When Microsoft first acquired LinkedIn back in 2016 we predicted big changes for the social media site. And, this is exactly what we’ve seen. This year the site has updated its ad targeting, given employers the opportunity to better locate candidates and individuals the chance to further their own careers. These changes have paid off, increasing its revenue by 25%. So, what will 2020 bring?
Groups
LinkedIn has already created a lot of features and opportunities to build groups and group communication on the site. We, therefore, predict that LinkedIn groups will be the main focus for the social media site in the coming year. We hope that their continuing updates will address the real problems with LinkedIn groups; spam and junk notifications!
Groups are a great opportunity for LinkedIn, especially with engagement continuing to rise on the platform. If the site can improve junk posting then these groups could be a gold mine for both employees and employers.
Video
Video is obviously the best performing content type on every social media platform so don’t be surprised that video is on our list of 2020 trends! However, we know that video hasn’t yet been utilised on LinkedIn to its full potential. Combined with the fact that LinkedIn members spend almost 3x more time watching video ads compared to time spent with static content, it’s safe to assume that LinkedIn will make creating and posting videos much more accessible for all users in 2020!
We predict that this will be done by adding video discovery tools to the homepage of LinkedIn, putting more emphasis on video content as a way of sharing your brand story and connecting with new audiences.
Events
In October of 2019, the site launched its events tools enabling people and brands to create new event pages in the app.
This allows users to create a centralised space for professional meetups and creating a networking platform. We believe that this is the start of event-focused features. Expect the site to rollout event features such as the ability to share live streams from the events page and the option to add separate pages for event sessions, thus boosting interactions.
Think events, meetups and digital and physical networking for 2020!
Return Of Inbot
In 2016 LinkedIn talked about a tool called ‘inbot’ that would help schedule meetings and find information on contacts via automated processes. However, ‘inbot’ never actually arrived. Now, we have it on good authority that this could finally be coming to fruition.
The ability to learn more professional information about the people you’re meeting with is invaluable and could be a very interesting tool for 2020!
Overall, there are a lot of interesting opportunities coming up for LinkedIn. And a lot of unexplored avenues that could be very influential on the site.
Let us know what you’re looking forward to from LinkedIn in 2020 in the comments. Or get in touch via our social media channels.