Time to link out of Linkedin?

LinkdedIn has sometimes been referred to as the “facebook” for professionals as the majority of registered users are over the age of 30. Now that facebook has grown up and grown beyond college social networking, is LinkedIn still relevant?  

With over 14 million subscribers in over 400 economic regions (as defined by LinkedIn), at first glance it would appear that the site is doing pretty well… although when put into perspective with a site like facebook that has nearly 40 million users as of September 2007 with the vast majority being at least weekly or monthly active users, LinkedIn seems less relevant.  A survey of my LinkedIn network reveals that most of my contacts rarely access the site and have found little value overall in being a member of their network. The reason?  LinkedIn was a good concept, but it was never a great website or experience. Now that we’ve all built up our social equity in other sites such as facebook, LinkedIn no longer seems relevant.

5 reasons why LinkedIn is no longer relevant (or 5 things they can do to regain relevance):

1) It’s not a community site by today’s standards. Where are the community tools? It would be nice to see RSS feeds and more ways for user generated content to be incorporated into the site.  How about a people map to visually link people in your network together? I’ve seen / experienced this done to great affect in other tools such as those offered by Leverage Software. If the tool is all about making connections or finding professinal matches, offer a visual way to see who is in your network…and offer filtering tools to change the view based on your preferences. The site needs to be more than a business card scan repository if you want engagement and relevance.

2) There is no mobile website - which is ridiculous when many “business” users have a blackberry or other PDA device and are already using the mobile web to access information and mobile email to keep in touch with contacts.  Having a mobile website that is built for the mobile web is now table steaks for any social networking site.  There are also no SMS alerts for when people in your network ask questions, send email & request updates etc. 

3) The current user interface and overall user experience is dated. The UI needs to be more intuitive. Give the site a new look, add some personality and make it easier to move around the site. A better user experience = more engagement which will lead to more social equity in the site.

4) Fee-based system. The free service is not bad…but why make the best features available only through the pay model? This restricts usage, engagement, and it’s social graph.  Web 2.0 sites are giving away everything away for free…so why pay anything for what is essentially a contact management website?

5) No unique or compelling offer. As marketers, we know in order for a campaign to succeed we need a strong call to action to get somebody’s attention - but if the product is not unique, people will not stay engaged. Try putting lipstick on a pig… people will still see that it’s a pig - albeit a more attractive one?  LinkedIn offers a way for people to look for jobs, find answers to their business questions and build their online reputation. The problem is that other sites do a much better job at this too - like monster.com for jobs and yahoo answers. Create something better…something unique and the social graph will get better.

If you believe like me that it’s time to link out of Linkedin…you better get started as it may take some time. Unlike other social media platforms, there is no automated way to disable your account and remove your profile from the LinkedIn system. You have to submit a customer support ticket to be removed. 

At least they are consistent.

UPDATE 9/25/07 - Just came across an interesting article on this topic over at brand and market blogspot

UPDATE 9/27/07 - Check out book on LinkedIn entitled “I’m on LinkedIn…now what?” by Jason Alba