LinkedIn Looking Forward to Another Strong Year


While Facebook is garnering more and more attraction as it takes a step closer to launching possibly the biggest IPO of the year, LinkedIn quietly reports only continual improvement. Unlike many other social networking companies that issued a 2011 IPO or dropped in stock prices, LinkedIn reported heavy earnings in the fourth quarter of 2011. Its earnings came in at $6.9 million, or 6 cents per share. Revenue was $167.7 million, a 105% up from just a year ago. For 2011 overall, LinkedIn posted revenue of $522.2 million, a 155% leap from its 2010 figures. All of these numbers topped analysts' estimates, according to FactSet. Moreover, LinkedIn looks forward to this year as it estimates a revenue of $170-175 million for 2012 Q1 and revenue of $840-860 million for the year 2012.

LinkedIn ended 2011 with over 9,200 corporate customers, up 139% from 2010. More than 60 million members joined, and it began testing Talent Pipeline, a new recruiting product that allows recruiters to easily connect and stay in touch with candidates. The company also grew by over 100% for the sixth consecutive quarter. This quarter, shares already climbed by 4% to $79.85 on the second of February.

With technology advancing incessantly and trends and taste changing so fickly, it is difficult for social media companies to meet the needs of customers at all times. However, as shown, LinkedIn seems to do a good job as it continuously boosts its stock prices and looks into the future with ambition. This year, we will need to keep an eye open as we continue to track the development of LinkedIn as well as the shift in power within the social media industry.

by Chris Kim

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Ireland's Economic Comeback

Obama pushes for diplomacy on Iran's nuclear program

Ongoing Contact