LinkedIn Events, welcome to the "phygital" era
Linkedin has just launched the LinkedIn Events feature.
Similar to Facebook Events, is it now possible to create and join events embedding the description, the date, the time and the venue. Moreover, Linked Inners are able to invite their connections, manage all the planned events, communicate with attendees and stay in touch with them after the event.
Events includes security features for people to report and block events or conversations. (According to a study done by Business Insider Intelligence: LinkedIn is perceived as the safest social media.)
At the moment, Events is a free feature of the platform, including the fact that you cannot promote your event. Only use organic reach may be used to touch potential attendees.
Events should not be considered a platform for influencers who want to run their community events. If LinkedIn recognizes the power of business events and how planners could use Events strategically they could catch the opportunity to create another revenue stream in their business model, positioning themselves as a competitor to Eventbrite competitor.
The move into Events is one of the bigger moves that LinkedIn has made over the last several years, since Microsoft bought the platform in 2016.
- Where can I plan my next LinkedIn Event?
The feature appears as a menu item on the website and in the application.
- Where can I find upcoming LinkedIn Events?
Members looking for events to attend will see invites in their My Network tab, and they can also browse the feed to discover events shared by people in their network.
For reference, LinkedIn has a penetration of ± 30% in Belgium (16-64 years, GWI Q1 2019).
