BradPace.com

At the snap chat last week 2 guys (I didn’t catch their names) from WidgetBox.com spoke.  I have never built a web widget before and am simply not that familiar with them so this was a great opportunity for me to understand them better. Widgetbox distributes apps, has 18k developers, 25 Million page views per month and has 30k apps/widgets.

The most common use of widgets is to install them on your blog.  Most are built for WordPress or Movable type.  Also lets not forget Google Gadgets and Yahoo widgets (confabulator).  Then there is the desktop widget. There is a huge audience here and possibility to get your app distributed to thousands of sites.  Widgets tend not to be quite as “Social” as a social network because they don’t have the data that the social networks do.  But I think that hooking a widget into an app in Facebook or an OpenSocial site will be big soon.  Many people on the social networks also have a blog.  There is opportunity in this space and will be for a long time.

Tips for building a widget:

1. Match your audience.  This means take into account who will use the widget and what they want to do.  The Beebo audience is much different than the Eons audience.
2. Focus.  There are many ways to get your widget installed like widgetbox, yourminis, spring widgets and clearspring.
3. Operations.  This is the APIs, the networks, hosting and all the rest of the details.  Make sure you do it right and have a plan that scales well.  If your widget takes off you want to be ready.
4. Marketing. There are several ways to do this.  The above sites all have galleries where users can find apps.  There are also many widget directories.  But don’t forget good old virality.  Have your users invite their friends, make the install easy, and keep it going.  There are many widgets out there but the good ones grow on their own. Use an installer that launches right from the widget and also provide a “Get code” feature so it is easy to embed in a website.

For a good example of a widget check out the Netvibes widget.  Use your widget to push data out and bring users in.