Looking to steal some of Facebook’s mobile ads thunder, this week leading professional social network LinkedIn revealed plans to monetize its mobile app with the best mechanism available for doing just that – mobile advertising.
On Thursday, the big story for LinkedIn was that the company’s fourth-quarter revenue rose 105 percent thanks to an income spike born of the platform’s new job recruiting services.
But as it turns out, Facebook isn’t going to be the only prominent social network that will soon monetize its mobile app via advertising. During Thursday’s fourth quarter earnings call, LinkedIn executives confirmed that the platform will soon introduce advertising to its popular mobile apps.
LinkedIn, however, has at least done what Facebook hasn’t. Facebook is yet to confirm the rumor of forthcoming mobile ads. LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, while not elaborating greatly, did acknowledge that his company is actively putting the mobile ad infrastructure in place and will soon “introduce advertising in our mobile solutions.”
“2011 was a landmark year for LinkedIn,” Weiner said during the conference call. And he expects 2012 to be even bigger.
