Wednesday, October 29, 2008

LinkedIn's Applications

Hi all, it's been a while since I last posted. With the market gyrating and Sequoia's famous powerpoint presentation scaring the bejesus out of everyone (btw, you should read this is you haven't already), I've been busy focusing on new business development activities and developing a new marketing initiative. I believe in the theory that companies that can invest in marketing to maintain positive cash flow and compete effectively in a downturn can take market share and drive some competitors out of business.

One company that seems to have the same approach is LinkedIn. They announced the launch of their applications platform today. I've been very impressed with the groups feature they added earlier this year. In terms of traffic to my website, and generating conversations, it's the best, most immediate return on my investment of time, I find.

I'm eager to explore the apps they currently offer and I'm excited to see what apps are developed down the road. My concern however is that LinkedIn will have to gradually loosen the restrictions on contacting people you don't know. Now, any email you receive is going to be legitimate and, most likely, worthwhile to read. It would be a shame if they killed the golden goose by letting LinkedIn turn into a spam machine.

1 comment:

Marc Hausman said...

You raise a good point about a concern that LinkedIn will become overrun with spam. For instance, I enjoy participation in their groups, yet find that many of the posts are blatantly self-serving.