LinkedIn's Mobile Growth

LinkedIn, the professional networking site, just released it's 3Q results this past week. Althought they were at a loss of $3.4M this past quarter versus a $2.3M profit one year ago, there has been little concern from both LinkedIn and the investors side. That's because both have seen a significant growth in both LinkedIn's ad revenue from mobile and also in LinkedIn's mobile user adoption rate. So much so that revenues this quarter jumped close to $400M versus $252M last year (a 56% growth). LinkedIn now has over 259M users worldwide, a significant portion of them using LinkedIn's mobile app to connect with professionals (CEO Jeff Weiner expects at some point that close to 50% of it's traffic will come from mobile). 

What's important about all the growth is how LinkedIn has found a way to engage it's users on it's mobile platform. Whenever they release new products, they have always pushed them with a two prong approach--one for its traditional site and one for it's mobile platform. Meaning LI intro, sponsored updates, and navigator (some of LinkedIns's new products) are always available on mobile just as you would expect them on their normal PC platform. There's no waiting on the app to become available. 

Secondly, LinkedIn has said their biggest success has been the content they publish (for example, influencer posts). High content has drawn users back to using its mobile app and getting the necessary ad clicks to generate revenue. As advertisers try to find ways to bring back users and keep them engaged on mobile, it might be worth taking a look at just producing highly relevant content versus other gimmicks. User mindshare or time is never abundant and more are requiring better information to gain their eyeballs.