What changes in The recently announced acquisition of LinkedIn by Microsoft leaves us fearful about the future of this professional social network.
While it has been announced that LinkedIn will maintain its brand, culture and independence, and will be separate businesses, it is also known that Microsoft’s track record in past acquisitions has never been the most user-friendly. There have been numerous cases of bundled sales of Microsoft products, updates that cause problems for users or restrictions on free access to many features.
LinkedIn has been an exceptional tool What changes in
For professional relationships, social selling , market intelligence and building professional reputation; but will it continue to be?
According to Microsoft, the reason for the largest acquisition in history is the belief that they can help in the “monetization” of the tool (read: charge more for LinkedIn features ). It also means that they are looking to unite work tools, such as Microsoft’s Office program, with tools for connecting people (social networks), an area of activity that the company was very far from.
The fact is that acquiring control
Of the social network, with more than 430 million users, provides access to the gigantic database, with greater power to segment users, such as personal information, previous jobs, skills, interests, contact network, etc.
From this perspective, the billion-dollar lbank database would have a unit value of approximately US$60.00 per user; a value considered low due to the potential benefits of this type of information.
The purchase takes place precisely at a time when Microsoft was already a company that had fallen behind, given recent technological transformations.
Another opportunity is for Microsoft to utilize this has often happened Lynda.com training video channel, recently acquired by LinkedIn, as part of its Excel, Powerpoint, etc.
Companies that focus on what they will gain from an acquisition are less successful than those that focus on what they can contribute.
As for us users, all we can do is wait and see
Will we uab directory to use LinkedIn or will we soon migrate, by our own choice, to another professional social networking platform, free from the risks presented by Microsoft in dealing with users?