LinkedIn introduced LinkedIn Video on their mobile app back in August 2017 with the idea that their members would “share their experience and perspective”, and “share ideas, learn from others and jump start new conversations.”

Now hang on a minute, isn’t LinkedIn a business networking site rather than a social networking service such as Twitter or Facebook? Why would you want to post a video on your professional LinkedIn profile?

Maybe you want to sell your services by posting a video of you in action, or a video of you showcasing your product which sounds ok, but does it really make a difference?

Does anybody really care enough to watch the video?

Is it worth your time recording and posting a video from your phone or laptop or just share something professionally done in YouTube or Vimeo?

An article I read from LinkedIn back in August 2017 detailed a couple of videos that had been posted by members which LinkedIn felt were inspiring and good examples of how to use LinkedIn video.

Having looked at a few of these videos today I can see that one of them received 38 likes, another received 41 likes and 4 comments, and another one 67 likes with 4 comments.

From the outside you can’t see how many views the videos received, nor can we see how many people messaged, connected with or contacted via other means with the LinkedIn members who posted these videos, so I do have to question the value and impact of these.

Does that feel like a good response to you? For me it feels kind of light given the effort you’d have to put in to get a self-shot video right. Imagine you were going to shoot a video now – have you thought about:

  • Backdrop – no one wants to see your bedroom or messy office (yes we’ve seen both on LinkedIn already!)
  • Your clothes – If you think LinkedIn is a professional platform perhaps the Hawaiian shirt or bikini was not the best choice (yes, we’ve seen that as well and no they weren’t selling clothing)
  • Setting – Ensure you have a clean space to record in, no distractions, no phone calls due in, no dogs, pets or children. Nothing shatters professionalism like an unplanned intrusion mid-stream!
  • Sound and picture – Ok now all smartphones have reasonable cameras and sound for us to take pictures but a shaky handy-cam style video or iffy sound recording (and background noises!) may not put you in the best light.

We’ve also been left a little queasy at a couple of videos as the users walk around and film themselves (most often whilst on holiday, weirdly)

We haven’t seen any videos from our networks yet that have made a difference to the way we look at that connection, but then we do know all our connections. We’ve seen a few videos from within our ‘world’ some better than others, some that feel short on the above, some quite dry and some quite good, but in all cases it doesn’t seem to have translated well for the effort – perhaps live video and professional platform just don’t mix?

In our opinion you are better off spending your time working with a professional videographer and recording a clip you can share and use within LinkedIn, writing good quality posts and articles rather than posting a live video (for tips on how to get more people reading your posts click here).

Can you imagine what an executive in your team or client would say if you asked if it was ok to live video the meeting? Hmm I think not.

However, should you want to know how to use LinkedIn video on your mobile app.

  1. Simply click the button to share a status update (bottom right on most apps like a speech bubble) and look for the share box at the top, see below
  2. Hit the video camera icon to record, or you can select a video from your camera roll to upload (you do get the chance to preview the video before you share it).
  3. Choose to record, you can do this from the LinkedIn app and the video will save to your camera roll.
  4. Add text to tell your viewers what the video is about before you tap Post.

As soon as you hit post your video will be sent to your followers’ feeds and will auto play (assuming they have not disabled that in their settings).

Live video was originally contrived as a way to inform your network with more engaging content, but we’ve yet to see some good examples of this that have translated into commercial results and hence we are a little sceptical as it doesn’t seem widely adopted.

From a personal point of view we know even James has been hesitant to avoid the less than professional challenges of self-shooting a video and he’s quite often on a stage with 100’s or 1,000’s of people watching him – interesting!

The latest news from LinkedIn is that they are going to put live video into the group experience as well, so let’s watch this space to see how it unfolds, but we certainly won’t be rushing at it.