Future of Widgets in 2008
Importance of Widgets
It is expected for widgets to expand to a point where it will act like a network, the span over many different containers like social networks and even blogs. Since widgets are opt-in by the publisher or social network member, it’s a great way to track who’s actually interested in the content. As a result, the opportunity for more sophisticated marketing and advertising moves from carpet bombing to opt-in nearly GPS radar-like accuracy.
Growth of Widgets
Widget industry is rapidly growing in comparison to last year. Example, there were no widgets in Facebook last year, but now there is about 13,000+ widgets. One of the main drivers to the increase of widgets in social networks is AD marketing. If we look at the stats from the new comScore data for November, Slide claimed almost 144 million unique viewers, for a 16% market share, and RockYou claimed a 11.7% share, with 104 million individual viewers. In July, Slide had 130 million individual users, or a 15% share, while RockYou boasted 96 million users, or 11.1% of the total. (stats via MSNBC).
Currently only 6% of Internet advertising dollars were being spent on social networks, and only a smidge is being spent on social networks, and simdger anything is being spent on widgets. But the expectation is that there will be growth in Ads in Social Networks as well as widgets.
And hey, widget networks aren’t limited to social networks alone, in many cases, they can be repurposed for mobile devices as well as standalone embeds on websites and blogs.
Case Study: Forbes Widgets
Forbes has amazing number of widgetS that enables it to distribute its content all over the social networks. Also, the interesting part is that it’s sponsor, in this case Visa, goes with it.
Powered by Qumana
Sphere: Related Content
Print This Post
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Morad Rayyan is IT professional specialized in New Media development and has special interest in networking "routing" as well as programming.
Comments
No comments yet.
Leave a comment