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Economic Crisis A Boon To LinkedIn, Xing

  • Reuters, Friday, November 28, 2008 10 AM
The financial crisis has proven to be a good thing for sites like LinkedIn and Xing, Reuters says, as laid off and/or worried workers turn to their professional networks for possible job opportunities.

LinkedIn, in particular, has seen staggering growth this year, from 18 million to 31 million members since the start of the year. Not surprisingly, new registrations were heaviest in sectors like financial, technology, and media. In spite of solid membership growth, the company recently decided to lay off 10 percent of its workforce in order to focus more on revenue generation. Strategy Analytics, a research firm, says LinkedIn should do $100 million in revenue this year.

Xing, a popular professional social network in Europe, has seen similarly robust membership growth of nearly 25 percent since the beginning of the year. Like LinkedIn, Xing earns its revenue from advertising and premium memberships, for which it charges users $7.45 per month. Also like LinkedIn, Xing of late has seen a huge boost in traffic toward job advertisements. The company is on track to report 2008 sales of 34.7 million euros, an increase of 77% over 2007.

Read the whole story at Reuters »

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