Is clickbait content finally coming to an end on LinkedIn?

With the latest LinkedIn algorithm changes, we should see more constructive content and less clickbait and like hunting posts on our newsfeed.

4 min to read
Written by: Nataša Blagojević

With more than 830 million users in more than 200 countries around the world, LinkedIn is one of the leading social networks. In addition to the continuous growth of the users’ number, LinkedIn seems to be quite successful according to other indicators too. According to the results that Microsoft presented in April, not only did LinkedIn’s revenue grow by 34% thanks to the options that the platform offers to the companies for attracting talents and advertising, but LinkedIn also notes “record levels of customer engagement”.

Flood of clickbait and like hunting posts

Despite the excellent results, it seems that the company is aware that part of the success is related to more and more content that is not so popular among all users. Various changes in the business and private environment in the last two years have had a strong impact on communication on LinkedIn. There is more and more reposting of other users’ content, clickbait and “like hunting” posts, spam and topics that actually have no place on the platform for business networking. The latest news about the change in the algorithm that determines what we see on our newsfeed indicates that LinkedIn is aware of this problem, and here is how they plan to solve it.

More control on newsfeed for users

Content that users find uninteresting can be marked with an “I don’t want to see this” option, and they can also choose settings that will allow them to see less content by a particular author / content creator. Additionally, it is already possible to report content for which the user assesses that it violates the rules and professional standards of communication on LinkedIn in some way.

There is good news for users who want to see less political topics on LinkedIn. This option is currently being tested among users in the U.S., but if it is found to be useful, we can expect it to be available in other areas soon.

Less spam and polls, more useful content

Not only will users have better control over the content displayed on their newsfeed, but with the help of an algorithm they will see less and less content that directly calls for likes and other reactions. LinkedIn says the goal is to encourage more relevant and credible content. This will also mean less polls on users’ newsfeed, which have flooded the network recently. However, it seems that more and more users do not consider such content relevant, so content creators will have to come up with new “tricks” to attract users’ attention.

LinkedIn’s focus in the future will be even more on the development of tools and technologies that will contribute to more constructive content, make users feel safe on the platform and sanction undesirable behaviour. Also, the platform will focus its efforts on users seeing more content that encourages discussion and exchange of opinions, and for which there is positive feedback as it contributes to the professional development and education of users. At the same time, this content will be more precisely targeted, which in practice can be understood as if we will no longer see every “congratulations” when the connection of our connection announces its new position on LinkedIn.

Greater relevance of thought leaders and influencers

LinkedIn is once again recognizing the importance of content creators and influential people from various fields of business, who give the community valuable expertise and business advice from their own experience. The new “LinkedIn newsfeed experience” should provide more options for users to see content from these authors, even though these are connections that most users do not know personally. Combined with user posts that we show are relevant to us with our reactions and comments, on our newsfeed we should soon see more content of “thought leaders, industry experts and content creators, whose content is relevant for our career development or everyday work”.

Image: Freepik.com

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