As of: 2026-05-16

# linkedin

**Mode skill.** Default-enabled on the Channels specialist.

## When to use

Use when LinkedIn is on the channel mix for B2B audiences, professional services, or personal-brand-led businesses. Use when the brief mentions thought leadership, employee advocacy, inbound leads from operators, or "I should post more on LinkedIn."

Trigger phrases:

- "What should I post on LinkedIn?"
- "How do I get leads from LinkedIn?"
- "Help me build a personal brand on LinkedIn."
- "Company page vs. personal profile — which works?"

## Procedure

**1. Pick personal profile or company page (or both).** As of 2026-05-16, personal profiles structurally out-perform company pages on organic reach. If the brief is B2B inbound or personal brand, lead with personal profiles. Use company pages for employee-advocacy amplification and ad-account anchoring, not as the primary content surface.

**2. Assign LinkedIn a stage.** Most B2B uses serve Think (problem framing, comparison, category education) and Care (customer stories, retention signals to existing buyers). See-stage works for category-defining executives; Do-stage typically lives in DMs and ads, not in feed posts.

**3. Build the post mix.**

- *Think-stage text post (most common):* hook line, narrative middle, takeaway, single CTA. 1,200-1,800 characters typically optimal as of 2026-05-16 for in-feed dwell time.
- *Think-stage carousel (PDF document):* 8-12 slides, framework or process content, optimized for saves.
- *Care-stage story post:* customer transformation, lesson learned, post-mortem on a public failure.
- *Lightweight engagement:* polls (low-frequency, high-visibility), comments on others' posts (compounds your distribution).

**4. Cadence and dwell mechanics.** A sustainable B2B posting cadence is 3-5 posts per week per profile. The platform rewards in-feed dwell time more than vanity engagement — long posts that earn read-through outperform short posts with high likes. Spec hook lines that earn the "see more" click; bury the punchline.

**5. Measurement by stage.** Think-stage: impressions among target titles, comment-to-impression ratio, profile views from non-followers, DM-initiation rate. Care-stage: re-share by existing customers, employee-advocacy amplification. Treat connection growth as a lagging signal, not a goal.

**6. Hand to Copy for the words.** You spec the format constraints (hook line, length range, CTA placement, comment-call mechanic). Copy writes the post.

## Decision rules

- **Hook line earns the "see more" click.** As of 2026-05-16, the in-feed preview cuts at ~210 characters. The first three lines must earn expansion or impression dwell collapses.
- **Comments compound distribution.** Engaging meaningfully on others' posts (not "great post!") feeds the algorithm signals that lift your own reach. Treat commenting as part of the publishing system.
- **DMs beat link clicks.** LinkedIn structurally suppresses out-links. Push interested readers to DM you ("comment X and I'll DM you the framework") rather than to a landing page in-feed.
- **Personal profile owns the audience; company page rents it.** If the founder leaves, do not lose the audience. Build on the personal profile.
- **As of 2026-05-16:** native PDF carousels and text-only posts continue to outperform link-out posts. Spec link-free in-feed content; route link clicks to bio, DM, or comment.

## Anti-patterns

- Posting press releases or company news on a personal profile. The audience came for a person; corporate voice repels them.
- Reciprocity pods and engagement-pod games. The platform detects and suppresses pod patterns over time; the long-run cost exceeds the short-run lift.
- Quoting AI productivity hacks every day with no business outcome attached. Generic hot-take content underperforms specific operator content.
- Treating LinkedIn as a Do-stage channel for cold offers. Cold pitches in DMs to first-degree connections damage the long-run inbound relationship.
- Cadence over substance. Three substantive posts per week outperforms seven low-effort posts.

## Before / after

**Brief:** "Help me get more B2B leads from LinkedIn."

**Before** (vague, no stage):
> *Post daily — mix of thought leadership and product updates.*

**After** (stage-anchored, 2026-05-16):
> *Surface: personal profile (founder), not company page. Stage: Think (problem framing for [ICP]) + Care (customer transformation stories). Mix: 3 Think text posts/week (1,200-1,800 chars, hook earns the "see more" click, no out-links), 1 PDF carousel/week (8-slide framework, save-optimized), 1 customer-story post/week. Push interested readers to DM via comment-trigger CTA, not landing-page link. Measure: impressions among target titles, comment-to-impression ratio, DM-initiation rate. Brand sets voice; Copy writes posts.*
