Latest / Success Story with Scott Clary / Lessons - How I Hacked The LinkedIn Algorithm | Hala Taha - Podcast Host, Entrepreneur & Speaker

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Lessons - How I Hacked The LinkedIn Algorithm | Hala Taha - Podcast Host, Entrepreneur & Speaker · Success Story with Scott Clary

• 0:00
  In this lessons episode, we dive deep into the world of social media strategy,
• 0:04
  uncovering how to dominate a single platform, leverage organic reach,
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  and create impactful content that resonates with your audience.
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  From growth hacks to algorithm insights,
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  you'll learn the secrets behind building a thriving personal brand
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  and driving explosive growth.
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  When you approach, you know, we're going down the rabbit hole of the product that you're offering people,
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  and I love unpacking this because I'm a marketer too.
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  And to a fault, though, because I like to figure out things myself first,
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  and then, but I'm not even trying to sell it to somebody.
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  I'm just trying to figure it out myself.
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  So I love to understand how you approach channels,
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  how you approach unpacking algorithms,
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  all the growth marketer hacks that you do.
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  And when people hear hacks, it's not that you're doing something that is not allowed.
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  It's that you're using the channel to the best of its ability.
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  And most people don't know how to do that.
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  I mean, there's so many levels to this.
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  You're talking about CEOs that don't know how to build a personal brand
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  that are so far removed from the day-to-day activities of actual marketing.
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  All the way down to growth marketers that are running and operating in a social media agency
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  that are trying to figure out LinkedIn and don't get it.
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  But then it seems like some people every single post just hits.
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  Yeah.
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  All these different nuances and the span of knowledge that you have in bridging that gap
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  between the tactical implementation because you've done it before
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  and the needs and the wants of the actual customer serving,
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  that's actually what's made it successful for you.
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  And the $5 million run rate in two years is fucking insane.
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  But as a marketer, when you look at different channels,
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  you go into a new channel.
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  What are the things that you think about?
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  What are the things that you look for?
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  Can you even describe something that isn't common knowledge
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  on a channel that you do really, really well on
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  that people should start to understand and look at social this way?
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  Yeah.
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  So number one, you want to make sure you're picking the right platform
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  and you don't want to spread yourself to them.
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  So one of the reasons why I really want in this whole game of podcasting
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  is because when I started,
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  I didn't focus on Instagram, YouTube, all these platforms.
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  I said, you know what?
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  I think my target audience are young professionals.
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  And I think there's a huge gap.
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  There was only like Lewis House,
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  was sort of doing his thing on LinkedIn.
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  And I just came in and I focused on LinkedIn
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  and I became the number one podcaster,
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  bigger than Lewis House, bigger than Jay Shetty,
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  bigger than Jordan Harbinger on LinkedIn in terms of my engagement.
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  And I got leverage from that.
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  And that really set everything off.
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  It set up my social agency.
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  It enabled me to trade my audiences with podcast apps
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  and then blow up my podcast later on.
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  And so LinkedIn really kicked everything off for me
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  because I just focused on that
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  and realized my target audience was there and there was a gap.
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  I could stand out in the feed because of my topic
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  and because I'm a young woman, I stood out
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  and I could be different
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  and you want to be different on social media.
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  That's how you win, you want to stop the scroll.
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  So that's number one, figure out where your target audiences,
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  where you have the most opportunity,
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  where there's organic reach, right?
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  And focus on one platform until you gain leverage
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  and then move on to the next platform
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  unless you have a huge team and lots of money.
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  That's a different story.
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  But if you're just starting out
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  and you don't have that many resources,
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  just focus on one platform
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  where your target audience is hanging out in mass.
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  Can I ask you one question on that?
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  Because that runs counter to the GaryVee style strategy,
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  which is everywhere.
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  Which is podcast, 50 pieces of derivative content
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  across every single social platform known to human beings.
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  So that's great if you've got a lot of money in a big team, right?
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  If you hire me, yeah, we can have omnipresence
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  and I can crush it for you
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  because I've already done that, been there before.
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  But if you're starting from scratch,
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  you need to learn the platform, the ins and outs.
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  You need to be familiar with all the features.
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  You need to understand the engagement hacks
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  on that specific platform.
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  You need to build a community on that platform
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  and spend time engaging with your fans.
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  And that doesn't happen by accident
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  and spreading yourself to thin.
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  I see this all the time.
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  You get nowhere.
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  And then you don't have any leverage to then make things bigger
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  because you've got more power.
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  You've got an audience to trade.
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  That's a huge thing to have an audience to trade
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  when you don't have a lot of money, right?
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  And so figure out what platform you want to work on.
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  Then you want to make sure that you understand,
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  you experiment every day, you post every day.
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  There's really two parts of a social media strategy
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  that's important.
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  Number one is like your content marketing.
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  You don't want to push, I'm not a big paid ads person.
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  I never got into it.
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  Eventually I may have to do stuff with paid ads
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  and I do paid ads for podcasts and stuff like that.
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  But in terms of social media,
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  I feel like organic is definitely the way to go.
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  And so you need a really strong content marketing
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  and then you also need to understand the algorithm.
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  And those two things are really what can make somebody
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  become an influencer online.
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  And so in terms of the content marketing,
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  you want to position yourself as an old friend
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  to your community.
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  And that means you need to understand your values.
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  You need to understand your personality type.
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  You need to clearly understand the audience
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  you're trying to target.
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  You want to mirror your personality to your audience.
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  So for example, if I'm trying to attract young millennial men
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  who are the people who listen to my podcasts,
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  I want to make sure that I talk about topics
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  they're interested in, that I sound cool and relatable
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  and that I'm able to actually mirror the audience
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  that I'm trying to attract.
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  So what does that mean?
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  I don't do makeup tutorials.
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  I don't like do fashion blog.
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  Yes, the bit of gas you bring on are certain types.
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  I talk about person exactly.
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  And so I'm always doing things.
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  Not that make me happy, but that attract my target audience.
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  Right?
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  It's not about you necessarily.
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  And you want to think about the impact that you want to make.
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  And so like having a really clear voice identity
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  is really important.
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  A lot of people get stuck on visual identity
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  on social media where they care about a logo,
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  they care about branding.
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  But promotional salesy things, especially on a platform
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  like LinkedIn, actually do terrible because they don't stand out.
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  And they're not authentic and they're not relatable.
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  And so it's really getting clear on your voice identity.
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  Being comfortable with showing your face
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  is super important on social media.
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  A lot of people don't like to show their face
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  and that's one of the things that can like immediately
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  just change things if you just get your face out there.
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  And in terms of the algorithm, it's like,
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  I do things like read engineering documentation, right?
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  So I'm reading LinkedIn engineering documentation.
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  I'm super nerdy.
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  Yeah.
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  Good.
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  That's like, I thought I was nerdy.
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  That's like taking it to another level.
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  That good for you.
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  That you need to do that shit to kill it because it's tough.
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  Exactly.
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  Yeah.
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  No, I mean, that's absolutely wild.
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  Now, you keep bringing up LinkedIn again and again and again
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  out of all the social platforms.
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  Like if you think about the common advice that people give,
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  well, now you follow where the company is trying to promote.
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  So the Reels and the Shorts and the Snapchat Spotlights.
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  And that's where you focus your energy
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  with short form video clips.
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  Yeah.
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  No one really speaks about LinkedIn.
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  I'm obviously very bullish on LinkedIn.
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  I mean, that's actually where I'm not,
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  it sounds like as granular a marketer as you are,
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  but I still understood that like LinkedIn
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  is a content-efficient platform.
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  Yeah.
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  So when you put stuff on there, you get organic reach.
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  I'm a big fan of organic, as somebody you did not have money
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  starting at a podcast, then you have to find a way to tap
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  into an audience.
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  So I get LinkedIn and also their content is very similar.
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  It's business content, so it hits.
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  But I mean, I never put this much thought into it.
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  So it's like, sometimes I'm just like a good accident.
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  But I mean, you are very purposeful about all the shit you do.
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  Yeah, very purposeful.
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  Which is great.
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  And that's probably why you have a $5 million agency.
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  And I don't have one.
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  That's a lot.
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  But how do you actually, or why is LinkedIn
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  so important in your content strategy?
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  Why do you keep bringing it up?
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  Like, what is the thing about LinkedIn?
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  The differentiates it and put in layman's terms
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  over focusing on YouTube or focusing on Instagram
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  or focusing on Twitter or TikTok?
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  Well, number one, like I mentioned before,
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  the leverage of me being able to say,
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  I'm the number one podcaster on LinkedIn.
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  And I have a business podcast.
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  So all the business brands love to sponsor me.
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  And we didn't talk about it,
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  but I have a podcast network where I grow and monetize shows.
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  And a lot of my deals are 360 deals.
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  So I'm one of the first podcasters
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  that have monetized LinkedIn lives.
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  I sell my podcast as a sign-all cast across my podcast,
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  my YouTube and my LinkedIn.
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  I'm the first one to do that, right?
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  And so I've been able to like triple my impressions
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  just because I use LinkedIn live
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  as another podcast monetization tool, essentially.
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  And so 360 deals are really important to me.
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  Speaking engagements come from LinkedIn primarily.
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  A lot of my clients are authors.
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  Speaking engagements come from LinkedIn,
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  not from Instagram, right?
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  So really important for authors
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  and the types of clients that I run.
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  Something that I want to talk about,
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  because you mentioned it before,
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  but we didn't really get to talk about,
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  is just basic rules of growing on social media.
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  And I can take it from like broad cross channel
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  to then we can focus on LinkedIn.
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  Yeah, sure.
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  So first, every social media platform,
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  no matter what it is,
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  their goal is to keep users on that platform, right?
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  And anytime you post on social media,
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  you need to remember that if you want to be rewarded
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  on this platform, you need to keep users engaged
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  and you need to keep them on the platform
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  as long as possible.
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  So if you do anything that brings users off the platform
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  that boars them where people skim over your stuff,
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  you're never going to win.
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  You want to stop the scroll,
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  you want people to spend time on your posts
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  to take viral actions on your posts.
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  And that means that you really need to know
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  the content marketing that's going to resonate
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  with your target audience,
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  but then also have to like hack things
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  to make sure that people do spend time on your posts
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  and don't leave the platform.
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  That's how you get rewarded no matter what.
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  The other thing is that in this world,
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  everything is mobile.
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  You want to take up as much real estate
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  as possible on the feed.
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  It's super important.
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  People miss this.
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  So on LinkedIn, for example,
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  people will put up horizontal images
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  or text posts with no graphic.
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  That's the worst thing you can do
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  because the average person on LinkedIn
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  is scrolling through nine posts, right?
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  And if they just skim over your posts,
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  you're actually going to lose points for the algorithm
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  because you didn't have dwell time.
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  Nobody actually stopped and looked at your stuff.
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  And so the bigger the image, the better.
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  So on LinkedIn, that's like a four by five aspect ratio
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  for a graphic.
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  And if you have a photo with a person on it,
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  people are spending more time looking at the person
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  rather than like a promotional graphic
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  or something like that.
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  And so big photos right now work the best on LinkedIn.
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  Videos don't work well.
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  The only thing that works well with video on LinkedIn
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  is like LinkedIn Lives.
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  That's why I do a lot of LinkedIn Lives.
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  And so people try to take the same strategies
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  like Instagram Reels and do it on LinkedIn.
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  It doesn't work.
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  It's a whole different platform
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  with a different set of rules
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  that are prioritizing certain features.
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  It's not like Instagram.
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  So that's a big problem.
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  I see people trying to replicate,
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  you know, what they do on one platform
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  when it doesn't work that way.
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  No, I was going to say one more thing.
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  I guess on that point, I don't want to fire.
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  No, no, you're good.
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  You're good.
• 10:53
  I love it.
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  It's an easy interview.
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  But when you see people that are just copying the strategy,
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  I just want to highlight something.
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  I think what you're seeing is you're seeing people
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  that follow Gary Vee or some other social media influencer.
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  And they see that Gary has a very sophisticated strategy.
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  But you do see that he'll just take a random video
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  that he posted on Instagram and he'll post it on LinkedIn.
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  And he'll get thousands of likes and...
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  But you cannot equate what he has,
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  which is critical mass of an audience
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  versus what you're doing, which is no audience.
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  Yeah.
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  And I think that's the issue.
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  People replicate that.
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  And they're like, well, if he's doing it,
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  I should do the exact same thing.
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  You're playing at a different level.
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  And you have to play at the level that you're at
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  to eventually get to where he is.
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  Yeah, and by the way,
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  so somebody like Gary has well over a million followers
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  on LinkedIn and his engagements the same as me
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  and I have 200,000 followers.
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  So he actually has a very poor engagement rate
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  because like you said, he's just replicating
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  and he's just got this huge audience.
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  So it does well.
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  But he could be doing so much better
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  if he was leaning into the features
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  that LinkedIn is actually promoting.
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  The other thing is skimmable content, right?
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  People don't like to read.
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  And these algorithms want to keep users on the platform.
• 12:07
  So a platform like LinkedIn
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  is actually going to deprioritize your post
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  if you've got big chunky paragraphs
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  and you're making people work
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  because they know people are going to skim over them.
• 12:16
  And so big chunky paragraphs, you get deprioritized.
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  Linking in the caption, taking users to another website,
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  deprioritized.
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  The other thing that's really unique about LinkedIn
• 12:26
  is that the last stage of the algorithm
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  is actually human editors.
• 12:30
  This is way different than any other platform.
• 12:32
  And so an influence are like me and all my clients.
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  I know how to manipulate the algorithm so much
• 12:37
  that like we're always going viral.
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  So my worst performing post, 1500 likes, you know,
• 12:43
  and then ranging from like 1500 to like 5,000 likes.
• 12:47
  But then sometimes I'll get 100,000 like posts,
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  60,000 like posts, million, eight million views.
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  Tell me like nobody's getting these types of results
• 12:55
  on LinkedIn.
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  And the reason why is because my content is actually
• 12:58
  aligning to the LinkedIn editorial agenda
• 13:01
  because the LinkedIn is actually scanning
• 13:03
  the most popular posts and anything that aligns
• 13:06
  to careers, hiring, graduation, point in time holidays,
• 13:10
  Women's Day Month, Black History Month,
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  whatever is on their editorial agenda,
• 13:14
  they're going to pour gasoline on it.
• 13:16
  And they're going to stop anything that's salesy,
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  anything that's promotional, anything that's promoting me,
• 13:20
  my LinkedIn masterclass or whatever it is.
• 13:23
  And they're actually going to pour gasoline
• 13:26
  on the stuff that aligns to their agenda.
• 13:27
  So whenever I'm thinking about client strategy
• 13:29
  in terms of content marketing on LinkedIn,
• 13:31
  I'm like, what is the intersection of your niche
• 13:33
  and careers?
• 13:34
  Because that's how we're going to go massively viral.
• 13:36
  What's your ratio of promotional to editorial guideline
• 13:41
  focused content?
• 13:43
  On LinkedIn, sales happen in the DMs.
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  Always.
• 13:46
  Always.
• 13:47
  LinkedIn is going to do, from the first step
• 13:49
  of the algorithm, LinkedIn is deprioritizing sales
• 13:51
  and promotional stuff.
• 13:52
  If you link out, deprioritized.
• 13:54
  If you have salesy keywords in your post, deprioritized,
• 13:58
  LinkedIn is in the business of making LinkedIn money
• 14:00
  and keeping users engaged and entertained on the platform.
• 14:03
  And they want to reward content creators who do that.
• 14:06
  And by the way, only 6% of people who are on LinkedIn
• 14:09
  are actually content creators.
• 14:11
  So there's a huge opportunity for everybody
• 14:13
  to be that dominant person in their niche,
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  just like I was the number one podcaster
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  or the number one podcaster on LinkedIn.
• 14:19
  Thanks for tuning in.
• 14:20
  If you found this valuable, don't forget
• 14:22
  to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode.
• 14:24
  And if you want to dive deeper into this conversation,
• 14:27
  check out the links in the description
• 14:28
  to watch the full episode.
• 14:30
  See you in the next one.
• 14:31
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