Which Is Worth More, Twitter Or LinkedIn?
Both Twitter and LinkedIn are said to be valued at around $1 billion by their venture capitalists. The Twitter figure originates in a recent TechCrunch report, while LinkedIn was priced by former CEO Dan Nye last year. Note that Nye’s valuation came before he left the company in a shakeup that had LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman seizing control again and bringing in an interim president from Greylock, one of LinkedIn’s investors.
Yes, Twitter and LinkedIn are both social networks, but the similarities end there. Nye last year claimed LinkedIn has been profitable since 2006, while Twitter doesn’t make money. (One source said Twitter co-founder Biz Stone had no clue how Twitter was going to make money when he started the company, and that was part of Twitter’s charm for investors — Stone seemed so excited just by the idea of Twitter).
Nye declared LinkedIn’s billion-dollar valuation after the company had raised $53 million in four rounds (it has since done a Series E of $22.7 million), while Twitter’s new funding would bring its total to over $150 million.
Web site traffic differs. LinkedIn is a top 50 site on Quantcast, with 14.2 million U.S. visitors per month, but that’s half the number of U.S. visitors to Twitter. (However, Quantcast’s numbers on Twitter are only estimates). ComScore earlier this year declared Twitter the fastest growing property on the Web.
I could go on. Company valuations are a bit of a black art anyway, don’t you think? So which company do you think is worth more — Twitter or LinkedIn?
Related posts:
Hagrid said on September 24, 2009
LinkedIn is making money. Twitter is not.
LinkedIn users can upgrade to premium services for a fee. Twitter is just a platform for others to use (and make money).
Twitter’s valuation is based on the assumption that Google or other company will acquire the platform for a premium (now >$1 billion).
If somebody does acquire Twitter, how will THEY monetize it? That’s what I’d like to know.
John K said on September 24, 2009
that’s very easy – LinkedIn They have shown they can monetize and drive revenue.
Twitter has just generated lots of buzz. Facebook will eat their lunch after acquiring Friendfeed.
jenkins said on September 25, 2009
pretty ridiculous considering Linkedin is a real company and twitter’s site still crashes every few days.