Why I Think There ISN’T Much Value in Sharing Content on LinkedIn

To Share, or not to Share. That is the question.

Or should we Repost?

Or do neither?

There has long been the opportunity to Share a post that comes into your LinkedIn feed. Traditionally, LinkedIn trainers like myself have considered this a futile feature.

I make this case because sharing the originator's content in a new post does neither you nor the originator of that post any good whatsoever.

There are a few reasons for this.

The first is that, for reasons unknown, shared content gets very little engagement on LinkedIn. It could be partly that people seem not to interact well with shared content, or it could be that LinkedIn does not algorithmically share a shared piece of content very widely. It takes the conversation away from where it started.

For this reason, I have never recommended using the Share option at all.

Recently LinkedIn added a new option to the Share feature called Repost.

It has become very confusing to people to know whether a Repost is a better or worse option than the original Share option.

There is a significant difference with a Repost.

It attributes any further interaction from your re-post of it to the original author. So as far as a benefit to anybody is concerned, your reposting of it certainly adds additional readers to the originator's content, and any subsequent interactivity from your re-posting of it will benefit the original author.

The question is, does it benefit you?

Answer - Not really.

Unless you particularly want to pay tribute to the author in this way.

My opinion on this whole question suggests that commenting with value on the original post greatly benefits you and the original author more than the option to Share or Repost.

So, in summary, don't bother.

But what do others think? 🧐

You might want to click over to my post on LinkedIn in August’22 to hear what other people think.