We designed LinkedIn around a simple idea: “People you know, talking about things you care about.” It is at the heart of every product we build. One of the most vibrant and powerful tools we have to make this idea a reality is actually right in front of you every time you open the LinkedIn app: your feed!
The LinkedIn Feed is a great way to get way to get inspired by new insights and perspectives. But it’s also an invitation to have conversations and to participate with a vibrant network of smart people on the topics that matter most to you. Think of the posts and opinions as an active tool to guide and inform you as you accomplish your goals. Your feed should reflect where you are going as passionately as your profile reflects where you have been.
Setting up and managing an interesting and valuable LinkedIn Feed couldn’t be easier.
Start with the basics
A useful feed starts with the right professional network. The people you connect with will most often be the first to show up in your feed. That’s why it’s especially important to connect with people you know and trust. From there, you can also follow people that you want to hear from but maybe don’t know personally.
Want to find other people to follow? Check out our personalized recommendations on people, groups, companies and organizations that could be particularly relevant. Think of it a little like checking your Waze app: Where do you want to go, and how crazy will traffic be along the way?
While keeping a wide and vibrant feed is a great way to improve the value of your time on LinkedIn, unfollowing accounts or conversations that are no longer relevant is important too. To do this simply follow these steps.
Follow companies and executives
Following the leading companies in your industry is a quick and easy way to stay up to date with the latest changes that can impact your work or career. Follow their competitors too--it will help you understand the different takes they have on a product, innovation or trend. From there, try digging down to follow smaller companies that are presenting different solutions from the bigger players. Bookending the companies you follow with the giants of a vertical and emerging startups gives you a 360-degree perspective on what’s happening, and can even reveal fast-moving opportunities.
Another good way to hear these perspectives and follow these trends is to follow leading voices in the company—from owners to C-suite executives to spokespeople. Thought leaders within a company can often give a much more conversational and engaging take, and many take the time to write about their own experiences and interests. (What Bill Gates shares and talks about is often quite different than what Microsoft posts, for instance. Why not follow both?)
It is also worthwhile to follow industry’s leading voices as well—thought leaders outside a specific company who can give an objective view on trends, challenges or opportunities in an industry.
For more information on how to follow and unfollow people and companies, click here.
Use Hashtags for the Big Picture Perspective
There’s no need to limit yourself to one industry or vertical, even if it is where you are focused. Hashtags are a great tool for bringing interesting, wide-ranging conversations from across industries and fields to your feed. The cool thing about hashtags--and what makes them so effective--is that you don’t have to go and hand pick a bunch of specific people or companies to follow. That limits you to who and what you know. With a hashtag, you can get takes from lots of different voices within an area of interest.
From big picture topics like #creativity and #content to more targeted disciplines like #socialentrepreneurship or #digitalmarketing, hashtags are a quick and easy way to shape the conversations and insights in your feed. Simply click on any hashtag you like in the feed and then click follow under the hashtag’s title. You can also click the “…” tab to the right of the #hashtag to discover related hashtags or manage the hashtags you currently follow. You can also search for any #hashtag by entering it into the main search bar at the top of the page. If you ever want to unfollow a hashtag or anything else, it is as easy as clicking the follow button again.
Your Voice Matters--Chime In!
One of our biggest goals for LinkedIn’s communities is to make them as helpful as possible. One of the best ways to make this happen is to add your voice to the platform. If a post in your feed sparks a thought or response, go ahead and reply. It’s another easy way to help make your feed more relevant.
Plus, when you like, comment or share posts, you let us know that these types of posts are something you care about. We’ll make sure you see more of these types of posts, whether from that person or company, or that format of post. And when people like or reply to your insights, we will make sure they see more of you!
The LinkedIn Feed is a dynamic tool that is designed to continuously showcase and offer perspectives that are right for you right now. The more you focus on where you want to go, the more it will offer you the insights and direction to help you get there. Use it and enjoy it!