How often do you post an update on LinkedIn? – thought so !
Over the last few days you may have noticed a message from LinkedIn advising that your “tweets” will no longer appear automatically as status updates on LinkedIn.
If you didn’t have this feature switched on it obviously makes no difference to you but if you did you need to consider how this affects your social media activity.
Twitter to LinkedIn
I’m not sure what is behind this change but I am suspecting that LinkedIn may want you to post directly from their platform – at least this way you will have to open up your LinkedIn dashboard to make a post and hopefully (for them) notice some adverts that are of interest to you. Clicking these makes them money by the way!
The big problem that I see here is that most people do not consume their social media from LinkedIn – yep, we connect, search for contacts but very very few of us are actually consuming – am I wrong? Is this their effort to make themselves part of the conversation and more relevant?
LinkedIn to Twitter
You can see from the graphic above that it is still possible to push your LinkedIn posts to Twitter once you click the little twitter box at the bottom of the post.
Twitter to Facebook
Another recent development I have noticed is that my Twitter posts are no longer being pushed to Facebook despite all the connections being switched on. I have disconnected and refreshed the connection but it has made no difference.
I am starting to think that Facebook like LinkedIn want the user to log on directly to their platform to post updates, again in the hope that you will spot some adverts and make them a few bob!
Facebook to Twitter
I’m not sure if it is a coincidence but in line with this lapse in functionality Facebook are promoting their auto posts to Twitter feature quite actively when you log on. Hmmm ..
Automation isn’t always good ..
Consequence?
So what does all of this mean to the heavy social media user who is quite active on all platforms and was enjoying the benefit of these time saving applications. Effectively you could post once on Twitter and this post would replicate on both Facebook and LinkedIn. This is what I was doing myself.
Maybe it’s a good thing?
I think you should embrace the change and treat it as a good thing.
Auto posts from Twitter were never the best idea for a number of reasons:
- You can allow yourself to post more often and repeat posts on Twitter (this frequency could come across as “spam” on Facebook and LinkedIn)
- If you have posts of a visual nature you are better going to Facebook and posting there directly – when you post from Twitter any link was just appearing as a link.
- The platforms are quite different and while auto-post can be ok most of the time, often your “tweet” may be inappropriate on LinkedIn and maybe on Facebook
- I find that if you use the “auto-post” feature you actually start to miss some of the action on the other platforms – they all do a different job for you, don’t forget that.
- Users of LinkedIn and Facebook may not get all of the @gregcantyfuzion and the hash tag #FF, #Positivity “stuff” and can find it quite annoying and distracting from the actual message
My best advice is to treat each of the social media platforms differently, post separately as appropriate and for ultimate control use tools like Tweetdeck or Hootsuite as time saving devices. Using these you can select the destination for each of your updates (be it to any of your twitter accounts, your facebook personal or business pages).
The schedule facility on these platforms is an extra bonus, which can also be very handy.
Regarding LinkedIn status updates I don’t see the change making the platform more relevant – If anything it could actually have the opposite effect!
If you wish to make an impact here try:
- Participating in discussions on Groups you have joined
- Start discussions in Groups you have joined
- Start Asking and Answering Questions that have been posted for your industry sector/area of expertise
But I don’t have the time .. (this must be the one thing I hear most from people about social media)
Heh, that’s not my problem …if you have figured out that social media is good for your business then you’ll make the time!
Happy Posting ..
Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion PR
Note:
If you need a helping hand with your social media effectiveness check out our Social Media Training / Social Media Consultancy services.
Tags: facebook, Fuzion PR, Greg Canty, linkedin, social media consultancy, social media training, twitter
Greg Canty Fuzion Blog 
July 2, 2012 at 9:44 am |
Actually as you said in your post, it just creates more of a market for the likes of Hootsuite.
I do actually post only leadership related posts on linkedin and more social ones on facebook and so far my links between twitter and my facebook page are still working.
I keep my personal facebook page to friends and family but have a general fan page for my business profile, where the post connections are still working, so maybe that is the difference.
July 2, 2012 at 1:00 pm |
thanks for the feedback An – it sounds like you just post individually and have not been using “auto” – it actually is the best way. Well done!
July 2, 2012 at 11:26 am |
Thanks Greg – it’s great to get readable updates on the fast changing world of social media especially when you’re learning the ropes!
July 2, 2012 at 12:59 pm |
I hope it made sense Bernard – cheers for the feedback. Have a good one !
July 2, 2012 at 3:55 pm |
Greg, You’re so right when you say “Users of LinkedIn and Facebook may not get all of the @gregcantyfuzion and the hash tag #FF, #Positivity “stuff” and can find it quite annoying and distracting from the actual message”. I understand # before a word to emphasise it, but it is not standard English, LinkedIn posts in regular English would be better. # identifies a keyword in Twitter, but not on LinkedIn, to the best of my knowledge, so seeing a # in a LinkedIn post tells everyone that you’re using some sort of autoposter.
And you yourself have been among the worst offenders among those I follow. I’ve learned what #FF is, but I still have no idea what you mean by “–”, ““” and “””? and such words that appear in this very post. The appearance of such codes suggests you’re still using some sort of posting engine that corrupts your post in translation, and that you never bother to check your own posts on LinkedIn.
Tom
July 2, 2012 at 4:02 pm |
Interesting post Tom, which probably justifies the new changes. There was an option on LinkedIn that allowed “tweets” to appear automatically – as you pointed out there is a specific protocol on twitter that looks strange to “non-users” and it also looks like some error/conversion quirks can also creep in which must be annoying to the reader.
As a heavy social media user and trainer I do feel that LinkedIn is missing out on the “conversation” and this change could further isolate the platform.
Let’s see where it goes ..
July 3, 2012 at 9:30 am |
I had all my Twitter posts linked to Facebook and Linkedin to save time. This ment I never used two of my platforms always using Twitter only. Last week when I loged on to facebook the first thing that came to mind was all my posts on the three sites were identical. I felt this would be annoying to followers on Facebook and Linkedin as they may not understand the Twitter lingo so I disconnected all the auto posts.
I aggree 100% Greg, we may have to just invest the extra time to use social media in a proper manner to achive the best results.
Glynn
July 3, 2012 at 10:53 am |
thanks for the feedback Glynn and for sharing our experience
July 9, 2013 at 12:21 am |
Hi! Would you mind if I share your blog with my twitter group?
There’s a lot of people that I think would really enjoy your content. Please let me know. Cheers
July 9, 2013 at 9:16 am |
No bother at all – thanks for asking