LinkedIn Is Basically Instagram Now (But Still Biased)

Two women posted. One told a joke. One shared strategy. Guess which post LinkedIn prioritized.

LinkedIn is basically Instagram now. But with more words.

A couple weeks ago, I was chatting with the tenacious Beth Massa, who, like many of us, was wondering why her LinkedIn posts were not receiving the number of impressions she's come to expect.

It's a common frustration among those of us who post on LinkedIn, especially women.

I told her how LinkedIn was now prioritizing posts based on the level of engagement in the first hour--much like Instagram does. Additionally, LinkedIn is also prioritizing "relevancy" or "recency." I wrote about this previously (link in the comments).

The day after I posted, she wrote a very sarcastic post sharing how she was going to shave her legs, since LI is basically IG now. (link in the comments)

Upshot?
Likes:
➡️ Beth's: 47
➡️ Mine: 55

Comments:
➡️ Beth's: 9
➡️ Mine: 65

Impressions:
➡️ Beth's: over 4000
➡️ Mine: 1500

In BOTH cases, we would normally see a lot more traffic--especially me, since there were so many conversations happening in the comments of my post.

And b/c someone will want to know, the number of followers we each have:
➡️ Beth: 10,500
➡️ Me: 8000
Also, we both pay for Premium.

The difference? Hers was a "human interest" story, and the algorithm somehow decided that it was more relevant, including to the men who responded to her post. Or maybe it's b/c LinkedIn's algorithm decided her post resulted in more "meaningful" engagement.

Neither of which, it should be obvious by now, were true.

So is the algorithm biased? Absolutely.

Then what's the solution? More women need to post. A LOT MORE. And a lot more often. And I don't mean that "hey look what I did, here's an event where I spoke" kind of stuff. I mean sh*t that fires you up and makes you mad enough to vent or scream or be truly delighted.

Anyway, I've created a couple new logos for LinkedIn. Hope they like one of them. Gemini did a fine job. Which one is your favorite? I think mine is the LI logo in IG colors. Subtle, but effective, IMO.

h/t to Joshua David Mardice for posting his story, asking the questions that triggered the comparison in this post. Cuz clearly LinkedIn sure AF isn't listening to women.

And here's Joshua's post that inspired this one.

Categories: : For Women on LinkedIn, LinkedIn Strategy, Platform Bias, Thought Leadership, Visibility & Engagement