StickiWidgets

Nathan Kaiser, the CEO of nPost, sent us an email about their new widget. We’ve never heard of nPost before today so we checked it out.

Here’s what they have to say on their about page.

nPost is a site devoted to entrepreneurship and startups. The nPost.com Tech Startup Job Board features opportunities with Internet, Software, Hardware and Biotech startups. By focusing on the tech startup space, we have found that we can bring together startups with people that are specifically interested in and familiar with the dynamic and high growth nature of startups.

The job search market is pretty crowded these days so it’s going to be hard to compete. However, there is definitely a market for this niche. There are a lot of people who love the startup environment and this could be a great place to them to focus their search. It looks like they are also trying to set themselves apart by providing an interviews section. This section is where they post interviews of startup executives and entrepreneurs. The hope is that perspective candidates will be able to garner some insight into a specific company that they are interested in.

It also looks like nPost puts on events to help bring together the startup community.

Overall it’s a pretty no frills site. You search for jobs, read some interviews and apply for jobs. The listings are pretty sparse at this time. Let’s hope they get some more inventory and can fend off the competition by focusing on their core business. Many other job sites/boards we’ve come across are either overly diverse in listings or were spun off as a secondary business supplementing some other core component.

Ok, enough about nPost. Let’s get to the widget, this is a widget blog after all.

The nPost widget is a JavaScript widget so it will be limited in distribution. This shouldn’t be a problem as their target audience probably isn’t the MySpace/Facebook crowd. More likely than not, they are looking at tech bloggers and sites like ours.

You grab the widget through a web configuration page. There are 5 basic options to configure.

1) Widget Title - pretty straight forward option
2) Search Term - if you would like to narrow down the listings
3) Widget Style - 2 to choose from, more would have been nice
4) Widget Size - 2 to choose from, again more would have been nice
5) Where to Open Links - either same window or new window, this is a nice touch

The options are slim and it would have been good to provide a few more options. However, since this is a JavaScript widget, you can always inject your own CSS styling and customize the widget beyond the settings offered.

Job listings are displayed in the widget and there is also a search field which takes you back to npost.com for the results page.

There is also a link from the widget to post a job listing. This is where this widget gets a little interesting. When you grabbed the widget you also registered as an affiliate. Normally requiring registration would be a bad thing for widgets, but in this case you will be getting paid to use this widget. If someone creates a new account via your widget, you will get a cut of the first posting fee. At face value this seems to be a good thing.

We wonder, however, whether there will really be that many “new accounts” that actually goes through this process to make it worth while. You would figure that there are only so many startups in the world and your site is just one out of hundreds of ways a startup will discover nPost. Of course, one could argue that companies are continuously shutting down and being created all the time, resulting in unlimited potential.

nPost and it’s widget is simple and straight forward. The affiliate program is an interesting play. Time will tell how well they do.

We do have to give credit to nPost for being very responsive. During our review, a few bugs were reported and fixes were released within a couple of hours on a Friday night.

iMedia Connection has a post up, “4 widget best practices” by Nikole Brake, containing good information on launching widget campaigns. The best practices are specific to widget campaigns and are a good addition to the attributes of a successful social network marketing campaigns post by Jeremiah Owyang from a few days ago.

4 widget best practices

If you’re launching a widget campaign, consider these strategic and technical factors to maximize your campaign’s impact.

The intense popularity of widgets, gadgets, Facebook applications and their kin has advertisers and publishers eager to get on board. But before you invest in a widgetized advertising campaign, there are a number of strategic and technical factors to consider. There are also important guidelines to follow to ensure you get the most from your investment.

Are you ready to let go?
That’s the first question to ask yourself, because consumers interact with widgets (and thus your content) outside the confines of your website…

Serve a purpose, and serve it fresh
Widgets shouldn’t simply be advertisements for your content or service…

Stick with standards and partners you know
On the development side, adhering to IAB standards maximizes the number of potential placements for your widget…

The distribution question
Once you’ve created your widget, how do you get it to fly?…

Head over to iMedia Connection for the full post.

[via Snipperoo Blog]

Jeremiah Owyang has a great list of attributes that characterize successful campaigns targeting social networks. While not all widgets are part of a marketing campaign, the list is still very applicable to all widgets. It’s definitely a must read. Here are the first three items from the list, head on over to Jeremiah’s blog for the complete list. Don’t forget to check out the comments for some good feedback and conversations.

Marketing Campaigns on Social Networks share the following attributes:

• Meets a business objective: First and foremost, any marketing campaign or activity should match with a business objective, regardless of the tools being used.
• Encourage Member Interaction: The most successful social networking campaigns and efforts involve the audience.
• Quickly scale: Social networks are designed for information to quickly move from member to member, so campaigns that lean on these capabilities perform the best. These attributes known as Velocity, Viralness, and Spread are key.

“What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks?” - Web Strategy by Jeremiah