June: Length DOES Matter - Why the rise of LinkedIn articles is great news for you

This seemingly never ending heatwave has given rise to one thing and one thing only…

A thirst for our brand new newsletter.

Yeah, it’s cheesy but I couldn’t resist.

But one thing LinkedIn is thirsty for is content.

And we’re not just talking about short, sharp posts.

Return of the long form

LinkedIn has been banging on (like every other social platform) about providing relevant, quality content.

But what that means on LinkedIn is different to Insta, FB, and TikTok.

On LinkedIn it means authoritative, exceptional, thought leading, cutting edge content.

The stuff you know about, your expertise, the nerdy stuff that you know inside out upside down.

They want that.

And they have the perfect mechanism to deliver it.

Long Form Articles

The Article Button

Articles have been around on LinkedIn for ages. They’re not new.

But in recent months, they have been growing again in popularity for one key reason.

People read them, and LinkedIn wants to show off and highlight authoritative content.

And these articles ARE authoritative content (most of the time).

They make more people stay on the platform, show off expertise, and also brings AI and search traffic to the site.

So in one article, you can get more eyeballs on your expertise than ever before.

With that being said, the article button doesn’t get a lot of love.

Which is a shame (we’ve always been great fans of it, we always post our blogs and newsletters as LinkedIn articles too).

It’s part of a myriad of LinkedIn tools you are probably not using because you don’t know they exist.

The button is here:  

Really Another Blog?

If the thought of you having to write blogs/articles makes your blood run cold, then have no fear.

The ideal article length (according to LI themselves) is between 800-1200 words.

That’s a wide variety, and 800 words is actually easily achievable, especially about a topic you have a lot of knowledge about.

All you need is 3-4 good points to write about and a smidge over 200 words per point.

Start with that, and you will be creating amazing articles in no time.

What’s the point?

As you will know by now, social media is an attention grabbing game.

The more attention you can grab, the easier it is to get engagement.

The more engagement means the greater the likelihood of sales and conversions.

Where LinkedIn is prioritising and putting more effort into sharing articles from people, ranking them higher and making them appear in your feeds, you will likely be receiving a larger slice of that audience pie.

LinkedIn articles are appearing more frequently as sources in AI search results.

That means one blog will get automatically sourced and referenced and “re-printed” (at least in part) to every conceivable AI platform (ChatGPT, Perplexity, etc).

For more on that, wait for our blog.

The Updates

LinkedIn has been doing some serious updates recently.

You can’t do long comments now.

OK you still can, but the character count has dropped.

It seems to be capped at 1,000 characters now, down from 1,250.

It's a bit baffling since LinkedIn is supposedly pushing for community building.

But if you've got a lot to say, just drop multiple comments in a thread to get around it!

One of the biggest changes, though, is the new In-Comment "Follow" Button.

For some users, a "Follow" button is now popping up right on people's comments if you aren't already following them, making connecting with insightful people much faster.

This will be great for rapidly expanding your network with those you engage with.

There’s also something new ABOUT our profiles.

The "About" section preview has changed, you can now see up to 6 lines on mobile, compared to just 4 on desktop.

Since most users are scrolling on their phones, it just makes sense.

It’s a great time to review your own About section (or get someone else to do it *cough cough*!

Out And About - What have the Jems been up to?

Jem

Jem’s focus this month has been on building up the business and as a result, she's bagged a few new and wonderful clients to work with and exciting proposals are flying about the interwebs waiting to be signed off.

To do this though, she has had to abandon the world of socials and drag herself to ACTUALLY MEET PEOPLE!!

This shocking turn of events has paid off.

As a respite from all the hard work, she has been away on a quick sojourn to Wales to help refresh and recharge (as well as enjoy some of that beautiful half-term sun we had). 

Looking forward, she has  HER FIRST EVER SPEAKING GIG coming up.

It’s on the 16th June with the Powerhive, talking about how to use AI without losing your voice on socials.

It’s going to be incredible, so if you want to know about it, talk to Jem asap.

Oh and she’s also been to a spa…. At this point it’s just a running joke on these emails.

Sarah B

Sarah has been out and about a lot with friends and family down the beach, desperately enjoying the sun and sand (but still a little hesitant about the temperature of the sea).

Not only this, but she has been cruising up and down the Norfolk Broads on boat tours, taking in the majestic scenery that Norfolk has to offer.

Not only this, she became overwhelmingly excited about ducklings, and we have not heard her stop talking about them since.

The next big plan for her summer is to onboard more clients and finally achieve the dream of getting a dog (breed to still be decided)!

Sarah A

Sarah A has had a beautiful time celebrating her anniversary. Congratulations!
And nothing says anniversary celebrations like cake and LOOK HOW DELICIOUS THESE ARE!!

Other than that, this has been a relatively chill month with great coffee, exquisite food, breathtaking sunsets, and deeply relaxing massages to top it all off.

Freddie

The squirrel has been enjoying the sunshine, working hard in his garden, trying to make it neat and tidy for a beautiful summer.

Aside from this, he has been keeping his head down and working to build his stash of acorns for the winter before baby squirrel number 2 arrives.

And in the small downtime that happens, he has been building a campaign for his latest tabletop roleplaying venture - studying all kinds of mythologies to provide inspiration for the dark creatures of the world.

Wrapping up

All in all, it’s been a fantastic May and June has already promised an incredible summer.

We’re all for this new push for longer form content to take a larger more prominent and important place on LinkedIn.

It will help provide plenty of opportunities for people to truly show off their expertise.

But if you get tongue-tied at the thought of writing long form content regularly then you should give Jem a call to discuss how to make it easier for you.