The Colab Brief: 013 - The Anatomy of a Viral LinkedIn Post

LinkedIn has had a glow-up 🌟 over recent years. It moved from a virtual resume to the defacto social space for businesses and burgeoning thought leaders. This week, we’re discussing what it takes to succeed on the platform while analyzing one of our own viral posts and what made it pop. 🚀 

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Read Time: 4 mins

One year ago (to the day!), Ashley had a post go viral on LinkedIn. Not just a little viral. We’re talking real viral.

• 10.45 million impressions

• 3,828 comments

• 133,454 likes

• 654 reposts

The sheer volume of people interacting on the post went from shocking, to funny, to sort of scary, and then eventually became a huge moment that needed a lot of management.

The Good:

• Follower gain on LinkedIn exploded

• We had over 50 requests for new business calls (all within a three-day span)

• Posts were prioritized in the algorithm, meaning every piece of content for several days afterward received an insane number of impressions

• Personal brand awareness went through the roof

The Challenging:

• 500+ personalized LinkedIn messages needed responses, in addition to the vast number of sales queries (those were mostly deleted)

• Comments were mostly positive, but there are always a few bad apples

• We worked insane hours over the next several weeks, trying to assess every potential business opportunity, weeding out people who weren’t serious, and spent way too much time giving out free advice.

The Scary:

• Anonymous WhatsApp messages at all times of the night

• People threatened to kidnap Ashley’s children if she didn’t respond (yes, really)

• Feeling exposed

The crazy thing about going viral is that you have zero clue when it will happen or what to expect. Virality on social media is one of those things that is nearly impossible to predict and just as hard to orchestrate.

Despite all the craziness, our viral post did incredible things for our business, forged new connections, and gave us a larger platform to talk all things PR, comms, and even a little bit about our personal lives.

The ever-changing algorithm makes success a moving target, but there are a few things we’ve analyzed that made this post, specifically, stand out:

1. We were posting consistently. LinkedIn loves consistent posters. In fact, we had just started an internal 30-day LinkedIn challenge, and it was right around that 30th post that things started to really pick up. Consistency is the most important factor in getting your content served more frequently.
   
   

2. Posts should have some personal element. Posts that resonate? Stories. Personal experiences. Insights driven by years in XYZ industry. Things that don’t? Bland, dry commentary without any context or emotion. Tips and tricks that are too elementary. Self-promotional marketing messages. A human-to-human connection should always be your goal.
   
   

3. Sharability is key. No matter what type of content you’re posting, whether educational or telling your own story, it needs to be easily sharable. Images or other visuals that help it stand out on the page are essential. We’ve had some luck with carousels, but the basic static picture is still our top performer. The more other influential people share your content (whether you’re a brand or an individual), the more likely it is that you’ll see widespread reach.
   
   

4. Keep up on the algorithm. Stay informed on the constantly changing algorithm landscape. LinkedIn is notorious for switching things up. The most important thing you can do is to be an active LinkedIn participant yourself - the more you comment, reshare, and like other posts, the higher the likelihood your posts will appear at the top of the feed. Similarly, LinkedIn will prioritize your content if it starts receiving engagement quickly - meaning you should be responding to and liking comments on your posts within minutes, not hours or days. The more hooked into the platform you can be, the more people will see your message, and in turn, their engagement will drive yours higher (phew, that’s a mouthful). Also, a pro tip, LinkedIn will sometimes deprioritize edited posts. So proofread before you publish!
   

If you’re interested in doing more digging into the LinkedIn algorithm (which is, honestly, fascinating), we found this overview helpful.

You can’t pick your own viral moments, but by playing the game, writing high-quality content consistently, and engaging on other posts, you can boost your chances of amplifying your brand or personal profile.

Go forth, and good luck!

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