The news wasn’t all bad this week for social media companies reporting their quarterly earnings.
After the close of trading on Thursday, LinkedIn, the social media site you often forget about when you’re not looking for a new job, announced earnings that beat expectations, sending the company’s stock up more than 12 percent in after-hours trading.
Revenue at the Mountain View, Calif., company rose 37 percent from the same period last year to $780 million. LinkedIn lost $40.5 million, or 31 cents a share, up from $4.3 million, or 3 cents a share, last year. But not including certain expenses like employee stock compensation, the company would have made 78 cents a share, well above the 47 cents a share analysts were expecting.
More important, LinkedIn also raised its financial forecast for the full year.
That stands in contrast to another big name in social media, Twitter, which reported its earnings earlier in the week. While Twitter saw significant revenue growth in the most recent quarter, the one number Wall Street is watching — user growth — remained stagnant. And the San Francisco company also dampened expectations for its fourth quarter.
There doesn’t appear to be a common message to be gleaned from results from the two companies. Twitter’s challenges are well documented. And LinkedIn appears to be finding more ways to squeeze money from its less glamorous service.
Next week, Facebook will announce its quarterly results, which are expected to be strong. Perhaps the only big question will be how much advertising Facebook is pulling away from the smaller social media companies.