How LinkedIn is Adapting its Platform

Editor's Notes

• #2: Good afternoon! [ad lib witty banter]   I want to share with you some thoughts on how our platform facilitates the trusted relationships you have with your customers.   I’ll also give you a look ahead at investments we’re making to make marketing more effective on LinkedIn.
• #3: Almost a year ago – I stood on this stage and closed my presentation with where LinkedIn was focusing their marketing product efforts in 2014. I said that we would be enhancing our platform across a number of a big product areas in 2014. Extending our content marketing platform to handle the end to end process of marketing to prospective and existing customers. It was really just the beginning – so let’s talk about the journey we’ve been on and where we’re going.
• #4: Members first organization which is why you’ve seen so many changes to our platform.
 What we hear from members is what drives the platform
 Where we are today: Building trust and relationships 

• #5: And we have to remember that We’re talking to people.
• #6: And talking to people means we’re in the business of building relationships.
• #7: You can use social media to build and nurture trusted relationships. We’re focused on being relevant, being helpful and being everywhere.   1. Relevance is about having your employees actively participate in the conversation and sharing and measuring your content 2. Helpful is all about providing the kind of content your audience is looking for -- to cement a reputation as a trusted advisor 3. Being everywhere is going where your customer are and meeting them on their on terms
• #8: So, let’s talk about how to be relevant and humanize your brand. It’s about accurately finding the right people, with the right message, at the right time.
• #9: It can start with your leadership team. This slide reflects some of the many business luminaries who are members of our Influencer program. This is truly content unlike anything you get on the web or in print. It’s a differentiated experience that’s caught on fire.
• #10: Accurate targeting, based on authentic data, is essential to ensuring the relevance of your content marketing.   LinkedIn’s targeting is highly accurate because it draws from actual profile data provided and continually updated by our members themselves -- as they showcase their accomplishments (e.g., promotions, earned degrees)   For instance, you’ll find no more accurate Company Targeting on the planet than what we have at LinkedIn. You can confidently reach decision-makers and the people who influence purchasing decisions at the companies to which your sales teams believe they can sell.
• #11: Showcase pages are another way to forge these human connections. Here’s an example from Intel’s IT Center — focused on IT innovation and Insights. Intel shares rich content to help members meet each other, engage, and get the latest insights in IT innovation. As you can see, the members are engaged.
• #12: It started with influencers and it was so successful - we opened up the platform to help engage and inspire not just influencer to member, but member to member. And it can be a powerful tool for your brand and content strategy as Catherine outlined earlier today. We launched sponsored updates to help marketers publish content that provides value — relevant and targeted — so you can begin building and strengthening your relationship with your audience.  Sponsored Updates give you access to new audiences -- they are the only paid advertising on mobile smartphone so you can reach new people Seeing great engagement because they’re directly in our members feed Delivering quality traffic that is converting into leads at higher than average rates Great for performance advertisers because you only pay for the clicks you receive on your content
• #13: And now with Direct Sponsored Content, reach your target audience directly in the feed without publishing on your Company Page Allowing you to: Personalize your messages and offers to your target audience to boost your performance Test and optimize your reach to the right audience with the right message
• #14: We have developed ways for you to measure your content marketing success.   This quantitative score evaluates your influence on LinkedIn among a target audience over time, using an aggregate score that is benchmarked against your peer group and comes with recommendations on how to improve your content marketing score. Content Marketing Score allows you to measure you brand’s influence, compare to your peers and get recommendations for improvement  
• #15: The second way you build and nurture trusted relationships is by being helpful with relevant content and education -- becoming that trusted advisor.
• #16: Why is content on LinkedIn so important? Because people trust content on LinkedIn more than any other social source and trust is the most important part of building any relationship High: 70%+ visit each month Medium: 45% to <70% visit each month Low: <45% visit each month As trusted as the vendors themselves and 3 to 5 times as other social. In the past it was a monopoly for information. We have grown the pie. We have emerged as a second primary site where no other social network has reached.
• #17: And content that educates holds the most value for our members — they want to be educated and engaged. Earlier you heard Sal talk about how he revolutionized educational content – there are many ways you can do this for your customers.
• #18: Relevance is also powered by Insight. There’s no shortage of information in our businesses. The challenge is to zero in on the insight, to separate the signal from the noise.   We’ve developed a tool called Trending Content. Trending Content gives you a view of what topics your audience is engaging with most, based on the specific pieces of content they’re sharing on LinkedIn.   This gives you insight on how to tailor your content to your audience’s interests.
• #19: Because ultimately trust and credibility must be earned and All of the tools on LinkedIn are to help marketers educate, inform, inspire – building better relationships with your customers - you heard Sal talk earlier about rethinking educational content - we hope that inspires you to think about the content you’re creating differently.
• #20: A key driver of extending the experience and building trust with customers is meeting them on their own terms, where they’re already congregating and where their content consumption is moving.
• #21: When you look at the member usage data, you see unique patterns for desktop, mobile and tablet, and we tailor the experience accordingly.   Mobile and Tablet together provide an early morning spike, during the ‘coffee’ part of the day. Mobile holds steady all day, as connected professionals stay glued to their phones. And then during the ‘couch’ phase in the evening, you see this dramatic spike in Tablet use.   Sponsored Updates work seamlessly across all devices, so they ensure you’re going where your audience goes.
• #22: Mobile is driving content consumption. As you’d expect, our LinkedIn usage data reflects these same trends. Increasingly, we’re seeing our members access LinkedIn and professionally-relevant content away from the desktop. Sponsored InMails now reach members on mobile where they most often check their messages Reach mobile users >50% of inbox views on mobile 80% higher open rate on mobile In Q4 2013, an average of 41 percent of unique visiting members came through mobile apps, versus just 21 percent midway through 2012. So mobile is at the very center of our content strategy. There’s more content consumption on mobile device vs. desktop. So we completely started from scratch with our mobile experience to take into the user experience first and foremost.
• #23: So let’s look ahead to see what’s coming in 2015…
• #24: Combining to build the most effective platform for marketers to reach audiences, nurture prospects and acquire customers.
• #25: Simplifying the complex : With LinkedIn Auto Fill, a single click fills your forms with our accurate professional data
• #26: We will be Introducing the ability to automatically expand our audience via look alike and target a larger group in real-time
• #27: We are a little over 1 year into Sponsored Content and the growth has been tremendous. It has been highly engaging for members and providing strong ROI for advertisers primarily because our members are looking to hear from brands when they come to LinkedIn Leveraging this mindset (and demand), in 2015, one of our plans for next year is to expand Sponsored Content to other LinkedIn properties/products where our members engage with professional content – for instance Slideshare and Pulse. This is a great opportunity for marketers to expand their reach and be in touch with LinkedIn members in other places where they consume content