Which posts work best for you on LinkedIn?
Do you get more comments on a good old-fashioned text post, or do document posts get people talking?
Which of your posts gets the most love, and which ones are met with tumbleweed?
If you don’t know the answers yet, don’t worry – you’re not alone. But once you’ve nailed the foundations of your LinkedIn profile, the next step is learning how to track what’s working (so you can do more of it!) and what’s not working quite so well (so you can tweak and improve).
In this article, I’m walking you through five key areas:
How to find your analytics
What the individual metrics actually mean
How to use the Weekly Sharing Tracker
How to review individual post performance
And most importantly – what to do with your analytics once you’ve got them
Once you get to grips with your data, you’ll start to see patterns – which content your audience loves, and how they engage with what you’re sharing. That way, you can create content that hits the mark more often.
If you notice that document posts drive more interaction? Add more of them into the mix. It’s all about learning, testing, and improving.
Right then – let’s dive in!
1. How do you find your analytics
To find your analytics dashboard its easier to use your desktop rather than the mobile app. There are two way to access your analytics which I will show you below.
Personally I prefer to access via the second option as you also get to see the Weekly Sharing Tracker (more on that in a bit).
But if you choose route 1, the information you see is the same and the filters work in the same way.
Option 1
From the Home screen, view the section on the left handside of your feed, the section has a minimised view of your banner and profile photo.
Click onto either of the metrics that show to access the section.
This is a quick access route but you can't see the Weekly Sharing Tracker if you access it this way. See option 2 below.
Option 2 (My preferred route)
From your profile, under the header section (also known at the top card) you will see Analytics above your About section.
This is a high level view and you can see more details if you click on 'Show All Analytics'. Each section becomes clickable if you hover your mouse over it.
It can seem a bit overwhelming at first, but once you start to navigate reguarly it will become more familiar and second nature.
The steps I am going to go through below, assume you are accessing your analytics from this screen on the left.
The first thing you will see is a mini dashboard with these metrics:
Profile views - this is how many people have viewed your profile. (If you have a premium subscription you can see who has viewed it along with a trend line, but on a free account you to only see the number of views)
Post impressions - this shows you how many time your content has been seen by other people on LinkedIn (this includes all post types)
Search appearances - this shows you how often your profile has appeared in search results when someone has searched for a specific key word or title. (So make sure you have your keywords in your profile so you can be found)
As you change the filter the data below in the Discovery section and Top Performing posts will change in line with the date range you select. This is really useful as you can start to see trends and identify any patterns to identify improvements.
You can also export the data to your Mac or PC. I would suggest you do this at least on a monthly basis.
You can also choose to look at engagement.
Engagement shows the total number of time someone has interacted with your post, this include reactions (likes, love etc), comments and reposts (if you have a Premium subscription, it will also include the number of customer button clicks). As you start to track your analytics, you will start to see that some types of posts generate more engagement than others.
If you hover over one of these metrics you will see a clickable link, which will take you through to the more detailed view where you can filter your analytics. (see the screen grab to the right)
If I choose impressions as an example, when you click through the default view is the past 7 days but you can change this to the date range you are interested in as well as a custom date range.
As you change the filter the data below in the Discovery section and Top Performing posts will change in line with the date range you selected.
You can also export the data to your machine.
I would suggest you do this at least on a monthly basis.
You can also choose to look at engagement. In this context, it shows the total number of reactions, comments and reposts (if you have a Premium subscription, it will also include the number of customer button clicks)
To look at your audience data, click onto Audience next to Posts and in the same say you can choose the date range you want to look at it. (see the screen grab above)
In this section you can also also see the top demographics, useful to check the seniority and size of the organisations and location.
If you are targeting large corporates for example you can easily check to see if you are reaching the right people. You can also see which industry your followers are in, so can create content that appeals to that sector or even geographic location.
2. What the individual analytics mean
In this section, I've pulled together all of the individual metrics and their definitions, they are dotted about in the article but pulled together here, for those of you who are like me who want to see it all in one place, for ease.
Profile Level: If you are looking at your dashboard, before click on show all analytics, this will be the total for the past 7 days, once you click on show all, and click into each metric you can start to choose your preferred date range.
Profile views - this is how many people have viewed your profile. (If you have a premium subscription you can see who has viewed it, but on a free account you only see the number)
Post impressions - shows you the total number of impressions your posts have had.
Search appearances - this shows you the number of times that your profile appeared in search results. A great reminder to make sure you have those all important keywords in your profile so you can be found.
Posts:
Post impressions - this shows you how many time your content has been seen by other people on LinkedIn (this includes all post types)
Search appearances - this shows you how often your profile has appeared in search results when someone has searched for a specific keyword or title. (So make sure you have your keywords in your profile so you can be found)
Engagement - this shows the total number of time someone has interacted with your post, this includes reactions (likes, love etc), comments and reposts (if you have a Premium subscription, it will also include the number of custom button clicks).
Members reached - this shows you the number of specific users and pages that saw your post. NB this is an estimate from LinkedIn and does not inlude repeat views.
Audience:
New Followers - this show the number of new followers in the date range you select (this is first level connections and followers)
Top demographics of followers - this shows you the demographics of your followers (connections and followers) if you click on see all, you can see Job Title, Location, Industry, Seniority, Company Size and Company. This is really useful to check if you are connected with the "right" target audience for your business and services. If like me you have pivoted your career, it is worth checking this and curating your audience. (removing connections that are not in your target audience or who are not complementary)
If you have a newsletter on LinkedIn, you will also see these metrics
New Subscribers - this shows you the number of people who have subscribed to your newsletter.
Article views - this shows you the number of times that someone has clicked to view your newsletter (on the article page or in the email that is sent from LinkedIn to the user's inbox)
When looking at the individual post analytics under social engagement, you will see:
Reactions - this is the total number of reactions your posts received (likes celebrate, support, love, idea, funny)
Comments - this is the number of comments on your post
Reposts - this is the number of times someone reshared your post on their own feed
If you are looking at a video post, under video performance, you will also see:
Video views - this shows you the number of times that your video was watched for more than 2 seconds
Watch time - this shows you the total amount of time your video was watched for (all views)
Average watch time - this shows you the average amount of time that your video was watched (this is calculated by the time watched, divided by the number of views)
If you have a Premium Subscription you will also be able to see who has viewed your profile in one month since sharing the post starting from the day you posted. You can see up to 100, the most recent viewers will be at the bottom.
If you are looking at an article or newsletter, under article performance, you will also see:
Article views - this shows you the totall number of times your article was seen either on LinkedIn or via email. NB this is an estimate from LinkedIn.
Email sends - this shows you the number of subscribers to your newsletter who have received an email for it.
Email open rate - this shows you the % of subscribrs who have opened the email sent for this arfrticle. NB This is an estimate from LinkedIn.
If you have a Premium Subscription you will also be able to see who has viewed your profile in one month since sharing the post starting from the day you posted. You can see up to 100, the most recent viewers will be at the bottom.
3. Weekly Sharing Tracker
If you have come to your analytics via option 2, then you will see this one you’ve clicked on Show all analytics.
Creating content is at the heart of building your community on LinkedIn and this newish tracker shows:
No of posts - you have shared to your profile
No of comments - you have written, either on other creators posts or in response to your content
No of contributions - to collaborative articles
In a nutshell, this tracker is designed to hep you stay on track with your content creation and engagement with your audience.
Ideally you want to aim for a minimum of a 1:10 ratio of posts:comments (higher if you can).
The third section is collaborative articles, which are AI generated articles where you can share your expertise. When they were first launched, LinkedIn gave out profiles badges if you had contributed, but this was phased out. There doesn’t seem to be any benefit of contributing, but feel free to explore it if you wish. You can search for articles by topic.
4. Looking at an individual post
For individual post analytics you will need to review each post to see the profile activity and engagement as well as the demographics.
See the example here, on the left.
Go to the post
Click on view analytics (red circle)
The data in the screen grab is shown.
This is what you should be monitoring, move onto the next section to see how I do this.
5. You have your analytics, what do you do now?
Once you start to look at the analytics of your posts in this way, it’s so much easier to see the content is performing well and what isn't.
I recommend you set-up a spreadsheet to track your metrics, and include:
The link to the post (this is so you can easily go back to it)
The hook (so you remember what the post was all about) - this will help you to see which ones are working well
Posting Details: Day of the week and date - which day of the week works best for you (it isn't always Monday)
Type: What sort of post it was - text, image, document etc
Engagement: Impressions, Reach, Profile VIews, Followers, Reactions, Comments, Reposts and link clicks (if you have a Premium Subscription)
Video: Views, watch time and average watch time
Articles: Views, Sends and open rate
NB: You only have 90 days from the date of posting to view the details, so I would recommend you update your data at least at the end of each month. Set a diary reminder, that’s what I do.
By digging into your LinkedIn analytics, you’ll start to see what content is hitting the mark — and what’s falling a bit flat.
You’ll be able to spot your most and least popular posts, which ones sparked the most comments, and how long people are actually sticking around to view them.
Take a good look at both your top-performing and underperforming posts, and then come up with a hypothesis – a best guess as to why they did well (or didn’t). Apply that thinking to your next post… and then the next one… and keep going.
Test your hypothesis over 5 to 10 new posts to get a clearer picture of what’s working for your audience.
Then? Rinse and repeat! This is what’s known as a test and learn approach.
Not sure what kind of hypotheses to try? Here are some examples to test:
The topic of the post
The type (story, tip, lesson, list, etc.)
Length – word count or video duration
The complexity of the content – do people prefer bite-sized or more in-depth?
Tone of voice (or rate of speech, if it’s video)
Quality of the visuals, audio, or video
Readability – think font size, colour, layout
The emotion you’re aiming to evoke – is it funny, inspiring, urgent?
Test, tweak, and learn – that’s how you grow your presence and performance on LinkedIn.
Lets summarise.
LinkedIn analytics give you a clear picture of what’s working and what’s not, so you can tweak your content for better results.
I’ve shown you how to find your analytics and how to filter by date to track your progress over time.
While you can download your data, be aware it’s fairly limited.
If you want a deeper, post-by-post breakdown, I recommend tracking it in a simple spreadsheet – it’ll give you much better insight over time.
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