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Tag: LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Is Ten Years Old

    LinkedIn Is Ten Years Old

    LinkedIn turned ten years old on Sunday. It’s hard to believe it’s been a decade, but believe it or not, the professional social network launched all the way back in 2003. It has come a long way in the meantime.

    The company has put together an interesting visual timeline that you can peruse here. It begins in 2002 when Hoffman recruited a team of old colleagues from SocialNet and PayPal to work on the idea that would eventually become LinkedIn. In the early days, they were sometimes getting as few as 20 signups a day.

    In 2009, Jeff Weiner joined as President, and would then become CEO, a title he currently holds. Two years later came the IPO.

    Reid Hoffman writes on the LinkedIn blog:

    Ten years ago, I co-founded LinkedIn in my living room with the mission of connecting the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful. Inspired by the invaluable role relationships played in our own careers, we launched LinkedIn with the tagline “Relationships matter.”

    At the end of our first month, we had 4,500 members in the network. 10 years later, we’re honored and humbled that so many of you have made LinkedIn a part of your daily professional lives.

    Today, hundreds of millions of professionals around the world are turning to LinkedIn to connect with each other, manage their identities, get insights they need to be great at what they do, and find their dream jobs. I’m continually inspired by our members’ career aspirations and achievements.

    LinkedIn currently boasts 225 million members, and says it is growing by a rate of two members every second.

    The company’s stock is up 0.23% in pre-market trading.

    Take a look at the evolution of the homepage:

  • LinkedIn Revenue Up 72%, Forecast Not So Great

    LinkedIn Revenue Up 72%, Forecast Not So Great

    LinkedIn just reported its earnings for Q1, with revenue of $324.7 million for the quarter, up 72% year-over-year. Net income was $22.6 million, up from $5 million in the year-ago quarter.

    CEO Jeff Weiner said, “Q1 was a strong quarter for LinkedIn with member engagement and financial results reaching record levels. We remained focused on delivering great products that increasingly make LinkedIn the essential daily resource for global professionals.”

    Despite the revenue and earnings, LinkedIn stock is plummeting due to the company’s forecast, which didn’t meet Wall Street expectations.

    Here’s the release in its entirety:

    LinkedIn reports financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2013.

    MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., May 2, 2013 — LinkedIn Corporation (NYSE: LNKD), the world’s largest professional network on the Internet, with more than 225 million members, reported its financial results for the first quarter of 2013:

     

    • Revenue for the first quarter was $324.7 million, an increase of 72% compared to $188.5 million in the first quarter of 2012.
    • Net income for the first quarter was $22.6 million, compared to net income of $5.0 million for the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP net income for the first quarter was $52.4 million, compared to $16.9 million for the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP measures exclude tax-affected stock-based compensation expense and tax-affected amortization of acquired intangible assets.
    • Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter was $83.4 million, or 26% of revenue, compared to $38.1 million for the first quarter of 2012, or 20% of revenue.
    • GAAP diluted EPS for the first quarter was $0.20; Non-GAAP diluted EPS for the first quarter was $0.45.

     

    “Q1 was a strong quarter for LinkedIn with member engagement and financial results reaching record levels,” said Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn. “We remained focused on delivering great products that increasingly make LinkedIn the essential daily resource for global professionals.”

    First Quarter Financial Details and Operating Summary

     

    • Talent Solutions: Revenue from Talent Solutions products totaled $184.3 million, an increase of 80% compared to the first quarter of 2012. Talent Solutions revenue represented 57% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013, compared to 54% in the first quarter of 2012.
    • Marketing Solutions: Revenue from Marketing Solutions products totaled $74.8 million, an increase of 56% compared to the first quarter of 2012. Marketing Solutions revenue represented 23% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013, compared to 25% in the first quarter of 2012.
    • Premium Subscriptions: Revenue from Premium Subscriptions products totaled $65.6 million, an increase of 73% compared to the first quarter of 2012. Premium Subscriptions represented 20% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013, consistent with the first quarter of 2012.

     

    Revenue from the U.S. totaled $201.4 million, and represented 62% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013. Revenue from international markets totaled $123.3 million, and represented 38% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013.

    Revenue from the field sales channel totaled $184.0 million, and represented 57% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013. Revenue from the online, direct sales channel totaled $140.7 million, and represented 43% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013.

    GAAP net income for the first quarter was $22.6 million, compared to net income of $5.0 million for the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP net income for the first quarter was $52.4 million, compared to $16.9 million in the first quarter of 2012.

    Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter was $83.4 million, or 26% of revenue, compared to $38.1 million for the first quarter of 2012, or 20% of revenue.

    GAAP diluted EPS was $0.20 based on 115.4 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding compared to $0.04 for the first quarter of 2012 based on 111.3 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding. Non-GAAP diluted EPS was $0.45 based on 115.4 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding compared to $0.15 for the first quarter of 2012 based on 111.3 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding.

    “Our continued focus on our operating priorities yielded strong results in the first quarter, resulting in record levels of revenue, profitability, and cash flow,” said Steve Sordello, CFO of LinkedIn. “We remain encouraged by the diversity of our business and size of our market opportunities, and we will continue to invest aggressively to realize LinkedIn’s long-term potential.”

    For additional information, please see the “Selected Company Metrics and Financials” page on LinkedIn’s Investor Relations site.

    First Quarter Highlights and Strategic Announcements

    In the first quarter of 2013, LinkedIn:

     

    • Grew its member base to 218 million, and witnessed strong member growth through the quarter due to optimization initiatives. As a result, new sign ups increased to greater than two per second.
    • Introduced a new version of search, which streamlines the experience and unifies results across multiple types of content including people, companies, and jobs. Early use indicates members have responded with increased search utilization.
    • Improved its content offering for professionals by adding a number of Influencers including Mayor Bloomberg, Meg Whitman, Jack Welch, Jeff Immelt, and Martha Stewart. LinkedIn continues to take steps to become the definitive professional publishing platform.

     

    Additionally, LinkedIn launched several new products since the quarter end including a new version of its smartphone applications; Contacts, a new contact management system on the web and iOS mobile devices; as well products that enhance LinkedIn’s content ecosystem including the ability for member to include rich media in LinkedIn profiles, and content channels to follow 20 different professional topics on LinkedIn. In April, the company also launched a redesigned version of Recruiter, its flagship Talent Solutions product platform.

    Business Outlook

    LinkedIn is providing guidance for the second quarter and full year of 2013:

     

    • Q2 2013 Guidance: Revenue is expected to range between $342 million and $347 million. Adjusted EBITDA is expected to range between $77 million and $79 million. The company expects depreciation and amortization to be between $30 million and $32 million, and stock-based compensation to be between $49 million and $51 million.
    • Full Year 2013 Guidance: Revenue is revised upward by $20 million to range between $1.430 billion and $1.460 billion. Adjusted EBITDA is revised upward by $15 million to range between $330 million and $345 million. The company expects depreciation and amortization to be between $130 million and $135 million, and stock-based compensation to be between $190 million and $195 million.

     

    Quarterly Conference Call

    LinkedIn will host a webcast/conference call to discuss its first quarter 2013 financial results and business outlook today at 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time. Jeff Weiner and Steve Sordello will host the webcast, which can be viewed on the investor relations section of the LinkedIn website at

    http://investors.linkedin.com/. This call will contain forward-looking statements and other material information regarding the company’s financial and operating results. Following completion of the call, a recorded replay of the webcast will be available on the website. For those without access to the Internet, a replay of the call will be available beginning at 8:00 p.m. Pacific Time on May 2, 2013 through May 9 2013 at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time. To listen to the telephone replay, call (855) 859-2056 within the US or (404) 537-3406 Internationally, access code 34761898.

    Upcoming Events

    Management will participate in upcoming financial Q&A discussions at industry events on May 16th and 29th, as well as June 4th and 13th. LinkedIn will furnish a link to these events on its investor relations website, http://investors.linkedin.com/ for both the live and archived webcasts.

    About LinkedIn

    Founded in 2003, LinkedIn connects the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful. With more than 225 million members worldwide, including executives from every Fortune 500 company, LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network on the Internet. The company has a diversified business model with revenue coming from Talent Solutions, Marketing Solutions and Premium Subscriptions products. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, LinkedIn has offices across the globe.

    Non-GAAP Financial Measures

    To supplement its consolidated financial statements, which are prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP, the company uses the following non-GAAP financial measures: adjusted EBITDA, non-GAAP net income, and non-GAAP diluted EPS (collectively the “non-GAAP financial measures”). The presentation of this financial information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for, or superior to, the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP. The company uses these non-GAAP financial measures for financial and operational decision making and as a means to evaluate period-to-period comparisons. The company believes that they provide useful information about operating results, enhance the overall understanding of past financial performance and future prospects, and allow for greater transparency with respect to key metrics used by management in its financial and operational decision making.

    The company excludes the following items from one or more of its non-GAAP measures:

    Stock-based compensation. The company excludes stock-based compensation because it is non-cash in nature and because the company believes that the non-GAAP financial measures excluding this item provide meaningful supplemental information regarding operational performance and liquidity. The company further believes this measure is useful to investors in that it allows for greater transparency to certain line items in its financial statements and facilitates comparisons to competitors’ operating results.

    Amortization of acquired intangible assets. The company excludes amortization of acquired intangible assets because it is non-cash in nature and because the company believes that the non-GAAP financial measures excluding this item provide meaningful supplemental information regarding operational performance and liquidity. In addition, excluding this item from various non-GAAP measures facilitates internal comparisons to historical operating results and comparisons to competitors’ operating results.

    Income tax effect of non-GAAP adjustments. The company adjusts non-GAAP net income by including the income tax effects of excluding stock-based compensation and the amortization of acquired intangible assets. The company believes that the inclusion of the income tax effects provides additional transparency to the overall or “after tax” effects of excluding these items from non-GAAP net income.

    For more information on the non-GAAP financial measures, please see the “Reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP Financial Measures” table in this press release. This accompanying table has more details on the GAAP financial measures that are most directly comparable to non-GAAP financial measures and the related reconciliations between these financial measures. Additionally, the company has not reconciled adjusted EBITDA guidance to net income guidance because it does not provide guidance for either other income (expense), net, or provision for income taxes, which are reconciling items between net income and adjusted EBITDA. As items that impact net income are out of the company’s control and/or cannot be reasonably predicted, the company is unable to provide such guidance. Accordingly, a reconciliation to net income is not available without unreasonable effort.

    Safe Harbor Statement

    “Safe Harbor” statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: This press release and the accompanying conference call contain forward-looking statements about our products, including our investments in products, technology and other key strategic areas, certain non-financial metrics, such as member growth and engagement, and our expected financial metrics such as revenue, adjusted EBITDA, depreciation and amortization and stock-based compensation for the second quarter of 2013 and the full fiscal year 2013. The achievement of the matters covered by such forward-looking statements involves risks, uncertainties and assumptions. If any of these risks or uncertainties materialize or if any of the assumptions prove incorrect, the company’s results could differ materially from the results expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements the company makes.

    The risks and uncertainties referred to above include – but are not limited to – risks associated with: our limited operating history in a new and unproven market; engagement of our members; the price volatility of our Class A common stock; general economic conditions; expectations regarding the return on our strategic investments; execution of our plans and strategies, including with respect to mobile products and features; security measures and the risk that they may not be sufficient to secure our member data adequately or that we are subject to attacks that degrade or deny the ability of members to access our solutions; expectations regarding our ability to timely and effectively scale and adapt existing technology and network infrastructure to ensure that our solutions are accessible at all times with short or no perceptible load times; our ability to maintain our rate of revenue growth and manage our expenses and investment plans; our ability to accurately track our key metrics internally; members and customers curtailing or ceasing to use our solutions; our core value of putting members first, which may conflict with the short-term interests of the business; privacy and changes in regulations in the United States, Europe or elsewhere, which could impact our ability to serve our members or curtail our monetization efforts; litigation and regulatory issues; increasing competition; our ability to manage our growth; our ability to recruit and retain our employees; the application of US and international tax laws on our tax structure and any changes to such tax laws; acquisitions we have made or may make in the future; and the dual class structure of our common stock.

    Further information on these and other factors that could affect the company’s financial results is included in filings it makes with the Securities and Exchange Commission from time to time, including the section entitled “Risk Factors” in the company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K that was filed for the year ended December 31, 2012, and additional information will also be set forth in our Form 10-Q that will be filed for the quarter ended March 31, 2013, which should be read in conjunction with these financial results. These documents are or will be available on the SEC Filings section of the Investor Relations page of the company’s website athttp://investors.linkedin.com/. All information provided in this release and in the attachments is as of May 2, 2013, and LinkedIn undertakes no duty to update this information.

  • LinkedIn Lets You Add Photos, Videos to Profiles to Better Showcase Your Talents

    LinkedIn Lets You Add Photos, Videos to Profiles to Better Showcase Your Talents

    LinkedIn is giving users a new way to showcase their work by allowing them to add photos, videos, and presentations to their profiles.

    Let’s say you’re a photographer, and in your LinkedIn “experience” section you want to add some samples of your work – now you can do that. Let’s say you worked incredibly hard on a big presentation and wish to showcase that to everyone who views your profile – now you can do that.

    “For the first time, you will now have the ability to showcase your unique professional story using rich, visual content on your LinkedIn profile. This means you can illustrate your greatest achievements in the form of stunning images, compelling videos, innovative presentations and more. From the analyst who makes annual predictions on tech trends to the 3D animator who is looking to fund a new short film, the opportunities are limitless for how professionals can now use the LinkedIn profile to help showcase these unique stories in a visual way,” says LinkedIn’s Udi Milo.

    In short, LinkedIn is letting users create a more visual resume.

    To get started, just edit your profile and look for areas to add visual content in your “summary,” “experience,” and “education” sections. LinkedIn says that they rollout of this new feature begins today with English-speaking users.

  • LinkedIn Hits 1 Million Members in Singapore

    LinkedIn Hits 1 Million Members in Singapore

    While Facebook has recently been losing members in the U.S. and U.K., it has seen growth in developing countries such as India. While its worldwide membership growth is currently offsetting its membership losses, the loss of 6 million U.S. members this month does point to increasing competition in the social media space.

    One of Facebook’s largest competitors, LinkedIn, has been slowly building up its user base worldwide as well. The social network for professional networking celebrated 200 million members in January, and one year ago hit 15 million members in India.

    This week, LinkedIn announced that it now has over one million members in Singapore. The country is home to the social network’s Asia Pacific headquarters, which opened in 2011. Hari Krishnan, Managing Director at the headquarters, announced the milestone in a post on the LinkedIn blog. From the post:

    I’m especially excited about this milestone because I moved to Singapore earlier this year to take on the role of Managing Director, Asia Pacific and Japan, and it’s been a transformational experience so far. The energy and spirit among the professional community in Singapore is palpable. It’s been an honor to watch Singapore professionals turn to LinkedIn to build their professional identity, grow their networks and find the insights they need to be great at what they do.

    To celebrate, LinkedIn handed out coffee and cupcakes to commuters in Raffles Place.

  • LinkedIn Launches New LinkedIn Contacts

    LinkedIn Launches New LinkedIn Contacts

    LinkedIn announced the new LinkedIn Contacts today. This is described as a way to bring all your contacts into one place.

    Specifically, LinkedIn Contacts brings contacts from your address books, email accounts, and calendars together with your LinkedIn network.

    “From these sources, we’ll automatically pull in the details of your past conversations and meetings, and bring these details directly onto your contact’s profile,” says LinkedIn’s Sachin Rekhi.

    LinkedIn Contacts is available on LinkedIn.com, and has a standalone app for the iPhone. Stilly, you have to get an invite, and the company will start sending them to a limited number of users in the U.S. over the coming weeks.

    While LinkedIn does not mention Android or other mobile platforms, one can only assume that the app will broaden its audience at some point.

  • LinkedIn Updates Mobile Experience, Its Fastest Growing Area

    LinkedIn Updates Mobile Experience, Its Fastest Growing Area

    LinkedIn says that their mobile platform is the “fastest growing” aspect of their service. On average, 27% of their unique visitors comes through their mobile apps – up from 15% a year ago. In a year, their mobile pageviews have increased 250%.

    And with the added focus on mobile comes the need to improve upon its mobile apps. Today, LinkedIn has launched significant redesigns of both their iOS and Android apps.

    “We want to make it easier for our members to quickly discover and engage with the rich professional insights being shared across LinkedIn to help them make smarter decisions from wherever they may be working. We’ve designed the new LinkedIn mobile phone app for every professional, with a richer and more engaging stream and more personalization features,” says LinkedIn’s Tomer Cohen.

    Probably the biggest part of the redesign is the new activity stream. Not only is it more media-rich, with bigger photos and links to outside content, but it’s generally better looking. It’s also better at bringing in all types of content, including updates from connections, news, and posts from LinkedIn’s top influencers. In most every way, the new mobile apps mirror what LinkedIn has done to improve the desktop feed over the past few months.

    It’s also easier to get around the app with a brand new navigation page. All you have to do is swipe right to reveal a customizable menu complete with you messages, invitations, calendars, and more.

    LinkedIn says that 64% of their members are located outside the U.S. To that end, they’ve also expanded the language offerings of the apps – Dutch and Norwegian for iOS, and Turkish, Dutch and Norwegian for Android. As of now, 15 languages are supported across both apps.

    Finally, ads. Lead Mobile guy for LinkedIn Joff Redfern confrimed to TechCrunch that LinkedIn will be bringing more sponsored content to mobile. They’ve been doing the same on the desktop and iPad version of the app.

    “We’re now expanding this test into the mobile phone experience,” he says.

    You can grab the update on both iOS and Android today.

  • LinkedIn Acquires News Reader App Pulse for $90M

    LinkedIn Acquires News Reader App Pulse for $90M

    LinkedIn has decided to take another step toward being a platform for news, officially announcing the acquisition of Pulse, the news reader app similar to Flipboard.

    The transaction is valued at around $90 million, which is at the high-end of the “somewhere between $50M and $100M” range that we heard when rumors of the acquisition began swirling about a month ago.

    With this move, LinkedIn says they want to be “the definitive professional publishing platform where all professionals can publish, discover, and share.”

    Pulse’s Ankit Gupta and Akshay Kothari say that Pulse will remain the same, and their team is committed to improving upon their apps.

    “With LinkedIn by our side, our team will continue to make Pulse the best it can be. We’re still working together on the product you love, and will continue to provide an innovative and visual news reading experience. For now, the Pulse apps will remain the same, and our two teams are excited to work together to create cool and useful new offerings.”

    LinkedIn’s Deep Nishar explains what the Pulse acquisition means to them:

    “We believe LinkedIn can be the definitive professional publishing platform – where all professionals come to consume content and where publishers come to share their content. Millions of professionals are already starting their day on LinkedIn to glean the professional insights and knowledge they need to make them great at their jobs. We believe we can help all professionals make smarter and more informed business decisions leveraging all the great business knowledge flowing through LinkedIn in the form of news, Influencer posts, industry updates, discussions, comments and more,” he says.

    “Pulse is a perfect complement to this vision. Pulse’s core value proposition is to help foster informed discussions that spark the decisions shaping the world around us through news and information. This shared view that the power of professional information and knowledge can transform lives and the world makes LinkedIn and Pulse a particularly great fit. We couldn’t be more thrilled to be working side by side with the Pulse team to create new and better ways to help professionals contribute to and leverage this collective body of business knowledge to help them be great at what they do and from wherever they work.”

    The first sign of integration comes in the form of a new “LinkedIn Influencer” feed on Pulse.

    Pulse was founded back in 2010. Since then, it has amassed 30 million users in over 190 countries. It also boasts content from over 750 publishers.

  • LinkedIn Recruiter Gets A Homepage Update

    LinkedIn Recruiter Gets A Homepage Update

    LinkedIn has announced the launch a new home page for LinkedIn Recruiter, which introduces some new tools for hiring.

    There’s a new navigation bar with the Notifications feature, accessible via the flag icon at the top right. This will alert you to alerts you to job applies, new results for saved searches, completed hiring manager reviews and completed bulk resume uploads. There’s also a new “Smart-To-Do list” feature, which lets you to create to-do items that connect with a profile, project or job, using the ‘@’ symbol. Unchecked to-dos stay at the top of the list until they’re completed. Additionally, profile reminders you previously set will move into the Smart-To-Do list.

    The search box has been made more prominent, and it has a new drop-down that lets you access saved searches and history. Under that is the activity feed. There’s also a new feature on the right called “People You May Want to Hire.”

    Here’s what it looks like:

    LinkedIn Recruiter

    LinkedIn’s Elizabeth Burstein writes in a blog post:

    Its “look and feel” more closely resembles LinkedIn.com, which makes the user experience more intuitive and simple. As LinkedIn Talent Solutions’ Head of Product Parker Barrile noted during today’s homepage launch event, “Most recruiting products are outdated and designed for CIOs, not recruiters. Fortunately, the consumerization of the enterprise has begun to infiltrate the recruiting industry and is influencing a new generation of products. Consumerization means putting the user’s priorities first.”

    This idea motivated the Recruiter homepage redesign; we sought to build a tool that functions like a consumer app in the front, but has the power and rich feature set of an enterprise tool in the back. Let’s take a closer look.

    LinkedIn lets you take a tour of the new design here.

  • LinkedIn Tests Direct Mention Links in Status Updates [UPDATED]

    LinkedIn Tests Direct Mention Links in Status Updates [UPDATED]

    UPDATE: LinkedIn is now beginning to roll out the feature out to all English-speaking users.

    LinkedIn is currently testing user mentions, something that other networks like Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ have had for some time and that users rely on quite heavily. Simply put, user mentions in posts let the people you’re talking about know that you’re talking about them.

    If you’re currently part of the test, you’ll see a new tip box on your status update box. It’ll say “Now you can type a name to mention a member of company.”

    LinkedIn User Mentions

    Typing a name of a person or a company prompts a drop-down menu with choices arranged with the most likely suggestions (your actual connections) at the top.

    Like Facebook, the mentions simply appear as links to the users’ profile inside the status. When someone mentions you in a post, you’ll receive a notification.

    Apart from the aforementioned ability to tip people off to your statuses, mentions give users browsing their feeds and easier way to check out other users.

    A LinkedIn spokesperson told The Next Web:

    “We are currently testing the ability for members to directly mention each other in professional conversations on LinkedIn. This test is part of our ongoing efforts to help members further engage with their networks in meaningful ways across the LinkedIn platform.”

  • LinkedIn Revamps Its Search Algorithm, Adds Features

    LinkedIn Revamps Its Search Algorithm, Adds Features

    It doesn’t come with all the fanfare of Facebook’s Graph Search, but another important social network has just revamped its search engine.

    LinkedIn announced some new search capabilities, which it describes as “smarter and more streamlined,” and though Facebook’s Graph Search has plenty of ramifications for businesses, LinkedIn is used almost exclusively as a business tool.

    “We’ve unified the search experience so you no longer need to search for people, companies, or jobs separately,” explains LinkedIn’s Johnathan Podemsky. “Now, all you need to do is type what you’re looking for into the search box and you’ll see a comprehensive page of results that pulls content from all across LinkedIn including people, jobs, groups and companies.”

    They’ve also added auto-complete, suggested searches, a “smarter” query intent algorithm, enhanced advanced search, and automated alerts. As you search more on LinkedIn, the algorithm learns more about your intent to improve your results. Enhanced search includes filers like location, company, school, etc. Searchers can save their searches to be alerted when results change.

    “No two professionals are alike on LinkedIn,” says Podemsky. “This means even if you search for the same thing as someone else, your results will be customized to you. LinkedIn’s search efforts are founded on the ability to take into account who you are, who you know, and what your network is doing to help you find what you’re looking for. And we’ll continue iterating on this with better ways to surface new kinds of content across Linkedin as well as more personalized results.”

    The changes will start rolling out today, and should be available to all within the coming weeks. According to the company, there were 5.7 billion “professionally oriented” searches performed on LinkedIn in 2012.

  • Gonzaga Is LinkedIn’s Pick to Win the Tourney Based on ‘Dedication Score’

    Gonzaga Is LinkedIn’s Pick to Win the Tourney Based on ‘Dedication Score’

    LinkedIn thinks that they know who will will this year’s NCAA Tournament, and they don’t even need to consider basketball. Well, they need to consider the word “basketball,” but that’s about it.

    In alternative method to fill out a bracket news, LinkedIn has calculated a “dedication score” for all of the teams participating in March Madness. That “dedication score” is simply the number of current students and alumni with the word “basketball” in their profile divided by the total number of current students and alumni at each school.

    Use each school’s score to determine the winners and there you have it. Gonzaga (15,700 students and alumni, 2.5% referencing basketball) wins with a score of 2.46.

    #1 seed Kansas does well in this bracket, making it to the Final Four before being upended by Butler. The cinderella of LinkedIn’s bracket is 14th seeded Valparaiso, which makes it all the way to the Final Four, beating top-seeded Louisville in the process.

    Check out the bracket below (click to enlarge).

    “Now, I know some of you may be thinking ‘What does this have to do with the basketball team’s performance on the court?’ Team Spirit! We believe in the power of willing your team to win. Your chances of picking a bracket 100% correctly are infinitesimally small, regardless of method, so we think the power of willing your team to win is what it will take. So, you could fill out your bracket based on favorite school colors OR you could use our ‘dedication score,’” says LinkedIn’s Sohan Murthy.

    I can’t really argue with that, considering all of the ridiculous ways I’ve seen people construct a bracket.

  • LinkedIn Reportedly Buys Pulse For More Than $50 Million

    LinkedIn Reportedly Buys Pulse For More Than $50 Million

    The popular newsreader Pulse brings in 20 million users a day so it stands to reason that somebody would want to acquire such an audience. The only question that remained is who would come out on top in acquisition negotiations. We now may have our answer.

    All Things D reports that LinkedIn will purchase Alphonso Labs, the team behind the Pulse newsreader, for anywhere between $50 to $100 million. The business-minded social network reportedly beat out Microsoft and Yahoo, both of which were also interested in buying it.

    None of this is confirmed as LinkedIn and Alphonso Labs are both remaining silent. We should be hearing something later this week, however, if the deal went ahead smoothly.

    Unlike some acquisitions, I can’t see LinkedIn killing the Pulse newsreader. Instead, it’s more likely that LinkedIn will use the Pulse team’s design skills to redesign its own personalized news feed.

    We’ll continue to watch this story and bring you the official details of the deal when more is known. Until then, just imagine a LinkedIn newsfeed that looks less like this:

    Pulse LinkedIn buy

    and more like this:

    Pulse LinkedIn Buy

  • LinkedIn Updates its Job Search Engine

    LinkedIn Updates its Job Search Engine

    LinkedIn, the social network for professional networking, is set up to be the online, social alternative to the old resume system. Though the website as a whole is set up to get people hired, the social network also provides a streamlined way for users to search for their dream job.

    LinkedIn today announced that it has updated its job search page with a new look and new features.

    Job searchers can now use advanced search options to narrow their search by industry, position, country, and zip code. A salary level filter is also available for users who subscribe to LinkedIn’s “Job Seeker Premium” service.

    The new layout also prominently displays a “Jobs you may be interested in” section (with a sponsored sub-section) that surfaces jobs related to a LinkedIn member’s talents and previous work. A section at the bottom of the page now also lists companies where LinkedIn connections are employed, and a sidebar section automatically provides new results for saved job searches.

    The social network has created a SlideShare presentation that highlights the major changes. A small privacy warning before viewing it, however: SlideShare announced earlier this week that its presentations can now include new tracking tools that can track metrics such as how long an individual user spends on each slide.

  • SlideShare Introduces New Tracking Analytics Tool

    SlideShare Introduces New Tracking Analytics Tool

    In May 2012, LinkedIn acquired document presentation startup SlideShare. Since that time, the company has been integrating itself into LinkedIn’s carefully managed (and profitable) corporate culture.

    Today, SlideShare announced a very LinkedIn-style feature for its service. The new feature, called “Send Tracker,” is an analytics tool that will allow users to gather metrics on how people use Slide Share presentations. For example, the software could report back on who viewed a presentation and how much time they spent on each slide. It can also send alerts when people click through emails or view SlideShare content.

    The feature is geared toward marketers and salespeople, so that they can observe potential customers and focus their time on prospects who engaged well with a presentation. It’s a free feature for subscribers to SlideShare’s premium “SlideShare Pro” service.

    As expected, SlideShare has prepared a slideshow that covers the highlights of the new feature. The SlideShare presentation is embedded below, and it probably uses Send Tracker analytics to send data back to SlideShare. I’ll leave it up to each reader to decide whether they consider their SlideShare viewing habits private, and engage with the presentation accordingly.

  • LinkedIn Nails its Fourth Quarter, Yearly Earnings

    LinkedIn Nails its Fourth Quarter, Yearly Earnings

    If there’s one thing LinkedIn is, it’s consistent. The company has slowly built its brand and membership numbers in the crowded social media space where other companies are getting bloodied.

    LinkedIn today announced its fourth quarter 2012 and year-end 2012 financial results, and, once again, the social network for professional networking hit its marks.

    The company pulled in revenue of $303.6 million in the fourth quarter of 2012, an 81% increase over the fourth quarter of 2011. Non-GAAP net income was also up at $40.2 million and its non-GAAP diluted earnings per share rose to $0.35.

    For the whole of 2012, LinkedIn took in $972.3 million, an increase of 86% year-over-year.

    “2012 was a transformative year for LinkedIn,” said Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn. “We exited 2011 having successfully revamped our underlying development infrastructure. Based on that investment, we said that 2012 would be a year of accelerated product innovation, and it was. The products we delivered throughout the year drove member engagement and financial results to record levels in the fourth quarter.”

    For their fourth quarter earnings, the company cited strong revenues of $161 million from its “Talent Solutions” recruiting products and $83.2 million from its Marketing Solutions products. Subscription revenue from premium memberships to its social network rose 79% to $59.4 million.

    LinkedIn set ambitious goals for itself in 2013, and expects to bring in between $1.41 billion and $1.44 billion.

    “Continued investment in our talent and technology infrastructure drove momentum in both product and monetization, resulting in record revenue, profitability, and cash flow,” said Steve Sordello, CFO of LinkedIn. “As we look forward to 2013, we remain excited about the value LinkedIn will create for members and customers in the coming year.”

  • Sheryl Sandberg Passed on Opportunity to Be LinkedIn CEO in 2006, According to Her New Book

    Sheryl Sandberg Passed on Opportunity to Be LinkedIn CEO in 2006, According to Her New Book

    Did you know that Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg could have been the CEO at another huge social networking company? Probably not. But apparently she reveals that story and more in her upcoming book Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead.

    Tom Gara at The Wall Street Journal got an advance copy of the book and posted his thoughts late Tuesday. Since then, he’s been pulling out some interesting anecdotes about her time at Google, relationship with Mark Zuckerberg, and more.

    One little nugget comes in the form of a declined job offer from 2006.

    Apparently, LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman approached Sandberg and asked her to be the CEO of his company.

    Here’s a direct quote from the book:

    “In the summer of 2006, a tiny start-up called LinkedIn was looking for a new CEO, and Reid Hoffman, LinkedIn’s founder, reached out to me. I thought it was a great opportunity, and after five years in the same position at Google I was ready for a new challenge. But the timing was tricky. I was thirty-seven years old and wanted to have a second child. I told Reid the truth: regrettably, I had to pass…”

    Of course, LinkedIn would go on to hit 200 million members by the end of 2012.

    I think it’s safe to say that Sandberg did well for herself at the company she eventually chose, which has also become pretty successful over the past six years.

    Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead is due out on March 11th.

  • LinkedIn Kills LinkedIn Answers Service [Report]

    LinkedIn Kills LinkedIn Answers Service [Report]

    LinkedIn has had a service called LinkedIn Answers for going on six years. Never heard of it? You’re probably not alone, because there reportedly aren’t that may people using it – at least not enough for LinkedIn to keep it alive.

    Though as a LinkedIn user, I have yet to receive an email on this, Mashable is reporting that LinkedIn users are getting emails from the company about the service’s demise. The publication shares this statement from the company:

    “As of Jan. 31, LinkedIn Answers will be retired from LinkedIn. We will be focusing our efforts on the development of new and more engaging ways to share and discuss professional topics across LinkedIn. In the meantime, members can still pose questions and facilitate professional discussions through other popular LinkedIn channels including LinkedIn Polls, Groups, or status update.”

    Q&A site Quora (though it’s looking to expand its own offerings beyond Q&A) added a new LinkedIn connectivity feature last month, enabling users to directly share their Quora contributions on their LinkedIn profiles.

    “Quora is a place where people share a wide range of knowledge and experience with others, and many users have already shared stories about professional opportunities they’ve received due to their contributions on the site,” a spokesperson for Quora told WebProNews. “Now, with the use of LinkedIn’s new profile, Quora is making it easier to share your answers with your professional network to demonstrate your expertise and to give a fuller picture of your professional biography and identity.”

    LinkedIn announced last week that it has surpassed 200 million members.

  • LinkedIn Competitor Viadeo Acquires “#1 Hunting App” Pealk

    LinkedIn Competitor Viadeo Acquires “#1 Hunting App” Pealk

    Today Viadeo, a professional networking social network similar to LinkedIn, announced it has acquired Pealk, the self-styled “#1 Hunting App” for LinkedIn.

    Pealk was an app designed for HR and managers to cull LinkedIn profiles for potential recruits. It allowed users to sort and track recruits, similar to LinkedIn’s own paid-for headhunting service. Viadeo claims 50 million worldwide users for its service.

    The transaction wouldn’t be particularly worth mentioning if Pealk hadn’t had its LinkedIn API access yanked in the summer of 2012. LinkedIn claimed at the time that Pealk was abusing its API access and violating LinkedIn’s API Terms of Use.

    As the entire Pealk project had been built on LinkedIn, the company promptly discontinued its app after its API access was revoked. For six months no more word was heard of Pealk, and LinkedIn never released details on why it booted Pealk. Though today’s announcement did not include the amount of the purchase price, it is almost certainly less than Pealk’s founders might have hoped for. However, any sale of the languishing company must be better than none at all.

    “We’re very proud and pleased with this buyout, which we consider to be the happy ending to an exciting adventure,” said Boris Golden, Pealk CEO, in a press statement. “It’s also the beginning of a new adventure for us, since there are plenty of applications just waiting to be invented that will give professionals more ways to unlock Viadeo’s full potential!”

  • LinkedIn Hits 200 Million Members

    LinkedIn Hits 200 Million Members

    Today, LinkedIn is announcing a pretty significant milestone. The social network for professionals has just topped 200 million members. For reference, LinkedIn hit 100 million members back in March of 2011 – meaning it’s taken them nearly two years to double their user base.

    “This milestone is more than just a metric — it’s a reminder of the global footprint and the scale of impact our network has each day. Members come first at LinkedIn and we remain focused on creating economic opportunity for every professional in the world. We look forward to bringing the power of the LinkedIn network to many more professionals in the coming years,” said LinkedIn’s Deep Nishar in a blog post.

    LinkedIn boasts that their 200 million users hail from over 200 countries and territories, and use the service in 19 different languages.

    According to the stats, the U.S. is LinkedIn’s biggest user base – by a lot. With 74 million members, the U.S. dwarfs the next largest users base of India, which sits at 18 million members. Turkey, Colombia, and Indonesia are the countries that are growing the fastest on the network. The largest subset of LinkedIn members come from the Information Technology and Services industry.

    Of course, this is a members announcement – not an active users announcement. I’ve reached out to LinkedIn for specific MAU figures, and will update this article if I hear back. It’s safe to say, however, that LinkedIn’s MAUs do not quite total 200 million.

    That’s because in the world on social media, “members” or “accounts” is oftentimes a misleading metric. Take for instance Twitter, which reportedly sports over 500 million accounts. Less than half of those are active on a monthly basis, though. The latest figures put Twitter’s MAUs at 200 million.

    Google+ just announced 135 million MAUs, and Facebook claims to have over 1 billion MAUs.

    Here’s an infographic that LinkedIn has released in celebration of their milestone:

  • LinkedIn’s Top 12 Stories Of The Year Unsurprisingly Very Business-Oriented

    LinkedIn’s Top 12 Stories Of The Year Unsurprisingly Very Business-Oriented

    LinkedIn recently revealed its 12 most popular stories of the year, which included articles from Inc., Fast Company, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and Entrepreneur, to name a few.

    Yep, it really is the professional network.

    The top 12 were:

    1. The 8 Qualities of Remarkable Employees (Inc.)

    2. What Successful People Do in the First Hour of Their Work Day (Fast Company)

    3. Top Executive Recruiters Agree: There Are Only Three Key Job Interview Questions(Forbes)

    4. The Magic of Doing One Thing at a Time (Harvard Business Review)

    5. What Recruiters Look at During the 6 Seconds They Spend on Your Resume (Business Insider)

    6. Housing Crisis to End in 2012 as Banks Loosen Credit Standards (DS News)

    7. Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs (The New York Times)

    8. The Must-Have Job Skills of 2013 (The Wall Street Journal)

    9. How Pinterest Is Becoming the Next Big Thing in Social Media (Entrepreneur)

    10. Why You Shouldn’t Accept a Counteroffer (U.S. News & World Report, via Yahoo News)

    11. How Great Leaders Inspire Action (TED)

    12. New Job Seekers Getting Asked Facebook Passwords (AP, via Yahoo Finance)

    “Professionals gobbled up advice on how to be more efficient, more productive, and, yes, even more ‘remarkable‘ in the eyes of their bosses,” said LinkedIn’s Chip Cutter. “The self-help craze reflects, on some level, the realities of the economy. With the unemployment rate at 7.7%, and the economic recovery uncertain, businesspeople are looking for any edge they can find in the workplace.”

    It’s interesting to see how much more business-oriented the list is compared to other year-end round-ups we’ve seen from social media services and search engines.

  • That LinkedIn Endorsement Feature Is Pretty Popular

    That LinkedIn Endorsement Feature Is Pretty Popular

    Back in September, LinkedIn launched Endorsements, a way for people to endorse others in their network for specific skills, making them more attractive candidates for various positions and/or projects.

    The company announced today that it has seen over 550 million endorsements given out since the feature launched. Not bad for just a few short months.

    LinkedIn also shared some tips in a blog post for making your endorsements count.

    “It’s important to be thoughtful about what skill you endorse,” says LinkedIn’s Prachi Gupta. “We encourage you to focus on skills and expertise you can personally attest to or have experienced first hand. If you think your connection is being too humble for their own good, suggest a skill they may not have listed yet on their profile. Just remember, the endorsee must accept the suggested skill before it appears on their profile.”

    “Use this as an opportunity to keep in touch with your network,” she adds. “When you visit a connection’s profile page, you may see a module up top suggesting relevant skills you can endorse. Use this as an opportunity to reconnect with an old connection by endorsing them for work you’ve done together at your last company. Don’t see the skill you had in mind? Just ‘X’ out the suggested one and type in the skill you’d like to recommend.”

    She goes on to recommend that users “flex their best assets,” or in other words, manage your endorsements to select the ones you want to show or not show. You can always add or remove skills from your profile, of course.