2008: The Year of the Ad Widget

Hi everyone. Matt, CEO of Mpire here. I haven't contributed to this blog lately so thought I'd swing by, say hello, thank everyone for your continued support of WidgetBucks, and share a few thoughts on what I see ahead in the wild world of widgets.

First, a quick snapshot of the business. We continue to see great adoption of WidgetBucks, impressions are increasing each month, and we should reach the 2 billion impression mark by Valentine's Day. We have all of you to thank for this success, and appreciate your patience through some of our growing pains. Early next week, we'll be making December earnings payments to publishers -- our third such cycle. Even with this success, we continue to innovate, test and communicate with publishers to help maintain our focus on optimizing our ad widget network.

With the online ad and widget industries both evolving at break-neck speeds, I find myself constantly reading to stay ahead. I came across this fantastic and timely piece on GigaOm -- and wanted to share it with you. I found it so compelling because it captures much of the buzz around widgets today. Recent media chatter, including the GigaOm piece, are beginning to make 2008 look like the Year of the Ad Widget (this, after Newsweek declared 2007 the Year of the Widget). Many suggest an increasing push toward monetizing the millions of consumer eyeballs using widgets today. Some feel the RockYous, Slides and Clearsprings of the world -- essentially all consumer-facing widget platforms -- will find this a formidable mountain to climb. Even the ad widget networks that are seeing success around money-making widgets (i.e. WidgetBucks) are facing challenges, such as making sure our widgets continue to engage consumers without falling victim to user "ad blindness." We're embracing this challenge by constantly evaluating new approaches, technology and strategies to stay a step ahead. In fact, this quarter, we'll be announcing additional products and features, such as widget skinning, the expansion of monetizable widget content, and wide availability of YieldSense, which automatically transforms itself into a PPC, CPM or CPA ad widget on the fly, depending on highest yield.

"Those focused on a more ad-centric model are going ahead with their plans to use the widget as a more interactive billboard, but companies like Slide and RockYou may find that strategy more difficult." -- GigaOm, "Widget Me This," 1/26/08

Regardless of the various challenges and approaches -- consumer-centric or ad-centric widgets -- it remains to be seen if the two can meet in the middle and help the Year of the Ad Widget live up to its name. We certainly hope this happens -- it will be good for all of us in the industry. We are confident in our approach of creating an ad widget network first followed by a good consumer experience, and continue to work on refining that balance.

Where do you think widgets are headed this year?

Cheers,

Matt

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Matt Hulett
CEO, Mpire Corporation (the creators of WidgetBucks)
matt@mpire.com