I was going to wait until mid-year to write this post, but with LinkedIn’s recent IPO, the timing deserved to be accelerated.
Here’s what I wrote in December 2010:
“2011 will be the year of the social IPO. Leaders who can navigate these waters successfully will be few and far between. My money is on the ones who have done it before.“
LinkedIn is just the beginning. As mainstream media picks up the story of instant millionaires 2.0, social IPOs will be in the news on a regular basis.
“Got APIs? Businesses that have never considered their information as an ecosystem asset wake up to emergent uses and possibilities from sharing. B2B brings sexy back in 2011.”
RSS isn’t friendly enough for most users, so there’s little chance that we’ll hear a lot about APIs. But this is where value is being driven in B2B – businesses should stop obsessing about individual qualitative mentions and focus on big data and analytics.
“Game over for LBS businesses based on game mechanics. Facebook Places adoption will rise dramatically as integration with the social graph drives greater positive feedback for users from check-ins. Users tire in their pursuit of badges and digital paraphernalia, opting for engagement with their friends instead.”
Places hasn’t killed anything yet and LBS companies that ride the IPO wave will gain more time to die slowly. In the meantime, keep an eye out for Aaron Strout and Mike Schneider‘s forthcoming book on LBS.
One thing’s for sure: social business is very real. It must be the money.
Peter – great post. And kudos for following up on your 2010 predictions for 2011 while the iron was still hot. Even better is your balanced approach by not just presenting what came true (LinkedIn IPO et al.) along with the fact that Facebook Places hasn’t yet killed the other LBS. Personally, I’m a little surprised that FB hasn’t done more with their LBS offering given how many active users they have but lack of adoption seems to be coming from a combination of poor execution, lack of customer focus and for some folks and any gaming dynamics (not for everyone but certainly a must for many early adopters).
Also, thanks for the shout out on the book. Mike and I are thrilled to have the writing process just about in the rear view mirror.
Best,
Aaron