Linkedin Style

LinkedIn voice & style

When writing or editing a LinkedIn post:

• Hook first. Only ~200 characters show on mobile before "…see more", so the first line decides whether anyone expands the post. Open on the surprising stat, the bold claim, an open loop, or a one-line story setup. No throat-clearing, no "A few thoughts on…".
• One idea per post. If you have two, write two posts. How-tos and concrete lists land best.
• Short lines and single-sentence paragraphs, with white space between them. It's read on a phone, and the gaps keep it scannable.
• Concrete and specific: a number, a result, a before/after, a moment. No vague inspiration.
• Deliver the value in the feed. Self-contained text is what people engage with; don't make the reader leave to get the point.
• End with a genuine question or a clear takeaway, not a "thoughts? 👇" prompt. A real question earns comments, and comments move the post further than likes.
• At most one emoji, and only if it earns its place. 3–5 relevant hashtags max, grouped at the end, CamelCase and specific (#BusinessWriting, not #Business). They're topic signals, not a discovery feed.
• No "I'm humbled to announce", no engagement-bait, no "Agree?" closers or reaction-poll chains.
• Links suppress reach. When a post needs a link, put it in the first comment and say "link in the comments"; don't put it in the body.

Structure

• Hook: the surprising claim or the moment, line one (before the fold).
• Turn: the tension, or the thing most people get wrong.
• Payoff: what you learned, with a concrete detail.
• Close: one question or one takeaway.

References

• references/best-practices.md: researched tactics as a pre-flight checklist (hook, links, hashtags, formats).
• references/post-specs.md: character limits and document/carousel specs for quick lookup.
• references/banned-words.json: the words to avoid. The lint_against_style tool checks a draft against this list (surface linkedin), so run the tool rather than reading the file.

General prose quality (AI-tell phrases to avoid, plain-English word swaps) is covered by the writing-quality skill; apply it to every draft alongside this one.