You may have been patiently waiting for this update from LinkedIn, if like me, you saw people in your LinkedIn network reporting they had access to record video directly into the LinkedIn app or upload it from their camera roll over the last month. Well the feature is starting to be made available to more people and this week I got access.
So if you are curious how this works, then check out the screen captures below for a step by step approach to using the new feature with your iPhone and some additional notes at the bottom of the article if you are using an Android phone.
Note that this feature is not yet available for business pages.
How to post native video to LinkedIn using your iPhone
The feature is gradually rolling out to people, so don’t worry if you do not have access – you will see a prompt when you do have access on your home page of your news feed to share an article, photo or video.
Reading the LinkedIn help page about sharing a video, it comments that live streaming is not available at this time – so that suggests that it may be available at some stage in the future.
Once you click through to make a post you will get two options – you can record video directly in the LinkedIn app on your phone, or you can select a video to add from your camera roll. The video must be at least 3 minutes long and a maximum of 10 minutes in duration and should be no smaller than 75 KB and no larger than 5 MB.
The aspect ratio for video on LinkedIn is 1:2.4 – 2.4:1, though I have found posting a pre-recorded square video works well.
If you choose to record a video in the app, when you click on the video icon you will then be prompted to allow access to your camera in your phone settings which you need to enable.
You will then get a prompt to allow LinkedIn to access your microphone which you need to allow.
When you are recording native video into your phone, I recommend you wear the ear buds that come with your phone or step up your production using some of the resources I feature and personally use for social video content creation. This will improve the audio quality which is important, especially if you are outside or in a noisy environment.
If you wish to post a pre recorded video, you will need to navgate to the videos on your camera roll. If you did not create your video on your phone and need to transfer it to your camera roll, my recommended tool to navigate your smartphone and desktop is Dropbox – I use it daily to move media between my mobile device and laptop and visa versa.
One good reason that you may want to upload a video from your camera roll is that you can make it more easily watched on LinkedUn by including captions, as you can see in screen shot of a LinkedIn video post below (or here on LinkedIn). Learn more about captions in previous articles I have written.
You can play your pre-recorded video to check it before you post the video on LinkedIn.
A common mistake I have seen people make using video on LinkedIn, is failing to add a compelling description to the video – so remember to do that. You can include a URL and call to action if you are using the video as a prompt to direct people to other locations online such as a blog post or your LinkedIn published article.
You could choose to write your description first before adding the video to your post – you will see the video icon at the bottom of the post on your iPhone.
The current character count for your post is 700 characters and you may opt to prepare that first in your Notes app then copy it onto the LinkedIn post so you can easily check it before posting.
You can also go back to edit your video description later even when you have published the video.
On the first day I got access to the new native video feature for LinkedIn I tried uploading a video, but even after waiting more than an hour for the video to process, it still did not render. So I resorted to creating a video directly in the app. The following day, it still took a long time to process a short video which you can watch here (it’s actually an audiogram).
For any video you post you will be able to access the link to share the video by clicking on the three dots at the top right of the post. Unfortunately there is no embed feature yet to enable you to post your video on other sites such as your blog, website or event embedding in LinkedIn article. Let’s hope this is introduced.
I just don’t think LinkedIn are accommodate the volume of people trying to use the feature at this time. So you may need to be patient, especially if you are planning to upload video rather than creating video in the app.
When uploading native video using your iPhone, you will need to remain in the LinkedIn app while the video is uploading. LinkedIn advises that the video is uploaded and begins processing, you can use other applications and you should receive a notification when your video is ready to view. Personally I left the app open until the video had finished processing.
Once you are happy wth the video you have either recorded or uploaded, you will then get a prompt to add a notification to people who may be interested in watching your video.
You can then search for the people you wish to notify.
Once your video has been published, you will be able to see the number of views on your content and where views are from – your primary contacts of your extended network.
At any time after you have published the video you can edit the post or delete the video. Just click the three dots at the top of the post the access these features.
How to post native video to LinkedIn using your Android phone
When using your Android device to publish native video on LinkedIn, unlike with the iPhone, you will need to click on the bottom right of the screen where you will see a pencil icon to access the video post feature.
You will then get the prompt to add an article, photo or video.
You will then get a prompt to record a video or choose a video from your camera roll.
Additional LinkedIn Native Video Tips And Resources
When it comes to reviewing your resuts of using LinkedIn native video, there were early reports of people getting tens of thousands of views of video uploaded directly to LinkedIn. One of the reasons for this is that those people posting about it have huge numbers of connections on LinkedIn. Many of them teach social media including how to use LinkedIn. As they were using a new feature, it envoked curiosity from other people who headed over to view the videos. So do not be disheartened if you don’t achieve those results – it is who watches and engages inyour video that matters.
So do not be disheartened if you don’t achieve those results – it is who watches and engages in you content that matters not the number of views of your content.
I know from personal experience that some of the interaction I have had on my video posts has been from people I have known more than a decade, and yet they never seem to have interacted with my other posts over the years which is interesting. I wonder why that is? This engagement with people I have been out of touch with for some years presents a great opportunity to re-connect with trusted past colleagues.
If you are thinking of recording video direct in the app, I would suggest you hold your phone in landscape as that appears to work better when viewed on desktop. When initially available last month, LinkedIn seemed to show the replay on desktop with lots of margin around it as you can see in the screen shot below.
It looks as though LinkedIn have made some adjustments as when I recorded my video directly into the iOS LinkedIn app, the amount of padding was less and the video player renders square rather than a landscape size.
I would also suggest that you make sure that your first frame is eyecatching as that is what seems to stay as the thumbnail which will be seen in your newsfeed and activity feed. At this time you can not change the video thumbnail unlike on Instagram, and not can you upload a custom thumbnail as you can with Facebook and YouTube videos and live streams.
Remember that there are other ways to use video on LinkedIn if you do not yet have access. You can still post links from YouTube for example, in a LinkedIn article, or as you can see in the screen shot below, in your LinkedIn newsfeed. It is not immediately clear that this was not native video when looking at this post and it played inline, so if you have FOMO at the moment because you do not have access to the new feature, this is an approach you can take.
It appears at the time of writing this article that native video for LinkedIn posted via desktop is rolling out. I noticed this post in my LinkedIn newsfeed – I asked the author AJ, which browsers it worked in and he confirmed he can access it in Chrome and Firefox and Windows (I am unsure if thiis is for Edge and/or IE). At the time of writing this article he confirms the web feature only allows for uploads, not the creation of video. Let me know if you have access on desktop.
I have also noticed some social media experts make suggestions on how to use of this new feature of native video but let’s dispel some of the ideas they are sharing as they are simply not correct:
- You don’t have to use your web camera or a DSLR camera to record your video – your mobile phone and apps on your phone can do a terrific job in creating a professional video. After all if journalists working for the BBC and CNN use these kids of mobile video apps, surely they are good enough for us?!
- You don’t have to go to a recording studio to create the camera – you do need to be camera ready but you can record your video yourself or with a colleague
- You don’t have to use a green screen – in fact that can give a false impression of who you are and people want to connect with the real you.
Bringing native video to LinkedIn is going to change the game for professionals using the platform. Yes we need to carefully consider the content we share and it is not the same as sharing videos of ourselves to faily and friends. But there is nothing stopping you repurposing content that you create using some of the tools available in the Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat apps to LinkedIn. I covered this idea in a recent article and live stream. Just make sure that the content reflects your personal brand, is congruent with your brand guidelines if you are posting on behalf of your organisation, and that it is timely, relevant and helpful to your network.
Posting video on LinkedIn has never been easier and it is definitely worth experimenting with to see if it will help you achieve your professional goals.
If you have questions about using LnkedIn for your organisation and specifically your video content streategy, you can schedule a meeting with me and we can brainstorm the next steps you can take to becoming a master of mobile storytelling using just your smartphone.
UPDATE 22 August 2017: LinkedIn announce on their blog that they are rolling the feature of native video on LinkedIn out globaly in the next few weeks.
On the topic of analytics they comment that after you post a video, you can see audience insights such as the top companies, titles and locations of your viewers, as well as how many views, likes, and comments your videos are receiving.
UPDATE 6 SEPTEMBER 2017 ADVANCED TIP: One thing I realised when going back to search for past videos posted on LinkedIn is that they will no longer be able to be seen in a recent activity feed, so if you want to remember the videos and refer to them later, I suggest you curate a list of the links – you could post this to an article on LinkedIn, create a Twitter Moment or use anothe digital platform or cration tool to keep a note of your videos that you shared should you wish to refer people back to them in the future.
