Last week, LinkedIn announced a new publishing platform for its members. So far, it’s by invitation, only – probably to members who have posted a certain amount or length of updates on their profiles. If you didn’t get the invitation, you can request one here. Eventually, it will be open to everyone.
This is a good opportunity to share your expertise with the general public, and hopefully with people who can give you business or hire you. The mechanics of writing an article is mostly the same as writing a regular post, except you aren’t limited to 689 characters, and you can use basic formatting:
However, the system is rough around the edges. It doesn’t accept HTML or CSS formatting, all images wrap text around them and you can’t change it, and even if you insert a small image, the system forces a large amount of padding around it. The result can cause a mess like this (from my first post: Calculating percentages of a total using Excel), and you can’t fix it:
Maybe because this service isn’t fully released, there is no link on the menu bar to get to your posts or create a new one. You have to know the URL: https://www.linkedin.com/today/post/author/createArticle
I sent these concerns to LinkedIn, and they said “When many of our members ask for the same improvement, [the developers] try their best to get it done. However, due to the number of suggestions they receive, they usually don’t provide a timeline.” So we’ll see.
In the meantime, write some articles! It will help establish or burnish your professional credibility. And happy Bastille Day!