
LinkedIn plans to go public in 2011 - rs
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE7050DC20110106
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thirdstation
'"Some of these companies want to go public because they want to beat Facebook
and others out," said one of the sources.'

What's the value for being first with an IPO? Who does this matter to? Honest
question.

'"If Facebook went public before Linkedin, do you think anyone would pay that
much attention to Linkedin?" You might want to surpass the beast."'

Again, who does this matter to and why? They are similar companies but they
are different in ways that matter regarding target audience.

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lpolovets
Disclosure: I used to work for LinkedIn.

I think there could be a first mover advantage in the social networking IPO
space. In terms of Twitter, FB, LinkedIn, etc, there is not a lot of reputable
data about what kind of revenue and profit levels can be generated from a big
social networking site. If you're the first company in that space to file and
IPO, then you might get more leeway from investors because they don't have
anything else to compare to. If you're not the first, then you might be
scrutinized more.

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cletus
Is it just me of is LinkedIn just not relevant anymore? As in I have a
LinkedIn profile but I never use the site. I don't even know why I have a
profile on it.

So what is the value proposition of LinkedIn exactly?

I'm fully willing to admit I'm quite possibly an edge case here.

Whatever the case it seems there is no real "buzz" around LinkedIn so this
just strikes me as a way of cashing out before the bubble bursts.

LinkedIn has now branded itself a "social networking" site (even toasters are
"social" these days). This raises an interesting question: what if Facebook
decided to enter LinkedIn's space?

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joshklein
It is very useful in the B2B space. Organically, being able to figure out who
you know at a company and have them make an introduction for a sale/biz
dev/recruitment opportunity is a big deal. Advertising-wise, it lets you
target based on occupation. Many of the brands I do advertising for find
LinkedIn a very effective buy.

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ig1
Having used LinkedIn ads I've found it quite painful. The whole UX experience
of advertising is a mess, poor analytics, lack of email notification, etc. and
you're very restricted by the predefined list of occupations and industries.
They completely fail to understand the value of the long tail.

Facebook is miles ahead of Linkedin when it comes to their self-serve
advertising platform.

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swombat
LinkedIn, Zynga, Facebook, Twitter...

IPO season is now open.

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thewordpainter
I think 2011 will go down as the 'Year of the B2C IPO'

The article mentions LinkedIn and Zynga trying to beat Facebook's inevitable
IPO. I wouldn't be surprised if Pandora did the same in Q2 or Q3.

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martialtiger
Anyone else having problems logging into LinkedIn?

