April 16, 2024
LinkedIn's #B2Believe conference showcased significant updates in influencer marketing. Thought Leader ads now allow sponsorship from any member, not just employees, indicating LinkedIn's broader embrace of influencer collaboration. Livestream promotions and increased event viewership highlight the platform's live engagement features.
I went to LinkedIn's B2Believe conference this week (it was a pretty stellar production).
I'm sure there are people doing in depth roundups, so I'll leave that to other folks. Looking at it through the lens of LinkedIn influencer marketing, here are the three things that stood out to me:
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They called out the updates to Thought Leader ads and that they're yielding 1.6x more engagement than a standard image based ad.
If you're unfamiliar, Thought Leader ads are basically LinkedIn's version of promoted posts. However, when the product initially launched it was limited to companies being able to amplify the voices of employees. They've since expanded its capabilities so that advertisers "can sponsor content from any memberβnot just employees".
What are the implications of this?
This latest move is one of many signals over the last several years that LinkedIn is embracing (and encouraging) influencer marketing more broadly. Since 2021 LinkedIn has invested heavily in content creation tools and recruiting creators to the platform. Creator mode, the creator accelerator program, and talent managers to name a few.
Now, it seems, their urging advertisers and influencers to work together.
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Brands looking to host a livestreams can now run promotions to increase visibility and tune in during an event and retarget afterward.
LinkedIn also reported a 34% increase in event viewership over the past year.
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They showed off video content partnership opportunities to run in stream ads starting with pre-roll against a select group of publishers (WSJ, etc).
Why is this interesting?
Two weeks ago LinkedIn launched a short form vertical video feed (in Beta). The majority of social media usage is video consumption (about 60%).
I can't help but wonder if pre-roll could eventually expand beyond traditional publishers. If video is pushed to content creators (and adopted) more broadly, could we see a world where pre-rolls appear against creator content? If so, will there opportunities for rev share?
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I'm speculating a bit on some of the implications of these announcements, but as LinkedIn evolves the potential for influencers seems to be growing dramatically.
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