Green conversations are growing -- and LinkedIn members are highly engaged

The environment, climate change, innovation in green tech: these are topics that matter to our members personally and professionally. So it’s no surprise there’s been an uptick in green conversations on LinkedIn over the past year.?

In the last 12 months, there were 9.7 million-member posts and 4.7M company posts that included green content or hashtags. The share of green content (relative to non-green content) in company posts has almost doubled in the last 3 years.?

Not only is there more green content, but that content now generates more engagement than non-green content. In the past year, members’ updates that included green content received almost 2.4x the engagement of updates that did not, and company posts with green content earned 30% higher engagement than company posts without.?

Who’s leading the conversation

Members who are senior leaders (director-level and above) are driving much of the green content. They are over 1.5x more likely than non-senior members to post green content, perhaps reflecting their broad visibility of climate responsibility as an increasingly important corporate issue. We also found that LinkedIn members are more likely to engage with senior members’ (vs. non-senior members’) green content, suggesting an opportunity for strong leadership in developing mindsets and attitudes about climate responsibility across the economy.?

Among the voices driving engagement and that I’d recommend Following are Joel Makower - Chairman / Executive Editor / Co-founder - GreenBiz Group, who writes about restoring sustainability and the clean economy; Lubomila Jordanova - Co-Founder & CEO - Plan A, who posts on climate change and sustainability; and Sara Menker - Founder and CEO - Gro Intelligence, whose topics include global agriculture and sustainability.

And, while the green economy conversation is truly economy-wide, certain industries dominate the green conversation space on LinkedIn. As these charts show, Corporate Services, Manufacturing, Finance, Media and Communications, Non-profits, Education and Software and IT represent the largest volume of posts by both companies and members.

And what they are talking about

Green content is usually accompanied by hashtags around software development, innovation, and renewable energy -- accentuating both the need for innovative, tech-based solutions to combat climate change and transition towards more sustainable energy sources.??

In our data dive, we found that more than 90% of the green-related content on LinkedIn uses 93 common green keywords.?

If you are writing about a green topic, here are some of the most cited keywords or hashtags: Sustainability, Recycling, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Sustainable Development, Biodiversity, Eco-friendly, Cleantech, Energy Efficiency, Circular Economy, Electric Vehicles, Solar Energy, Carbon Emissions, Greenhouse Gas, Sustainable Business, Environmental Protection, Carbon Neutral, Green Energy, Sustainable Energy, Global Warming, Zero Waste, Sustainable Agriculture, Environmental Sustainability, Biodiesel, and Bioenergy.

Green will keep growing

As we’ve discussed before, we will need millions of workers transitioning into green skills to drive the future economy. The growth of green conversations can only help raise awareness around the opportunities.?

If you're looking to understand the in-demand jobs or top skills for green jobs please check out my recent post or the Earth Day post from our global director of environmental sustainability on how to find green jobs.