Web Worker Daily

When it comes to truly professional “social” networks, there are far less than general interest and entertainment-oriented networks. Ryze is virtually dead. Xing is more global. The old standby is LinkedIn although it still struggles with its Web 2.0 features. Facebook is still trying to overcome it’s school focus in some professionals’ minds. Plaxo has tried to capitalize on their previous incarnation as a contact management system. And hybrid online/offline communities such as BizNik tend to be more niche or regionally focused.

Enter Konnects. Konnects wants to fill in the gap between LinkedIn and Facebook, providing social tools for a younger professional who may not quite have enough contacts to make LinkedIn really work for them but want to focus on business more than Facebook promotes. Konnects wants to be not only the place where business professionals can find one another but also the place where they can transact business on the site, exchanging all of the information and documentation needed to solidify a working relationship.

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Inspired by Mike G.’s spring cleaning post, I’ve been thinking about all the social networks I have joined both as part of my work and for my work. As an Internet strategist, I try to test out all the sites and Web apps that I can so I can make educated recommendations to my clients based on hands-on experience as well as research and anecdotal information. As a Web worker, I use my social networks to source stories and make contacts and connections that could lead to more work.

I decided to put three of the professional networks that I belong to through a completely non-scientific analysis to see how they are working for me. Of course, once I got this idea in my head, the answers were obvious to me, but it is a good exercise to write it all down.

So without any further ado, the networks I will look at are Ryze, SoFlow, and Xing. Read the rest of this entry »