There are many private branding ideas, like:
- “Publish 5 instances per day”
- “Publish extra video content material”
- “Publish at 8:27AM PST!”
Nevertheless, I haven’t seen any current to help many of those claims.
Till now.
I analyzed 100 LinkedIn influencers in addition to every influencer’s three high performing posts (for a complete of 300 posts) to reply questions like:
- How typically do high creators publish?
- What number of high performing posts are reposts?
- What are the highest performing varieties of posts (picture, video, carousels, and so forth.)?
On this publish, I’ll share what I discovered from this knowledge and the way you should utilize it to develop on LinkedIn.
About The Knowledge Used To Develop These LinkedIn Private Branding Stats
First, I acknowledge that 100 LinkedIn profiles and the highest three performing posts (for a complete of 300 posts) is a really small pattern of information.
Sadly, LinkedIn has strict limits, making it troublesome to scrape a bigger pattern measurement.
Nevertheless, even a small pattern of information means that you can see dominant traits.
Due to this fact, this knowledge isn’t designed to ship arduous and quick guidelines. As a substitute, it make clear a number of traits that may enable you enhance your LinkedIn private branding technique.
As for the info itself, we solely analyzed LinkedIn profiles who:
- Earn no less than a median of 40 feedback per publish
- Publish no less than 30 instances prior to now six months
- Have lower than 500,000 followers
The minimal requirement of 30 posts within the final six months and fewer than 500,000 followers helped us get rid of “enterprise celebrities” (i.e., well-known entrepreneurs/executives with thriving private manufacturers outdoors of LinkedIn).
These necessities permit the info to light up techniques and techniques anybody can use to develop on LinkedIn.
For instance, Sam Altman may publish something on LinkedIn, and the publish would obtain excessive engagement merely due to his model outdoors of LinkedIn. But when you copied his actual publish format, type, and tone, it most likely wouldn’t carry out as nicely just because he already has a wider community than the common entrepreneur or skilled.
I additionally regarded on the three high performing posts from every influencer. We outlined “high performing” because the posts with essentially the most engagement prior to now six months and in the end collected a knowledge set of 300 posts.
To gather all of this knowledge, we used the Chrome Plugin Creator Match and manually entered the info from every LinkedIn influencer right into a spreadsheet.
1.) 91% of LinkedIn creators publish no less than as soon as each three days.
There’s no query that posting frequency is essential.
- 91% of the LinkedIn creators publish no less than as soon as each three days.
- 72% of LinkedIn creators publish no less than as soon as each two days.
- 20% of LinkedIn creators publish no less than as soon as per day.
As talked about within the knowledge assortment methodology, I solely included LinkedIn influencers who had posted no less than 30 instances throughout the final 180 days to stop together with “enterprise celebrities” (i.e., individuals who already had a model and would, subsequently, generate engagement no matter their LinkedIn savviness.)
Nevertheless, I used to be shocked to see that ALL folks we included within the research (influencers with a minimal common remark per publish of no less than 40 and fewer than 500,000 followers) posted no less than as soon as each 5 days.
To be exact, solely two of the 100 influencers randomly chosen for this research posted much less often than as soon as each 4 days.
The primary takeaway from this statistic is that posting often is essential to LinkedIn private branding success.
Many individuals agonize over content material high quality and spend an excessive amount of time crafting the proper publish while you’d see a greater ROI when you often publish the very best content material you may produce in a restricted time.
So sure, spending hours, days, or weeks on an impressive piece of evergreen content material for a channel like search engine marketing or YouTube would possibly make sense, however for LinkedIn, the important thing to success is posting often.
TL;DR: Simply begin posting! And publish extra typically!
2.) Over half of the content material posted (59%) was picture based mostly.
We checked out all the LinkedIn posts from the 100 influencers included within the research, and the info set in the end consisted of 12,184 posts.
Photographs have been by far the most well-liked, as greater than half (59%) of posts have been picture based mostly posts.
Right here’s the total breakdown of publish varieties (observe that numbers have been rounded):
- Textual content based mostly posts made up 12% of the overall
- Video posts made up 11% of the overall
- Carousel posts made up 17% of the overall
- Picture posts made up 59% of the overall
- Polls made up >1% of the overall
- Newsletters made up 1% of the overall
I used to be shocked that almost all creators rely closely on picture based mostly posts. Loads of Linkedin creators encourage video and carousel posts as they could produce greater engagement, but picture posts are the bread and butter for many creators.
I assume it’s because, as referenced by the primary level, posting frequency is king.
As carousels and movies take extra time to create, picture based mostly posts are the bread and butter for many creators’ technique.
Takeaway #3: 67% of the highest performing posts have been picture posts
After seeing that a lot of the high performing posts have been picture based mostly, I used to be curious to see what kind of publish carried out the very best.
So we regarded on the high three highest-performing posts (outlined by “highest engagement” – a mixture of essentially the most feedback, likes, and shares) from every creator prior to now 180 days.
From this pool of 300 high performing posts, we discovered that picture based mostly posts have been nonetheless the highest performers:
- 16% have been carousel posts
- 67% have been picture posts
- 9% have been textual content posts
- 8% have been video posts
Once more, I used to be a bit shocked by this knowledge at first.
I assumed that movies and carousels would be extra participating, and subsequently, even when creators didn’t publish them as typically, they’d nonetheless be the highest performers.
Nevertheless, there are a number of different the reason why picture based mostly posts nonetheless proved to be the highest performers:
- The ROI On Luck: In fact, when you have extra textual content based mostly content material, there’s a better likelihood that considered one of them will take off. However I feel these subsequent components have extra of an affect.
- Content material Substance Trumps Content material Medium: It’s straightforward to fixate on the content material medium fairly than the substance of the content material itself. However when you simply cured most cancers and defined how you probably did it, that content material would carry out nicely, no matter whether or not you selected to make a video, a carousel, a graphic, or a text-based publish. Deal with bettering the substance of your content material fairly than fixating on hacks or mediums.
- Instantaneous Comprehension: A graphic can show an idea extra instantaneously, whereas movies and even carousels require extra time for folks to get into the content material and “get the purpose.” Particularly on social media, immediate comprehension is essential for comprehension.
When you’re curious to see how the highest performing posts in comparison with the overall posts, right here’s a breakdown:
Takeaway #4: 16% of the posts that had a picture or video weren’t authentic
Many individuals don’t publish on LinkedIn as a result of they don’t wish to rent a designer or create their very own movies.
Nevertheless, it seems that you just don’t have to create distinctive graphics or movies.
The info reveals that 16% of the highest performing picture and video posts have been graphics or movies that the creator borrowed (with permission) from one other creator.
Here’s a terrific instance of how Reno Perry used (after which credited) a graphic from one other creator to make his publish extra participating:
In some instances, you may even piggyback off another person’s complete thought and artistic (so long as you credit score them).
Here’s a terrific instance of this technique from Kyle Poyar:
We already established that publishing frequency is without doubt one of the most essential indicators of success on LinkedIn, so when you’re in a pinch and have to give you one thing rapidly, contemplate borrowing one other creator’s graphic or video and provides them credit score.
Many of those creators really respect that you just share their content material, and it may be an effective way to construct extra relationships.
Takeaway #5: 37% of the highest performing picture based mostly posts have been professionally designed graphics
I anticipated a lot of the high performing picture posts to be top quality, professionally designed graphics, although I discovered that almost all of them have been simply mobile phone photos of the creator.
For instance, this was the picture for considered one of this creator’s high performing posts.
Keep in mind that LinkedIn is initially a social media platform, so posting life updates and together with photos of your self is an effective way to extend engagement.
That stated, the high quality of engagement may be greater when you publish graphics illustrating blueprints or ideas as that can entice your superb viewers, although private images can even assist construct belief along with your viewers.
Takeaway #6: 17% of the highest performing posts have been reposts
Once I began combing by means of the info, I spotted lots of the three high performing posts have been reposts. Right here’s an instance:
Due to this fact, I excluded any reposts from the primary knowledge set of 300 posts for the sake of analyzing what makes a publish an outlier, however we later went again and checked out simply how lots of the high three posts for any given creator have been reposts.
And the reply was 17%.
The takeaway is to periodically repost every of your high performing posts.
In reality, the reposted content material typically outperformed the unique model.
This can be as a result of the creator had extra followers when the reposted model was printed.
Nevertheless, it nonetheless reveals that almost all of your followers could not see (or keep in mind) your content material, so there’s a major profit in reposting your previous content material.
Right here’s a full breakdown of the repost statistics:
- 17% of the highest performing posts have been reposts
- A repost was among the many high 3 performing posts for 36% of the profiles analyzed.
- Over half of the reposts (67%) really outperformed the unique publish.
Takeaway #7: Engagement dramatically decreases as your follower depend will increase
Right here’s the breakdown of common engagement charges at totally different follower counts:
- 0.51% is the common engagement price for influencers with 200,000 to 500,000 followers
- 0.91% is the common engagement price for influencers with 100,000 to 200,000 followers
- 0.92% is the common engagement price for influencers with 50,000 to 100,000 followers
- 1.38% is the common engagement price for influencers with beneath 50,000 followers
This statistic was a shock, but it surely reinforces the purpose above, which is that it’s important to repost your content material as your follower depend grows, as a result of most of your followers most likely don’t see your entire content material.
This statistic additionally reinforces the significance of rising a publication, as e-mail is without doubt one of the few channels the place you personal the viewers and might ensure that every subscriber sees your viewers.
Takeaway #8: 8AM PDT or 11AM EST is the most typical publishing time
The most typical publishing hour is 8AM PDT or 11AM EST.
I didn’t gather particular location knowledge on these LinkedIn influencers, although it was a world pattern, and anecdotally, I seen that almost all of them have been in the USA.
Takeaway #9: Solely 17% of high performing posts tag different LinkedIn creators/corporations
Tagging different folks and collaborating might be an effective way to encourage engagement.
This post referenced knowledge created by Rand Fishkin and illustrated how he leveraged the info to enhance his course of is an excellent instance of how one can embody different influencers in your content material.
Because of this, Rand commented on the publish and it organically earned extra attain.
Nevertheless, this statistic is an effective reminder that whereas many of those widespread LinkedIn ideas (i.e., tagging influencers) can assist you improve attain, you may waste time overoptimizing your content material while you’d see a greater ROI merely posting extra often.
I additionally wish to observe that the utmost variety of folks tagged in a single piece of content material was not more than two.
I discovered this shocking as I assumed that roundup posts, just like the one beneath, would generate extra engagement.
Nevertheless, the takeaway is that high quality content material and natural relationships trump “engagement methods.”
Takeaway #10: 88% of Prime Performing Posts Had Zero Hashtags
LinkedIn hashtags appear to be much less essential (or just much less utilized), as 88% of the posts didn’t include any hashtags.
And, even when folks did add hashtags, most solely used one hashtag.
Of the posts containing hashtags, solely 34% had greater than three hashtags, and solely 20% had greater than 5.
So use hashtags sparingly. And, they doubtless aren’t as essential as they as soon as have been.
Takeaway #11: 14% of the highest performing posts contained a gated supply
You’ll typically see gated LinkedIn posts the place folks should remark to obtain a free useful resource.
Right here’s an instance:
Due to this fact, I anticipated these gated posts to make up a big proportion of the highest performing posts.
Nevertheless, solely 14% of the highest performing posts have been gated.
Gating posts can assist you construct a listing however use it sparingly.
When you gate your content material, attempt to seize the individual’s e-mail deal with.
The LinkedIn algorithm controls who sees your content material, and it will probably ban you at any second. Nevertheless, capturing emails permits you to personal your viewers and you’ll guarantee every follower receives your content material.
Takeaway #12: 18% of high performing posts contained exterior hyperlinks
Some social media platforms lower attain when you embody a hyperlink within the publish, although we seen that 18% of the 300 top-performing posts contained exterior hyperlinks.
So, your posts can nonetheless carry out nicely when you embody exterior hyperlinks.
Further Anecdotal Observations
I manually collected the info myself, and listed here are some anecdotal observations I gathered from the method.
Whereas I couldn’t put a quantitative worth to those observations, I really feel they’re nonetheless precious sufficient to incorporate on this research.
#1: Every individual has their very own posting type
I initially created a column referred to as “Publish Kind” and deliberate to assign every of the 300 top-performing posts to a particular class, resembling “blueprint” or “private failure story.”
Nevertheless, I rapidly realized that there have been far too many classes and types of posts. And, many posts may belong to a number of classes.
Nonetheless, I did discover that the highest three performing posts for any creator tended to be very related.
For instance, Amanda Natividad’s high performing posts are all very related:
She takes a standard finest observe and provides her personal contrarian viewpoint to the topic. You’ll see that also they are simply easy textual content posts:
Alternatively, Jacob Klug is wildly profitable making a gift of blueprints of cool initiatives they’re engaged on. Listed here are two of his high performing posts:
I’ll provide you with yet one more instance. Two of Gina Sapien’s high performing posts are simply lists of corporations to work for:
The redundant nature of the highest performing posts is probably going as a result of every creator discovered a method of content material they have been good at creating.
So don’t attempt to simply copy a single creator’s content material type. There are lots of of publish codecs that may work, so experiment till you discover one that you just get pleasure from creating.
Nevertheless, it’s a good suggestion to finally develop an everyday content material format and magnificence, not simply to make the content material creation course of simpler for you, but in addition as a result of your viewers will doubtless gravitate in the direction of a specific type of content material.
When you preserve altering the type of content material (e.g., tremendous tactical to “really feel good” wellness content material), you’ll most likely see low engagement charges as not your entire viewers will like the various vary of content material.
#2: Engagement doesn’t account for follower or relationship high quality
Controversial posts and even basic psychological wellness posts are likely to carry out very nicely, however they gained’t essentially enable you construct a following of prospects.
For instance, this publish generated quite a lot of engagement. However did it really assist this individual generate income? Most likely not.
Certain, you may sprinkle in a couple of posts like this to assist improve whole attain and permit your followers to get to know you, but it surely doubtless gained’t show your business authority to prospects, which means it most likely gained’t enable you construct income.
Get Extra Assist Rising Your Private Model
Maybe a very powerful takeaway from this lesson is that a very powerful factor to do is to easily publish extra content material.
Nevertheless, it may be lonely making an attempt to determine the right way to enhance your private model.
That’s why we created Copyblogger Academy. It’s a course and group for entrepreneurs and aspect hustlers constructing on-line companies. There are programs overlaying search engine marketing, content material advertising and marketing, e-mail advertising and marketing, private branding, and different advertising and marketing abilities that may enable you develop quicker.
You’ll even have the chance to attach with different likeminded people in the neighborhood, attend accountability classes, and ask seven determine entrepreneurs (myself and my accomplice Charles Miller) particular questions.
