The mantra of the marketing world seems to be “Anything you can do I can do better.” Companies seem to be reflecting this notorious line from Irving Berlin’s 1946 Broadway musical “Annie Get Your Gun” in their constant efforts to get a leg up on their competition. This is most recently being seen by professional social networking site LinkedIn, which is reportedly looking to ramp up its ads to make them more like those of big hitters like Twitter and Facebook.
The site, which currently boasts 238 million registered users, is expected to release a new advertising application programming interface (API) to help simplify the process for brands and agencies looking to make big “media buys” on the site. The news broke from LinkedIn’s very own CEO, Jeff Weiner, who explained in the company’s most recent quarterly earnings call that this is currently a “high priority.”
Weiner further expressed interest in delivering a “robust set of APIs for social marketing agencies to best leverage the platform.” While no date is in the works just yet for the official launch, it is high on the company’s list of priorities.
image via LinkedIn
LinkedIn has been doing especially well as of late, having reported second quarter results that soared past top analyst predictions. Specifically, the company’s revenue was 59 percent higher than one year ago, whereas analysts forecasted a slightly lower – yet nonetheless healthy – 55 percent growth. At the end of the day, LinkedIn saw total revenue of $363.7 million – representing notable growth from the company’s revenue of $228 million from that time last year. Even more, the company’s shares increased 7.9 percent (at $229.75) in only hours following the news of its impressive revenue growth.
While LinkedIn does currently offer an Ads API, according to reports, it’s a more “limited, private release.” Tech news media source TechCrunch reports that expanding its API offerings to be larger and more public shows the company’s commitment to becoming more serious about how it accrues revenue from the ads on its platform.
With Facebook shares soaring 40 percent in only one week thanks to the increase the company saw in its mobile ad revenue, we can’t say we blame LinkedIn for wanting to step up its game, too.
Edited by
Ryan Sartor
