SHIP IT: Introducing the XING Partner Ecosystem

It gives us great pleasure to announce The XING Partner Ecosystem.

Starting today, XING’s members will benefit from a wide variety of partner applications on the XING platform.

The XING Partner Ecosystem is made possible via the OpenSocial framework. XING’s partners are able to create applications using OpenSocial and then easily enable those applications to integrate into the XING professional network. The Applications are tightly integrated into the core functionality of XING, and are thus able to leverage XING’s “business graph” of connections between professionals to make the applications engaging and rewarding for XING’s users.

What’s most exciting about the XING Partner Ecosystem is that it is a win-win-win for everyone involved:

• XING’s Members win when we introduce engaging applications for various specific user interests.
• XING’s Partners win by gaining valuable distribution through the XING platform.
• XING wins because our service gets more valuable to our members and our partners.

We have 16 launch applications from 13 partners, from 7 countries. Notably, the XING launch apps represent our focus on both locally relevant and globally valuable applications. We have many applications that function in multiple languages, as well as several apps that are specific to the German-speaking markets.

This is just the start. We will be adding more and more apps in the future.

Got an app that you think might be suitable for XING? Here are our guiding principles for taking new apps onto the XING platform.

1. Open — we are open to launching anyone’s application that we believe will provide user value. In the end, the XING users will decide which apps they prefer.  So, we are OPEN for apps.Come one, come all, with your great applications!
2. Professional — not just any application, apps that are suitable for a professional network, and which provide value to the business community on the markets we serve
3. Rewarding — apps that provide a return on time investment to our users.

Do you think your app idea matches our criteria? Contacts us at opensocial@xing.com.

Here you can view the powerpoint presentation from the launch event today:

But, don’t just read about the apps, I encourage you to check them out!  - and give us your feedback on them. What do you want to see us do better? What types of new apps should we add? Let us know via the uservoice forum, or contact me directly on XING at or via twitter at http://www.twitter.com/socialmedian.

On a very personal note, this is a super exciting day for me as we are launching the first big project I was handed when I joined XING 6 months ago. And, it only gets better from here. More and better to come!

SHIP IT!