How the Insurance Industry Can Reset LinkedIn

A scroll through LinkedIn has become predictable. A flood of canned pitches. Connection requests with sales scripts disguised as introductions. Frustration about it all, shared in the form of complaints that gather likes but change nothing.

We in insurance know better than most how much reputation and trust matter. And yet, here we are, watching the one platform built to showcase both get buried under noise. LinkedIn won’t fix itself. That’s on us.

Remember Why We’re Here

LinkedIn was never meant to be a cold-call factory. Its strength has always been credibility: the chance to display real experience, to show the endorsements of peers, to validate who you are in a crowded market.

The numbers remind us why it matters. Recruiters still treat LinkedIn as indispensable, 87% use it to vet candidates, and six people are hired through the platform every minute. Hiring managers say they trust recommendations more than traditional references, and LinkedIn’s own research shows they can cut time-to-hire by nearly 20%. Recommendations aren’t window dressing; they’re leverage.

A Small Act with Outsized Impact

Think about the last time someone wrote you a genuine recommendation. It didn’t just decorate your profile, it gave you confidence walking into the next pitch or interview.

Now imagine if every frustrated scroll on LinkedIn ended in one recommendation written instead of one complaint posted. The insurance industry alone could flood the platform with recognition, thousands of moments of credibility created each day.

And this isn’t just feel-good theory. A study of 20 million LinkedIn users by MIT, Harvard, Stanford, and LinkedIn itself confirmed that “moderately weak ties,” acquaintances, colleagues, people just outside your inner circle are the biggest drivers of career opportunity. Writing recommendations strengthens exactly those ties.

How to Put This Into Practice

If you want to turn this idea into a habit, here’s a simple four-step guide:

1. Choose one person. Pick a colleague, partner, or peer you’ve actually worked with. Someone whose contribution you can speak to directly.

2. Focus on one strength. Highlight a single quality that stands out most, reliability, creativity, leadership, client focus, whatever feels authentic.

3. Share one example. Anchor your recommendation in a real moment: a project they led, a client they helped, a time they made the difference.

4. End with endorsement. Wrap it up with a confident line that signals you’d work with them again in a heartbeat.

That’s it. Four sentences can change the way someone shows up on LinkedIn.

Make It a Habit

One recommendation is valuable. But a habit is transformative. Aim for one or two a week. That’s less than ten minutes of effort, but over a month it means four to eight colleagues lifted, four to eight profiles strengthened, and four to eight reminders that LinkedIn can be about credibility instead of clutter.

The math compounds quickly: if even a few hundred people in insurance made this a practice, the result would be thousands of new recommendations in a single month. That’s how you shift the tone of an entire platform.

Why Insurance Should Lead

Our business runs on credibility. We sell products that hinge on trust, not impulse. Every client conversation is proof that endorsements matter. If any industry can model how to rebalance LinkedIn, it’s ours.

So here’s the challenge: every time the platform frustrates you, write a recommendation instead of a complaint. Turn irritation into recognition.

Reset in Practice

LinkedIn won’t reset itself. But it doesn’t need to. We can do it, one recommendation, one week, one colleague at a time.