Ms. Hyder describers herself as a longtime “power-user-slash-thought-leader” of the site and believes users are more likely to engage with the profiles of people they find credible than they are the profiles of brands. She makes paid content for sponsors on the platform — with her rates beginning at $20,000 for one post — and said she had worked with brands like Adobe.
“Brands are getting it,” she said. “They’re waking up to this.”
LinkedIn is adding even more ways for influencers to make money, and has expanded its own “paid creator partnerships,” the site said. That wave, who use the hashtag #LinkedInpartners, included Fernando Mendoza, a football player who celebrated being the first overall pick for the 2026 N.F.L. draft with a LinkedIn post.
Dr. Hogan, however, is skeptical that this broadening engagement will keep audiences on LinkedIn long-term. “It will work in the short term until people get fatigue” he said.
Power-users like Ms. Hyder also do not want LinkedIn to lose its professional utility. “I think they will lose folks if they continue to have a lot of the same content that you can find on other platforms,” she said.
After so many calls with influencers, I couldn’t stop dwelling on my LinkedIn presence. I took the advice of some coaches and:
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Added a banner image to my profile
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Shared a vulnerable story about my past
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Reposted a senior editor
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Let myself use exclamation marks and an emoji!!
Only a few people liked my posts, including a friend and a former teacher. But I could see that more users were engaging with my profile each week; the site suggested I keep commenting and posting for even more reach.
I reached back out to Mr. Cheng, the comedian, who was recently paid to host a marketing conference. “I’ve become the thing I seek to destroy,” Mr. Cheng said, jokingly. Since our last conversation, he had raised his rates, he said, and expected to raise them again.
Matt Yan contributed reporting.
