LinkedIn has confirmed that starting on September 30, 2021, the platform will remove the current Stories experience.
Stories are over on LinkedIn. After Twitter, it’s the professional social network’s turn to say goodbye to its Stories format. Indeed, the platform has decided to put an end to these short-form ephemeral videos, which failed to meet user expectations.
The Story format clearly isn’t for everyone. While TikTok has announced plans to launch its own take on Stories, LinkedIn is moving in the opposite direction by removing the format from the platform by the end of September. Liz Li, senior director of product at LinkedIn, revealed this change in the platform’s functionality, August 31: “As part of this change, we’ll remove the current Stories experience by the end of September, as we work on the new experience.”
In case, advertisers have promoted or sponsored a Story directly from their Page in Campaign Manager, these paid Stories will not be visible in the LinkedIn feed. One will need to recreate them in Campaign Manager as an image or video ad.
As part of a statement to TechCrunch, LinkedIn confirmed the development of the feature adding they are “doing some early tests to create a unique audio experience connected to your professional identity.” It also plans to bring audio to other features on LinkedIn such as events and groups.
LinkedIn’s Stories feature was launched around the time Twitter had introduced its Instagram-like disappearing stories feature, Fleets, which was shut down last month.
While the Microsoft-owned company has scrapped the Stories feature, it is said to be working on a Clubhouse-like audio feature, in addition to the “short-form, rich interactive video format”.
“We want to embrace mixed media and creative tools of Stories in a consistent way across our platform, while working to integrate it more tightly with your professional identity,” Li said.
