How to Tag Someone on LinkedIn?

So, what does tag mean, generally? Well, as Oxford defines the word, “tag means a label attached to someone or something for the purpose of identification or to give other information; a small piece or part that is attached to a main body; add to something, especially as an afterthought or with no real connection.” Merriam-Webster defines it as “A brief quotation used for rhetorical emphasis or sententious effect; something used for identification or location; an element of code in a computer document used especially to control format and layout or to establish a hyperlink; a string of text (such as the symbol @ followed by a person’s username) that is used to tag a person or account in a social media post.”

What does tag mean?

As you can see, tagging has different meanings in the world’s most credible dictionaries, including Oxford, Webster, Longman, etc. But what we are more interested in is the underlined meaning of Webster, tagging people in social networks. We talk in detail about the importance and how to do this on the Internet. But under this subtitle, I’m just telling you that tagging plays an important role in networking, the visibility of your content on the internet, increasing sales, etc., and doing it is effortless but risky at the same time. The right tag at the right time and place can lead to many opportunities, while the wrong tag can greatly reduce the value of the content you have shared. What I share with you here is the result of years of work in social networks and online marketing, so make sure to read the rest of the article.

To tag someone on LinkedIn, simply type the "@" symbol followed by the person's name in your post or comment. LinkedIn will suggest names as you type, so you can select the appropriate person from the list.

What does tagging mean: online edition

Do you remember the good old Facebook days? Yeah, it still is around and many people still use it, but there are a lot of other social media platforms these days. Yet, it was just Facebook once! Yeah, there was Yahoo Messenger before that but Facebook was the most serious social media platform back then. People used to tag each other in Facebook posts and photos, but to be honest, just a few people used to know what to do with it professionally. Most of them just kind of use it to mention a friend in a photo, it used to be kind of a luxury thing for most users. I remember that I posted a picture from my high school friend once and forgot to tag two of them. That was a messy fight, for they thought I was ignoring them while that was but an honest mistake! So I just removed the photo and reposted it while all of them were tagged on the photo.

Maybe they knew the tagging had benefits for them back then. Who knows? But seriously what does it mean, what is this fuss around it, what are hashtags, and how to use them? What do you think about these questions? Let’s just answer them.

Tagging was always around, you know, even before Facebook people used them under their blogs to categorize their websites and weblogs. But they were more hashtags-like because you could click on one of the tags and see every post that has been tagged in that weblog. But tagging is totally different in the case of social media. It allows people to mention another person, business, etc. and it’s in different forms on different platforms. For instance, on Facebook, when you click on a person in a photo, you can see their name; on Instagram, you can see their account ID if they are tagged on a story or posts text and if they are in a photo, you can tap on the picture to see their accounts name tagged, in Twitter it is somehow the same, meaning you can see an @Username in the tweets’ text and when they tag you on a photo you can see their accounts name under it, and so on. But in the end, all of them are clickable names or usernames that refer you to their accounts and also notify them that you tagged them in a post (text photo, video, comment, etc.), and you can make sure that they see that post.

Tagging is also very important in business; it no longer is just something we do to please friends or family members. For years now, content marketers have been doing it for website ranking for every article they publish on the internet and for every piece of content on social media. They not only tag people and businesses in their posts on social networks but also tag keywords in their blogs and other content they publish on websites. By doing this, they not only Specialize content in a specific area but also make it easier for interested people to find it in search engines. On the other hand, search engines will rank your post more easily with a strong tag, and the probability that your website will rank better in the SERP increases much higher. As the W3schools website states, “The <strong> tag is used to define text with strong importance. The content inside is typically displayed in bold. Tip: Use the <b> tag to specify bold text without any extra importance!”

But what about social media? I mean, we use them for everything in business, right? Yes, we use them to target our audience, do prospecting, marketing, etc. social media platforms help us to make sure people notice our existence. Thanks to them, we can now reach out to specific audiences the way no businesses (large or small) could before. The more important thing is that they do not even have to be your direct connections; you can tag anyone you want and make sure they see your content. But is it guaranteed that the ones you want to see what you shared on your company page will definitely see it? Since we know how those annoying algorithms work, you know, the first hour and stuff! That is when we use tagging, especially when we have a specific someone or a few people we want to make sure that they see the post. But we can send them that post, right? Yeah, but think of the image. You are posting an article or a product introduction and forwarding the post instead of just tagging the recipient. That will be annoying, and you are lucky if they do not think of you as a spammer, not to mention that many busier people receive loads of messages they never actually open them. But the interesting thing is that they do care when they get tagged on a post and usually react to it.

What is a hashtag, and why use it?

So, are hashtags and tags the same? No, they are totally different. While tags are mostly used to reach out to certain people and make sure that they notice a post you published on a social platform (let’s not talk about the strong tag for now), the hashtag promotes your brand, idea, product, and service, etc. for a huge group of people who may follow that hashtag or simply search it on that social media. So, what is it?

As the Digital Marketing Institute defined it, “A hashtag is a word or keyword phrase preceded by a hashtag symbol (#). It’s used within a post on social media to help those who may be interested in your topic to be able to find it when they search for a keyword or particular hashtag. It helps to draw attention to your posts and encourage interaction.”

You can reach a large number of people who are not in your connection circle to notice you, your brand, content, and comments on social media platforms. That kind of works on every platform but is even more important on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Maybe you think, all right, it’s no big deal then. You know, just put a hashtag before the keyword you want people to find your post with, and that’s it, right? Yes, but still, there are some points to consider while using it. Believe it or not, this little symbol can do miracles for your business on online platforms if used correctly.

1. Do not overuse hashtags. I’ve seen people use so many hashtags. Sometimes all you can see on a tweet are loads of different hashtags. Don’t do that, it differs on different platforms, but usually, the best number is three hashtags.
2. Another thing that you are suggested to do is try to use short and memorable words for your hashtags. They are much more effective than long ones. For instance, take a look at the way #MeToo influenced this movement.
3. Don’t get too smart or obscure. People do not search for complicated tags and using them won’t benefit you.
4. Still, use hashtags that are specified and memorable because they result better than the general ones. You don’t want your post to be washed off by different posts’ floods that are using the same tags.
5. Do not add hashtags to every single post you are publishing, it is better to use them for stimulating engagement.

Hashtags simplify the searching process. There are millions of different types of content published on the internet every day, and that makes it really rare if a lot of people are able to see your posts on social media platforms. We can always tag some people to make sure they see our post, but what if we don’t have a specific someone in mind? What if we just want a large number of people to see our post? There can be a lot of benefits in that, you know, you can do prospecting, promoting your brand and products, promoting an idea, etc, and the tool for that is using a good hashtag. Another thing that a hashtag can do is to compel action, like making the audience go through the content, engage in the comment section, share the post, etc.

Remember that hashtags are easy to use, they let people find you easier and not only let you reach more people who are interested in your content but also help you to see who your competitors are and what they are doing. So a related industrial strong, short, and memorable hashtag can help you a whole lot in social media marketing. They can also be used in content organization; they used to call this action tagging in the past, but as mentioned above, these tags used to work like a hashtag on a website.

How to tag someone on LinkedIn and other social media?

I said tagging is one of the best ways to get a person’s attention to what you want. This is very important on all social networks, so if you do a small search for “tagging in social media”, you will see a lot of content in different languages, especially about tagging on LinkedIn and Instagram. Let’s talk about LinkedIn first, since this social network is currently the top platform of communication with professionals and marketing in any industry. tagging is one of the best ways to build a strong network and make sure that people who want to see a specific post, see it. You may still not know how tagging is done on LinkedIn, so I explain it here.

Well, as mentioned in the above subtitles, social media tagging is done in order to ensure that the person, company, or organization in question sees the content that is important to you. But that’s not all. LinkedIn can also increase the number of views of the tagged person’s profile, that’s why we always recommend optimizing your profile for viewers; who knows Who might tag you in their post and how many people might visit your LinkedIn profile?

Now, the main advantage of tagging people on LinkedIn is to increase the possibility of interacting with more experts who may have access to a particular person’s profile through tagging. As the circle of connections expands, the interaction becomes more meaningful, and the sale (if there is anything to offer) is likely to increase. Because people have a strange tendency to share the posts in which they are tagged, take a look at the Instagram influencers’ stories. You will see that most of them share all the posts and/or stories in which they are tagged in; this is exactly the same on LinkedIn. Many people share the posts in which they are tagged in with their connections. This will increase the number of visits and impressions of your post and profile, which usually results in an increase in connection requests, followers, and sales.

Now, why is it important that tagged people share our posts or tag other people in the comments? Well, LinkedIn is different from other social media platforms. This social network is just like society, not a one-way highway (like Instagram and Twitter). Also, since it’s completely business-oriented, we probably all have people in our circle of connections who are involved in our industry. Those people who are tagged in our posts are also the same! It means that they are in contact with people like themselves, and when they send your post in which they are tagged to others or mention them in the comments, they are unconsciously expanding your communications (especially considering the limit of LinkedIn’s weekly invitation). To tag them on LinkedIn, just tag them as @LinkedIn-ID in text, photo, video, etc.

Well, now you know how to tag people, companies, and organizations on LinkedIn, but it’s better to remember a few points during tagging to increase engagement in addition to tagging efficiency. Tag people in the right place. It is very important that the post you tag the person or people in is really relevant to them! They must understand this connection; because people really hate being tagged in irrelevant places; not only will they not share that post, but they may identify you as a spammer and report your post or even your account. For this reason, always consider the relevance of the content and the target person when tagging. They need to know what you mean by tagging, and it needs to be crystal clear, so don’t try to be mysterious, you’re not Moriarty, and they’re not Sherlock Holmes.

To tag people, it is better to choose posts that have a more positive sense. For example, on LinkedIn, you can tag people in posts in which you appreciate them, wish good luck to them, welcome them, job postings, product introduction posts (where you think it can solve that particular person’s problem), etc. This increases the probability that the tagged person will interact with you in the future or share the post with you greatly.

Another very important point that is unfortunately often overlooked is that when you tag someone in a post related to them, be sure to interact with them and answer their questions and concerns. Also, if you are tagged somewhere, make sure to interact with them under the same post because this will make your post more visible. LinkedIn algorithms are very interested in comments that are more interactive, especially those that the author is engaged with. LinkedIn’s algorithms monitor your posts very closely, especially in the first hours, so it is better to tag people who you think will react to this tagging faster.

Of course, along with the things we should do while tagging, there are also things we should not do. For example, since tagging is very important on LinkedIn if you are in doubt about whether or not to tag a person, company, or organization, it is better not to do it. Never abuse this feature, and don’t spam tag other users. It is better to be strategic in tagging and tag the most relevant ones in the posts you want to be seen. Also, please don’t tag a LinkedIn account everywhere, not only does this not bring positive results, but it may cause people to think bad about you and make your attractive and valuable content look less valuable.

Also, don’t bulk tag (tagging too many people in one post). As mentioned, people tend to share posts in which they are tagged with their connections, but this does not happen in the case of posts in which several other people have also been tagged. Therefore, it is better to personalize the tags to increase the probability of interaction and sharing as much as possible.

Never people in negative content. This is the worst thing you can do to yourself and your brand on LinkedIn; tagging on LinkedIn should always be positive. Of course, there is nothing wrong with negative tagging; many people on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, etc., do this to notify a person, organization, or company of a problem, issue, etc. However, this is not really recommended on LinkedIn. It is better to have these fights on Instagram and Twitter.

How to tag companies on LinkedIn?

We have dozens of social media platforms nowadays, from the good old Facebook and Twitter to the very popular TikTok. But we all know that LinkedIn is something different. Not only it is a business-oriented platform, but the features are so different in it. We can use it for so many things like lead generating, job searching, marketing, finding and interacting with new business partners, finding mentors, B2B and B2C business, etc. As the statistics suggest, more than 30% of the B2B online traffic comes from LinkedIn, so it is only natural if you want to make sure that different companies see the posts you are sharing, whether in your feed or company page.

Tagging them is the best way to do that since you are notifying them that a post is shared and you decided to tag them in it, so it is interesting for them (logically). So, how to do it? It is no big deal; I am going to tell you how right now and right here.

1. Enter your account
2. Click on ‘Me’
3. Select the company page you want to post as
4. Click on ‘start a post’
5. Tag the company you mean to see the post
   1. If it is a text post, you are to add an @+(the company name), and you will see a drop menu of the users.
      1. Click on the right one to see that it gets bolded in the text
   2. If you want to tag them on a photo, click on the ‘Tag’ button
      1. Click on the Tag button from the pop-up window to edit your photo. Then click anywhere on the uploaded photo
      2. Type the name of the company you’d like to tag and then select its name from the list of names.
6. Click on the ‘Post’ button

But, why should you do it? I mean, what is the benefit of doing so?

Well, first of all, tagging an organization or a company creates a hyperlink that leads to their LinkedIn profile. There are some benefits in doing this, first of all, you are making them aware of your existence. So, it will be more likely for them to engage with you and you are making sure that they get notified of the content you want them to see.

The tagged companies are very likely to view your company page and its admin’s LinkedIn profile. Another advantage of tagging company pages is that you can stick to their minds by posting content that is meaningful to them and related to their work and industry, so they will remember you from time to time. I mean, who knows what business-to-business opportunities exist at such an advantage?

In addition, by tagging other companies, you increase the probability of their interaction with you. Also, as mentioned, when you tag a company (especially in a post published on the company page), they will check both the company page and possibly the page admin profile. Plus, a meaningful post is likely to encourage them to react, comment, share, and even message you to ask a question or even offer to have business relationships.

I emphasize again, tag companies and people only in the posts that are related to them. Tagging a company you might do B2B business with or a member you might have a B2C relationship with, in a post about your seven-year-old son’s painting picture is really unwise. At the same time, if a company or brand has helped you in any way, you can publish a kudos post and tag them in it. They will definitely thank you for this post on a public platform and this will be a unique opportunity for your brand to be more visible.

Another benefit is that when you tag a company in a valuable post related to them (in your own feed), you might get some good job offers from them because you showed that you have good knowledge in a specific field, and told showed you are a professional. One of the best pieces of content that can help in this matter is to create a portfolio and tag the company you want to work for in your portfolio.

I need to warn you again, do not tag people and/or companies so much because LinkedIn might consider it spam after some time. LinkedIn has much more serious protocols about spam than other platforms and if its algorithms flag your content, you can be permanently banned from this platform.

Related Questions & Answers

How to tag someone on LinkedIn after posting?

To tag someone on LinkedIn after posting, follow these steps:

1. Locate the post that you want to tag someone in and click on the three dots (…) in the upper right-hand corner of the post.
2. Click on “Edit” and then place your cursor where you want to add the tag. Type the “@” symbol followed by the person’s name, and select their name from the list of suggestions that appear.
3. Once you’ve added the tag, click “Save” to update the post with the tag. The person you’ve tagged will receive a notification and be able to see the post in their notifications feed.

It’s important to note that it’s best practice to only tag people who are relevant to the content you’re sharing or discussing. Avoid over-tagging people in posts or comments, as this can be seen as spammy or intrusive.

How to tag someone on LinkedIn if their name doesn’t come up?

If the person you want to tag on LinkedIn doesn’t appear in the list of suggested names, you can still tag them by following these steps:

1. Type the “@” symbol in your post or comment, followed by the person’s name or their LinkedIn profile URL (e.g., “@JohnDoe” or “@www.linkedin.com/in/JohnDoe“).
2. When you publish the post or comment, the person you’ve tagged will receive a notification and be able to see the post or comment in their notifications feed. Note that this method may not work for every user, as some people may have their tagging settings turned off or may not be able to be tagged in certain situations.

It’s important to only tag people who are relevant to the content you’re sharing or discussing and to avoid over-tagging people in posts or comments. Additionally, be respectful of people’s tagging preferences and only tag them in posts or comments where it makes sense to do so.

Why can’t I tag someone in a LinkedIn post?

There are several reasons why you may not be able to tag someone in a LinkedIn post. Here are a few possible explanations:

1. Privacy settings: The person you’re trying to tag may have their privacy settings set to restrict tagging, which would prevent them from being tagged in posts or comments.
2. Connection status: If you’re not connected with the person you’re trying to tag, you may not be able to tag them in your post or comment. You can try sending them a connection request and waiting for them to accept before tagging them.
3. LinkedIn restrictions: LinkedIn may have certain restrictions in place that prevent users from tagging certain individuals or groups. For example, LinkedIn may prohibit tagging more than a certain number of people in a single post or comment.

It’s important to respect people’s privacy settings and tagging preferences on LinkedIn. If you’re not able to tag someone in a post or comment, consider reaching out to them directly via InMail or another communication channel instead.

Conclusion

I remember the first time I heard about tagging (online); it was when everyone had a Facebook account. Honestly, in the beginning, it was very confusing to me. Why should I tag someone else? So what? The problem got worse when I wanted to explain it to my parents and even worse in my grandparents’ case. Of course, they didn’t have a problem with the word “tagging.” After all, they had already seen the price tags on the items they wanted to buy, but the online version of tagging was another story.

Anyway, after years, I can talk for hours about what tagging is and how to use it, why this feature should be used, especially on social media platforms, etc. This has many advantages, some of which I mentioned above. We can inform people directly about a post or our brand and be sure that we have drawn their attention to the content we publish. We can use tagging to find jobs, partners, B2b and B2C customers, etc. A lot can be done with tagging, and you just have to do it right, at the right time, and in the right place.

FAQ

How do I tag someone in my LinkedIn post?

To tag someone in a LinkedIn post, type “@” followed by the person’s name in the post or comment box. A dropdown list will appear with suggested names as you type. Select the correct individual from the list to tag them. Once tagged, they will receive a notification about the mention.

How to Tag Companies on LinkedIn?

To tag companies on LinkedIn, start typing the company’s name with the “@” symbol in your post or comment. As you type, a drop-down menu will appear with suggestions. Select the correct company from this list, and it will become a clickable hyperlink in your text, notifying the company of your mention. This tagging feature is useful for drawing specific companies’ attention to your posts, making public mentions, or engaging in discussions related to these companies. Ensure you’re selecting the correct business, as many companies may have similar names. This simple yet effective feature enhances networking and visibility on the platform.

Why can’t I tag people on LinkedIn?

If you’re unable to tag someone on LinkedIn, it might be due to several reasons. The person might not be in your connection list, their privacy settings might prevent tagging, or LinkedIn might be experiencing a temporary glitch. Always ensure you have a strong internet connection, and if issues persist, try refreshing the page or using a different device.

How do I enable tagging on LinkedIn?

LinkedIn does not have a specific setting to enable or disable tagging. By default, users can be tagged in posts and comments. However, you can control notifications and manage who can see your posts. To adjust these settings, go to “Settings & Privacy,” then navigate to “Communications” and adjust your preferences accordingly.

How do you tag someone on LinkedIn if they don’t pop-up?

If someone doesn’t appear in the dropdown list when you’re trying to tag them, ensure that you’re connected with them on LinkedIn. If you are connected and they still don’t appear, it could be due to their privacy settings or a temporary platform glitch. In such cases, you might not be able to tag them immediately. Try revisiting the post later or using a different method, like sharing their content or mentioning them in a comment.

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