LinkedIn is a professional social networking platform that allows users to create profiles, connect with other professionals, find jobs, network, and share content. One of the main ways users can share content on LinkedIn is by publishing articles. Here’s an overview of where you can write and publish articles on LinkedIn and how the article publishing feature works.
Write Articles Directly on LinkedIn
The primary place to write articles on LinkedIn is directly within the LinkedIn platform. When you are logged into your LinkedIn account, you can create a new article by going to the “Write an article” link on your homepage or by clicking on the pencil “Create” icon at the top of your LinkedIn feed and selecting “Write an article”.
This will open up LinkedIn’s built-in article editor where you can write and format your article directly within LinkedIn. The editor allows you to add text, formatting, images, headers, quotes, and more. It’s a full-featured publishing platform so you can create a polished article without any external tools.
As you write your article in LinkedIn’s editor, you can save it as a draft at any point to come back and work on it later. Once your article is ready to publish, you can set a unique URL slug for the article web address and preview how it will appear to your connections. When you are satisfied with your article, you can officially publish it to your LinkedIn profile.
Publish Long-Form Articles
LinkedIn allows you to write both short posts and long-form articles. Standard LinkedIn posts have a limit of 1300 characters, but articles do not have a length restriction. This means you can publish in-depth long-form content directly on the LinkedIn platform.
Long-form articles are known to help boost engagement and establish thought leadership. Sopublishing your insightful long articles on LinkedIn can be a great way to share your expertise while also building your brand and credibility.
Enhance Articles with Rich Media
LinkedIn’s article editor supports rich media embeds to make your articles more visual and engaging. You can easily embed things like:
- YouTube videos
- Vimeo videos
- SlideShare presentations
- Infographics
Adding multimedia elements helps break up long blocks of text and keeps readers interested in your content. Embedding visual assets that support your article’s topic is an impactful way to reinforce your ideas.
Article Appears in Your LinkedIn Profile
Once you publish an article, it will appear in the “Featured” section at the top of your LinkedIn profile under the “Posts” tab. This provides an easy way for your connections and profile visitors to immediately see and access your published articles.
Your articles also show up in LinkedIn search results, allowing people to find and share your articles more widely. Articles can thus become a source of passive traffic and exposure for your brand and expertise.
Share Articles Beyond LinkedIn
Another benefit of authoring articles directly on LinkedIn is that they provide shareable links and embed codes. After publishing your article, you can share it outside of LinkedIn by linking to it or embedding it on external websites and platforms.
For example, you can link to your LinkedIn articles from your email newsletters, website blog, Twitter, Facebook, and other social channels. The embed code also allows you to easily integrate your articles into WordPress sites or other CMS platforms.
Gain More Readership with Hashtags
You can use hashtags in your LinkedIn articles to help more people find and read your content. Strategically adding relevant hashtags allows your articles to appear in hashtag feed results, helping expand your potential reach.
For example, if you publish a business article, you could include hashtags like #business, #management, #leadership, etc. This allows your content to be discoverable by LinkedIn members following those topics.
Turn On Comments
LinkedIn allows you to enable or disable comments on your published articles. Turning on comments provides a space for readers to discuss your article and ask questions.
Comments help create community around your articles while also providing a channel for further engagement. You can disable comments if you prefer, but keeping them on can lead to higher engagement.
Track Article Analytics
LinkedIn provides data and analytics about the performance of your published articles. You can see key metrics like total views, likes, comments, shares, click-throughs, and more.
Monitoring these article analytics allows you to see what topics and types of content resonate best with your target audience. You can use these insights to improve future articles.
Promote Your Articles
To maximize viewership of your LinkedIn articles, be sure to actively promote them across your other social channels, email lists, and website.
You can also engage with your network by liking and commenting on their posts. This raises your visibility and can lead to more of your connections organically seeing and sharing your articles.
Strategically using LinkedIn’s built-in tools like hashtags, embedding rich media, and enabling comments can also boost your article reach.
Benefits of Publishing on LinkedIn
Here are some of the key benefits of writing and publishing articles directly on LinkedIn:
- Share your expertise with your professional network
- Establish thought leadership in your industry
- Increase brand visibility and credibility
- Showcase your writing skills
- Drive visitors to your LinkedIn profile
- Generate leads and opportunities
- Position yourself as an influencer
- Distribute content widely via LinkedIn’s reach
In Summary
LinkedIn’s article publishing platform allows you to write and share long-form articles that enable you to inform, teach, inspire, and engage your professional community. Leveraging LinkedIn articles can be an extremely effective content marketing and thought leadership strategy.
With the ability to craft in-depth articles supplemented by multimedia, track analytics, promote your content, and distribute it beyond LinkedIn, the platform provides a versatile hub to reach your target business audiences.