Wow! amazing with the power of the internet. This is what happening in this current melting down economy. Given the state of the economy, many people decided to jump on board. Professional networking is a ‘must do’ during unstable economic times.

The economic crisis slamming firms across the globe has sparked a spike in usage of professional networks like Xing and Linkedln, as people hedge against losing work and laid-off employees seek jobs. US unemployment hit a new 14-year high in October 2008 and according to online job advertising firm Monster, recruitment activity on the Web plunged to its lowest level in nearly 3 years. Jobless rates are also rising in Europe.

Traffic on the world’s top professional web networks has surged since the financial crisis started to make headlines, with top player, privately held Linkedln, notching 25% more registrations in September than forecast. Membership on Linkedln has jumped to more than 31 million from 18 million at the start of the year, growing fastest in the financial services, media, education and technology fields. This is what being reported by Kevin Eyres, head of Linkedln’s operations in Europe.

“The recruitment industry in general is being hit hard. In financial services it’s clearly very bad. In construction it’s bad. In retail it’s getting bad,” said Evan.

A German based, Xing from Hamburg, which has 6.5 million users in total and whose half a million premium users pay 5.95 euros (about RM30) per month for extra services, has seen a jump in registrations and connections to record levels and believes the crisis could open opportunities to grow through acquisition. “The crisis is very benefitial for us. We are debt-free, with over 40 million euros (RM200 million) in cash….,” said Xing CEO, Lars Hinrichs.

So guys, it is possible for us to find our ways online. Be positive and keep thinking and thinking and thinking. Networks are very good example of weak ties. Traditionally it has been thought that we need strong ties to get jobs, but we often get jobs through weak ties, not strong ties.

So in this current economy uncertainties, let’s do networking to get the connections, for a better things to come in our life. This could be done and is possible with the power of the Internet ties.

In other words,

“Networking Pays” and you must do it in style!

Read more here: http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/pip_Internet_ties.pdf

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