LinkedIn is constantly releasing updates to its platform to attract new users and add utility to its existing ones. And as the world’s largest business-focused social media network, it has to do a lot to compete with the top platforms that people are drawn to for pleasure.

LinkedIn released several updates this month, and in this article, we’re going to give you the lowdown on all of them. Here’s what’s new in May 2022.

LinkedIn updates in May 2022

LinkedIn is experiencing some of its best years as a platform. Over the last 6 quarters, they’ve had increasing levels of engagement. And, that’s expected to continue as the corporate world rebounds from the pandemic and the platform grows in popularity.

While amazing on one front, this growth presents a challenge on another. Social media platforms are about popularity, and LinkedIn looks like prime territory for growth hackers.

To combat the rise of people gaming the algorithm for engagement boosts, LinkedIn is updating its algorithm to minimize the exposure of engagement-baiting posts and other content users have said they’ve had enough of.

Here’s what you’ll be seeing less of on LinkedIn going forward:

Engagement posts

Users have expressed their frustration at posts asking for engagement, and LinkedIn is taking action on it:

“We’ve seen several posts that expressly ask or encourage the community to engage with content via likes or reactions – posted with the exclusive intent of boosting reach on the platform. We’ve heard this type of content can be misleading and frustrating for some. We won’t be promoting this type of content, and we encourage everyone in the community to focus on delivering reliable, credible, and authentic content.”

Engagement posts that ask you to react a certain way, ‘share for exposure”, or like to unlock more content are annoying. Thankfully, we’ll have less of it on our LinkedIn timelines now.

If you’ve been doing this, your days are numbered. If you focused on delivering reliable, credible, and authentic content like the quote says, you wouldn’t need to “growth hack.” Audiences are naturally drawn to good content.

Relentless Polling

Polls are engagement gold on every platform. From Facebook to Twitter and Instagram, the growth hackers know polls are an easy way to get people engaged. But there’ll be a lot less of that on LinkedIn now.

The simplicity of polls means we’re all likely to engage with one when we see it, but seeing them on every second post on the timeline gets old quickly.

“We’ve heard feedback that there are too many polls in the feed. We’re taking steps to be smarter and show you only those that are helpful and relevant. That means fewer polls from people you don’t know and more from those you’re more likely to engage with from your network.”

LinkedIn will be adapting its algorithm to limit the visibility of useless and irrelevant polls on the feed.

Polls are still elite content, though. Yours might not reach as many people as they used to, but more people in your network with relevant opinions will engage with you instead of scrolling past because it’s just another poll.

So long as relevance and the likelihood of meaningful connections increase and annoyance levels drop, a knock in reach is a justifiable trade-off.

Political content

Politics and social media do not mix, and good on LinkedIn for doing something about it.

“We heard from some of you that you don’t want to see political content. To fix this, we’re testing a way to give you the option to reduce political content in your feed. While we’re only testing currently in the US, based on feedback we receive, we may further develop the feature and expand it to more regions and languages.”

The option to opt-out of political content is welcome because political discourse on social media tends to bring out the worst people.

Hopefully, the tests which began in February produce positive results and see the option rolled out across more regions. More options for users could never be a bad thing.

For brands and users in politics or politics-adjacent roles or fields, a knock in reach and engagement could be looming. The fallout of the move won’t be definite until we know whether the option will be extended to other regions and languages, and how many people will opt out of getting political updates on the platform.

Apart from algorithm-related updates, LinkedIn is also working on increasing the relevance of updates you get from your network.

“For example, you may not get a lot of value from seeing a connection’s comment on someone else’s post about a job change if you don’t know that other person. That’s why we’ll be showing you more targeted activity from your network, and where you’ll be more likely to join the conversation, too.”

This would be another great update because there’s really no reason why we should be getting updates where we don’t fit into the conversation.

From what we can tell, these new algorithm updates from LinkedIn are all winners. They will no doubt improve the user experience and provide a much-needed reprieve from attention hawks.

That being said, it’ll be interesting to see if LinkedIn’s algorithm can understand our interests, eliminate the white noise content, and present us with the relevant content we want.

What do you think of the updates? We’re definitely sold on the political content update, but limiting the reach of polls has us on the fence.

Hopefully, the update doesn’t turn polls into a fossil of a feature. The engagement they create is part of what’s so nice about social media.

Let us know what you think on Twitter. It’s always nice to hear from you.