Googlebot Crawl Budget Explained on Google Webmaster Central Blog

Recently, we've heard a number of definitions for "crawl budget", however we don't have a single term that would describe everything that "crawl budget" stands for externally. With this post we'll clarify what we actually have and what it means for Googlebot.

First, we'd like to emphasize that crawl budget, as described below, is not something most publishers have to worry about. If new pages tend to be crawled the same day they're published, crawl budget is not something webmasters need to focus on. Likewise, if a site has fewer than a few thousand URLs, most of the time it will be crawled efficiently.

Prioritizing what to crawl, when, and how much resource the server hosting the site can allocate to crawling is more important for bigger sites, or those that auto-generate pages based on URL parameters, for example.

Crawl Rate Limit

Googlebot is designed to be a good citizen of the web. Crawling is its main priority, while making sure it doesn't degrade the experience of users visiting the site. We call this the "crawl rate limit," which limits the maximum fetching rate for a given site.

Simply put, this represents the number of simultaneous parallel connections Googlebot may use to crawl the site, as well as the time it has to wait between the fetches. The crawl rate can go up and down based on a couple of factors:

• Crawl health: if the site responds really quickly for a while, the limit goes up, meaning more connections can be used to crawl. If the site slows down or responds with server errors, the limit goes down and Googlebot crawls less.
• Limit set in Search Console: website owners can reduce Googlebot's crawling of their site. Note that setting higher limits doesn't automatically increase crawling.

Crawl Demand

Even if the crawl rate limit isn't reached, if there's no demand from indexing, there will be low activity from Googlebot. The two factors that play a significant role in determining crawl demand are:

• Popularity: URLs that are more popular on the Internet tend to be crawled more often to keep them fresher in our index.
• Staleness: our systems attempt to prevent URLs from becoming stale in the index.

Additionally, site-wide events like site moves may trigger an increase in crawl demand in order to reindex the content under the new URLs. Taking crawl rate and crawl demand together we define crawl budget as the number of URLs Googlebot can and wants to crawl.

Factors Affecting Crawl Budget

According to our analysis, having many low-value-add URLs can negatively affect a site's crawling and indexing. We found that the low-value-add URLs fall into these categories, in order of significance:

1. Faceted navigation and session identifiers
2. On-site duplicate content
3. Soft error pages
4. Hacked pages
5. Infinite spaces and proxies
6. Low quality and spam content

Wasting server resources on pages like these will drain crawl activity from pages that do actually have value, which may cause a significant delay in discovering great content on a site.

Top Questions

Crawling is the entry point for sites into Google's search results. Efficient crawling of a website helps with its indexing in Google Search.

Q: Does site speed affect my crawl budget? How about errors?

Amswer: Making a site faster improves the users' experience while also increasing crawl rate. For Googlebot a speedy site is a sign of healthy servers, so it can get more content over the same number of connections. On the flip side, a significant number of 5xx errors or connection timeouts signal the opposite, and crawling slows down. We recommend paying attention to the Crawl Errors report in Search Console and keeping the number of server errors low.

Q: Is crawling a ranking factor?

Answer: An increased crawl rate will not necessarily lead to better positions in Search results. Google uses hundreds of signals to rank the results, and while crawling is necessary for being in the results, it's not a ranking signal.

Q: Do alternate URLs and embedded content count in the crawl budget?

Answer: Generally, any URL that Googlebot crawls will count towards a site's crawl budget. Alternate URLs, like AMP or hreflang, as well as embedded content, such as CSS and JavaScript, may have to be crawled and will consume a site's crawl budget. Similarly, long redirect chains may have a negative effect on crawling.

Q: Can I control Googlebot with the "crawl-delay" directive?

Answer: The non-standard "crawl-delay" robots.txt directive is not processed by Googlebot.

Q: Does the nofollow directive affect crawl budget?

Answer: It depends. Any URL that is crawled affects crawl budget, so even if your page marks a URL as nofollow it can still be crawled if another page on your site, or any page on the web, doesn't label the link as nofollow.

For information on how to optimize crawling of your site, take a look at our blogpost on optimizing crawling from 2009 that is still applicable. If you have questions, ask in the forums!

How to Respond to Four Common Salary Negotiation Questions

You want to be prepared for your upcoming salary negotiation, so you plan to research the standard pay range and practice asking for what you want. Those steps are certainly valuable, but they’re not enough.

Too often, people lose money because they think through just one contingency. While they’re ready to say, “I know the starting number for someone in this sector in this city is $55,000,” they’ve never considered how they’d reply to “This is our best offer, with no room for negotiation.” Feeling flustered (or stumped), they accept on the spot, even if they’re not at the desired number.

After interviewing dozens of women, I learned that one of the main reasons their negotiations didn’t go as planned was they weren’t prepared to respond to what the other person said. To make sure that doesn’t happen to you, read on for the most common things you’ll hear and tips for how to respond.

1. “What Are Your Salary Expectations?”
It sounds like the hiring manager is letting you lead. But in actuality, they want to gauge the very least you’d be willing to accept. If you say you’re hoping for a certain salary that’s at the bottom of their range, they know they won’t have to offer you more, (even if they were originally planning to).

Deal with this question with a diplomatic deflection: “I’m more interested in finding a position that’s a good fit for my skills. I’m confident that what you’re offering is competitive.”

Or spin the question right back around to them: “I’m flexible on compensation. The position and growth potential are much more important to me. Would you be willing to share the rough range you have in mind for this position?”

If they still push you for an answer, come prepared with some market data to answer the question matter-of-factly, without giving away what you’d actually accept: “Based on my research, the market rate for a position like this is $65,000 - $80,000.”

2. “How Much Are You Currently Making?”
A common mistake applicants make is disclosing their current salary early in the process. Again, employers will use this to gauge if you’d be willing to accept a low offer. If they’ve budgeted up to $90,000, but you disclose that you’re currently making $65,000, they’re likely going to start with a lower offer, assuming that you’ll be happy with a 10 to 15% jump.

Therefore, the best response is to avoid giving an exact number. Try: “I’d prefer to not discuss what I’m currently making because this position that I’m interviewing for isn’t exactly the same as my current job. I’d like to discuss the responsibilities and then I’m sure we’ll agree on a salary that’s appropriate.” Or, “My current employer doesn’t allow me to discuss compensation outside of the company. I’d like to respect their privacy.”

Of course, this may’ve come up before the interview stage, if you had to list an amount in your job application. (For future reference, I suggest putting “N/A” or an obviously incorrect number, like $1. In my experience, most recruiters won’t penalize you, as they’ve likely seen it before from experienced negotiators).

If you already listed your compensation, be ready to reframe that amount during the interview process. Come up with solid reasons why your current salary isn’t reflective of your true market value. For example, highlight if you’ve taken on significant responsibilities in your current job or classes to improve your skills.

Whatever you do, don’t confuse pivoting the question back or delaying it until the interview process with lying. While it’s okay to argue your market value is higher than what you currently make, it’s never okay to lie.

3. “Unfortunately, We Don’t Have Any Room to Negotiate”
Sometimes, the number really isn’t negotiable. For example, if you’re being hired into a “start class,” the offer can be nonnegotiable. (A start class is when a large company hires a number of people at the same time with similar qualifications—associates straight from law school or management trainee programs.) It can also be non-negotiable if you’re taking a public sector role and you’re already getting the best offer for the pay grade.

That’s a good time to ask about the compensation package as a whole (vacation, tuition reimbursement, stock options, bonus, work from home flexibility). Even if they can’t budge on take-home pay, other benefits could provide a real monetary value.

Once you’ve decided what benefit you’d like to focus on, try: “I understand that at this point, salary isn’t negotiable. I see that you have a tuition reimbursement program and I want to get my product management certification. Would you consider sponsoring my program?”

4. “In the Future You’ll Have Opportunities for Growth and Raises”
If the offer isn’t competitive and they deflect any of your attempts to negotiate by saying you’ll discuss it in the future, don’t let the conversation end there. Instead see it as an invitation to specifically discuss what’ll come next.

It sounds like this: “Because this number is a little lower than I feel comfortable with, I’d love to discuss my future and performance. I know that one of the most important things in this role is [key metric here]. If I’m able to deliver that in [time frame], would you be open to raising my compensation to [target amount] then?”

If they say yes, make sure you get something that describes this agreement written into your employment contract—and then work your tail off to deliver before that review date.

Just as you prep for an interview, you’ll want to prep for your negotiation. And that means more than thinking about your canned speeches, it means getting ready for a two-way conversation. So team up, practice with a friend, and imagine how you’ll respond to the unexpected. That way, you’ll avoid being caught off guard—and be a lot more likely to hit your target number.

This post originally appeared on The Muse.

How to use IFTTT for Social Media Automation

You putting out tons of helpful online content everyday & move hurriedly all day long, and going nuts on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram, Pinterest, etc. But there is also a chance that you feel overwhelmed with every social media profile that you need keep active.

It’s not enough to have a website or blog anymore - you need to have website & blog with amazing content in it, and also have to post fresh & amusing content regularly. You need to market your posts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram like crazy, and have bustling social media profiles. And don’t forget to distribute your content everywhere and meaningfully interact with your subscribers.

This can become an overwhelming amount of work that only a small army of people can accomplish within a reasonable time-frame.

Worry not, because our this post will give you and Social Media Automation Strategy when it comes to Social Media Promotion and Content Syndication.

You Love Automation, Right?

What is Social Media Automation?

Social Media Automation refers to tools that are used to semi/automate the process of posting content to social networking and social bookmarking websites. Tools can range from mostly manual and free to semi-automated tools which are either commercial standalone software or paid subscriptions (Wikipedia).

In General, Social Media Automation let you schedule social media content weeks and months in advance.

The 15 Best Social Media Automation Tools

Let’s have a look at our hand crafted Best of The Best Social Media Automation Tool for you. These 15 automation tools will help save you time and can do a few other things to make your life easier too.

1. Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a dream for all of us social media lovers. There are so many actions that Hootsuite can help with that if you have not learned the full scope of this social media automation tool, then I recommend you start looking it over. If you are serious about social media… then Hootsuite it is.

Hootsuite gives you the ability to keep track of many social media channels at once. This is perfect for those who work in the social media world, because it truly does make life a lot easier. Not only does it allow you to have multiple channels, it also lets you know if your brand has been mentioned.

2. IFTTT

IFTTT will save you from endless hours of frustrating Social Media Management by Automating Your Social Media Strategy.

IFTTT is a one-stop-shop for all of your favourite apps, allowing you to connect with them in a way that works best for you. And it’s super powerful. For example, you can automatically Tweet the photos you post on Instagram without any extra clicks and you can hook-up with your FitBit to make sure you get a little nudge if you’re not quite reaching your daily goal. Also set up auto replies to new followers, automatically post a blog on your social media once it’s published, and create alerts for brand mentions are all just some of the Applets you can create using this great service.

3. Buffer

Buffer makes posting to social media a whizz. All you have to do is add your post to the queue and it will be posted for you. No need to even schedule a time that the post will be posted because Buffer will take care of that too.

Buffer is also known for providing great analytics. If you want to know what is working and not working, these analytics will let you know. Buffer is always adding more to the analytics so keep an eye on this application.

4. Crowdfire

Crowdfire works with both Twitter and Instagram. Want to know who unfollowed you? Crowdfire is the source to go to have your questions answered.

In both business and personal life, we want to know about those who are following us and those who have decided they do not like the posts we are putting put up. Crowdfire also allows you to find those Twitter users who are inactive and delete them if you want to.

5. CoSchedule

CoSchedule is a writer’s dream. This management tool allows for articles to be scheduled, blog post management, scheduling for marketing projects and social media management.

CoSchedule allows for the organization that many writers and social media marketers yearn for. If you have given up on complex spreadsheets like some of us have, CoSchedule is a gift of organization.

6. SociAlert

SociAlert automates your hashtag search and allows a user to analyze what is happening on Twitter for your twitter campaigns in realtime. From digital marketers to established brands and media agencies, everyone can make the most out of their twitter campaigns with this hashtag tracking tool.

You can also use socialert to track event hashtags and monitor your brand as well. If you are really interested in how your twitter marketing works for you than this is the application to be using.

7. BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo allows for many different tasks to be accomplished. BuzzSumo has an influencers search that cannot be beaten. It allows for searches being conducted by location, topic and area.

You can also analyse influencers with the filter you can go by authority, reach, engagement and influence. It also has the ability to build lists and communicate with key influencers. Follow those influencers you choose to and add them to your Twitter lists.

8. SocialOomph

SocialOomph is an excellent tool for beginning social media managers because it’s a bit more holistic. It works with Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Tumblr, RSS feeds, blogs, Plurk, and App.net.

SocialOomph’s free level allows you to work on up to five twitter accounts to schedule tweets and track keywords. The scheduling and posting tool includes a URL shortening feature also allows you to track clicks.

9. Scoop.it

Scoop.it allows for content publishing in less time than any other social media automation application. With Scoop.it content can be curated from other sources and shared with your opinion or angle. It also allows posts to be shared across social media platforms with the push of a button. Searching for content is easy with the use of the search bar for a particular topic.

Scoop.it is great for when you want to share something on a certain niche or topic. It also allows for freedom from writing all of your own content. Looking for ideas on topics and what is getting traffic? Head over to Scoop.it and I bet you will be mildly surprised.

10. MavSocial

MavSocial is, even as a freemium, so fully-fledged that it could be considered a social brand management system. The platform not only allows you to schedule posts for profiles on multiple different networks, but stores your images and assets in the platform for you to reuse.

Mavsocial works with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Instagram, and YouTube.

11. Post Planner

Post Planner is a helper when it comes to finding, planning and posting content that helps to increase followers and visibility on Twitter and Facebook. Finding content that works and will draw customers to your website is what post planner does best.

With Post Planner the user can actively choose photos, articles and even statuses to share. Having issues with content creation? Post Planner will certainly fill the void when needed. Hit that writing block or just need something intelligent to share? Try Post Planner!

12. Likeable Hub

Likeable Hub is a well-rounded social media management tool, though the freemium option may be better suited for individuals as it limits your access to business profiles.

Designed for ‘Smarter and Faster’ social media management, at the freemium level you can integrate and autoschedule from Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. You’re offered basic analytics and reporting, email support, and access to a database of thousands of social media post ideas.

13. SocialPilot

SocialPilot is a marketing tool with social media scheduling for marketers and social media management teams. SocialPilot allows you to collaborate with your team by sharing their social media calendar. Over 500 posts can be shared to 200 social media accounts. Bulk scheduling of posts and updates is easy with SocialPilot. To use bulk scheduling all the user has to do is upload a file in CSV format or text. The bulk text will then go out as scheduled.

Looking for article topics to write about? SocialPilot takes care of that too so that you do not have to wrack your brain trying to think of something when in a pinch. Separate account groups and calendars for each of your clients keeps things organized and helps with team communication.

14. Sprout Social

Sprout Social has some great analytic tools for those interested in growing their following on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and more. Sprout Social has many valuable tools that can both increase business revenue and help social media managers remain organized and save time.

15. Zapier

Zapier allows you to link your web apps together to streamline your information and make things a whole lot easier. Once the apps are connected it is then possible to pass the information between them creating workflows which are named zaps. Zapier will automatically finish routine tasks so that you are able to complete other tasks that need your attention. Having the ability to plan and build workflows results in more work being completed and staying organized.

Zapier is great for those who want to integrate process and automation into a business. The next wonderful gift is that building process and automation does not include having to know how to code because this application will handle it for you. Can’t put out a bit of code? Do not get discouraged because Zapier will keep things stress free.

Social Media Automation With IFTTT

If you haven’t heard about it, IFTTT is a wonderful and free web-based automation tool. The name IFTTT stands for “If This, Then That.” And it’s just as amazing as it sounds.

You could have an email trigger a tweet, or a Facebook post could trigger a download. I’m getting a little ahead of myself, though. There are lots of these connections (IFTTT calls them “Applets”) down below.

Getting Started on IFTTT

Once you sign up for your free IFTTT account, you can start connecting different services such as email or Facebook. IFTTT has more than 360 services in all, and it is constantly adding to its lineup.

Here are the Major Social Nedia Services that work with IFTTT:

Facebook (Profiles, Pages, and Groups)

• Twitter
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• Reddit
• Tumblr
• YouTube
• Pinterest
• FourSquare
• Blogger
• Medium
• WordPress

(No Google+ yet, there are some workarounds.)

Beyond Social Media Services, IFTTT connects with a vast number of other services, including both Apps and Hardware. These range from straightforward services like email, text message, and GPS to unique and creative services like electronic piggy banks and smart lightbulbs. Here is just a sampling of a few notable services IFTTT can connect.

• Pocket
• Jawbone Up
• Soundcloud
• Gmail
• Google Calendar
• Evernote
• Buffer
• Craigslist
• Dropbox
• Feedly

When you’re ready to get started with a Applet, you can browse the gallery of popular and trending Applets, or you can make one from scratch. Each service has a landing page of its own, too, which explains all the possibilities you can do with triggers and actions. (Click here for an example page for Facebook.)

Any applet can be paused or stopped whenever you like, so feel free to experiment! We’ve got a great list of applets to try below.

The 13 Best IFTTT Applets

Share your Instagram photos as native Twitter photos

Managing multiple social networks is a pain. While getting Instagram photos onto Facebook is a straightforward process — you just need connect your accounts — there’s no native solution for Instagram to Twitter. Use this applet to post your Instagram photos on Twitter in a natural way, one that allows your followers to see them without clicking.

Turn on your Philips Hue lights when you arrive home

You can use IFTTT to turn on your Hue bulbs when you get home, without having to fumble with the app. This is a real nice feature especially if you’re coming home from the supermarket and don’t have a free hand. While we’ve linked to the version for iOS, if you have an Android phone, use this applet instead.

Automatically post your Tweets on Facebook when you include a specific hashtag

While you can link your Twitter and Facebook accounts together, every single tweet you post will also post to your Facebook profile. That might not be the best option, especially if you’re a frequent social media user (hello, oversharing). Try using this applet, which only posts tweets to Facebook if you use the “#fb” hashtag.

Automatically keep your Facebook and Twitter profile pictures in sync

Don’t let your profile pic on either service get too old with this applet. It checks your Facebook profile picture, and if it changes, will automatically update your Twitter profile picture. Pretty convenient if you ask us.

Use Alexa to set the temperature on your Nest thermostat

If you have a Nest Thermostat, stop getting off the couch to change the temperature. With this Applet, you’ll be able to ask Alexa to do it.

Download new songs you like to Google Drive

Keeping up with all of the new music coming out is hard. This service will download publicly favorited songs on SoundCloud to your Google Drive.

Start brewing coffee when your FitBit registers you’re awake

If you’re obsessed with your Fitbit and wear it while you sleep, why not tell it to tell your WeMo coffeemaker to make you coffee when you wake? That’s possible with IFTTT. You’ll need Mr. Coffee’s WeMo-enabled coffeemaker, but it’s cool to know you’ll never be without a hot cup of joe in the morning again.

When your Fitbit records a sleepless night, remind yourself to go to bed early the next night

Fitbit devices are great for analyzing your sleep patterns, but if you’re not getting enough rest, it’s bad for your health. This particular applet watches for when you fall below a preset number of hours of sleep. If you do, IFTTT adds a reminder to your Google Calendar to turn in early the net night, ensuring you don’t run too much of a sleep deficit.

Get notifications about your favorite sports team on your TV

Comcast has recently enabled its X1 boxes to connect to IFTTT, meaning you’re life just got a whole lot easier if you’re an Xfinity customer. Once enabled, you’ll receive a notification on your TV whenever there’s news regarding your favorite sports team. It’s perfect for the sports nut.

Save your Strava activities in a Google spreadsheet

Strava too has its own IFTTT service, and if you’d like to do some cool data analysis on your activities outside of the app, have IFTTT save it to a Google spreadsheet. This applet saves the name of the activity, the time elapsed, the time elapsed in seconds, and the distance in meters traveled. It also saves links to the actual event on Strava, as well as a link to the route map.

Log rain to Google Docs Spreadsheet

Log rain in your city to a spreadsheet as it happens. This service will also add to a spreadsheet in your Google Drive.

Let me know if it's raining (So I can pack an umbrella)

Cool Service. You"ll Receive a text message when the weather changes. While the default is set to notify you of rain, you can change the trigger to use rain, snow, cloudy or clear.

Get notified of new Craigslist posts

Looking for something special on Craigslist? Have IFTTT monitor the service for you. Just provide IFTTT with the URL for your search query, and every time a new result matches your query, you’ll get alerted via an email.

Microsoft and LinkedIn Aggrement

Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn June 13, 2016 LinkedIn Blog Post.

Today we are excited to share that LinkedIn has entered into an agreement to be acquired by Microsoft. We are joining forces with Microsoft to realize a common mission to empower people and organizations. LinkedIn’s vision – to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce – is not changing and our members still come first.

Our companies are the world’s leading professional cloud and network. This deal will allow us to keep growing, investing in and innovating on LinkedIn to drive value for our members and our customers. Our members will continue to develop their skills, find a job and be great at that job, using our platform. We will continue to help our customers hire top talent, market their brand, and sell to their customers.

The LinkedIn you know and value is only getting better. LinkedIn will retain its distinct brand, culture and independence. We’ve been changing the way the world’s professionals have connected to opportunity for 13 years, and this is an opportunity for us to truly change the way the world works on a massive scale.

I’m incredibly energized by what this means for our members and employees, and for my personal perspective on this news, I encourage you to read my Influencer post. You can find more details on the agreement on the Microsoft News Center and the LinkedIn Newsroom.

Additional Information and Where to Find It

In connection with the transaction described above, LinkedIn Corporation (the “Company”) will file relevant materials with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”), including a proxy statement on Schedule 14A. Promptly after filing its definitive proxy statement with the SEC, the Company will mail the definitive proxy statement and a proxy card to each stockholder entitled to vote at the special meeting relating to the transaction. INVESTORS AND SECURITY HOLDERS OF THE COMPANY ARE URGED TO READ THESE MATERIALS (INCLUDING ANY AMENDMENTS OR SUPPLEMENTS THERETO) AND ANY OTHER RELEVANT DOCUMENTS IN CONNECTION WITH THE TRANSACTION THAT THE COMPANY WILL FILE WITH THE SEC WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE BECAUSE THEY WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT THE COMPANY AND THE TRANSACTION. The definitive proxy statement, the preliminary proxy statement and other relevant materials in connection with the transaction (when they become available), and any other documents filed by the Company with the SEC, may be obtained free of charge at the SEC’s website (http://www.sec.gov) or at LinkedIn’s website (http://investors.linkedin.com) or by writing to LinkedIn Corporation, Investor Relations, 2029 Stierlin Court, Mountain View, California 94043.

The Company and its directors and executive officers are participants in the solicitation of proxies from the Company’s stockholders with respect to the transaction. Information about the Company’s directors and executive officers and their ownership of the Company’s common stock is set forth in the Company’s proxy statement on Schedule 14A filed with the SEC on April 22, 2016. To the extent that holdings of the Company’s securities have changed since the amounts printed in the Company’s proxy statement, such changes have been or will be reflected on Statements of Change in Ownership on Form 4 filed with the SEC. Information regarding the identity of the participants, and their direct or indirect interests in the transaction, by security holdings or otherwise, will be set forth in the proxy statement and other materials to be filed with SEC in connection with the transaction.

The Big Internet Venture: LinkedIn + Microsoft

Changing the Way the World Works: LinkedIn + Microsoft

June 13, 2016 Jeff Weiner CEO at LinkedIn sent following email to LinkedIn’s global workforce.

December 15th, 2008, marked the first day of the best job I’ve ever had. My rationale for joining LinkedIn was simple: The opportunity to work with Reid Hoffman, a founder I greatly admired and respected; to join an extremely talented and dedicated team; and to massively scale LinkedIn’s membership and business, both of which had the potential to fundamentally transform the way the world connects to opportunity. Never in my wildest dreams, could I have imagined what would happen in the next 7½ years. Our team has grown from 338 people to over 10,000, our membership from 32M to over 433M and our revenue from $78M to over $3 billion.

Despite those accomplishments, we’ve only just begun to realize our full potential and purpose: Our mission to connect the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful, and our vision to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce.

Today’s announcement, that LinkedIn will be combining forces with Microsoft, marks the next step in our journey together, the next stepping stone toward realizing our mission and vision, and in remaining CEO of the company, the next chapter in the greatest professional experience of my life.

No matter what you're feeling now, give yourself some time to process the news. You might feel a sense of excitement, fear, sadness, or some combination of all of those emotions. Every member of the exec team has experienced the same, but we've had months to process. Regardless of the ups and downs, we've come out the other side knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt, this is the best thing for our company.

Let me explain why.

Every day I come to work, I'm primarily guided by two things:

First, realizing our mission and vision. While this has always been top of mind for me, it’s never been more so than now. Remember that dystopian view of the future in which technology displaces millions of people from their jobs? It's happening. In the last three weeks alone, Foxconn announced it will replace 60,000 factory workers with robots, a former CEO of McDonald’s said given rising wages, the same would happen throughout their franchises, Walmart announced plans to start testing drones in its warehouses, and Elon Musk predicted fully autonomous car technology would arrive within two years.

Whether it's worker displacement, the skills gap, youth unemployment, or socio-economic stratification, the impact on society will be staggering. I’ve said it on multiple occasions and believe it even more so every day: creating economic opportunity will be the defining issue of our time. That's why I'm here and why I can't imagine doing any other job. Simply put, what we do matters, and matters more than ever.

The second thing I focus on every day is making our culture and values come to life. Ten years ago, had you asked me about culture and values I would have rolled my eyes and recited a line from Dilbert. But when I started as CEO I began to appreciate just how important they were. Culture and values provide the foundation upon which everything else is built. They are arguably our most important competitive advantage, and something that has grown to define us. It's one thing to change the world. It's another to do it in our own unique way: Members first. Relationships matter. Be open, honest and constructive. Demand excellence. Take intelligent risks. Act like an owner.

That's who we are. That's LinkedIn.

I primarily focus on these two things, because that's all I ever wanted when I was in your shoes: A clear sense of purpose and the opportunity to be successful in pursuit of that purpose. Thankfully, in my current role, I can actually do something about that.

In order to pursue our mission and vision, and to do so in a way consistent with our culture and values, we need to control our own destiny.

That, above all else, is the most important rationale behind today's announcement.

At this point, some of you may be thinking this sounds completely counterintuitive: How will we be more likely to control our own destiny after being acquired? The answer lies in both the way in which the world has been evolving and the unique way in which this deal will be structured.

Imagine a world where we're no longer looking up at Tech Titans such as Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and Facebook, and wondering what it would be like to operate at their extraordinary scale -- because we're one of them.

Imagine a world where we're not reacting to the intensifying competitive landscape -- we're leading it with advantages most companies can only dream of leveraging.

Imagine a world where we're not pressured to compromise on long-term investment, hesitant to disrupt ourselves, or hamstrung in the way we can reward and acquire new talent due to stock price concerns, but consistently investing intelligently toward the realization of our mission and vision.

And imagine a world where a global economic downturn doesn't limit our ability to execute, but reinforces the essential quality of our purpose and actually strengthens our resolve when people need us most.

With today's news, we won't need to imagine any of it because it's now our reality.

Some of you may be asking “Why Microsoft?”

Long before Satya and I first sat down to talk about how we could work together, I had publicly shared my thoughts on how impressive his efforts were to rapidly transition Microsoft’s strategy and culture. After all, it’s extremely rare to see a company of that scope and scale move so quickly to make fundamental changes.

The Microsoft that has evolved under Satya’s leadership is a more agile, innovative, open and purpose-driven company. It was that latter point that first had me thinking we could make this work, but it was his thoughts on how we’d do it that got me truly excited about the prospect.

When Satya first proposed the idea of acquiring LinkedIn, he said it was absolutely essential that we had alignment on two things: Purpose and structure. On the former, it didn’t take long before the two of us realized we had virtually identical mission statements. For LinkedIn, it was to connect the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful, and for Microsoft it was to empower every individual and organization in the world to achieve more. Essentially, we’re both trying to do the same thing but coming at it from two different places: For LinkedIn, it’s the professional network, and for Microsoft, the professional cloud.

Both of us recognized that combining these assets would be unique and had the potential to unlock some enormous opportunities.

For example:

1. Massively scaling the reach and engagement of LinkedIn by using the network to power the social and identity layers of Microsoft's ecosystem of over one billion customers. Think about things like LinkedIn's graph interwoven throughout Outlook, Calendar, Active Directory, Office, Windows, Skype, Dynamics, Cortana, Bing and more.
2. Accelerating our objective to transform learning and development by deeply integrating the Lynda.com/LinkedIn Learning solution in Office alongside some of the most popular productivity apps on the planet (note: 6 of the top 25 most popular Lynda.com courses are related to Microsoft products).
3. Realizing LinkedIn’s full potential to truly change the way the world works by partnering with Microsoft to innovate on solutions within the enterprise that are ripest for disruption, e.g., the corporate directory, company news dissemination, collaboration, productivity tools, distribution of business intelligence and employee voice, etc.
4. Expanding beyond recruiting and learning & development to create value for any part of an organization involved with hiring, managing, motivating or leading employees. This human capital area is a massive business opportunity and an entirely new one for Microsoft.
5. Giving Sponsored Content customers the ability to reach Microsoft users anywhere across the Microsoft ecosystem, unlocking significant untapped inventory.
6. Redefining social selling through the combination of Sales Navigator and Dynamics.
7. Leveraging our subscription capabilities to provide opportunities to the massive number of freelancers and independent service providers that use Microsoft's apps to run their business on a daily basis.

And these are just some of the ideas that have been discussed since our first meeting.

Turning from purpose, we focused our attention on potential structure. I had no idea what Satya was going to propose, but knew how difficult acquisition integrations could be if not established the right way from the start.

Long story short, Satya had me at “independence.” In other words, his vision was to operate LinkedIn as a fully independent entity within Microsoft, a model used with great success by companies like YouTube, Instagram and WhatsApp. I would remain as CEO and report directly to him instead of a board. Together, along with Reid, Bill Gates, my former colleague Qi Lu, and new partner Scott Guthrie, we would partner on how best to leverage this extraordinary combination of assets while pursuing a shared mission. This, we both agreed, might not only be a structure that could work, it would be one in which both companies could thrive.

Now onto the most important question: What does this mean for you specifically as an employee of LinkedIn?

Given our ability to operate independently, little is expected to change: You'll have the same title, the same manager, and the same role you currently have. The one exception: For those members of the team whose jobs are entirely focused on maintaining LinkedIn's status as a publicly traded company, we'll be helping you find your next play. In terms of everything else, it should be business as usual. We have the same mission and vision; we have the same culture and values; and I’m still the CEO of LinkedIn.

I wanted to conclude on a familiar note. One of the most memorable moments I’ve experienced at LinkedIn was ringing the bell at the NYSE. I remember the All Hands we had following the event like it was yesterday. During that meeting, we reinforced the fact that becoming public was not the end game, but rather a stepping stone in the process of our ultimate objectives. We finished the All Hands with two words that have become LinkedIn’s unofficial mantra: “Next play.” In other words, don’t dwell on the past, lingering for too long on a lesson learned, or the celebration of a special accomplishment, but rather focus on the task at hand. It’s a mantra that’s served us well.

So, here’s to the next stepping stone.

Next play.