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  • LinkedIn Earnings Released, Revenue Up 46%

    LinkedIn Earnings Released, Revenue Up 46%

    LinkedIn just released its earnings report for the first quarter with revenue of $473.2 million, up 46% year-over-year. The company managed to beat analysts’ expectations.

    The company reminds us that it has over 300 million members, which it announced a couple weeks ago.

    LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner said, “The first quarter was strong for LinkedIn in terms of our member engagement and financial results. We made significant progress against several strategic priorities including expanding internationally with our China launch, extending our shift to content marketing, and furthering our goal to make LinkedIn the definitive professional publishing platform by giving members the ability to publish long-form content.”

    Here’s the release in its entirety:

    MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., May 1, 2014 – LinkedIn Corporation (NYSE: LNKD), the world’s largest professional network on the Internet, with over 300 million members, reported its quarterly results for the first quarter of 2014:

    Revenue for the first quarter was $473.2 million, an increase of 46% compared to $324.7 million in the first quarter of 2013.
    Net loss attributable to common stockholders for the first quarter was $13.4 million, compared to net income of $22.6 million for the first quarter of 2013. Non-GAAP net income for the first quarter was $47.3 million, compared to $52.4 million for the first quarter of 2013. 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 $116.7 million, or 25% of revenue, compared to $83.4 million for the first quarter of 2013, or 26% of revenue.
    GAAP diluted EPS for the first quarter was $(0.11), compared to GAAP diluted EPS of $0.20 for the first quarter 2013; non-GAAP diluted EPS for the first quarter was $0.38, compared to non-GAAP diluted EPS of $0.45 for the first quarter of 2013.
    “The first quarter was strong for LinkedIn in terms of our member engagement and financial results,” said Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn. “We made significant progress against several strategic priorities including expanding internationally with our China launch, extending our shift to content marketing, and furthering our goal to make LinkedIn the definitive professional publishing platform by giving members the ability to publish long-form content.”

    First Quarter Operating Summary

    Talent Solutions: Revenue from Talent Solutions products totaled $275.9 million, an increase of 50% compared to the first quarter of 2013. Talent Solutions revenue represented 58% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2014, compared to 57% in the first quarter of 2013.
    Marketing Solutions: Revenue from Marketing Solutions products totaled $101.8 million, an increase of 36% compared to the first quarter of 2013. Marketing Solutions revenue represented 22% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2014, compared to 23% in the first quarter of 2013.
    Premium Subscriptions: Revenue from Premium Subscriptions products totaled $95.5 million, an increase of 46% compared to the first quarter of 2013. Premium Subscriptions represented 20% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2014 and 2013.
    Revenue from the U.S. totaled $284.9 million, and represented 60% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2014. Revenue from international markets totaled $188.3 million, and represented 40% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2014.

    Revenue from the field sales channel totaled $275.3 million, and represented 58% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2014. Revenue from the online, direct sales channel totaled $197.9 million, and represented 42% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2014.

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

    First Quarter Highlights and Strategic Announcements

    In the first quarter of 2014:

    LinkedIn launched a beta version of its platform in Simplified Chinese, furthering its mission to connect the world’s professionals. The localized site aims to broaden the Chinese member base from four million English-language members today, to the addressable audience of 140 million professionals and students in China.
    LinkedIn opened its professional publishing platform, enabling any member to publish long-form content. Early indications are positive, based on strong uptake and network engagement.
    LinkedIn released a new version of Who’s Viewed Your Profile, an analytics dashboard giving members actionable intelligence on how to best build their professional brands and manage their professional identities.
    “Strong first quarter financial results were driven by sustained investment, resulting in healthy member trends and balanced growth across our three diverse product lines,” said Steve Sordello, CFO of LinkedIn. “We are excited for the remainder of 2014, and believe investment in our strategic initiatives will continue to drive our member and monetization platforms.”

    Business Outlook

    LinkedIn is providing guidance for the second quarter and full year of 2014:

    Q2 2014 Guidance: Revenue is expected to range between $500 million and $505 million. Adjusted EBITDA is expected to range between $118 million and $120 million. The company expects depreciation and amortization to be approximately $53 million, and stock-based compensation to be approximately $75 million.
    Full Year 2014 Guidance: Revenue is expected to range between $2.06 billion and $2.08 billion. Adjusted EBITDA is expected to be between $505-510 million. The company expects depreciation and amortization to be approximately $225 million, and stock-based compensation to be approximately $305 million.
    Quarterly Results Webcast and Conference Call

    LinkedIn will host a webcast and conference call to discuss its first quarter 2014 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.

    Upcoming Events

    Management will participate in upcoming financial Q&A discussions at industry events on May 7, May 13, and June 3, 2014. 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 over 300 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 peer 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 the non-GAAP measures facilitates internal comparisons to historical operating results and comparisons to peer operating results.

    Accretion of redeemable noncontrolling interest. The accretion of redeemable noncontrolling interest represents the accretion of the company’s redeemable noncontrolling interest to its redemption value. The company excludes the accretion 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 operating performance. In addition, excluding this item from the non-GAAP financial measures facilitates internal comparisons to historical operating results and comparisons to peer 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. Beginning in the first quarter of 2014, the company has implemented a long-term non-GAAP tax rate for evaluating its operating performance as well as for planning and forecasting purposes. This projected long-term non-GAAP tax rate eliminates the effects of non-recurring and period specific items, which can vary in size and frequency and does not necessarily reflect our long-term operations. Historically, the company computed a non-GAAP tax rate based on non-GAAP pre-tax income on a quarterly basis. Based on our current forecast, a long-term non-GAAP tax rate of 35% has been applied to our non-GAAP financial results for the first quarter of 2014. 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.

    Dilutive shares under the treasury stock method. During the first quarter of 2014, the company excluded certain potential common shares from its GAAP diluted shares because their effect would have been anti-dilutive. On a non-GAAP basis, these shares would have been dilutive. As a result, the company has included the impact of these shares in the calculation of its non-GAAP diluted net income per share under the treasury stock method.

    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 (loss) 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 (loss) and adjusted EBITDA. As items that impact net income (loss) 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 (loss) 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 customer and 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 2014 and the full fiscal year 2014. 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, Asia and 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 international operations; 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 for the year ended December 31, 2013, and additional information will also be set forth in our Form 10-Q that will be filed for the quarter ended March 31, 2014, 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 at http://investors.linkedin.com/. All information provided in this release and in the attachments is as of May 1, 2014, and LinkedIn undertakes no duty to update this information.

    Other Information

    Investors and others should note that we announce material, non-public information regarding LinkedIn using our company website (www.linkedin.com), our investor relations website (investors.linkedin.com), our company blog (www.blog.linkedin.com), SEC filings, press releases, public conference calls and webcasts. Information about LinkedIn, its business, and its results of operations may also be announced by posts on the following social media channels:

    Our LinkedIn Page: https://www.linkedin.com/company/linkedin
    The LinkedIn Twitter Feed: https://twitter.com/linkedin
    The information that we post on these social media channels could be deemed to be material information. As a result, we encourage investors, the media, and others interested in LinkedIn to review the information that we post on these social media channels. These channels may be updated from time to time on LinkedIn’s Investor Relations website.

     

    Image via LinkedIn (Flickr)

  • LinkedIn Charges You To View Full Names, But Only If You’re Logged In

    LinkedIn Charges You To View Full Names, But Only If You’re Logged In

    For some reason, LinkedIn is hiding the last name of some members on profile pages when you’re logged in. This appears to be happening at least when you’re searching for a person on Google. As far as we can tell, it makes no sense.

    Darren Nix at 42floors pointed this out in a blog post, though I noticed it the other day as well.

    “This morning I had a call with someone I hadn’t met so I Googled their name and, inevitably, clicked through to their LinkedIn profile,” Nix writes. “I was bemused to note that, although the search result in Google showed their full name in the title, their profile page obscured their name until I ‘Upgrade for full name’.

    He goes on to note that when he tried the same thing in Chrome’s Incognito mode (not being logged into LinkedIn), the profile displayed the full name.

    This happened to be when I was covering a Yelp blog post. I was quoting the author of the post in my post, but for some reason Yelp’s blog only gives you the first name and last initial of is authors, as well as their titles. In this case, it was Justin O., Business Development. Naturally, I Googled “Justin O., Yelp Business Development,” and the first result was for the LInkedIn profile of Justin Overdorff. The name was fully visible on the search results page. When clicking over to the LinkedIn profile, however, like Nix, I was surprised to find a profile displaying his first name and last initial, while also being invited to “upgrade for full name”.

    When clicking to upgrade, you’re invited to “see full names to network effectively” by paying an annual fee of $99.95 per month or a monthly fee of $119.95.

    If you replicate the search and LinkedIn visit, you get the full name (for free).

    Odd.

    LinkedIn will release its latest earnings report this afternoon.

    Images via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Launches Partner Programs For Sponsored Updates, Content

    LinkedIn Launches Partner Programs For Sponsored Updates, Content

    LinkedIn announced two new types of Certified Marketing Partners – Sponsored Updates Partners and Content Partners. These, the company says, will make it easier for brands and agencies to scale their content marketing efforts on LinkedIn’s platform.

    LinkedIn launched Sponsored Updates last summer:

    The company says it quickly became its fastest-growing Marketing Solutions product.

    LinkedIn’s Penry Price explains, “Our Sponsored Updates partners provide customers with advanced tools, powered by our APIs, to manage their Sponsored Updates campaigns, while our Content Partners provide access to high-quality content to enhance an advertiser’s activities on LinkedIn. Both are part of our Certified Marketing Partners program, which connects brands with leading companies who have the tools to help them increase visibility and performance on our platform.”

    LinkedIn launched the Sponsored Updates Partner program with AdStage, Brand Networks, SHIFT, the Salesforce ExactTarget Marketing Cloud, and Unified Social.

    Early certified content partners include The Atlantic, Bloomberg, CBS Interactive, and IDG Communications, Newscred, Percolate, Atlantic Media Strategies, Contently, Freshwire, and Group SJR.

    More on both programs here.

    Image via LinkedIn

  • Infographic: LinkedIn Analyzes Global Economic Confidence

    Infographic: LinkedIn Analyzes Global Economic Confidence

    LinkedIn recently surveyed 14,000 senior business leaders in 16 countries to get an idea about the health of local and global economies. The company has put the highlights together in an easy-to-read infograhpic for your viewing pleasure.

    It’s not the most rosy picture. Most of those surveyed are concerned their countries will be left behind in a global economic recovery.

    LinkedIn says it will revisit the research each quarter to track how insights from business leaders change. You can follow here.

    LinkedIn announced last week that it has surpassed 300 million members.

    Image via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Hits 300 Million Members, Compares Today To Five Years Ago In Infographic

    LinkedIn Hits 300 Million Members, Compares Today To Five Years Ago In Infographic

    LinkedIn announced on Friday that it has surpassed the 300 million member mark. When it reported its earnings in February, it had 277 million.

    A third of the 300 million are members in the U.S.

    “While this is an exciting moment, we still have a long way to go to realize our vision of creating economic opportunity for every one of the 3.3 billion people in the global workforce,” says LinkedIn’s Deep Nishar. “To get there, we are delivering personalized experiences built around members and their identity, network and knowledge. We believe this focus will give us the ability to better help each of our members achieve their professional goals. This strategic shift has already come to life through our content products.”

    The company says that later this year it will reach the moment when mobile accounts for more than fifty percent of all global traffic. Mobile users already outweigh desktop users in Costa Rica, Malaysia, Singapore, Sweden, United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom. LinkedIn says it sees an average of 15 million profile views, 1.45 million job views, and 44,000 job applications in over 200 countries through mobile every day.

    LinkedIn will release its next earnings report on May 1st.

    Image via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Makes SlideShare More Mobile-Friendly

    LinkedIn Makes SlideShare More Mobile-Friendly

    LinkedIn has launched an Android app for SlideShare, as well as a redesigned mobile web experience and a mobile preview feature for uploads on the desktop.

    LinkedIn acquired SlideShare about two years ago, and has since added features like a tracking analytics tool and an infographic player.

    Now there’s a new focus on making the product mobile-friendly.

    “Combined, these products make it easier to access, view and share your presentations on-the-go, but they also help you with what SlideShare does best: discover content through people and people through content,” says LinkedIn’s Andri Kristinsson. “Most presentations are still made with desktop software, so we’ve developed a preview of what your SlideShares will look like on any mobile device, allowing you as the content creator to make sure your work is mobile-friendly.”

    “We’ve completely redesigned the mobile web experience, allowing you to swipe from slide to slide within a presentation, as you can in the app,” he adds. “We’ve also made it easier for you to share SlideShares with your friends and social networks directly from your mobile device via SMS text or WhatsApp for iOS users.”

    The Android app lets you follow insights on topics you choose, view presentations from friends and colleagues, save SlideShares to read later or offline, and share presentations with friends and social networks.

    The company says it has “many more” mobile products and features to come.

    Images via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Angers Businesses With Feature Removal

    LinkedIn Angers Businesses With Feature Removal

    As recently reported, LinkedIn is killing the Products & Services tab on Company pages. It turns out that some businesses aren’t a fan of this move.

    Do you use the Products & Services tab? Do you find it to be a necessary feature of the LinkedIn experience or are the alternatives better? Share your thoughts in the comments.

    Back in November LinkedIn launched its new Showcase Pages, which enable companies to show off specific brands and products. Users can follow these pages just as they can other pages on LinkedIn. So, if you have multiple products, you can set up these pages for each one, and users can follow the products they’re most interested in. If you have multiple brands, they can follow the brands they like. Obviously they can still follow your Company Page as well.

    For example, Microsoft has a Showcase Page for Microsoft Office. Users may not be interested in everything that the corporation is up to, but they use Office all the time, so they want to follow that. You get the idea.

    LinkedIn apparently wants companies to use these pages more, so it’s ditching the Products & Services tab. The tab will be gone on April 14th. Until then, you can edit your content from the tab as you like. You won’t be able to add anything new.

    “We’re constantly evaluating how features are being used and exploring new ways to enhance the content experience on LinkedIn,” the company says. “We do this to ensure that we’re creating a platform where companies can deliver timely, engaging content to our members. Sometimes, this means we need to remove a feature to focus on areas of the product that most benefit both companies and our members.”

    Showcase Pages are one alternative LinkedIn recommends. Another is to simply use Company Status Updates (or both).

    The updates show up on your Company Page as well as in your followers’ feeds (on every device). You can even use them to show videos that play directly in the feed, and/or direct users to customized landing pages.

    “The real-time nature of updates makes them perfect for sharing news about your offerings, so your content feels relevant and timely,” LinkedIn says.

    LinkedIn also says that Showcase Pages make it easy to build dedicated communities on LinkedIn, and start conversations about products and brands. Showcase Page updates work just like Company Updates, so they have the same visibility benefits. They also appear in search results and on your Company Page.

    Believe it or not, not everyone is happy with LinkedIn’s decision to shut down the Products & Services tab. Many have taken to its help forum to complain. John Bernardi is particularly angered by the move, and started a lot of discussion about it there. He wrote (via MarketingLand):

    LinkedIn does it again. They’ve made an arbitrary decision to remove content previously entered by its subscribers. On April 14 all the hard work done by subscribers who created product and services pages will be sent to the trash bin by LinkedIn. I have a number of clients who paid to have their products and services pages created for them. LinkedIn has decided that their investment means nothing.

    This decision is even more obtuse than the one made by LinkedIn to remove the section where people saved and shared the books they had read.

    I will never trust LinkedIn with a mission critical application for my business. They make too many arbitrary decisions that are non customer centric.

    One user calls the move “insane”. Another says LinkedIn is afraid of lawsuits like those Yelp has been involved in, and doesn’t “have the spine for it”.

    Crystal Thies writes:

    I am extremely upset with this. Managing a Showcase Page for every product or service is unrealistic. There are no options for recommendations currently in the Showcase Pages, so will that change?

    The target market views that LinkedIn created for the products and services tab was brilliant and there is nothing else like it out there. Anytime I fully explained the capabilities of the tab, I landed a company hiring me to build out their Company Page and target that page to their verticals. There is nothing else like in in social media.

    However, LinkedIn has done a very poor job of informing people of the true magic behind the Company Page so no one knows to do anything with it. This was also the main way to tie your company page to your website with the Recommendations plugin.

    If they continue to remove it, it will be an enormous loss to small business owners across LinkedIn and will lower LinkedIn to Facebook level. It will be all about blasting your message out to people and that’s not what LinkedIn is really about. You need those recommendations and validation to build credibility for your company, your products and services. Would you remove Recommendations from the Profile? That’s essentially what you’re doing to the businesses.

    To the point about “blasting your message out to people” not being what LinkedIn’s about, the company did recently announce that it is opening up its publishing platform to everyone, so that kind of is what LinkedIn is all about now. Or at least partially about.

    There are eleven pages on that one thread in LinkedIn’s forum, and it’s pretty much just angry comment after angry comment. Will LinkedIn listen?

    Do you think LinkedIn should keep the Products & Services tab? Is this all just overreaction or legitimate concern? Share your thoughts in the comments.

  • LinkedIn Is Giving Companies An Internal Job Recommendations Tool

    LinkedIn Is Giving Companies An Internal Job Recommendations Tool

    LinkedIn announced new features to make recruiting and talent retainment easier. One of these is for Internal Job Recommendations, which raises employee awareness about open positions within the companies they’re already working at. More importantly, for those looking to retain their employees, it lets them know about internal jobs when they start looking externally.

    The recommendations will appear in the “Jobs You May Be Interested In” section on LinkedIn.com, as well as in corresponding emails, and on the company’s own intranet if it’s utilizing the new Internal Job Recommendations widget that LinkedIn also launched.

    “Many customers who participated in our Internal Job Recommendations charter program saw the number of employees engaging with their jobs on LinkedIn double or more,” says LinkedIn’s Parker Barrile. “In fact, Johnson Controls saw employee engagement increase by more than 350 percent, and last month, more employees applied for an internal position via LinkedIn than conducted a search on the company’s internal search engine.”

    “But most importantly, customers have been making internal hires. Westpac Group, for example, has made nine hires using Internal Job Recommendations,” he says.

    The recommendations will be available for corporate customers with 100 or more Job Slots soon. Those interested are told to contact their LinkedIn sales representative.

    The company has also launched a new version of the Recruiter Profile and new versions of the Recruiter iPhone and Android apps. More on those here.

    Image via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Redesigns Groups Landing Home

    LinkedIn Redesigns Groups Landing Home

    LinkedIn has released a new landing page for LinkedIn Groups users to manage their participation and discover new groups. You can access this if you go to “Interests” in the top menu, and then go to “Groups”.

    The company says it makes it easier to stay up to date on what’s happening in groups you manage or are a member of, and makes your time more productive.

    “At the top of the page, you’ll see all of your current groups in one place. If the group has new activity, you’ll instantly see the number of updates, new discussions or job postings within that group when you hover over it,’ explains LinkedIn’s Daria Axelrod Marmer. “We’ve also made it possible to start or join a conversation in any of your groups directly from this page. New to groups? We’ll help you get started by suggesting relevant groups you can join today.”

    There’s also a new conversation feed:

    Earlier this week, we learned that LinkedIn is killing the Products & Services tab on April 14th, encouraging businesses to use Company Updates and Showcase Pages as alternatives.

    Images via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Kills Products/Services Tab On Company Pages

    LinkedIn Kills Products/Services Tab On Company Pages

    Back in November, LinkedIn launched “Showcase Pages” for companies to show off specific brands and products, which users can follow separately. Users can follow Microsoft Office specifically, for example, without having to follow Microsoft itself.

    In an apparent push to get companies using these, LinkedIn is ditching the Products & Services tab on Company Pages. The tab will be gone on April 14th. Until then, you can edit your content from the tab as you like, but you won’t be able to add anything new.

    “We’re constantly evaluating how features are being used and exploring new ways to enhance the content experience on LinkedIn,” the company says. “We do this to ensure that we’re creating a platform where companies can deliver timely, engaging content to our members. Sometimes, this means we need to remove a feature to focus on areas of the product that most benefit both companies and our members.”

    LinkedIn suggests using Showcase Pages as an alternative to the tab, as well as Company Updates. Many businesses are already using both.

    The updates show up on your Company Page as well as in your followers’ feeds (on every device). You can even use them to show videos that play directly in the feed, and/or direct users to customized landing pages.

    “The real-time nature of updates makes them perfect for sharing news about your offerings, so your content feels relevant and timely,” LinkedIn says.

    It also points out that Showcase Pages make it easy to build dedicated communities on LinkedIn, and start conversations about products and brands. Showcase Page updates work just like Company Updates, so they have the same visibility benefits. They also appear in search results and on your Company Page.

    Hat tip to Social Media Today

    Image via LinkedIn

  • YouTube, Google+, LinkedIn & Twitter Are All Better Than Facebook For Post-Click Engagement [Report]

    YouTube, Google+, LinkedIn & Twitter Are All Better Than Facebook For Post-Click Engagement [Report]

    Shareaholic has a new report out called “Social Referrals That Matter,” which looks at the average visit duration, pages per visit, and bounce rates for visitors to its network of sites from the top 8 social media platforms.

    The report is based on data from over 200,000 sites, reaching over 250 million unique monthly visitors over a span of six months (September 2013 – February 2014). Specifically, it looks at data from YouTube, Google+, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, reddit, and StumbleUpon.

    The study found that YouTube beats all others for both average time on site and average pages per visit. Interestingly. Bounce rate is lower than all others as well.

    Google+ comes in second for post-click engagement, with pretty good numbers in all three categories. Interestingly, Facebook is all the way down at number 5.

    Shareaholic’s Danny Wong writes, “Why are visitors from YouTube so engaged? …because video itself is so engaging and viewers are likely to maintain a similar level of engagement with related content. Therefore, video watchers are especially receptive to links within video descriptions which complement the audio+visual content they just consumed. Another reason YouTube takes home the crown is because viewers are simply used to spending minutes — perhaps, hours — educating and entertaining themselves with awesome video and may have fewer qualms about taking extra time to discover more great content post-click.”

    “Although Google+ and LinkedIn drive the fewest social referrals, they bring in some of the best visitors. Google+ users, on average, find themselves spending north of 3 minutes diving into things shared by connections in their circles,” he adds. “They also visit 2.45 pages during each visit, and bounce only 50.63% of the time. LinkedIn users generally spend 2 minutes and 13 seconds on each link they click, viewing 2.23 pages with each visit and bouncing 51.28% of the time. Although many sites see minimal traffic from both Google+ and LinkedIn, now may be the time to invest in building communities within those networks if engagement really matters to your business.”

    Well, we certainly know businesses are growing increasingly frustrated with a certain other social network that has been decrasing the reach of their posts. In fact, one brand just announced that they’re so fed up with Facebook’s practices, they’re leaving the network entirely.

    It also just so happens that YouTube just released a new Creator playbook for brands.

    Both of these things make Shareaholic’s report all the more timely.

    Image via Shareaholic

  • WordPress Founder Talks To LinkedIn About The Future Of Publishing

    WordPress Founder Talks To LinkedIn About The Future Of Publishing

    This video’s about a month old, but interesting none the less, and LinkedIn just shared it in a blog post today. WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg discusses the future of publishing with Reid Hoffman.

    It’s part of the LinkedIn Speaker series.

    It’s probably safe to say that Mullenweg knows a bit about what he’s talking about when it comes to publishing. WordPress boasts over 77 million sites with over 409 million people viewing more than 13.1 billion pages each month.

    More incredible WordPress stats here.

    Image via YouTube

  • Facebook, Google, Twitter & LinkedIn Team Up On WebScaleSQL

    Facebook, Google, Twitter & LinkedIn Team Up On WebScaleSQL

    Facebook, Google, Twitter and LinkedIn announced a new collaboration among their engineer teams called WebScaleSQL.

    A spokesperson for Facebook tells us that the companies are “working to share a common set of changes to the upstream MySQL branch that will be available via open source,” and “will include contributions from MySQL engineering teams at all four companies.”

    WebScaleSQL will expand on existing efforts by the MySQL community, and we will continue to track the upstream branch that is the latest, production-ready release (currently MySQL 5.6), Facebook says.

    So far, the engineers have set up a system for collaborating, reviewing code, and reporting bugs. One engineer can propose a change, and another from another company will review the code and offer feedback. If an agreement is reached, it will be pushed to the WebScaleSQL branch for everybody else. Each company can then further customize WebScaleSQL for their own needs.

    The engineers have already made an automated framework that will run and publish the results of MySQL’s built-in test system, a suite of stress tests and a prototype automated performance testing system. They’ve also made changes to code structure and existing tests as well as performance improvements, and features to make WebScaleSQL scaling easier.

    You can read more about the specifics here.

    The companies intend to keep their WebScaleSQL work open and to continue to follow the most up-to-date upstream version of MySQL.

    “As long as the MySQL community releases continue, we are committed to remaining a branch – and not a fork – of MySQL,” says Facebook software engineer Steaphan Greene.

    Those who want to get involved with the project can check out this site.

    Image via WebScaleSQL.org

  • LinkedIn Launches Content Marketing Score, Trending Content

    LinkedIn Launches Content Marketing Score, Trending Content

    LinkedIn has launched a new analytics tool designed to help users gain insight into the impact of their paid and organic content on the social network. It generates a score, which is calculated by measuring “unique engagement,” which is gauged through social actions, and dividing that by your total target audience.

    More specifically, Content Marketing Score measures member engagement with your Sponsored Updates, Company Pages, LinkedIn Groups, employee updates, and Influencer posts. And let’s not forget that LinkedIn recently announced it’s opening up its publishing platform to all users (as opposed to just Influencers).

    LinkedIn also gives you recommendations about how to improve your score based on “different levers you can pull to give you more reach, frequency and engagement.”

    Scores can be filtered by region, seniority, company size, job function, and industry.

    “By tracking performance on a monthly basis, you get a powerful snapshot on how well you are engaging with your audience over time,” says LinkedIn’s Valter Sciarrillo. “With this knowledge, you’ll be empowered to upgrade your strategy to optimize engagement within your target.”

    The company is also launching a Trending Content feature. You can find more on both of these features in LinkedIn Marketing Solutions.

    Image via LinkedIn

  • Watch This LinkedIn Webinar About Recruiting And Hiring Trends

    Watch This LinkedIn Webinar About Recruiting And Hiring Trends

    LinkedIn recently held a webinar discussing the “latest buzz and talent trends” related to recruiting, staffing, and hiring. The company has now put it on YouTube for all to view.

    Lou Adler, CEO of The Adler Group, who LinkedIn calls a “recruiting expert,” discusses said buzz and trends based on stats from LinkedIn’s Talent Trends 2014 survey.

    Adler “tells you what’s going on in the minds of professionals today and how you can entice them to switch jobs,” as LinkedIn puts it.

    This follows an infographic LinkedIn put out earlier this week looking at why employees are jumping ship and how much it’s costing companies.

    Image via YouTube

  • Infographic Looks At B2B Social Media Potential For 2014

    Infographic Looks At B2B Social Media Potential For 2014

    UK-based Real Business Rescue has gathered some findings about B2B social media use to project what’s in store for the remainder of the year. Data comes from a bunch of sources including eMarketer, Social Media Examiner, InternetRetailer, BusinessInsider, MediaBistro, AdAge and others.

    Among said projections is that social media advertising will see “explosive growth” throughout the year and into the future.

    It looks at the top social media sites by unique monthly visitors, as well as those adopted by B2B businesses (guess which one is tied with Facebook). It goes on to examine B2B social media budgets, marketing tactics and marketing goals, and throws in a few tips for good measure.

    Take a look.

    [via Social Media Today]

    Image via Real Business Rescue

  • Companies Struggling To Retain Their Best Workers, Says LinkedIn [Infographic]

    Companies Struggling To Retain Their Best Workers, Says LinkedIn [Infographic]

    LinkedIn surveyed 7,530 of its members in the US, Australia, Canada, India and the UK who recently changed jobs. The company is calling this its “Exit Survey”. We’re assuming there will be more of these in the future.

    The findings were used to determine why employees are leaving their jobs, and how much it’s costing companies.

    “Companies across the globe are grappling with talent shortages due to the skills gap and scrambling to snatch the best and brightest from the workforce,” says LinkedIn research consultant Matt Grunewald. “Tempted by the prospect of landing a better gig, more and more employees are weighing their options — 85% of the workforce (up from 80% in 2012) is either actively looking for a job or open to talking to recruiters about relevant opportunities; even the ones who are “satisfied” with their jobs. But in their hunt for great hires, companies are failing to retain their own high performers, which is costing them big.”

    Here’s what they found.

    linkedin

    Image via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Recruiter Gets Searchable Custom Fields

    LinkedIn Recruiter Gets Searchable Custom Fields

    LinkedIn announced that it has made custom fields searchable in LinkedIn Recruiter, potentially making the search tool more useful for finding people based on very specific criteria.

    LinkedIn uses the example of a candidate who isn’t available until a certain date, and a recruiter that uses the custom field search to find him based on the noted date.

    To use the feature in a case like this, you would open LinkedIn Recruiter’s advanced search page, enter a date range, and in the “Availability Date” custom field, the candidate’s profile would appear.

    “Last year, we added Custom Fields to LinkedIn Recruiter to help you keep track of proprietary candidate information such as work authorizations or desired salary,” LinkedIn’s Prasad Gune says in a blog post. “Many Recruiter users found Custom Fields helpful to capture and organize customized information, but in order for them to be really useful, Recruiter users wanted to search them at a later date.”

    “To start, use the suggested custom fields, such as work authorizations and willingness to relocate, or create your own. For example, if you recruit for government agencies you may want to create a agencies is to create a security clearances field,” he says. “The possibilities for Custom Fields are endless, which is why I’m excited that they are now even more powerful because they are searchable.”

    LinkedIn recently started a series of tip videos for Recruiter, which may help you get more out of the service as well. Topics include saved search alerts, smart to-do lists, talent pipeline filters and custom search filters. You can find each of these here.

    Images via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Infographic Looks At How Small Businesses Are Using Social Media

    LinkedIn Infographic Looks At How Small Businesses Are Using Social Media

    LinkedIn recently put out a report based on a survey of small business owners, looking at how they use social media, and how it drives growth for SMBs.

    Now, the company has put together an infographic sharing some more findings.

    “You might be surprised by what we found,” says LinkedIn’s Davis Schneider. “94% of survey respondents who use social media said they use it for marketing, and 3 in 5 say social solves for the core business challenge of attracting new customers.”

    Image via LinkedIn.

  • LinkedIn Tells You More About Who’s Viewing Your Profile

    LinkedIn Tells You More About Who’s Viewing Your Profile

    LinkedIn announced that it’s providing users with a lot more information about who has been viewing their profiles.

    Apparently in preparation for the launch, the company announced last week that users can now block other members from viewing their profiles, which had been a highly requested feature.

    With new analytics features, the company says it can tell you, for example, that your profile would be eleven times more likely to be viewed if you add a photo or share a specific article.

    “As one of the most popular destinations on LinkedIn, Who’s Viewed Your Profile has always given members a way to discover new opportunities and be discovered by others – but we knew the full potential hadn’t been unlocked,” says LinkedIn’s Udi Milo. “Today we’re giving you the key with access to more data driven insights such as the industry your viewers work in, the keyword searches that led to your profile, how they found you and new insights including what regions they live in, what profession they are in and what company they work for. This will help you quickly identify trends and enable you to align your professional brand with your professional goals.”

    “The most exciting new feature we’ve added are the real-time personalized tips on actions you can take to make yourself more discoverable to other like-minded professionals, potential employers or business partners on LinkedIn,” Milo says. “The personalized tips on Who’s Viewed Your Profile provide suggestions on everything from actions you can take to complete your profile to industry relevant articles that you can share to professional groups you can join – as well as how those actions can potentially increase views of your profile. Ultimately, this takes the guesswork out of how you can continue to build your own professional brand and manage your professional identity to make yourself even more productive on and off of LinkedIn.”

    LinkedIn is rolling out the new features around the world in English beginning today. Other languages will come in time.

    The company is also in the process of rolling out functionality to let all members make use of its long-form content publishing platform, which has historically only been available to “influencers”. It might take a few months for you to get access to that.

    Images via LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn Now Lets You Block People

    LinkedIn Now Lets You Block People

    LinkedIn announced that users can now block other members. According to the company, this has unsurprisingly been a highly requested feature.

    “I come to you today to assure you that your concerns were heard loud and clear,” writes LinkedIn Trust & Safety head Paul Rockwell in the LinkedIn Help Center (via TechCrunch). “We built this feature not only because it was a feature our members requested, but because we also knew it was the right thing to do. I’m pleased to share that we are rolling out a new Member Blocking feature today to all LinkedIn members.”

    “While on the surface this may seem like a simple feature to develop, it was not,” he adds. “There were many different use cases to consider, products and features to integrate, as well as a user interface we had to create.”

    He suggests you that consider enabling anonymous profile viewing before blocking another member, and lists some other settings you might want to adjust, including disconnecting, customizing your public profile, activity broadcasts, and photo visibility.

    Earlier this week, LinkedIn announced that it’s opening up its publisher platform to all members (rather than just “influencers”), and is encouraging more people to follow one another.

    Image via LInkedIn, Flickr