LinkedIn Reveals a Hideous New Look
LinkedIn has a new look.
It’s awful.
On so many levels. Here are just three:
Irrelevant news feeds. First, I am greeted with a “News” section that I cannot get rid of. The “News” features headlines from a company I haven’t worked with in 8 years. It’s not relevant to me. And it’s not why I use LinkedIn.
Bad ads and bad ad placement. Second, some of the worst video ads ever created are flashing uncontrollably in the upper right. Because these highly distracting ads are next to the unwanted, irrelevant news feeds, my first act upon visiting the new LinkedIn page is to scroll down as quickly as possible. The relevant area of LinkedIn — the status updates — are at the very bottom of the page. LinkedIn advertisers should be dismayed by the negative impressions and low click-through these ads generate.
Ripping off FaceBook, only not as well. Third, it’s pretty clear that LinkedIn is trying to be more FaceBook-y by adding “Status Updates”. This feature would actually be OK – except that LinkedIn expects me to manually update my status, instead of playing nice with other social media mechanisms. For example, FaceBook lets me update status through Twitter. And Twitter automatically updates whenever I post at my blogs. LinkedIn remains stand-alone, sitting in its own sandbox, expecting everyone to play within rigidly drawn boundaries. And that takes the “social” right out of “social networking”, doesn’t it?
The new LinkedIn homepage layout gets me to thinking — “Hmmm….if LinkedIn wants to be FaceBook-y, only not as social as FaceBook, and without the audience of FaceBook — why bother with a pretender?”
Surely, this disaster can’t last! How long will it take for LinkedIn to wise up? Will it be when a) advertisers pull the plug on bad ad placements that cause negative impressions or b) when users flee the scene for more relevant social media venues?
ps — Please feel free to comment: what do YOU think about the new LinkedIn layout?
Related Posts:If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
[...] conclusion was, “these updates feel like an attempt to mimic Facebook.” Another was Laura Bergells who dubbed it a hideous new [...]