Is the Wall Street Journal Taking a Jab at LinkedIn’s Professional Network?

WSJ product snapshot

In an effort to make its website more engaging, The Wall Street Journal has a new social networking platform in the works that may offer similar services to those of LinkedIn’s.

The company aims to leverage the power of social networking platforms to increase the time users spend on their site. At an investor day in New York, Dow Jones CEO Lex Fenwick said, “If you build applications and become a platform, it does lots of magical things that help us. It increases the customer stickiness and it means the customer spends longer on the site then he or she previously was. It allows targeted advertising as you start to understand more about your customer, what their interests are and what they may care about,” according to The Next Web.

The new social network will be centered around the WSJ Profile, or a space where users can upload a personal photo, a short bio, contact information, and information on their work experience and other work-related topics such as awards received and research projects. Here is the Profile preview that was presented in New York:

WSJ product snapshot

Along with the ability to add personal information, WSJ’s upcoming networking will also support internal messaging between users, a feature that suggests like-minded people can connect via The Wall Street Journal to share ideas. Smells a lot like LinkedIn to me.

With this news, it looks like The Wall Street Journal is attempting to monetize their website through two approaches: paid online subscription combined with advertising revenue generated from the network.

According to The Next Web, WSJ’s social network is set to launch within the next few weeks. Let us know if you gain access!

Do you think WSJ’s social network will gain traction among readers or do you think it will end up a dud?

Lauren Mobertz

By Lauren Mobertz

Lauren is the former managing editor for DashBurst. One part geek, one part urban nomad, she is constantly scouting for the latest tech and world news. In the evenings you'll find Lauren running in strange places or attempting to dance salsa.

4 comments

  1. Actually if anyone has a chance it is more likely to be Twitter or Facebook. People don’t join a social network for the brand but for the function and value they derive out of it.

  2. With people being weary of too many places to maintain, it’s not got a good enough offer, solution to make it worth many folks time. Being a copy cat to benefit your goal of more reader time on your site is not a benefit to me.

  3. dud. Many have tried and many have failed. 60% of people in Linkedin are looking for a job and its a known source for candidates, and another 20% are recruiters and HR folks using the site. Like Blackberry’s in corporate world, Linkedin as gained acceptance as legit in the eyes of compliance. Its entrenched and a few fancy pants articles cant knock Linkedin out of its box.

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