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LinkedIn Opens Its Publishing Platform To Users

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When I heard that LinkedIn was opening its publishing platform to all users, I had mixed feelings. The notion of a flood of terrible content on LinkedIn worried me. However, after careful consideration, I recognized the level of foresight behind this new feature.

The Benefits of an Open Publishing Platform

The advantages of an open publishing platform aren’t one-sided. A setup like this offers benefits to a wide range of contributors — and provides even more people with opportunities to increase their knowledge.

1. Everybody now has a platform through which they can contribute. In one of my first articles published on LinkedIn, I wrote about the importance writing has for every leader. It was amazing to have more than 200 comments posted, which helped continue the discussion and enabled everyone to share their expertise. LinkedIn has now given everyone a way to do this. Here's an introductory guide to using the LinkedIn publishing platform, which I wrote based on my experience with it.

2. It provides HR solutions. A substantial part of LinkedIn’s revenues come from providing companies with HR solutions to recruit top talent. Gathering data about potential recruits is one of the best ways to make sure a potential hire is the right fit for a position.

Currently, LinkedIn has the advantage of using the data it’s collected through its massive social network to help employers find the right fit. By opening up a publishing platform, employers now not only have demographic information, but they also have the opportunity to showcase their expertise, interests, and passions in their writing, giving potential employees a glimpse of what their company culture is like. Employers can, in turn, examine the content of prospective new employees.

3. Members can showcase their expertise. My company specializes in helping businesses showcase their employees’ strengths. This process has many steps, including developing an appropriate strategy, creating content, editing, publishing, and distributing the final product. LinkedIn is decreasing the barriers by helping professionals in one of these areas.

Identifying the right outlets to reach a target audience is challenging. Many professionals have no control over where their content is published or which audience it reaches. With LinkedIn, your content will at least reach your network and could reach other distribution channels, which is extremely valuable.

4. Members have the ability to distribute quality content to their networks. The days of relying on media outlets to help build your platform are slowly diminishing. With contributor models opening up and people gathering information from a variety of sources, you can’t rely on one article to be a game changer. You need to build your own platform to develop quality and consistency to expand your audience and influence.

5. Authors have access to demographic analytics. Here is a screenshot of some of the analytic features of contributing to LinkedIn: 

I have data on all my followers, including a variety of data points. I’m also able to see the positions, industries, and cities that make up my following.

Here’s another example of how I’m able to see data points about followers’ interactions with my content and its reach:

I can see the audience I’m communicating with, and that motivates me to continue to share my thoughts and strategies.

Potential Drawbacks of the Platform

Despite the wide-ranging benefits of the LinkedIn platform, there are still some drawbacks for users to keep in mind.

1. The potential exists for a flood of bad content. At publications, editors monitor the quality of content. LinkedIn will not have the same luxury. Members must realize that their personal and company brands are being represented. Just because you’re allowed to publish content doesn’t mean that you should rush to hit the “publish” button. Think about the quality and type of content that you might publish. LinkedIn will obviously take quality into consideration when determining the algorithm of how content is distributed. Poor quality will hinder your potential.

2. Members might not realize the value. The initial reaction of some members may be to compare this feature to sharing a post with only their connections, as they’d been able to do in the past. However, there’s a huge difference between a friendly post and an actual article in terms of quality.

LinkedIn is creating specific channels that will support targeted content for a variety of industries. As you build your platform, this will be a key way to stand out as an industry leader. If your features don’t get enough traction, this could prevent your platform from being as useful as it could be.

I’ve had the opportunity to be a part of the testing phases for this new LinkedIn feature, and I’ve enjoyed the experience. The engagement, conversations, and opportunities that have resulted have been remarkable. While LinkedIn’s new platform is a great feature, smart brands and individuals will be driven to use it only to distribute high-quality work.

What are your thoughts about this new feature?  Feel free to comment below.

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John Hall Influence & Co. | @tweetjohnhall LinkedIn | Google+