For years, LinkedIn carried the aura of a digital name tag: present, but largely out of the spotlight. Now, in South Africa, corporate engagement with LinkedIn has moved beyond routine and into strategic intent.
The new “South African Social Media Landscape Report 2025", produced by World Wide Worx in partnership with brand intelligence company Ornico, reveals a sharp shift. LinkedIn adoption among South Africa’s top brands has reached 85% of companies, marking its highest level since the study began 15 years ago. This year, more than 140 major brands participated in an industry survey that formed part of the study.
LinkedIn’s growth, from just 72% in 2024, signals a structural change in how local businesses communicate with the world beyond their own walls.
While it could be seen as a case of brands simply adding another social media handle, it goes further. LinkedIn overtook Facebook, which dropped from 83% of brands adopting it to 78%. The figures for Facebook may still seem robust, but the trend line tells a deeper story: it has slipped from a peak of 97% in 2018.
Clearly, companies are making deliberate choices about where they show up and how. Boardroom announcements, hiring milestones and thought leadership now appear first on LinkedIn.
User behaviour tells a similar story. Data from market researchers Ask Afrika’s TGI study, which forms a core part of the report, shows that daily and weekly LinkedIn use among professionals earning more than R18,000 a month jumped from 18.5% to 31.4% in 2024. These users reflect a cohort of decisionmakers, analysts and managers engaging consistently, and drawing others in their networks into the fold.
The TGI data reveals deeper patterns. LinkedIn penetration is highest among South Africans in the upper socioeconomic tiers. Analysis by socioeconomic level (SEL), a 10-level segmentation tool developed by Ask Afrika to offer a more nuanced understanding of consumers than living standards measure (LSM), shows active users in the most affluent SEL 1 increased from 43.2% in 2023 to 59.4% in 2024. SEL 2 also recorded a significant year-on-year rise, from 22.4% to 29.5%, while SEL 3 grew to a lesser extent (12.8% to 18.8%).
This gives LinkedIn a powerful user base shaped around access and influence.
Lurking in the data is the insight that corporate messaging on LinkedIn increasingly centres on organisational identity. Executives share their views on leadership, sustainability and transformation. Employees weigh in on team culture and innovation. These posts now form a live stream of how a company thinks and behaves, reaching stakeholders without the need for a press release.
Facebook still gets the bulk of marketing budgets due to its consumer reach, and here it has gained on LinkedIn. The industry survey shows the proportion of major brands spending most of their budget on Facebook has jumped from 28% to 40%, while LinkedIn saw only marginal growth in this measure, from 24% to 25%. It suggests that the mass market is still the arena where major brands prefer to play. However, Facebook’s penetration among adult South Africans, revealed in the TGI data, continues a slow decline, from 60% in 2023 to 56% in 2024.
It indicates that marketing teams may have to begin adjusting their corporate communications. Campaigns designed for scale now find limited traction. Instead, storytelling, positioning and consistent tone drive engagement.
Job portals remain vital, but employer branding increasingly plays out through day-to-day dealings on LinkedIn. A post from someone announcing they are stepping into a new role, or welcoming a new colleague, helps shape the perception of a workplace more effectively than a static careers page.
Still, visibility remains a craft. Some companies flood timelines with self-congratulatory updates or bland messaging. Others outsource their voice to generic or AI-driven templates.
However, unlike other social platforms, LinkedIn’s algorithm favours depth over frequency. This is a distinction that is increasingly important in an environment more often shaped by mistrust than by credibility.
• Arthur Goldstuck is CEO of World Wide Worx. He was principal analyst for the SA Social Media Landscape study.
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