If there was any doubt that commercial reasons were behind the move, it’s gone now. Both emails end by proposing that the companies join LinkedIn’s “Partner Program for enterprise products.” A representative for LinkedIn has confirmed that the companies would pay for this access.

While BranchOut and BeKnown got all the attention, LinkedIn also cut off access to at least four other companies. Startup mixtent and resume parsing company Daxtra are two more companies that serve recruiters that were affected. As of this morning, the import function that is the core of mixtent’s service appears to be completely broken.

Unlike mixtent, Monster seems unmoved. A spokesperson said that “LinkedIn is actually the smallest source of BeKnown network growth compared with other sources.” Similarly, a BranchOut spokesperson said that “changes to the LinkedIn API have little impact on the BranchOut experience, as it was only being used by a small fraction of our users.”

A LinkedIn representative said that they had been in contact with Monster and BranchOut since the emails, but representatives for both companies denied that they were engaged in any discussions with LinkedIn regarding restoring API access.

The full emails are below, but here’s the rest of what I found notable:

• I wrote that LinkedIn had cut off access to the API because the companies were competitive, which is prohibited by LinkedIn’s API Terms of Use. Competition still underlies this decision, but the specific trespass that LinkedIn cites is that both BranchOut and Monster intend to charge “fees for access to LinkedIn’s Content,” which is also not kosher under the TOU.
• The move appears to be preemptive, since BranchOut does not charge for access to user data at this point in time.
• Unlike BranchOut, Monster is already very much in the business of charging for access to data. However, the LinkedIn move seems preemptive there as well, since the BeKnown database is currently separate from the main Monster database. The company has acknowledged plans to merge them in the future.
• LinkedIn claims that Monster is also in violation of the TOU for sending emails via the API to promote BeKnown.

The emails were sent by Adam Trachtenberg, the director of LinkedIn’s Developer Network, to his counterparts at Monster and BranchOut.

This is the complete email from LinkedIn to Monster:

From: Adam Trachtenberg
Date: July 1, 2011 12:29:16 PM CDT
Subject: Important information about BeKnown’s LinkedIn Developer Program account

Dear Mark,

LinkedIn’s Developer Platform Program helps partner websites build the professional web with LinkedIn.  Specifically, LinkedIn’s People API allows our partners to add professional identity to their sites with LinkedIn member profile and connection data to create a richer professional web experience for our members.  LinkedIn’s Messaging API allows our partners to use LinkedIn’s Inbox to make their applications a social communications hub by letting their customers send invitations to connect on LinkedIn and messages to existing connections.

We have become aware of your recently launched BeKnown application on Facebook.  Your use of the LinkedIn APIs in connection with this product violates LinkedIn’s API Terms of Use and Platform Guidelines by, at a minimum, using the APIs to send messages to promote BeKnown.  Also, we have concerns that LinkedIn Content imported into BeKnown will be used in connection with your enterprise sourcing products, and, in effect, you will be charging fees for access to LinkedIn Content.  As a result, we have disabled the BeKnown application’s access to the LinkedIn’s APIs.

We have a Partner Program for enterprise products and, if your messaging violations are corrected, are open to discussing with you whether BeKnown offerings are a fit.  If you are interested, please contact Scott Roberts, our Senior Director, Business Development, at sroberts@linkedin.com.

Regards,

Adam Trachtenberg
Director of Developer Network

And this is the full email from LinkedIn to BranchOut:

From: Adam Trachtenberg
Date: July 1, 2011 12:29:07 PM CDT
Subject: Important information about BranchOut’s LinkedIn Developer Program account

Dear Nathan,

LinkedIn’s Developer Platform Program helps partner websites build the professional web with LinkedIn.  Specifically, LinkedIn’s People API allows our partners to add professional identity to their sites with LinkedIn member profile and connection data to create a richer professional web experience for our members.

We recently became aware of BranchOut’s imminent launch of a premium enterprise recruiting search tool.  BranchOut’s use of LinkedIn’s API to support this tool violates LinkedIn’s API Terms of Use by, at a minimum, by charging fees for access to LinkedIn’s Content.  As a result, we have disabled BranchOut’s access to the LinkedIn API.

We have a Partner Program for enterprise products and are open to discussing with you whether BranchOut’s offerings are a fit.  If you are interested, please contact Scott Roberts, our Senior Director, Business Development, at sroberts@linkedin.com.

Regards,

Adam Trachtenberg

Director of Developer Network

As we’ve reported, both services are designed to leverage Facebook’s social graph and more than 750 million users to help them find career opportunities through their friends. Until LinkedIn’s move, they had been able to use the API to give those Facebook users a shortcut in creating a resume on their own services, making them easier to set up.

As this conflict unfolds, we are going to hear a lot from each party about how they are acting in consumer’s best interests, while the other side is trampling their rights. Don’t be fooled by the rhetoric though — all three companies are simply following the money and acting for their own best interests.

LinkedIn has not yet commented publicly about this situation, and its blog doesn’t even hint that anything out of the ordinary is going on. But when it does, LinkedIn will likely claim that it is protecting its users’ privacy. Who could argue with that?

But the real motivation here is something else. LinkedIn’s rapidly growing business depends entirely on its proprietary data; there’s just no way that it is going to let other companies use its own data to compete with them. In fact, the LinkedIn API’s Terms of Use, section 1.5.n., explicitly states that companies using the API agree not to “use the APIs in an Application that competes with products or services offered” by LinkedIn, something that Monster and BranchOut were surely aware of when they built their applications.

Monster’s Vice President of Product Management Matthew Mund posted Monster’s official response to the API shutdown. In it, he says:

We are disappointed by this decision. Why? It’s not good for LinkedIn users: blocking the API effectively limits LinkedIn members’ ability to import their own profile data or invite their own connections to another environment, whether BeKnown or others.

See? Monster is doing this for the poor suffering users who just want to post their data anywhere they want.

Except that Monster’s entire business is charging for access to a closed database. In the Monster Terms of Use, the company specifically prohibits anyone who would “aggregate, copy, or duplicate in any manner any of the Monster Content or information available from any Monster Site, without express written consent from Monster.” What’s good for the LinkedIn goose is clearly not good for the Monster gander.

As for BranchOut, its public position is similar to Monster’s. As the new kids on the block, it also seems happy to be getting this kind of attention, and used its response to the TechCrunch article to promote the superiority of the Facebook audience over LinkedIn’s.

This move by LinkedIn will not greatly hurt either BranchOut or Monster’s services in any big way — importing a resume was just a convenience for their users, who can still create profiles the old-fashioned way. But its a clear sign that LinkedIn recognizes that these services are taking aim squarely at its market, and that it won’t just roll over and let them do it.

Or to quote Monster VP Eric Winegardner, “game on.”

You may have noticed recently that under the LinkedIn Jobs tab, there are listings under a section called “Jobs you may be interested in” that offer jobs that are specifically targeted to end users. Here is a screenshot of my personal job offerings:

Pretty good, if you ask me. Based on my experience and the keywords I’ve listed in my profile, these jobs are pretty spot on for things I’d be interested in, though the AAE job would be a bit junior (a PR AAE is typically an entry-level or one-year experience role). LinkedIn started beta testing this and saw lots of success with clickthroughs from active job seekers. It decided to see what would happen if it put it on the home page, and they discovered that it was able to reach a whole new group of individuals — passive job seekers who were not actively looking for jobs — but when this offering was placed in the home page, they clicked through.

Jobs For You

Having found this to be successful with bringing a whole different set of eyeballs, LinkedIn took things one step further, which is where it’s at today in announcing the new Jobs For You. This new product offering will allow companies to share jobs with individuals conducting normal web searches, using information from their LinkedIn profiles to target them with specific, relevant opportunities.

While the concept of delivering relevant job opportunities is not new, LinkedIn has taken this to a new level. Others who have explored this idea have looked at data based on search activity, thus targeting active job seekers who have run searches indicating that they were specifically looking for jobs. Another method of targeting job seekers has been by using geotargeting. While using this approach will get you geographically targeted individuals, and often passive job seeker traffic, they may not necessarily be the “right” talent. They’re just targeting anyone and everyone within a specific location. With the data that LinkedIn has gathered from individual profiles, this new Jobs For You ad module will deliver targeted and relevant opportunities to individuals based on the information in their LinkedIn profile (as an aside, this means it’s a good time to fill our your LinkedIn profile completely!)

In case you were wondering, there are no privacy issues here: LinkedIn will not be selling your profile data to any third parties in order to accomplish this. As simply as it can be explained, LinkedIn reads a user cookie from your computer and applies it to the code in the ad module that will show up in your search results, on a career web page, or wherever else a company wants to place this coded ad. This cookie is unique to you and provides the LinkedIn ad with the information it needs to deliver a list of relevant opportunities from the company that purchased the ad. And of course, LinkedIn users will be able to opt out from this if they don’t want to participate. But who wouldn’t want an occasional interesting opportunity to be tossed their way?

To recap, Jobs For You will work both on LinkedIn as well as offsite. From what we know at this point, pricing is a CPM model. You can find out more detail info by visiting LinkedIn’s Talent Advantage website. This is a pretty interesting product, because from a recruiting perspective it takes targeting passive candidates to a whole new level.

Referral Engine

The second product that LinkedIn announced this morning will remain in beta until the first half of 2011, but it will make some waves in the area of employee referrals. This product, called Referral Engine, assists companies in hiring talent from their employees’ referrals by involving more employees in making referrals, and helping them make more quality referrals. One of the issues with receiving employee referrals is that sometimes, employees will refer someone for a job just because they’re a friend, or they think perhaps they might be a fit even though they probably aren’t. With Referral Engine, when a company posts a new job through LinkedIn, LinkedIn will make suggestions to employees tied to that company of individuals within their networks that would be a good fit for that job, and it will ask them simply if they wish to refer any of those individuals. Essentially, Referral Engine helps employees to “pre-screen” their own network in order to make quality referrals.

The even better part about Referral Engine is that it will be a free service to “Recruiter” customers once it is rolled out. Obviously, the more jobs posted by the company, the better this service will work. But this new product will really make a difference with employee referral programs and getting more employees involved in making referrals from their networks. It also opens another door for LinkedIn (or anyone, for that matter) to offer training to companies and whole teams within companies for using LinkedIn, getting employees involved, helping them to thoroughly fill out their profiles, etc.

You can learn more information about these two new offerings from LinkedIn on its Talent Advantage website.

Here’s what’s going on in the ERE community this week:

1. Linkedin Recruiter Tip… X-ray, then login
2. Benefits of Technology Going Down
3. Understand the difference between high complexity and high volume RPO providers
4. The kind of video you wish your company would do
5. Interview Records Retention
6. Split Fee Networks

1. Linkedin Recruiter Tip… X-ray, then login

Jeremy Roberts writes about the benefits of using Google to x-ray LinkedIn first. He says, “Linkedin Recruiter is a great tool for corporate recruiting.  It allows recruiting teams access to all linkedin members without actually having a direct connection. In using Linkedin recruiter for sourcing REMIC candidates for a client I discovered that using the Google x-ray feature still results in a lot more candidates than searching within Linkedin recruiter

Check his post out and many others below.

2. Benefits of Technology Going Down

Davis Szary writes about a situation when his connection went down. He says, “Without the constant interruptions of voice mail/email, I have been laser focused and have knocked off many “to-do’s” that I have “started and stopped” many times because of pesky CIE’s (calls, interruptions and emails for those that haven’t been through our Perfect Week/Perfect Day training program).

Are you more productive when technology is down because it allows for less interruptions or does that connection make you more efficient in the long run?

3. Understand the difference between high complexity and high volume RPO providers

Tracey Friend talks about how RPO providers are not all created equal. She writes, “Today’s blog posting will focus on the difference between “high volume”  and “high complexity”  RPO solutions. At the highest levels both require requisition management, sourcing, screening, interviewing, offer and on-boarding practices.  However the detailed processes, the people and where the most time is spent, will vary based upon complexity.  So just because your RPO fills call center roles really well, does not mean they can do high level professional roles and vice / versa.

Read through from some insight on the differences between the two.

4. Split Fee Networks

A forum member asks, “What are the top 3 split fee networks these days?” Another member asks for clarification but is there a general split fee network out there? Or are all industry focused?

5. Interview Records Retention

Here’s an older one about interview records retention that is getting some renewed interest: “I am a contract recruiter that has recently started working for a national insurance company. I am not working out of the corporate headquarters, but one of our regional office. I have not been able to find a firm corporate policy for the retention of interview notes for candidates that we did not hire. Some of the recruiters maintain them for one year, some three years, some appear to not be keeping them at all! Can anyone tell be what the legal standard is for maintaining interview notes?

Do you have any guidance for interview records retention?

6. The kind of video you wish your company would do

The final word comes from Sarah Welstead who writes about businesses releasing viral videos. She writes, “One day the president comes in and says “We’ve got to have a video!  We’ll make it funny, and get all the staff to be in it, and everyone will send the link to their friends!  And my nephew says he’ll do it for $1500!”

“(There’s a reason why professional writers, directors, producers and actors get paid – quite a lot, sometimes –  for what they do.)

“Which is why it’s so great to discover a company who really is doing it right.  Check out this video from Recruitment Juice, a UK-based recruiting training company:

Check out the video and tell Sarah what you think!

To see what else you’ve been missing, check out the ERE community.

Here’s what’s going on in the ERE community this week:

1. Our members speak out on the .jobs issue
2. Personal branding is NOT evil
3. Are you on the no brain picking list?
4. Autoposting software for LinkedIn advertising
5. Do you know anything about Co-Sourcing?
6. Featured group of the week: New York Metro ERE

1. Our members speak out: What does .jobs mean to you?

We’ve had some great coverage on the recent .jobs issue from our editorial staff here at ERE. In response to the situation, several members posted some insightful opinions to contrast what has taken place over the last week:

• Gerry Crispin writes An Open Letter to the SHRM .Jobs Advisory Board. Hard to sum it up in a choice quote but he ends with this recommendation, “As to all the misunderstandings, mis-stated facts and other issues of timelines leading up to today, it would seem prudent of any truly independent council considering what to do next to at least offer a serious period of public comment- say 30 days.
• Sean Ryan writes how he’s Failing to See the “.Jobs” Hype. He says, “Call me cynical… but I simply don’t buy this “.Jobs” business. It’s not going to change the world. I also don’t buy the uber outrage. It’s not going to change the world. But what do I know… I’ve only been job searching in this terrible economy.
• Ernest Feiteira posts Dot Jobs 2006 and Now and adds, “Very few URLs in themselves are the key to success.  siliconvalley.jobs might seem like a goldmine, but why isn’t siliconvalleyjobs.com already?  It’s because it’s what you “make of it” and the value you provide users on  the site.

2. Personal Branding is NOT evil

Sarah Welstead posts an interesting take about personal branding. Sarah says, “If you’ve been resisting building a personal brand on the assumption that you’ll be contributing to the downfall of society, you can rest easy.  Branding (and advertising, and marketing) are good for society as a whole (by fostering advances in the absence of war); good for people individually (by allowing them to make choices); and good for the economy (by fostering capitalism).

It seems as though personal branding has gone through a hype and rejection period. Are we finally going to hit a point where we just use what we’ve learned and move on? Let Sarah know!

3. Are you on the no brain picking list?

Sandy Jones-Kaminski asks if people are on the no brain picking list. She goes on to write, “Are you a recruiting strategy consultant or a service provider? How many non-billable brain picking sessions did you sit through so far this year? Or, on the flip side, how many brains did you try to pick for free in Q1 of 2010? I think we should start a National Do Not Brain Pick registry and I want to be on it.

I’m sure we’ve all been in that boat before. Where do you personally draw the line on brain picking sessions?

4. Autoposting software for LinkedIn advertising

A group member asks, “Are there any products out there that can auto-post my paid LinkedIn ads as well as the free ads within my LinkedIn groups?”

Have you seen anything like that? If so, drop him a comment.

5. Do you know anything about Co-Sourcing?

Another group member asks, “Are you aware of different models in Recruitment Co-Sourcing? Can you provide any links for suggested reading?”

What do you know about recruitment co-sourcing? Let the group know.

6. Featured group of the week: New York Metro ERE

The New York Metro ERE group was started by Steve Levy and is “An offline community to augment the ERE’s online fraternity. Open to all metro New York (CT, NJ, NY)ERE members (if you want to travel from California to attend, that’s cool). Share contacts, ideas, problems and solutions, etc.” I wonder if they’ll take someone from Oregon?

This is a very active offline group too (check out their regular meetups, the next one is happening on April 22nd).

To see what else you’ve been missing, check out the ERE community.

LinkedIn is doing well in this recession.  According to Hoffman:

We’ve been profitable the last two years. Q4 was actually our highest revenue quarter ever.

Not surprisingly, recruiting is one of LinkedIn’s three primary revenue sources, along with subscription fees and advertising. In Hoffman’s words:

We have a software-as-a-service business primarily driven by recruiting. And as a surprise we are actually doing quite well at that currently. You’d think that with layoffs and everything else that that business was being hit. Currently, we are the disruptive low-cost provider of really good hiring services, and when you are hiring 50 people as opposed to 1,000 people we are still growing there…

I find that “disruptive, low-cost provider” comment to be especially telling. Many startups claims to be disruptive, but when you actually kick the tires, few truly are. If LinkedIn is growing its market share of dollars spent while just about every job board is shrinking, it sounds about right to me.

LinkedIn is now allowing group members to post job openings at no charge. The jobs are separate from the group discussions and have their own channel. Only other members of the group have access to the jobs, so while that reduces the overall visibility, it makes it possible to highly target job openings.

If LinkedIn announced this feature anywhere, we missed it. Nor could we find anyplace on the site itself explaining how it works. What it looks like, though, is the job posting rules are the same as participating in a discussion. Only members of a group can post a job. And the jobs aren’t included in the main, fee-based job board.

So this looks to us like more of an opportunity for specialty recruiters already participating in groups where they fish. It’s also likely that recruiters may start joining more groups.

We suspect that eventually LinkedIn will open up the group job boards to anyone for a fee. But that’s just a guess.

That alone makes the announcement news, but this is a game-changer. Even more important than the access it gives recruiters to two of the largest networks in the world, is the validation Jobvite is bringing to all those predictions about the value of social networks as a recruiting tool.

No need to point out that recruiters discovered social networks almost as soon as they came along. That’s true enough, but consider how they’ve been used for recruiting. It’s mostly been a passive exercise with Facebook and MySpace widgets enabling a company’s jobs to appear on individual pages. LinkedIn and others of its kind have been mostly a source of leads.

In the one instance, the social networks are little more than a job board in new clothes. In the latter case, it requires active recruiter time to source candidates, more targeted perhaps, but functionally not a whole different from using Google or Yahoo or other research tools. As recently as last summer Kevin Wheeler was predicting that eventually social networks “will become core to good recruiting and talent management,” though he called them “over-hyped and poorly used at the moment.”

Jobvite’s announcement today, and last week’s from Appirio, are bringing us closer to realizing as practice what Wheeler astutely saw as a trend. What the new tools from both companies do is to leverage social networks in a directed manner. Where referral programs pioneered by the likes of companies such as Jobster (site; profile) scattered job opening announcements like seeds in the wind, Jobvite and Appirio tell participating employees who among their contacts would be a best fit. Forwarding the opening is still up to the employee, but at least it won’t be an address-book dump.

So similar are the tools from the two companies that you have to wonder if it’s one of those natural evolutionary paths or someone was peeking in someone else’s window. Both also operate pretty much the same way.

Here’s how the new Jobvite tool works: A participating employee opts in to the program by logging into their Facebook or LinkedIn account (Appirio’s took works only with Facebook) using the Jobvite service. Jobvite then analyzes their Facebook friends and 1st-degree LinkedIn contacts, matching them to jobs on the basis of the skills they list, the job titles and companies in their profiles, and other relevant information. Matches are reported to the employee who chooses to forward — or not — the job opening.

This is where the Jobvite tool parts company with Appirio’s tool to go a step further. Actually, it goes many steps forward: A recipient of a job announcement who decides to forward it to their contacts can also opt-in for the matching feature. So even if you have no connection to the company that has the job opening, you can see who among your contacts is a good fit and forward it only to them. And so long as the referrals are made via the link in the email, everything is tracked so the recruiters know whence came the referral.

“In a world in which the job seeker is changing,” says Dan Finnigan, CEO of Jobvite, “It’s obvious the backend side of e-recruitment is going to change.” In this case, Jobvite’s created a sort of guided viral program that leverages the information individuals volunteer about themselves to find the best match among their employees’ contacts.

There’s plenty more to like about the new release. Interested referrals who choose to apply can use their online profiles, instead of a traditional resume. There’s also a LinkedIn widget they can use to find out who works at the company, should they have questions or want to make a direct contact. There’s also a Twitter application to send job invitations to followers and, if they have posted a Twitter profile, to offer up matches.

“People want to use their networks to do their jobs better,” Finnigan was saying as we talked about the social networking phenomenon. “The people who do that have friends and contacts who do that too and those are the people recruiters want to reach.”

Despite the tracking, Finnigan said neither Jobvite nor the employer ever learn who is in anyone’s network (except, of course, should one of them apply for the job). The way both the Facebook and LinkedIn APIs work keeps the data from flowing back. Jobvite neither stores nor retrieves data.

One interesting aspect is that the APIs these social networks make available have a value that Appirio and Jobvite and others still to come are commercializing in an important way. LinkedIn sells a recruiter service itself. So how long will it be before the network operators start to charge for this kind of access? That will depend on how well these recruiting programs pan out and especially how much more efficient they are identifying good candidates.

How good, then, are the matches? That all depends on how good the profiles are and how well designed the job description is. Jobvite’s analysis uses job titles, geography (location), education, skills and keywords. For competitive reasons, Finnigan didn’t get too specific about the algorithms Jobvite uses. But he did say the system is heuristic. “It has to learn over time,” he told us. “Suffice it to say there is a feedback loop.”

Chances are it uses fairly standard matching developed by the ATS builders as a starting point, then learns to give more or less weight to certain terms and their proximity to each other based on things like whether similar candidates in the past applied for the job and whether interviews were scheduled and possibly even if offers were made. (Jobvite is a recruitment management system that includes calendaring, CRM, ATS, and offer management.)

As Finnigan added, social networking and the kinds of tools that Jobvite is introducing, are the future of recruiting.

We ran a webinar today with Elaine Orler and Jason Corsello of Knowledge Infusion about what changes we should expect from recruiting technology in the next year.

I learned a lot on the call, but one of the polls that we took really made me stop and think. Here it is:

That LinkedIn was the most popular did not surprise me — it’s not exactly a secret that it has become one of the critical tools of our profession. I was surprised that LinkedIn was such an overwhelming favorite – nobody else was even remotely close.

The way we asked the question had people answering which of these services they are most likely to use the most. But I wonder — if we had phrased the question to ask if recruiters are using these sites at all for professional services, would the answers have been any different?

Asked a different way, aside from a very small portion of the recruiting community, are we really using social media effectively?