Los Angeles — Global online employment site operator Monster Worldwide Inc. is armed with a new service called BeKnown, a Facebook app that it launched over the weekend that will let the 700 million users of the popular social media community build a professional network separate and apart from the one their friends get to see, which apparently set to compete with the LinkedIn social network.
The Facebook application, BeKnown, as it is called, is set to go live Today, derives much from LinkedIn and BranchOut, but goes further than the latter and offers more versatility and flair than the former, will empower social medial Facebook users to make professional connections that are distinct from their friends, while also discovering job opportunities and controlling their professional identity.
An explanation of the service and how to sign up can be seen by clicking here.
Matthew Mund, global vice president of product for Monster, explained that since Facebook is accessed by more than 700 million members, most people are on it already. “This is the path of least resistance,” Mund says. “You can manage your professional identity and your social identity in one place.” BeKnown will also be targeted at recruiters. Mund says Monster gets about 38 million unique visitors a month.
It is not a head-on attack on LinkedIn’s ballooning recruitment business, but a flanking maneuver, focusing on younger workers just beginning to build their business contacts.
In building a network from scratch, though, Monster faces a formidable challenge. Although, Monster has bundled BeKnown with few bells and whistles that it hopes will differentiate the offering. For instance, users get Foursquare-like badges when they complete certain professional goals, such as graduating from college. Users can also follow companies and get endorsements a la LinkedIn, features not yet available on BranchOut.
Darko Dejanovic, global chief information officer and head of product at Monster Worldwide said: “BeKnown answers the need and challenge in the marketplace for people to build their professional networks on Facebook while keeping personal and work-related contacts and content completely separate.”
Speaking to Personnel Today, David Henry, vice president of media and digital marketing in Europe, said BeKnown would “expose professional networking to the masses”. Facebook has approaching 700 million users across a broad demographic, compared to LinkedIn’s 100 million mainly professional users.
With BeKnown, users on Facebook will be able to invite contacts from other social media networks to expand their BeKnown network beyond their existing Facebook friends, including Gmail, Yahoo, Twitter and, of course, Facebook.
The BeKnown app will be available for download in 19 different languages, and is accessible by any Facebook user.