Has the Time Come to Use LinkedIn Pulse Like They Used Us?

I just got done reading Jim Murray's post, The Wall. If you haven't read it you should. In the post, he voices the frustration so many of us have experienced with publishing on LinkedIn over the last year.  

So many posts have been written about the many problems that exist on Pulse, so I won't go into great detail here other than to say, independent writers have seen their numbers plummet as engagement on the platform has been in steady decline. Here is my personal opinion on what happened. 

In 2014, LinkedIn was in real trouble of becoming just another job board. Most of their users only used the platform when they needed a job. While there was an active community on the platform at the time, those users were the minority. LinkedIn needed to do something big to reinvigorate their platform and bring in more active users.

Thus, they opened up their platform to independent writers. Then, over a million writers began publishing on Pulse, many of whom abandoned their websites and other blogs in favor of publishing on LinkedIn. With 1000's of writers creating compelling content, LinkedIn began to see its user base become more engaged. Readers flocked to the site by the millions. In 2014 alone my blogs received in excess of 1 million views.

The independent writers that created all of this content and engagement on the platform. Then, LinkedIn changed the rules. They limited notifications and changed how posts were distributed. They favored the posts of their influencers and invited the likes of major publishers to begin syndicating their content on Pulse. Clearly, it became a pay to play platform. The winners of which were celebrities and huge sites like Tech Crunch, Mashable, Inc, New York Times, etc.

We know the rest of the story as LinkedIn just cashed out by selling to Microsoft.

Would LinkedIn been able to monetize Pulse or cash out big time to Microsoft without all of the hard work independent writers put in creating content that brought users back to the site? 

I feel that LinkedIn used independent writers to save the day, and then turned the backs on the very people that saved their platform from becoming a total ghost town. Yes, LinkedIn used us.

So, has the time come for us to start using LinkedIn the way they used us? Should we be using Pulse as merely a way to drive traffic to our other blogs? Here's what I mean.

Recently, I began publishing an article on LinkedIn Pulse with only the title, image, and only a few sentences from the blog. Then, I have put in a link directing people to my blog on Inc. where they can read the whole story. 

Only a short time ago, I would have never considered this strategy as I considered it to more than a bit cheesy. However, now I am doing it and sleeping just fine at night. 

Jim Murray has said he won't blog on Pulse ever again unless they get their act together. I sure as hell can't say I blame him. However, maybe we should be using LinkedIn the way they have used us to drive traffic. 

When you post on beBee, Medium, your blog, or elsewhere, why not post the same article on Pulse with a link directing traffic to the destination of your choice? Is this a good way to drive traffic or have I just become cheesy?