LinkedIn came to India in 2009 and has grown into a platform with more than 100 million professionals, which is a big milestone for the Microsoft-owned social media platform. It has evolved from a ‘jobs site’ to a thriving professional community where members come together to share knowledge, ideas and opportunities, says Ashutosh Gupta, Country Manager for India at LinkedIn.
Gupta adds with pride, “We’ve seen that having a trusted online professional community where people can go and support each other amidst the economic uncertainty is incredibly valuable.”
The two-decade-old company credits this growth to its “members-first” approach. According to Gupta, “India is LinkedIn’s largest market outside of the US and our long-term members-first approach to growth is working well. With a growing member base, we are also seeing strong customer demand on the other side of the marketplace for hiring, learning, marketing, selling and training.”
e4m spoke to Gupta to understand LinkedIn's revenue model, growth of its Hindi platform, expansion plans and much more.
Excerpts:
Can you please explain your revenue model?
We have a strong, diversified business model with revenue coming from member subscriptions, hiring and learning solutions, advertising sales and SaaS solutions for sales professionals. Whether companies are looking to build their brand, understand real-time labour market trends, attract, hire and develop talent, or market and sell their products and services, LinkedIn’s unique data and insights empower businesses and help them grow.
We are among the top three players in each of our four core businesses-Talent Solutions, Marketing Solutions, Sales Solutions and Learning Solutions.
Around 97% of Fortune 100 companies globally use Talent Solutions to meet their talent acquisition and development needs. In Q4 FY22, Talent Solutions surpassed $6 billion in revenue over the past 12 months, up 39% year-over-year.
As far as Marketing Solutions is concerned, we surpassed $5 billion in revenue in FY22 and continue to be a B2B advertising leader that offers companies higher reach and ROI. More than 96k products have Product Pages on LinkedIn and approximately 63M companies have a Page on LinkedIn. Clients that participated in B2B Edge in FY22 collectively invested over half a billion with LinkedIn Marketing Solutions in the past 2 fiscal years.
Our Sales Solutions surpassed $1B in revenue in January 2022. As measured by revenue, we are the number 1 sales intelligence provider. More than 1.2 million sellers use Sales Navigator. InMails are 3x more likely to be accepted than a cold call and 6x more likely to be accepted than email.
Moreover, LinkedIn Learning offers over 20,600 courses across business, creative and technical categories, as of April 2023. Members added 446 million skills to their profiles over the last 12 months, up 48% year-over-year.
Can you please share your revenue growth in India over the past three years?
Our revenue is up by almost 84% from FY20 and nearly 4x over the last five years. India is LinkedIn’s second largest business market in the Asia Pacific with some of the biggest global customers in the IT sector such as TCS, Infosys, Wipro, big ed-tech players, and several unicorn startups.
In terms of content, how has the Indian market evolved over the years?
LinkedIn has evolved from a ‘jobs site’ to a thriving professional community where members come together to share knowledge, exchange ideas and opportunities. We have seen a two-fold increase in the sharing of knowledge-based content derived from firsthand experiences. These insights cover a wide range of topics including creating business plans, scaling startups, fostering a culture in hybrid environments, and developing recession-proof skills. Members are actively engaging with this content, which is deeply rooted in knowledge and insights, to grow and thrive as professionals in these dynamic times.
We’re also seeing an increase in conversations about emerging workplace trends on LinkedIn. From the "Great Resignation" to the "Great Reshuffle," and from ‘quiet quitting’ to ‘moonlighting’, unique workplace conversations are emerging from a broader audience on our platform.
Our findings show that professionals in India are building new skills and looking for roles that best match their values. Around 84% of Indians agree that skills are more important than degrees compared to 20 years ago in the workplace.
In 2022 alone, members in India spent nearly 4.6 million hours learning and upskilling on LinkedIn – almost twice the global average. The future of work will be about potential over pedigree. Professionals who are proactive in their approach to learning new skills, be it AI or coding, stand to gain amidst this great resetting of the workplace.
Besides, young Indians are prioritising working in companies that demonstrate a commitment to the culture and values they support. We have introduced a new job search filter for professionals to easily find open roles based on an organisation's commitment to values like work-life balance, DEI, career growth, social impact, and sustainability.
Has the Indian market given you the largest growth?
India has played a pivotal role in driving LinkedIn's remarkable growth. The vibrant and engaged audience in India has made it one of our most active and engaged communities around the world. India's position as our second largest business market in the Asia Pacific region highlights the impact and trust we have earned among businesses and professionals across markets.
You also launched Hindi LinkedIn in 2021. How has been the response so far? How many users do you have on that platform?
A key part of our strategy in India is localising our product offerings so more communities can harness the potential of our platform to thrive as professionals. The launch of LinkedIn in Hindi was our first big step forward, boosting access to opportunities for 600 million Hindi speakers around the world, 500 million of whom are in India. We're witnessing growing interest and engagement in Hindi on our platform, and we're committed to investing in new features and resources that cater to the needs of Indian professionals.
What are your expansion plans?
As we charge towards the next two decades, we are laser-focused on our commitment to building a skills-first labour market that is efficient and equitable. We are constantly making strides in that direction with strategic needs in product innovation and adoption in the Indian market. Our Bengaluru R&D centre is a hub for technological developments globally with a fantastic team of engineers. We will continue to invest in the centre with a focus on building a safe and trustworthy platform for audiences in India and the world.
We’re also excited about generative AI and how we can use this new technology to help support the hiring process and make our customers be even more productive and successful in their jobs.
