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When LinkedIn purchased mobile newsreader Pulse for $90 million in April, the message was loud and clear — the world’s biggest professional network is serious about content.

“LinkedIn argues that it is acquiring Pulse because it wants the site to “be the definitive professional publishing platform — where all professionals come to consume content and where publishers come to share their content,” wrote Frederic Lardinois for TechCrunch. 

The idea is simple. Start your day with great content on LinkedIn. Then, hop back on the network for your afternoon brain-break. If you rely on LinkedIn to help you advance in your field, the high quality content will be your most powerful resource.

A Niche in the B2B Market

B2B marketers constantly struggle to find the right professional audience. While blogs can be a powerful medium, they are frequently limited in readership and influence. That’s where LinkedIn comes in.

“One of the things that we’re increasingly focused on in 2013 is going to be the opportunity to support content marketing,” said LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner in a conversation with analysts and investors. 

What LinkedIn is becoming is a content hub with a built-in social component. The outlook?

“The platform hopes to become a giant information exchange where users can swap exclusive content like white papers, presentations, and expert discussions,” explained Joe Lazauskas in an article for The Content Strategist.

Custom Communities & Advertising Opportunities

LinkedIn is a community built on layers — the first being direct professional relationships. The platform’s users are also looking for value beyond their real life connections. That’s where niche groups come in.

According to Jonathan Lister, LinkedIn’s advertising sales and operations leader, big brands are leveraging LinkedIn to complement their traditional marketing efforts.

“They do this by building custom communities on the LinkedIn platform like Citi’s Connect: Professional Women’s Network, or through targeted sponsored updates currently being tested by GE and Xerox,” Lister wrote for FastCompany. “They spend their time on our platform creating and feeding content which will resonate with their base, and in turn, build committed followers from which they can glean insight.”

A Hub for Influencers

Last year, LinkedIn released an open call for influencers — connected CEOs, experts, and career coaches — and gave them a platform to write. Here’s how LinkedIn’s microblogging platform was born. 

“LinkedIn’s newest feature, thought leaders, allows users to follow the world’s most influential thinkers,” wrote Lewis Howes for the Clarity Blog. “Everyone from President Barack Obama to Richard Branson are flocking to this platform for one major reason: reach.”

Why read 100 business leader blogs when you can find all the thought leadership that you need in one place? Through its microblogging platform, LinkedIn is capitalizing on this idea — that audiences love great content but want everything aggregated, in one place, on an easy to navigate platform.

From professional network to multimedia giant, LinkedIn is leading the content marketing charge. Do you think that the investment will ultimately yield an ROI? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Seven years ago, the app industry didn’t even exist. Flash forward to today — the mobile economy is now worth an estimated $25 billion — a number that translates into 500,000 jobs. And the future? By 2016, apps marketplaces will almost double in size to nearly $46 billion .

According to research from iStrategyLabs, the average smartphone user has more than 100 apps on their mobile devices. U.S. consumers spend approximately two hours per day using their apps with 43% of their time spent on games and 26% spent on social media. By the end of this year, consumers will be downloading two billion apps per week. 

The world of mobile has never looked brighter. Here’s what you need to know.

Tablet Commerce Is Taking Off

Adobe Digital Index recently analyzed 23 billion website visits and found that tablet usage tripled from 2011 to 2012. Adobe believes that by early 2014, 10% of web traffic will come from tablets. 

This should be cause for action for many retailers. As GetElastic’s Linda Bustos points out, only 7% of retailers have tablet-friendly websites. 

That’s a trend that needs to change —  by 2016, tablets are expected to outship PCs.According to eMarketer, 15% of online retail sales in 2013 will take place on mobile devices — with tablets leading the charge. By 2017? That number will rise to 25%. 

Consumers Value On-Demand Details

Last holiday season, smartphones were a major consumer staple. According to a January Pew Center report, nearly 60% of cell owners used their phones inside brick-and-mortar stores for assistance in making a purchase. 

Shoppers rely on their mobile devices to consult with friends and family, research reviews, and compare prices. Young adults are leading the charge with this trend. 

Consumers want details — now and without blinking. Smartphones empower shoppers with that craving for instant information. 

Smartphones Are Life’s Hub

“For several years, technology companies have promised the dream of the connected home, the connected body and the connected car,” wrote Brian X. Chen for The New York Times. “Those connections have proved illusory. But in the last year app-powered accessories have provided the mechanism to actually make the connections.”

People are inseparable from their smartphones, which are quickly becoming life’s hub for staying in touch, managing finances, reading the news, and keeping comfortable.

Thanks to mobile, people are perpetually connected — a double-edged sword for both brands and consumers.

How does mobile fit into your brand’s strategy?

Native advertising is taking the marketing world by storm. The idea? Present audiences with information that they’ll value and enjoy.  These days, online advertising is the norm — banners, widgets, and lead gen forms are everywhere. Brands are constantly competing for consumers’ attention — and even more so, users are looking away.

“Traditional display advertising such as banners, pre-roll, and pop-ups continue to perform poorly due in no small part to vastly low public appeal,”according to a recent infographic by Column Five Media. 

Banner blindness is causing major pain-points for conversion-driven marketers who prioritize results. Between 2000 and 2012, banner ad click-through rates decreased from 9% to 0.2%, says Column Five.

Native advertising is a new way to build substantive audience connections where all parties win — the advertiser is able to engage with users, and the customer is able to enjoy a high-value multimedia experience. 

What Is Native Advertising?

This marketing strategy boosts user experience by delivering content in-stream. Brands and agencies are teaming up with major publishers like Forbes, Atlantic Media, and the Washington Post to connect with consumer audiences.

“Forbes BrandVoice allows marketers to connect directly with the Forbes audience by enabling them to create great content – and participate in the conversation – on the Forbes digital publishing platform,” wrote Frederic Filloux for The Guardian. “Each BrandVoice is written, edited and produced by the marketer.”

Native ads can be in article or video form. Some brands hire professional journalists, and others leverage in-house teams to cover recent events, evergreen topics, or areas of controversy. You can do anything as long as you follow one rule — make it compelling.

Does It Work?

New spaces have limited data — however, a recent study from Sharethrough and IPG Media Lab suggests that native ads are on to something big. 

The study examined nearly 5,000 consumers on their response to native advertising. Of these participants, 200 agreed to have their eye movements tracked.

“The results overwhelmingly backed up the central contention of companies like Sharethrough, which helps publishers push their native ads across different platforms: that readers are more likely to pay attention to marketing messages that resemble the content around them,” wrote Jeff Bercovici for Forbes. 

Study participants were 25% more likely to look at a native ad than banner — they also looked at native ads more often in the testing session.

It’s Emotional, Powerful, and Relevant

Native ads work because they aren’t salesy. Self-promotional pitches can only take your brand so far — no consumer wants to be beaten over the head with aggressive advertising.

“A native ad is something that consumers read, interact with, even share — it fills up their attention space, for a certain period of time, in a way that banner ads never do,” wrote Felix Salmon for Reuters. 

This is a marketing strategy that does more than sell. It builds trust, forges bonds, and sparks a conversation. It’s a pull-mechanism that empowers consumers while keeping them interested.

Are native ads a fit with your brand strategy? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

It’s hard to believe that 2013 is already under way. Last year, the tech sector saw some amazing innovation — the rise of Pinterest, the sale of Instagram to Facebook for $1 billion, and historic highs in Internet ad revenue. This year, already-strong product and business models are positioned to grow even more. 

A key theme that consulting giant Deloitte highlights is the concept of “social reeingineering by design.” In other words — “how work gets done is no longer constrained by 19th century platforms.”

These last few years have introduced new business models and monetization strategies — like affiliate marketing, online subscriptions, pay-per-click. These techniques have evolved into the foundations for commerce on the Internet. They’ve also opened doors to even more creative business strategies. Here’s what to expect in 2013.

1. Peer-to-Peer Business Models

“In the 20th century, consumer goods became key focal points for every Western economy,” wrote Dan Martell for the Clarity blog. “From televisions to cell phones, computers, luxury cars, entertainment, travel, and leisure, the concept of private ownership — especially in the United States — was entwined with prosperity.”

Now, that perspective is changing. People are pursuing options for cost-effective and sustainable living. They’re sharing instead of owning.

“Thanks in part to refined high-tech platforms, close-knit social media communities, and the economic downturn, peer-to-peer markets are emerging in key sectors including travel (AirBnB), transportation (Getaround, Relay Rides, Zipcar, Zimride), fashion (Rent the Runway, 99Dresses), skills (TaskRabbit, Zaarly), and even kids’ clothing (thredUP),” Martell said. 

And it’s not just the consumer goods industry. Everyday consumers are participating in crowdfunding programs like Kickstarter, peer lending networks like Prosper, and shared office space environments. 

2. Niche Social Networks

Phase one of social media was the rise of general networks like Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. Then came B2B platform LinkedIn and intellectual discussion platform Quora. Over the next year, social media initiatives will continue to become more niche.

“The idea of appealing to a specific core audience isn’t exactly new,” wrote Christian Arno for SearchEngineWatch. “Forums, message boards, and online communities — the forerunners to social media sites as we know them today — have brought people with shared interests together for years.”

But these social networks aren’t looking to grow to the scale of Facebook and Twitter.

“They’re not necessarily looking to compete with the big boys on their own terms, but to win their own dedicated and highly specific sets of followers,” wrote Arno. 

One example is HealthTap, an online platform that connects patients with doctors to address common medical questions. Another example is Doximity, a HIPAA-compliant professional network for doctors to share information about their patients. 

3. Education 2.0

Student debt in the United States has now surpassed $1 trillion, and it is becoming increasingly clearer that continued education is becoming increasingly out of reach. With a national unemployment rate close to 8 percent and a widespread shortage of talent, the demand for skill-building remains strong. 

That’s why alternative education programs are emerging through free or low cost models. Now, you can learn valuable skills in data, computer programming, finance, and business without the price tag of a major university.

These platforms are even combining free education with profitability. Udemy, for instance, works with employers to recruit top-performing students in exchange for a referral fee. Online platform Lynda.com charges students a monthly fee in exchange for unlimited access to professional lectures. General Assembly hosts expert-led classes, lectures, and development workshops in exchange for an attendance fees. 

Through new health platforms, people are able to get smarter for less — in return, these education providers are still able to make a profit. Will 2013 be the year that these ventures begin to scale?

Your Thoughts

What core tech trends do you think should also be on this list? Which are your favorite? This year is going to be an exciting one, and businesses on the Internet are starting to mature. And still, opportunities are boundless. 

1. Where he’s from: The bustling suburban metropolis of Huber Heights, OH (home of rock band Hawthorne Heights, of “Ohio is for Lovers” fame).
2. Hobbies/Interests/What he does when he’s not working: Playing volleyball (some might say I have an unhealthy addiction to it).
3. Favorite TMK Memory: Presenting on Aboslut Vodka’s sponsorship of RuPaul’s Drag Race in front of the entire company during Presentation Skills class, and Patrick So laughing out loud in an otherwise quiet room at my “You Betta Drink!!!” title slide (PS. I had only been working at TMK for 2 weeks).
4. Favorite thing about TMK: The people, durr!