LinkedIn Video – The Complete Guide

How to publish kick-ass video content on LinkedIn?!

Over the past 2 years, I have managed 4 LinkedIn accounts with more than 12k followers and increased the total post reach by more than 150%.

While posting infographics, slideshows, or creating events and thereby leveraging social capital quickly became apparent, LinkedIn videos remained a black box for a long time. A quick look at LinkedIn videos' keywords gave me a hint that I might not be the only marketer that wonders how to publish video content on LinkedIn. Well, I decided to write a guide on this exact topic to help you leverage the human side of your business: video content!

TL; DR what you can expect from this article

Table of Contents

• LinkedIn: the Go-To Place for Lead Generation and Community Building
• Content Marketing: the Organic Reach Opportunity of the Hour
• Video Content Marketing: the Scalable Human Side of a Business
• LinkedIn Video Content Marketing
• 5 Ways of LinkedIn Videos
• 5+1 LinkedIn Video Marketing Best Practices
• Feed Video: Native vs. Embedded | Short vs. Long | 16:9 vs. 9:16
• Featured Video/Ads
• Stories Video
• Live Streams
• Video Messages
• 5 Examples of Kick-Ass LinkedIn Videos

If you want to deep-dive into a specific topic, please look at the sources below. And If you have any questions, feel free to drop me a line: colin@typestudio.co. I'm looking forward to your feedback!

LinkedIn: the Go-To Place for Lead Generation and Community Building

Today LinkedIn is one of the most relevant social media platforms with 756M members in 200 countries and regions worldwide. B2B marketers love the network to position their companies. But also personal branding has increasingly raised attention. Consequently, LinkedIn with the yearly  Top Voices award users is granted for being the most relevant thought leader in their respective fields.

In 2021 the social media network is far away from being a social media platform for job search or advertisements only. Users manage their professional identity, build and engage with their professional network, and access knowledge, insights, and opportunities. On the other side companies acquire new leads or engage with their community by sharing knowledge, insights, and opportunities. In terms of lead generation, LinkedIn, therefore, is the best social network according to a recent case study by Hubspot: "LinkedIn generated the highest visitor-to-lead conversion rate at 2.74%, almost 3 times higher (277%) than both Twitter (.69%) and Facebook (.77%)."

You might be wondering how the most successful accounts got that successful on LinkedIn. The short answer: Content Marketing!

Content Marketing: the Organic Reach Opportunity of the Hour

Content marketing offers free and valuable information to their audience, attracts potential customers, and retains existing customers through high-quality engagement. Hubspot (2020) analyzed the potential of an integrated content marketing strategy and found out:

• Content marketing brings in 3x more leads than traditional marketing and costs 62% less.
• SMEs that do content marketing receive 126% more leads than those that do not.

And it gets even better when looking at the share of people creating vs. those consuming content on LinkedIN! From 756M members, only 4.2M create content (Tim Queen, 2020).

Video Content Marketing: the Scalable Human Side of a Business

Seeing a face, especially in times of social distancing, is worth gold. Well, here comes the good news: video content marketing is your gateway to reach users on a personal level. And in case you didn't notice it yet: you can scale personal interactions with your users through video marketing. Just build it once and sell it twice or even more. For example, by using the Type Studio repurposing feature, you're able to change your video ratio from a LinkedIn to an Instagram format within seconds. Find out more about resizing your video.

Besides the personal note, another advantage of video content marketing is that your audience is able to better understand the value of your product or service. I, therefore, recommend you to not only use the opportunity to allow your customers to listen and watch but also read f.e. through subtitles. (Subtitle your video with Type Studio)

LinkedIn Video Content Marketing

As already said, LinkedIn is the go-to place for lead generation, and content marketing is your gateway to acquire those leads or build your community of young professionals, senior-level influencers, and decision-makers. A great opportunity in this regard is video marketing that allows you to scale personal interactions.  So what type of LinkedIn videos exist and how to leverage them?

5 Types of LinkedIn Videos

Today there are five types of  Videos on LinkedIn:

1. Feed Video
2. Featured Video/ Ads
3. Stories Video
4. Live Streams
5. Video Messages

5+1 LinkedIn Video Best Practices

Overall, LinkedIn suggests 5 dimensions as best practices for video content marketing (2021), we at Type Studio added one more, and you can use it for free by using our tool:

1. Be prepared - Have a good grasp on your subject matter and your overall run of the show.
2. Be authentic - Don’t aim for memorization or perfection. Audiences respond best to genuine, relatable content.
3. Be consistent - Consistency helps set expectations around when your audience can expect new content and consider series-based content.
4. Be flexible - If something unplanned happens during your stream, try to respond to real moments in real-time. You’ll be rewarded for your authenticity. (Streams)
5. Be engaged - Treat your audience as if they are a real presence in the room.  Moderate the comments and respond where appropriate
6. Repurpose: - Build once, sell twice, or a dozen times. Be creative and leverage your content by publishing on other social networks, as a follow-up via e-mail or in your blog post. Check out our repurposing tool here:

LinkedIn Videos: Feed

‍Native vs. Embedded: Stay With Me (*Sam Smiths' LinkedIn Voice)

The most common way to publish a video on LinkedIn is via the Feed. Here one can choose between embedding a link from YouTube, Vimeo, etc., or the LinkedIn native videos upload. The most frequent question I get is: LinkedIn native videos or embedded links?

As always: it depends. More specifically: it depends on your objective. Do you want to grow your YouTube channel?  Then embed the respective link. But in case you want to grow your LinkedIn account instead, choose the native upload. In any case, the LinkedIn native video is more likely to perform better than the embedded video, and there are many reasons for that.

1. LinkedIn wants you to stay on its social media platform and therefore favor native uploads
2. You can add an alt-text as a caption which improves your SEO ranking
3. You can upload subtitles as an SRT file, making your content easier to access for both search engines and users. (Sidenote: With Type Studio, you can automatically generate subtitles in your browser)
4. LinkedIn native video allows the auto-play function
5. You can upload a thumbnail to grab peoples attention right away

If you're still not convinced, about LinkedIn native videos have a look at this native vs. embedded test:

Short vs. Long Videos: Time is Money

In the Linked feed, you can post videos with a minimum video length of 3 seconds and a maximum video length of 10 minutes. And here comes the next frequently asked questions: What performs better, short videos or long videos?

Let's state it like this: People use LinkedIn in business contexts. As a consequence, time is particularly valued as a commodity. So don't waste people's time with long videos unless you're solving a problem for them which would otherwise take up more time. However, as a general remark, it makes sense to rather publish many short instead of one long video, where drop-out rates are likely to be high. And for those interested, you could embed the link to the whole video in the description section or the comments. By the way: do you already know the highlights feature from Type Studio? It helps you extract the best parts from your long video.

Speaking of time:  The more information you give your audience upfront, the easier it is to decide if the video is relevant. With limited information, they're likely not to watch. This is why I recommend always adding copy to your videos. Oh, and did I mention SEO? ;)

Horizontal, Square, Vertical: All Over the Screen

In terms of the video format, you can choose between horizontal, square, or vertical. But what to choose?

While on Instagram, video marketers use 4:5 format to capture the most screen space, vertical videos in LinkedIn feeds are cropped into a square in the preview.  Since most of the users, at least from 9 am to 5 pm during weekdays, access LinkedIn through their desktop, 16:9 might be the ideal format to capture as much screen space as possible. But again: it depends! In this case on the behavior of your users. So after reading this article, go ahead and have a look at your LinkedIn page analytics where you can see with which device people interact with your content.

LinkedIn Video: Ads

LinkedIn video ad campaigns support a minimum length of 3 seconds and a maximum length of 30 minutes for native videos. In terms of the format, be aware that only square or horizontal videos are supported, not vertical ones.

Before setting up a campaign, get an understanding of your objective. LinkedIn helps you to improve your campaign by choosing between 3 categories:

1. Brand Awareness (tell people about your brand through impression-based campaigns)
2. Consideration (get people to click to find out more about your brand)
3. Conversion (drive leads and website visits)

Based on those objectives, you then plan your video campaign. If you decide to raise brand awareness, you should consider telling your brand story. But if you intend to focus on conversions, a product demo might be the better way to go.

Whatever you aim for testing and optimizing your videos should be an integral part of your content. In this regard, you can A/B Test various dimensions of your campaign such as the video length, the caption, the type of content, etc...

You can find further insight in the article "Video ad tips" by LinkedIn mentioned below.

LinkedIn Video: Stories

LinkedIn video stories can only be published and accessed from the LinkedIn mobile app. The maximum duration of a video is 20 seconds, and the ideal aspect Ratio for stories is 9:16. LinkedIn shares your Story for 24 hours after you’ve posted it, just like on Instagram or Snapchat.

It is a great way to connect to your community by sharing behind-the-scenes footage because it can only be seen by your connections and followers. While on Instagram, there is a threshold of 10k followers to embed swipe-up links to your Story, LinkedIn lets you do it regardless of your followers.

LinkedIn Video: Live

LinkedIn Live Video allows approved accounts to broadcast live video to a LinkedIn page, profile, or event. But why using LinkedIn Live? Here are some facts (Hootsuite, 2019)!

• 24x more comments on LinkedIn Live streams vs. native video
• 7X more reactions on LinkedIn Live streams vs. native video
• 73% of B2B marketers say video positively impacts marketing ROI

7 LinkedIn Live Formats

And what do they look like? Here are some examples of how you can use LinkedIn Live!

• Interactivity and Q&As
• Event streaming
• Showcasing innovation
• Talent branding
• Celebratory moments
• Fireside chats & CEO diaries
• Topic-specific shows

Before LinkedIn Live

Before you start streaming, make sure to promote your stream. In the worst-case scenario, you begin broadcasting, but nobody shows up. An excellent way to promote your stream could be a LinkedIn event. It will help you remind people of the stream, and if you get the right people on board, social capital will do its magic. Right before you go live, make sure to test your internet connection so that everything runs smoothly.

During LinkedIn Live

To get the most out of your Live video, make sure to be well prepared. The stream is an excellent opportunity to engage with your audience directly and thereby build your community. A good moderation and a fun stream will make people come back and maybe even recommend you to their friends.

After LinkedIn Live

After your Live video is before your Live video! Since you now built a content piece seize the opportunity to learn from it by analyzing it. Also, follow up with your attendees. They won't just appreciate your extra effort but be more responsive to an invitation to the next event. To bridge the gap between the streams and keep people activated you can repurpose your stream by extracting the highlights mentioned above.

LinkedIn Video: Direct Message

Finally, a way to use videos on LinkedIn a few people will tell you about: sending videos via direct message.

Trying to reach out to a customer and sending a personalized video is different from the rest. Here is how it could look like just tap the video button to start

5 Examples of Kick-Ass LinkedIn Videos

LinkedIn Video Example: Feed

Founders Foundation

Founders Foundation celebrated its 5 th anniversary by featuring the key actors looking back at successes and celebrating the next generation of B2B tech entrepreneurs.

LinkedIn Video Example: Ads

Facebook for Business

Facebook used video very meaningfully by featuring top leaders in Southeast Asia speaking about consumer buying trends in a personal talking-head format. Type Studio is ideal for adding subtitles automatically, captions or your brand logo.

LinkedIn Video Example: Stories

Ernest & Young

Ernst & Young let their interns take over their LinkedIn Page and post Stories on their behalf. The result was an authentic, behind-the-scenes look at the organization from a relatable perspective.

LinkedIn Video Examples: Live

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

MIT live stream from their 2019 Commencement ceremonies for Bachelor’s and Master’s candidates

LinkedIn Video Example: Direct Message

Type Studio

Conclusion

LinkedIn is a great social media platform for lead generation and community building, to put it in a nutshell. Video content is your gateway to leverage your marketing and sales efforts in this regard. There are plenty of ways to interact with your audience through video on LinkedIn (Feed, Ads, Stories, Live Stream, Direct Message), and you should choose those that best fit your strategy. With this article, you now have a toolset of how-to's, do's & don'ts just as kick-ass examples. If you want to dive deeper into a specific aspect, feel free to drop me a line I'm always happy to help or go through the sources attached. Oh, and make sure to check out our video tutorial on how to create professional-looking video content using our tool Type Studio!

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