Latest / Hope + Possibilities: Trust, Leadership + Strategic Foresight / How I'm Rethinking My LinkedIn Strategy for the Future: Designing for Future Focused Visibility That Feels Good

Transcript

How I'm Rethinking My LinkedIn Strategy for the Future: Designing for Future Focused Visibility That Feels Good · Hope + Possibilities: Trust, Leadership + Strategic Foresight

• 0:02
  I am Nola Simon, thank you for joining this episode of Hope and Possibilities.
• 0:06
  Love Letter to the Future of work.
• 0:09
  I'm the host of this podcast and what I wanna talk about really
• 0:12
  is the state of social media and.
• 0:17
  Discoverability in general.
• 0:19
  And I wanna start with talking about LinkedIn because quite honestly,
• 0:23
  LinkedIn has been my favorite place on the internet for a very long time.
• 0:27
  At least 10 years.
• 0:29
  I've, I think I created an account back in 2009, 2010, something like that.
• 0:34
  But I didn't really actively start using it until 2016 and then.
• 0:39
  I started getting a lot of traction as an employee advocate.
• 0:43
  And then when I started my own business in 2020, then I really
• 0:47
  seriously started to grow it.
• 0:49
  And again, I only have 7,000 followers, but I am a LinkedIn top voice, so I like
• 0:55
  to think that my account is small but mighty, and I've had impact with it.
• 1:02
  Now, honestly, it depends what you think of LinkedIn top voice, but.
• 1:07
  It's not something that you can pay for.
• 1:09
  You can't influence your way into it.
• 1:11
  The only thing you can do is really create good content that gets the
• 1:15
  attention of LinkedIn and talk about things that stand out that
• 1:20
  aren't the same as everybody else.
• 1:22
  And that seems to be what I've been able to do.
• 1:25
  My coach, Carrie Twick has been on LinkedIn Top Voice several times.
• 1:29
  I think she's being.
• 1:30
  I designated three different years.
• 1:33
  LinkedIn has changed Top Voice over the years as well too, so now it stays with
• 1:36
  you unless you actually use it, lose it.
• 1:39
  And one of the ways you lose it is you stop engaging, you stop
• 1:43
  posting, you stop commenting.
• 1:45
  You stop adding value really, to the community.
• 1:48
  So for me, if I want to maintain top voice status, I have to
• 1:52
  continue my work on LinkedIn Now.
• 1:55
  If you've been paying attention to LinkedIn at all, you'll note that
• 1:59
  there's a controversy going on right now because people feel that posts by women
• 2:05
  are really downgraded in the algorithm.
• 2:07
  The algorithm has definitely changed.
• 2:09
  There's something now called 360 Brew Degree Brew.
• 2:13
  And what this algorithm really is doing is it's shifting the focus from.
• 2:20
  Posting to commenting.
• 2:23
  There's also other things that are factoring into it.
• 2:25
  LinkedIn has come out to state that they don't use gender as a determinant
• 2:32
  of how people get discovered in the algorithm, but they do use other
• 2:38
  democratic, other information and data that really serve as proxy bias.
• 2:43
  Men tend to be more active on the platform, so activity is a factor.
• 2:47
  Your hierarchy your title.
• 2:50
  Men tend to get, promoted.
• 2:52
  If you look at the demographics of CEOs and senior leadership,
• 2:57
  they tend to be men.
• 2:58
  So those types of proxy bias are ways that people who don't fit that particular
• 3:07
  demographic are maybe overlooked in the.
• 3:12
  Algorithm.
• 3:13
  So of course it's not women alone.
• 3:16
  It's, anybody who has an intersection.
• 3:19
  If you happen to be female and a person of color, your algorithm
• 3:25
  is going to treat you differently.
• 3:27
  If you happen to be trans, your algorithm is going to treat you differently.
• 3:31
  It's
• 3:34
  proxy bias.
• 3:35
  So the algorithm is looking at.
• 3:40
  How you intersect with the world and what those dominant features
• 3:45
  are and how that matches to what other people are searching for.
• 3:50
  And that's problematic in lots of ways.
• 3:54
  But what I'd like to point out is, the people who are bringing this
• 3:58
  to your attention also do have.
• 4:03
  Legitimate concerns, but they also do have an agenda themselves as well.
• 4:06
  So if I look at the people who are the most vocal about it, they are the people
• 4:12
  who are also themselves trying to create platforms for underserved communities.
• 4:20
  They are people who.
• 4:23
  Have not thrived in the status quo.
• 4:25
  They don't meet that demographic, and therefore what they're creating
• 4:29
  and fueling their business really serves those underserved communities.
• 4:34
  So as legitimate as their concerns are, they do also have an agenda.
• 4:40
  So what does that mean, and why am I talking about this?
• 4:43
  What this means is you have to think about.
• 4:51
  Future you.
• 4:52
  Future you is future.
• 4:56
  You going to thank yourself for really taking on a Goliath type battle and
• 5:05
  making it a real focus of your business.
• 5:10
  So for some of the people that I've seen really get up in LinkedIn's face and go on
• 5:15
  the news and really they have made that a big core piece of their business, right?
• 5:23
  The one person in particular that I'm talking about is Cindy Gallup.
• 5:26
  And I like Cindy.
• 5:27
  I like her approach.
• 5:28
  I like her.
• 5:30
  Instincts.
• 5:31
  I do think that she has a lot of valid points, and again, she
• 5:34
  is a person of color, right?
• 5:36
  She has an Asian background, right?
• 5:40
  So she appears white, but she's not,
• 5:46
  and she works in a sex tech.
• 5:50
  So make love not porn is her business.
• 5:53
  She's being unbanked.
• 5:55
  A lot of her accounts get shadow banned all the time because of the way the
• 5:58
  platforms, Instagram and LinkedIn.
• 6:01
  All of those social media platforms tend to react towards businesses
• 6:06
  they don't themselves offer and in categories that they deem inappropriate.
• 6:13
  I understand where she's coming from, but she does also have an AI tech solution.
• 6:20
  She is really vocal about creating platforms that are alternatives
• 6:29
  to what we have so far.
• 6:32
  So she does actually have a vested interest in alternatives.
• 6:38
  And she has the voice to really back it up.
• 6:41
  She's been doing this for a very long time and she's a
• 6:44
  marketing expert to boot, right?
• 6:46
  So she has actually created a business where it behooves her really to be vocal.
• 6:53
  Is that you?
• 6:55
  So if it's not.
• 6:58
  And again, no shame to Cindy.
• 7:00
  I believe in, in, what she's creating.
• 7:03
  And I understand where she's coming from and I agree with an
• 7:05
  awful lot of what she's doing.
• 7:08
  I think it's more complex than most people are recognizing.
• 7:13
  So far, I think there's more to it that we just don't know.
• 7:17
  I do think it's a worthwhile conversation to be having as well too, but.
• 7:22
  How does the regular LinkedIn user wanna proceed with that?
• 7:27
  And how do you adapt to the changing algorithm?
• 7:29
  Because it's a reality.
• 7:33
  It's not gonna change overnight, and the average user isn't
• 7:36
  going to change LinkedIn's mind.
• 7:37
  So how do you proceed?
• 7:40
  And that honestly is
• 7:44
  assessing how it's making you feel for one.
• 7:48
  How does it feel that you're posting and not getting a lot of interaction,
• 7:52
  not getting a lot of reach, your impressions have dropped significantly.
• 7:57
  How do you change that and how do you deal with the emotional impact?
• 8:00
  Again, a lot of these platforms are designed to manipulate, right?
• 8:04
  So you have to recognize that.
• 8:07
  There are emotions that are attached to this, and the way that you've been doing
• 8:12
  things up until now is not necessarily the way that it's gonna work in the future.
• 8:16
  But again, this is change.
• 8:19
  And how do you adapt to change?
• 8:21
  How do you adapt to uncertainty?
• 8:23
  Because there's no playbook that's really being made public.
• 8:27
  Sure, there's lots of speculations, but it's not LinkedIn has actually laid out
• 8:31
  their algorithm to explain step by step.
• 8:35
  Exactly how you've gained traction in this particular version of their platform.
• 8:43
  So what do you do?
• 8:45
  You have to assess again, as I said, how it's making you feel, but you
• 8:49
  also have to experiment and look at
• 8:54
  what seems to be working.
• 8:55
  As I said, commenting seems to be working.
• 8:58
  Now for me, commenting has always been part of my strategy.
• 9:01
  Initially I, when I started commenting I leaned into cheerleading,
• 9:05
  really is celebrating wins of others and being supportive.
• 9:09
  And I've gotten away from that, not because I don't believe in being
• 9:16
  supportive, but again, it's about how much traction you're getting from
• 9:21
  the effort that you're putting in.
• 9:23
  And cheerleading.
• 9:25
  Might make people like you, but it's actually not gonna drive business.
• 9:29
  For example, like I'm offering consulting services being supportive
• 9:35
  without actually creating any kind of understanding about my insights,
• 9:39
  my capability, my credibility, the services I offer, that doesn't serve me.
• 9:45
  So I've had to change how I comment since I really started commenting back in 2016.
• 9:51
  That's changed and adapted.
• 9:53
  Recently I got, I had a comment get over 21,000 impressions, which was
• 10:00
  more than almost triple the impressions I'd gotten from 28 days of actually
• 10:05
  posting my own original con content.
• 10:09
  That's a true signal of how things are working.
• 10:12
  And does it indicate to me that the platform is more
• 10:15
  of a discovery platform now?
• 10:17
  Yes, because what's happening is people are coming to my platform
• 10:21
  on the strength of those comments and what are they learning about me
• 10:26
  when they first look at my profile.
• 10:28
  So I have to assess my profile and see, have I built this for people who already
• 10:33
  know me and know what I'm about and what I believe in, and what my values are.
• 10:37
  And.
• 10:38
  How to hire me and what I'm trying to do, or am I building it for people who
• 10:44
  have never heard of me and the only thing they know about me is the one
• 10:48
  particular comment I happen to leave on
• 10:52
  a stranger's post that I may or may not be connected to.
• 10:57
  So I think that I have to go back and reassess my profile and how
• 11:01
  I've built that so that I am.
• 11:05
  Being memorable and being engaging, it's going to spark curiosity, but
• 11:09
  also how am I driving that interest?
• 11:12
  Am I encouraging people to DM me?
• 11:14
  Am I encouraging people to go to my website?
• 11:16
  Am I building out blog content that I own on a platform that's mine?
• 11:22
  And where am I going to be spending my time in a way that feels good to
• 11:27
  me and feels productive and feels.
• 11:31
  That it's really just not fueling the algorithm for LinkedIn.
• 11:35
  And again, I like LinkedIn.
• 11:36
  I'm a LinkedIn top voice.
• 11:38
  I'm invested in the success of the platform because it's treated me well.
• 11:44
  But this also goes for all the other services that you're on.
• 11:47
  Like I don't really post on Instagram.
• 11:50
  The only thing I do on Instagram is stories.
• 11:52
  If you look at my Instagram account, it's on private and my my grid is empty.
• 11:59
  I don't use it.
• 12:00
  The only thing I like on Instagram is stories, and I like their inbox, right?
• 12:05
  So I will respond to messages there.
• 12:08
  I still have a Twitter or X. I don't really use it.
• 12:13
  I post occasionally.
• 12:14
  Mostly I find that it's not productive.
• 12:17
  Same with TikTok.
• 12:19
  I do TikTok because.
• 12:25
  It surfaces what's immediately happening.
• 12:28
  But I don't find that people engagements from people who tend to hang out
• 12:31
  there and who are commenting and interacting I do find the people who
• 12:37
  tend to be on TikTok aren't there to build relationships long term.
• 12:41
  They're there to make themselves feel good in the moment.
• 12:45
  And again, that's not how I want to build out my business.
• 12:49
  And, I like the discoverability idea.
• 12:53
  Same with YouTube.
• 12:54
  But YouTube and Pinterest are more search related, right?
• 12:58
  I'm not there for comments.
• 12:59
  It's like, how can you use that for discoverability?
• 13:02
  And so I'm all about async as well too.
• 13:05
  I don't wanna have to be managing multiple inboxes.
• 13:09
  So I plan to, as I said, like I like the LinkedIn and I like Instagram.
• 13:16
  Threads has an inbox, but I say almost nobody knows it exists.
• 13:20
  I like threads as well too, but again, I don't find it drives
• 13:24
  relationships or long term commitment.
• 13:28
  And again, I think that's a lot to do with the platform and the fact
• 13:31
  that they don't insist on you using your own identity on those platforms.
• 13:36
  So any platform where you don't actually have to use your identity, I don't
• 13:40
  know that's where I really wanna build.
• 13:43
  So that means that I'm looking at Substack again, you can create there,
• 13:50
  but I create under my own name and I have my podcast there, my newsletter
• 13:53
  there under hope and possibilities.
• 13:56
  I like Substack.
• 13:57
  I think it's very interesting.
• 13:59
  I'm interested in what I can actually do.
• 14:04
  There that I haven't explored yet.
• 14:05
  Like I haven't done video on Substack.
• 14:07
  I don't know how that drives engagement.
• 14:09
  I don't think a lot of people use Substack for live or video.
• 14:13
  So does that have more discoverability?
• 14:16
  I'm interested in playing with that.
• 14:17
  So what I'm saying basically is I. I'm going to focus my
• 14:23
  intention on things that I own.
• 14:25
  For example, before I post anywhere, I should post on my website,
• 14:29
  on my blog and then use that to then post a LinkedIn again.
• 14:36
  Articles seem to be doing well, a newsletter.
• 14:38
  I have a newsletter with 2,500 followers.
• 14:40
  How many of those actually receive emails?
• 14:42
  I have no idea.
• 14:44
  But in terms of like actually owning email list, I need to
• 14:46
  develop at my email, which I can use Substack to, to help as well too.
• 14:52
  And that's really where I want to focus my attention is
• 15:01
  how do I build in such a way that I'm building out relationships and
• 15:04
  people who actually care about me as a person, as an individual, as a
• 15:08
  consultant, and are looking to hire me.
• 15:11
  So again, having friends is great friends.
• 15:14
  Don't pay your bills.
• 15:16
  Clients do.
• 15:17
  And that's really what my focus is, has to be.
• 15:20
  And you'll be seeing more for me on that.
• 15:23
  So again, this is a topic that I tend not to write about very often
• 15:29
  on LinkedIn just because people then come to me and expect me to want
• 15:34
  to be a LinkedIn trainer because.
• 15:37
  Somehow people always wanna put me in a trainer box.
• 15:41
  I know an awful lot about the platform.
• 15:42
  I know a lot about social media, but social media and training in
• 15:46
  particular tends to be transactional.
• 15:49
  And I've spent my career in transactional roles and I'm much more interested in
• 15:57
  strategy and long term nurturing and.
• 16:03
  Planning and innovation than I am about transactional task related type work.
• 16:09
  And that's, I think, where my strong suit is.
• 16:15
  I'm capable of doing the other thing, but that's not where I feel
• 16:19
  the long term opportunity is for me.
• 16:21
  And that's not where my drinks lie in the future of work.
• 16:28
  This is why I'm doing the podcast.
• 16:30
  I will actually then convert this into things that I post in
• 16:33
  the platforms I've mentioned.
• 16:34
  So Substack and Pinterest, and I might put some shorts on YouTube to experiment with
• 16:40
  how that really plays in the algorithms there and how that drives search.
• 16:45
  This is the decision that I've made and now it's up to me to.
• 16:49
  Really experiment and fuel and see how it goes.
• 16:52
  I support having more clarity and transparency in platforms and how
• 17:00
  they actually derive their content.
• 17:03
  And I do think that ethical AI use means that we have to look at proxy bias.
• 17:12
  It's how long, how much effort do you wanna devote to it personally and.
• 17:21
  My instinct is to support the conversation and not drive it.
• 17:26
  So that's how I'm choosing to actually pursue that is how do I adapt, how
• 17:31
  do I change my behavior so that I'm going to be successful in a way that
• 17:37
  feels good and drives business and also supports the conversations that
• 17:41
  need to be happening to actually.
• 17:44
  Facilitate change in a way that's not gonna be draining for me.
• 17:47
  That's really what it comes down to.
• 17:51
  So I'm interested to hear your thoughts.
• 17:53
  I'm interested to hear how you're changing your behaviors what you
• 17:58
  think about social media and the changes, not just on LinkedIn, but
• 18:02
  anywhere that you actively active.
• 18:04
  And.
• 18:06
  The other thing I'd like to mention too is like there's a really
• 18:09
  strong push that I'm noticing.
• 18:10
  I'm noticing trends 'cause I'm always looking for trends
• 18:12
  and foresight and scenarios.
• 18:15
  I'm seeing a really strong trend to people saying that in
• 18:19
  person is where it has to be.
• 18:20
  That you have to have success offline and that the changes in social media mean that
• 18:26
  everything's going to be driven in person.
• 18:29
  I still don't find that's to be.
• 18:31
  Inclusive, because again, you have to remember, I live in the middle of nowhere.
• 18:35
  I'm 45 minutes north geographically of Toronto.
• 18:38
  But every time I go to Toronto, it takes out two hours of my day at best.
• 18:43
  That's honestly when I'm taking my kids back to university and we're
• 18:46
  going at nine o'clock at night.
• 18:48
  During the day, if I try to go to Toronto, it's gonna be a two hour commute.
• 18:52
  So before I even step foot into a venue, I have to get up, get
• 18:57
  dressed, take my dog for a walk.
• 18:59
  Drive down there, find parking deal with all of the stress.
• 19:03
  Even just going to Toronto last night, it almost got killed three
• 19:06
  times by people driving too fast, people switching lanes too quickly.
• 19:10
  Somebody was driving backwards on Dundas.
• 19:12
  I have no idea why commuting in Toronto was.
• 19:17
  A joy.
• 19:18
  So the bar is really high for me to actually go to somewhere in person, and
• 19:22
  that's for somewhere that I can drive.
• 19:25
  If you're actually expecting me to get on an airplane, then that
• 19:28
  becomes a different bar entirely.
• 19:32
  Why am I actually leaving my house?
• 19:37
  I'd have to arrange dog walkers and care for everything that
• 19:43
  I have to do in the house.
• 19:45
  It has to be worth my while.
• 19:46
  I'm not just going because it's a nice to have.
• 19:51
  I'm either making money, I'm learning something significant, or I'm
• 19:56
  collaborating with something that has real potential to save me time,
• 20:05
  earn me money, or reduce my risk.
• 20:09
  Those are really high bars, and so I challenge the people who are
• 20:14
  saying that in person is the way to go because in person is the
• 20:19
  way to go if you happen to live.
• 20:23
  Where events are easy,
• 20:27
  but the majority of the world doesn't necessarily live where events are easy.
• 20:34
  And where there's interest in the particular thing that you're offering.
• 20:39
  So again, virtual options still
• 20:46
  are very attractive, particularly to me.
• 20:49
  So that's one thing I wanted to put out there as well too.
• 20:52
  So anyways, thank you for listening again, some of your comments.
• 20:55
  I'm always interested.
• 20:56
  You can rate or review the podcast.
• 20:59
  That would be great.
• 21:00
  Apple, Spotify pod engagement.
• 21:02
  Good Pods is my favorite place.
• 21:05
  I'm actually listed in the top Leadership podcast of all time there.
• 21:09
  So this is the reason why.
• 21:11
  It's like how do you lead when things are uncertain and what, how is that gonna
• 21:16
  serve and fuel the future of your work?
• 21:19
  That's really what it comes down to, and that's what this episode is about.
• 21:23
  It's not just social media, it's leadership, it's visibility,
• 21:26
  it's reputation, and.
• 21:30
  How is all of this gonna drive if AI really becomes a reality?
• 21:35
  And again, how is AI going to pick up those in-person interactions?
• 21:41
  It's not, so how does that get applied?
• 21:45
  How does it get used in a way that's productive and not, doesn't just feel good
• 21:53
  in the moment where you happen to walk into a room and everybody recognizes you.
• 21:57
  These are the things that you have to think about is how
• 22:00
  does this fuel the future?
• 22:02
  What are you building?
• 22:04
  And that's what's important.
• 22:06
  Anyways, thanks for listening.
• 22:27
  Find yourself in.