LinkedIn is trying to become the trust layer of the creator economy.
There was a time, not all that long ago, when LinkedIn was where people went to announce a promotion at work, look for a new job (maybe stalk a hiring manager), or write something irritatingly emotional about ‘what XYZ taught me about marketing’…
That LinkedIn is still there, obviously. It is alive and well and there are plenty of people posting about the random leadership lessons they’ve learned from delayed trains or walking the dog or eating a Ginsters pastie on the bus.
But something much more interesting is happening underneath all of that noise. LinkedIn is trying to become the trust layer of the creator economy.
The signs are that it’s making moves to take this unique position over the next couple of years. Not as the loudest creator platform, or the funniest, or the most chaotic. It’s not tryin to say it’s the place where culture moves fastest. LinkedIn’s opportunity is completely different. It wants to monetise credibility, access, expertise and professional identity at exactly the moment when the rest of the creator economy is battling a trust and authenticity crisis.
On 10 June 2026, Business Insider reported that internal LinkedIn strategy documents point to a wave of planned creator monetisation tools for 2027, including a brand-deal marketplace, one-time purchases for creator “experiences” such as paid advice sessions, subscriptions for newsletters, podcasts and paywalled communities, and a possible creator fund. The same reporting says LinkedIn wants to expand exclusive and ticketed creator events from around 50 creators to more than 1,000.
There are definitely indications that LinkedIn is taking cues from Patreon, YouTube, Substack, TikTok and every other platform that has realised creators need to be paid before they leave. But LinkedIn’s version is a little more unique.
A creator on TikTok or YouTube is trying to sell attention, and entertainment. A creator on Patreon sells a form of intimacy and more exclusive access. A creator on LinkedIn sells expertise.
The most valuable LinkedIn creators aren’t just people with audiences, they’re people whose opinions help followers decide what to buy, where to work, what trend to believe, which skill to learn, which founder to trust, which category is heating up, which technology is hype, and which cultural signal deserves attention.
This is fandom…. but not as you may recognise it.
Professional fandom is a different, aand much quieter and calmer beast than say, pop culture fandom, but it is still fandom. It has rituals, status, belonging, language and emotional attachment. People wait for certain voices to post, and they are quoted in meetings. They forward the best, most insightful newsletters to colleagues, and they attend their webinars. They buy their books, copy their frameworks (often flat out steal them). They feel like they understand the landscape better because someone they trust has explained it before everyone else.
Professional Linkedin fandom is less about screaming at the barrier, and more about paying to be near useful people who can elevate you and your thinking.
That is LinkedIn’s unique position.
While some of this hasn’t been fully, and publicly confirmed yet, there are official product moves already in motion. LinkedIn launched Creator Marketplace and BrandWorks on 10 June, framing both around trusted voices and measurable business impact. LinkedIn’s own 2026 Global B2B Marketing Outlook, a YouGov survey of 1,299 B2B marketers across the US, UK, France, Germany and India, found that 77% of B2B marketers say buyers need to trust and know a brand before they are willing to engage. It also found that 82% say creators increase credibility with decision-makers, 83% say credibility matters more than traditional brand messaging, and 56% say B2B buyers depend on creator input in the final stage of the buying process to validate recommendations.
Those are some pretty impresive numbers, and they explain why LinkedIn’s creator economy won’t look like the consumer influencer economy.
Traditionally, working with influcners has been about making people notice us… For Linkedin it’s more like, can you make the right people believe us?
LinkedIn’s new Creator Marketplace lives inside Campaign Manager and lets brands search for vetted creators by topic, assess audience and performance fit, identify organic or sponsored creator content already featuring their brand, and contact creators directly. Business Insider reported that LinkedIn is deliberately positioning this around subject-matter credibility rather than cheap reach, with the platform arguing that marketers are looking for practitioners and experts who can speak credibly from experience.
For a long time now, LinkedIn creators have monetised things indirectly, but this is the beginning of the B2B creator stack becoming formalised. Before, a strong post became a consulting lead or a newsletter may have led onto a speaking enquiry. A viral opinion post could generate discussion and become an inbound DM from a CMO.
LinkedIn created the attention, but much of the money moved off-platform. Now LinkedIn wants more of that value to happen inside its walls.
That is why Advice Sessions, BrandLink, Top Voices 360, Creator Marketplace, paid events, subscriptions and possible creator funds all point in the same direction. LinkedIn is building the links between expertise, trust and transaction.
LinkedIn says it now has more than 1.3 billion members, with original posts up 14% year over year and knowledge-oriented comments up 11%. Revenue grew 12% year over year in Microsoft’s Q3 FY26 reporting, while paid video grew nearly 30%. Reuters also reported that LinkedIn’s BrandLink programme had added more than 70 publishers and creators, with video uploads up more than 20% and video views up 36% year over year as of February.
This hasn’t been just a jobs site with some posts, for a long time. It is becoming a professional media network.
And professional is the importasnt bit. Because that is where the emotional connection is different than any other platform. Consumer fandom often forms around desire, identity, escapism or entertainment. Professional fandom forms around aspiration, anxiety and progress.
People follow a trusted LinkedIn creator because they want to feel sharper and more knowledgable and more ‘on it’. They want to feel less behind the curve and they want something that refelcts, and interprets for what they are seeing at work. They want to expand their understanding, and in turn expand their confidence before walking into a meeting, and this often comes from borrowing someone else’s clarity.
That all makes the relationship emotionally loaded, in a way you might not expact from B2B and ‘business stuff’. A great LinkedIn creator doesn’t just inform an audience of something. They educate and they make people feel more capable.
The creator economy has spent years proving people will pay for personality. LinkedIn is betting they will pay even more for trusted professional proximity.
The timing really is interesting, because trust is becoming scarcer everywhere else.
So much of the internet feels increasingly synthetic and fake. Feeds are jammed full of AI content, paid recommendations, growth hacks, spam, ads, and creators being asked to act s if the’re authentic, even thought they clearly aren’t. At the same time, brands are desperate for credible voices because traditional marketing is struggling to land with audiences who are more sceptical, fragmented and better at ignoring they hyper polished and flawless messaging.
LinkedIn’s entire pitch is that credibility can be structured, and monetised.
On 15 June 2026, the UK government announced plans to ban social media platforms from offering services to under-16s, with protections expected to come into force in spring 2027. The announcement names platforms like Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and X, while saying messaging services such as WhatsApp and Signal are not intended to be included. LinkedIn is not named in that list, and LinkedIn already requires users to be at least 16.
The point isn’t that teenagers will suddenly flood LinkedIn. They won’t
The interesting point or signal to look at is that the social internet is splitting into categories of perceived risk. Some platforms are being framed as addictive, unsafe or too culturally volatile for younger users. Others are being framed as useful, professional, educational or economically productive.
That distinction gives LinkedIn a powerful cultural position.
We’ve already seen more film, music, media, sport and creator figures use LinkedIn as a stage for them to build their professional reputation, and not just somewhere to grow bigger audiences and more reach. LinkedIn’s own creator-video expansion has included names such as Steven Bartlett, Guy Raz, Kara Goldin, Allie K Miller, Bernard Marr and Dorie Clark through BrandLink and creator-led programming. This isn’t the whole TikTok celebrity culture migrating… It’s certain public figures realising that LinkedIn can make them look more serious, and much more commercially credible.
TikTok makes you visible. Instagram makes you desirable. YouTube makes you watchable. Substack makes you readable. LinkedIn makes you credible.
The danger is that LinkedIn could ruin the very thing it is trying to monetise. Trust is really fragile, and the more creator tools become formalised, the easier it becomes for the feed to fill with sponsored wisdom, reheated thought leadership and paywalled common sense.
Professional fandom only works when the audience believes the creator has earned their authority.
