In November last year, LinkedIn began testing a new Events option, which seemed like a feature the platform should have always had, combining the networking value of LinkedIn with professional events, all built into the same platform.
And with the pandemic shutting down IRL functions, LinkedIn launched Events to all users back in May, which has since resulted in more than 200,000 events being listed on the platform, reaching nearly 10 million digital attendees.
It’s a logical, and beneficial, complement to LinkedIn’s tools. And now, LinkedIn’s looking to make its Events options even better, with new discovery features, promotion options and data capture processes, making it an even more significant consideration.
First off, on discovery – in order to boost the promotion of Events, Linkedin’s adding new personalized event recommendations in the “My Network” tab, while it will also start sending out a new, weekly Events digest email to users.
“So far, we’ve seen a +40% increase in event attendees from recommendations found in the “My Network” tab.”
Email notifications are risky – back in 2015, LinkedIn significantly reduced its email notifications after users complained about getting too many updates about job changes, group posts, new updates, etc. LinkedIn has significantly reduced its email prompts since then, and hopefully these new event notifications will be targeted enough that they don’t become problematic for users.
In addition to this, LinkedIn will now also send out automatic notifications to your company page followers whenever you add a new event.
It won’t be sent out to all your page followers, just the ones that LinkedIn determines are “most likely to attend based on various criteria, including their interests”. That should limit potential spam, like people creating fake ‘events’ that are actually sales pitches and the like. But it could still, potentially, be abused. Watch this space.
LinkedIn has also heard from businesses running LinkedIn events that they would like to have more options to track attendees, and gather data on those who’ve registered interest.
On this front, LinkedIn will also now enable businesses to create registration forms for their events, so you can collect the names and emails of people signing up.
“You can also download the list from your event page and send them a thank-you email, upload the list to your CRM, or share it with your sales teams.”
This is a signficant, and valuable addition, which will provide more incentive to run LinkedIn events as a means to build your outreach lists.
And you’ll also be able to use those details in your retargeting efforts:
“Once you know who’s interested in your content or brand, you can continue the conversation and nurture leads by retargeting your prior event registrants. All you have to do is create a custom target audience in Campaign Manager based on those who have RSVPed to any of your LinkedIn Events.”
Really, if you’re getting a listing of emails from your gated events, you’ll be able to do this off LinkedIn also, but this option relates to all Event attendees, not just those who’ve filled in your contact form to sign-up. That could be another great way to hone in on the right audiences with your LinkedIn promotions.
LinkedIn’s also giving businesses the opportunity to run Sponsored Content Single Image Ads alongside organic posts to promote events.
“Single Image Ads can get your event in front of the right professionals and hard-to reach audiences, like executives and decision-markers. By including your Event URL as the destination URL in your campaign, you’ll be able to see how it performs against a new set of event-specific reporting metrics, like the total number of registrants, as well as views and clicks on the ad that led to an event registration.”
These are some important, and valuable additions to the LinkedIn Events offering, which, as noted, will make it a much more enticing promotion option, especially for B2B organizations and those looking to maximize the performance of their LinkedIn efforts.
On another, related front, LinkedIn has also announced the full roll-out of its new video meeting options within LinkedIn messaging.
As explained by LinkedIn:
“In the message thread, either with another individual or with a group of people, simply click the video meeting icon, and select a provider to sign-in or register. Once complete, you’ll be able to automatically generate a unique video meeting link within any message threads on LinkedIn.”
LinkedIn announced the coming addition last month as part of its broader refresh of the platform’s look. The option caters to the growing usage of video connection in replacement of in-person meetings, and provides more options to immediate connection from your LinkedIn message.
