The king of social media
Do you still recall when Microsoft bought LinkedIn for 26.2 billion dollars in 2016? Microsoft likely knew why they invested in this social media platform. The most “conservative” platform is holding up well in 2024, with a community of around 875 million strong. Among them, 141 million are active daily.
You will struggle to find any individual or company in the meetings industry without a profile on LinkedIn. The findings from this year’s Kongres Barometer research conducted by Kongres Magazine among 229 event organisers worldwide have underlined its significance. Let’s see some of the key findings regarding social media platforms.
Rank the following social media platforms by order of importance to your company.
| 2024 | 2023 |
| 12.5% – LinkedIn | 10.7% – LinkedIn |
| 11.1% – Facebook | 10.5% – Facebook |
| 10.7% – Instagram | 9.9% – Instagram |
| 10.6% – YouTube | 7.3% – Clubhouse |
| 9.0% – X | 7.0% – Pinterest |
| 7.4% – Pinterest | 5.8% – YouTube |
| 7.1% – TikTok | 5.8% – Reddit |
| 5.5% – Tumblr | 5.2% – Twitter |
| 5.1% – Reddit | 5.0% – Tiktok |
| 4.2% – Clubhouse | 4.9% – Snapchat |
| 3.3% – Xing | 3.2% – Tumblr |
| 2.4% – Be Real | 2.6% – Twitch |
| 2.1% – Threads |
Top 5 social media platforms
TOP 5 social media platforms and their importance according to the research in 2023 and 2024:
- 11.6 Linkedin
- 10.8 Facebook
- 10.3 Instagram
- 8.7 YouTube
- 7.2 Pinterest
LinkedIn is head and shoulders above other social media platforms. In a way, that makes sense since most sales activities happen in the B2B market. That poses the question of why individuals in our industry follow influencers on LinkedIn. The respondees replied differently:
- 68.5%: to learn about new products
- 46.8%: to connect with people different than me
- 26.0%: to learn about promotions and discounts
If LinkedIn is integral to our industry, we must obtain the skillset to reach our goal on the platform. In light of our research, 68.4% of users use LinkedIn for business purposes in 2024 (compared to 75.4% of respondees in 2023). Therefore, being familiar with LinkedIn’s algorithm is imperative.
Understanding the latter is a prerequisite for deciphering what works and what doesn’t. Here is a summary of the most relevant findings based on my own experience:
1. As with any other platform, LinkedIn favours users who regularly post, comment or at least like other posts.
2. LinkedIn prioritises expert content, particularly if it provides valuable advice or expert opinion.
3. LinkedIn’s algorithm supposedly prefers comments, trailed by comments and likes.
4. LinkedIn favours posts with a high SSI rank and all-star profiles. Posts from such profiles have 25% more visibility and reach. You should optimise your profile as soon as possible to gain more visibility.
5. We recommend you post regularly, but not more than once a day. The algorithm prioritises periodical and consistent posts, not publishing innumerable articles.
6. If you wish to be credible, we suggest you publish longer posts – LinkedIn articles.
7. Be wary about including external Links in posts. LinkedIn aims to keep you on their site as long as possible. That is why you should add the links in the comments.
8. Try to reply to as many comments as possible. You can elevate this by asking additional questions in the comments section.
9. I believe in the power of video content, but you should do your best to publish native videos (20 to 60 seconds). That means you shouldn’t include video links leading to YouTube and avoid external links.
10. The algorithm rewards the responses from users. We can encourage more responses by using the @mention function. LinkedIn advises to include up to 15 users per post.
LinkedIn has long been one of my favourite social media platforms. The main reason is that there is still an abundance of educational, motivational and inspirational stories on the platform that benefit my business and personal development.
Amidst your followers, you will likely be annoyed by some of them to the extent that you will be compelled to remove them from your profile. Before delving into this topic, let’s see what the results of the Kongres Barometer have to say:
Which of the following factors negatively impacts your opinion about brands on social media platforms?
- 60.5% – Poor content
- 46.1% – Too focused on self-promotion
- 26.3% – Incompleteness of profiles
- 25.0% – Inactivity on social media
- 25.0% – Rarely posting any content
- 22.4% – Poor interaction (comments or direct messages)
- 22.4% – Belated replies to public comments or direct messages
This topic correlates to another question: what are the top three reasons respondents use social media platforms?
- 59.6% – Inspiration
- 56.1% – News
- 55.3% – Keeping in contact with friends and family
That reveals a matrix we should keep front of mind when promoting our profile or company profile on social media.
LinkedIn profiles to avoid
As my network grows, I get more and more strange requests for connections. At the same time, I have noticed a concerning increase in posts that remind me of my Facebook timeline (about kittens, dogs, flowers and emojis). Such cringe posts encourage me to reject some connections.
When confirming new connections, I follow a simple rule of thumb:
- Confirm individuals who I know or have personally met
- Confirm individuals who are part of the meetings industry
- Confirm individuals who I plan to meet in the future
Despite this straightforward recipe, I instantly regret confirming some profiles.
We recently asked colleagues on LinkedIn about the topic. Here are the preliminary results of the ongoing survey:
What are the types of people you want to avoid on LinkedIn?
- 51% – Aggressive seller
- 34% – Self-proclaimed guru
- 11% – Those without a face (photo)
- 3% – The perfect stranger
We could add many other profiles to the list of annoying contacts. I believe the following two archetypes should be on the list too:
Chronic liker
A user that likes almost everything. When looking at their profile, though, we often see the user hasn’t posted any valuable content that would benefit the industry.
Political troll
LinkedIn is not the right platform to share political views. We should avoid such contacts. Other platforms are more suitable for sharing such thoughts, including X.
More than half of the respondees (52.6%) are already intensively investing in marketing on social media, dedicating up to 10% of their marketing budget. That is why we must show a deep understanding of our target group.
If you wish to learn about marketing, sales and AI trends in the meetings industry, we invite you to download our latest study, the Kongres Barometer 2024, to learn more.
Download the research here:
www.kongres-magazine.eu/download-the-kongres-barometer-2024/.
Most used messaging apps
“LinkedIn is not about who you know, it’s about who knows you.” – Janine Popick
P.S. Here is a list of the most used messaging apps on social media platforms:
| 2024 | 2023 |
| 8.6 – Whatsapp | 7.9 – Facebook Messenger |
| 7.2 – Facebook Messenger | 7.0 – Instagram Direct Messages |
| 6.7 – Instagram Direct Messages | 6.2 – Whatsapp |
| 5.9 – Skype | 5.7 – Skype |
| 5.1 – Viber | 4.9 – Line |
| 4.4 – Telegram | 4.0 – Slack |
| 3.5 – Slack | 3.1 – Snapchat |
| 2.2 – Line | 3.1 – Viber |
| 1.4 – Snapchat | 3.0 – Telegram |
TOP 5 messaging tools on social media according to importance from our research in 2023 and 2024:
- 7.5 Facebook Messenger
- 7.4 Whatsapp
- 6.9 Instagram Direct Messages
- 5.8 Skype
- 4.1 Viber
To learn more about AI and marketing trends, download the Kongres Barometer research here.
