I recently did some digging into how LinkedIn's newsfeed works, as part of that research I learned that the LinkedIn algorithm tries to keep a varied stream of different types of content in the newsfeed.

LinkedIn seems to prioritise different types of content - in order to keep the newsfeed engaging. I wanted to know how that worked in reality, so last week on holiday with some time on my hands I surveyed what content was actually winning in the newsfeed. 

My method was not particularly scientific. For 100 posts, I noted; the type of content being posted, the focus of the content (picture, video etc) and the reason it was in my timeline (posted by a connection or promoted by a company).

Here are the results.

External links appear as much as LinkedIn hosted content

One of my hypotheses before the survey had been that LinkedIn might prioritise content that kept people on the site instead of sending them away. Of the 100 posts, almost 30% were external content links - showing possibly that external links are not deprioritised as I had thought.

Quite surprisingly, only 4% of posts I saw were "text only" updates.

Promotional content edges out educational content

I categorised any content that promoted a company and its achievements as "promotional". Anything that had an informative or educational angle was "education" and anything that was not quite either came into the category of "update".

Educational content and promotion were the big winners here in the newsfeed.

Connection interactions, not posts created were the biggest influencer

I see what my connections have liked or commented on more than I saw what they posted themselves. 

A learning here is that every engagement you get from a connection on LinkedIn is exposure to their network as the most significant part of the wider network feed is dedicated to interactions from connections.

Content from influencers I follow appeared in my newsfeed a lot more than posts from my connections and far more than promoted content.