amazon.com here and Amazon.co.uk here.