{"id":653181,"date":"2013-04-18T13:09:57","date_gmt":"2013-04-18T17:09:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gigaom.com\/?p=632226"},"modified":"2013-04-18T13:09:57","modified_gmt":"2013-04-18T17:09:57","slug":"mobile-app-redesign-proves-linkedin-wants-to-be-your-destination-for-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/653181","title":{"rendered":"Mobile app redesign proves LinkedIn wants to be your destination for news"},"content":{"rendered":"

If it wasn\u2019t already obvious from the company\u2019s acquisition of social news reader Pulse<\/a> and launch of Influencers, a professional blogging service<\/a>, LinkedIn\u2019s\u00a0mobile app update on Thursday<\/a> shows that the company is increasingly focused on news.<\/p>\n

\"new<\/a>As my\u00a0colleague\u00a0Mathew Ingram wrote, LinkedIn\u2019s\u00a0media ambitions began back before the company went public in 2011<\/a>, but the full scope of what the company had in mind\u00a0is evident in this\u00a0redesign launched Thursday<\/a>\u00a0for iPhone and Android.<\/p>\n

The new feed looks a heck of a lot more like Facebook\u2019s News Feed than a digital resume service. Gone are the weird folders a user used to see on logging in, which are now\u00a0replaced with a stream of information that combines both professional updates<\/a>\u00a0(which of your friends have new LinkedIn connections or jobs), and news stories, as well as a top bar that shows \u201ctop stories for you,\u201d and other customizable features. Users can like or comment on stories directly from the feed, which again, provides the service with more data on user interests.<\/p>\n

While its stock price is doing well<\/a> and it\u2019s well on its way to becoming the digital resume of choice for a lot of professionals, LinkedIn still only has 200 million registered users<\/a>, which isn\u2019t all that significant when you consider that those aren\u2019t active users \u2014 just people with accounts. (For a point of comparison, Twitter, which is a much newer company, has 200 million users \u2014 active ones.)<\/p>\n

LinkedIn\u2019s business model hinges on the \u201ctalent solutions,\u201d or\u00a0the corporate\u00a0recruiting arm of the company<\/a>, which brought in more than 50 percent of the revenue last quarter. But that business needs users to\u00a0continue\u00a0uploading information to LinkedIn. When users note when they get new jobs or list their skills, they\u2019re providing more data for recruiters and companies to evaluate, making that section of the business more\u00a0valuable. And if users never visit LinkedIn, that\u2019s a problem, as we\u2019ve written before<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Scrolling through this feed, it\u2019s easy to see why adding news stories and content to the LinkedIn site makes it far more\u00a0engaging\u00a0for users. After all, people don\u2019t change jobs and update their LinkedIn profiles often enough to populate a timely news feed, but if I checked the LinkedIn app to find an interesting mix of technology and media news, I might be more likely to come back for a visit \u2014 not just to accept a connection.<\/p>\n

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