On Linkedin, you want to be a purple cow.
Note: this article was originally published on my Substack newsletter.
Hey everyone,
I’m going to start sending this newsletter every time I have new insights and experiences to share about LinkedIn. You’re receiving it because you’re either an inkiro ai user or you’re subscribed to my Substack.
This week, I want to talk about the question “Do you need to be controversial to get reach on LinkedIn?” and share some tips on what I see working well. Let’s get into it!
On Linkedin, you want to be a purple cow.
Seth Godin wrote this book called “Purple Cow” where he defends the idea that people’s attention spikes when the unexpected happens. Like seeing a purple cow 😊
This is applicable for anything marketing-related, including your content on LinkedIn.
On LinkedIn, most posts look like a field of regular cows. People share new jobs they’re starting, AI slop from ChatGPT without substance, generic advice without real life experiences, etc.
To stand out, you have to break the pattern of what people expect to see:
- Create memes about topics no one posts about.
- Use videos no one ever expected you to have the courage to record.
- Share real things that happened to you that no one else would share.
Your goal is to create contrast, and to show your personality (it’s called a personal brand for a reason, duh!).
Alright, but do I need to be controversial to get reach?
The short answer is ‘no’. But you should also not be super vanilla about it.
From a psychology standpoint, well performing content always makes people feel something. Whether that’s agreement and validation, disagreement and rage, or simply curiosity, laughter, and joy.
Take James (co-founder & ceo of Posthog) below. His audience is tech people who work at tech companies. He could post boring stuff about working in tech. Instead, he posts this👇
No, you don’t need to rage bait people. No, you don’t need to make it toxic. No, you don’t need to pick up a fight.
You can joke about it. You can take a stand. You can provoke emotions. All without being uncomfortably controversial.
What I see working well on LinkedIn
With so much AI generated media flooding the web, pictures with real people in them are instantly recognized as authentic and give your posts credibility, reach, and engagement.
Here are some examples that I’ve seen working well lately:
Pro tip of the week
I recently gave a training session of inkiro.ai to a B2B sales team using the app to post more on LinkedIn as a team. One of the tips I gave them was to use Wispr Flow to dictate ideas directly to the “Create a post” field and let the app write the post in your voice.
They loved it!
I use it all the time to ramble about ideas for content I have and it’s surprisingly very good at speech to text (both in English and Portuguese).
Wrapping up
Alright guys, that’s it for this week.
I hope I left you with some thoughts and learnings about controversialism and reach on LinkedIn, and that my insights and tips were useful!
If you have any questions or things to share, feel free to reply.
See you next time,
Francisco