Previously reserved for some of the elite few major industry and political figures, LinkedIn’s advice and blog section will now be open to all users looking to share ideas and advice.
The business social networking site announced the news in a blog post, in what it sees as a way of giving all users the ability to promote their brand in what can be seen as a potential rival to Twitter, but with more than 140 characters.
As of today, members of the website now have the ability to follow other members outside their existing network and build a new group of followers, as well as continue to share their expertise by posting photos, images, videos and their original presentations on SlideShare.
Up until now, the only people who have been using their ‘Influencers’ blog postings have included Virgin Group founder Richard Branson, TV personality Martha Stewart and former Microsoft chair Bill Gates.
The service was initially launched in October 2012 covering a total of 150 people, but now the service will cater to an initial 25,000 people and will be expanded upon over the coming months and years.
Speaking about the launch, LinkedIn’s head of content development Ryan Roslansky expects it to be a valuable tool for businesses.
“The valuable Influencer posts and the wide range of professional content from millions of publishers that we currently aggregate on LinkedIn are powerful, but only the tip of the iceberg. Combined, our members have extremely valuable and varied experiences; however, their knowledge and expertise has not yet been captured and shared.”
