LinkedIn Just Celebrated a Birthday
May 17th, 2011
LinkedIn, as you know by now, is one of my favorite social media applications. It just makes sense in the business community that a platform such as this will work better than Facebook for it’s intended purpose.
LinkedIn was launched on May 5th, 2003. It has probably grown a little more slowly than other social media platforms, but I also think it that is a good thing, I think it indicates longevity. It currently boasts more than 100 million members. I think the slightly slower growth points to the fact that people take it seriously – they don’t open an account just because, they have a purpose behind it – whether it is networking, looking for talent, or promoting yourself or your business. The profiles are carefully constructed, and I think most people who make connections on LinkedIn do so because they have actually met, they want to recommend someone, or some other fruitful purpose – not simply because they found their profile, or they went to the same college, even if they graduated 10 years apart. And best of all, you don’t have to look at vacation pictures of your boss in a speedo.
LinkedIn has rolled out new features over the last several years. This year they have added Twitter and blog feeds, TextIn, LinkedIn Industry specific news feeds, and various other new features that make using LinkedIn pretty handy. One pretty relevant feature is the Student Job Protal which helps recent graduates find jobs in their field. Pretty cool – if you’re a recent graduate, you should check it out. So here’s to eight years for LinkedIn – if you haven’t set up a profile, I would recommend it – go check them out – they have a fun video up on the blog that shows the growth of the company over the last eight years.
