adapativeblue Archive

Last night, Adaptive Blue hosted the “The Changing Role of PR in Publishing and Tech” meetup in NYC. The panelists were (from left to right in the video): Chantelle K from Yelp, Kristin M from Attention PR, Ami G. from Macmillan and Russ M from RussCommunications.

The panel discussion lasted an hour and I’ve split the video into 20-minute segments – you can view the videos below. Some notes from the panelists:

• Chantelle loads Tweetdeck the moment she hits the office to check Twitter and spends 30 minutes to 1 hour each day going through what her friends sent her
• Kristen discussed using the bit.ly URL shortener as a way to track ROI
• At about the 18 minutes mark in the first video, Chantelle explains how they went to market for their iPhone app using an exclusive with Robert Scoble. She notes that they saw great results by using Robert to get the word out about the app and were even able to get an exciting trending topic on Twitter. They didn’t give the news to the NYT or Newsweek. They met with Robert several times beforehand to build a relationship with Robert. Later on Chantelle noted that depending on the type of story they are trying to push, they will use different sources to work with.

There was a discussion about analytics in the second video although I found the analysis weak. There was no mention about real-value stats – just simple discussion about how many followers or fans a brand has. My guess is that in late 2010 ”followers and fans” will be the hits of 1995.

In the third video there is a discussion about whether to hire a PR firm or if you should look at bringing a person on-board internally.
Continue reading “The Changing Role of PR in Publishing and Tech (video)” »

NY-based Adaptiveblue has announced the launch of an API for their Glue service yesterday. AdaptiveBlue calls Glue a ”contextual network.” Here’s my overview of Glue from our initial review, “You install the browser plugin and then as you browse the Web normally, a menu shows up on any pages where Glue has information to share. These are typically pages dealing with movies, music, books, music artists, restaurants and wine.”

The company describes the API release as, “tapping into Glue’s databases and semantic recognition engine enabling fun & useful applications about people and things.” You can use the API to get popular lists, lookup user lists, create data streams, send info into Glue and access user profiles.

The goal of the API is to drive usage of Glue and the underlying data. The applications built using Glue should also provide new visibility for the Glue service.

The company is running a contest to find great ideas for the API. You could win an all expenses paid trip to NYC to meet the Glue team and have a hot dog and a knish. When you are in NYC, I recommend a visit to the transit museum.

Nearly everytime I write about NY-based AdaptiveBlue, I always note that while their technology is good, their ability to connect with a mainstream audience has been very limited. They seem to always push big tech words over what value the services actually provide. Last week I started playing with a new version of the AdaptiveBlue service which is a huge leap forward in attempting to reach out to the mainstream audience.

The AdaptiveBlue BlueOrganizer is no more. In its place is Glue, what the company calls a "contextual network." Here’s the basic concept behind Glue. You install the browser plugin and then as you browse the Web normally, a menu shows up on any pages where Glue has information to share. These are typically pages dealing with movies, music, books, music artists, restaurants and wine. You can also browse the full list of sites available in the Glue network.

The Glue bar shows up on the top of sites that Glue has a match for and is actually a HTML injection – this means it becomes part of the page and not a plugin that sits active at all times. The bar is a simple way to shows friends information related to the current item being viewed. You can see which of your friends like the item, which have commented on the item, along with where the person viewed the item. You also see a sample of others outside your network who liked the item – this helps with discovery.

You can click on a friend to see more information about them and the current item. From there you can select other services related to the current item including item purchase. There’s a "2 cents" option which lets you add comments about the item directly into Glue. I assume if they get enough traction on this 2 cents concept, it could lead to a very rich reviews destination site.

Their business model continues to be based on affiliate comissions through the use of the Glue bar. I hope they will look to diversify their revenue potential as I am a bit concerned that there won’t be enough sales to drive enough total volume. But affiliate revenue is good as a piece of the overall business model pie.

I think today’s launch is a great step forward towards the mainstream for AdaptiveBlue. Now the really tough work begins on getting mainstream user adoption – they need a strong number of users and friend relationships for the service to be effective.

Here’s a demo the company put together about Glue:

Thanks to all of the great RSS subscribers and site visitors that are helping to grow CenterNetworks! I appreciate it. We are just about at the 9-month anniversary which is very cool!

And thanks to our sponsors:

Zoho – they make a great online software suite for business. Most recently they have launched multilingual support in Zoho Sheet and created a place for public presentations with Zoho Show.

The Go BIG Network - The Go BIG Network is the World's Biggest Community of Startup Companies. Startups use Go BIG to find funding, recruit talent and get expert advice.

WingSix – they provide our hosting. WingSix has the best support in the business, period. I say this because they reply nearly instantly and the level of expertise is top notch. They are based in Chicago. I also like that you can actually build a relationship with them and you are not just a customer id.

AdaptiveBlue – the team at AdaptiveBlue make the BlueOrganizer which helps speed up your Firefox browsing. They also have a very cool BlueBadge widget which allows you to monetize your traffic by showing items you like on your site. 

We still have one opening for sponsors. Send me an email and let's discuss how CenterNetworks can help you maximize your marketing investment.

A big thank you to all of our readers. Our RSS numbers are going up and that means a lot to me. I appreciate all the feedback about tweaks and things you would like to see. Keep it coming!

I would also like to thank our sponsors. I asked each sponsor for some updates and here are the hot and new things they are working on:

AdaptiveBlue – The guys at AdaptiveBlue (makers of the BlueOrganizer Firefox extension) have launched a pretty cool new option to their site. Called the BlueShowcase, they are showing some web celebs and their badges. Currently, Seth Godin, Richard McManus, Emily Chang and Fred Wilson. Our badge is on the left menu under Interviewed!.

Text Link Ads – The team over at Text Link Ads launched a new offering for bloggers and site publishers last month. Auction Ads allows you to monetize your website by displaying live eBay auctions next to your related copy.

Zoho – Zoho has launched some updates to their Projects and Wiki tools. They have also launched a fun comicstrip generator, ToonDoo.

We have more exciting things coming for CenterNetworks in the coming weeks, so stay tuned!

AdaptiveBlue has released the 3.1 version of their BlueOrganizer product. Some of the new features include:

• Improved BlueMenu
• RSS Links with BlueMarks
• SmugMug Integration
• Compact BlueBadges
• Performance and bug fixes

The BlueOrganizer supports almost 100 sites in about 15 categories. From the BlueOrganizer overview: BlueOrganizer is the new smart-browsing tool for Firefox and Flock. It unleashes the information hidden in the pages of your favorite web sites, and allows you to quickly do what you want to do: find, compare, upload, download, post, rent, reserve, rank, keep track, subscribe, share, and more… The Web is even more connected with BlueOrganizer!

I like the tool because it takes Firefox (or Flock) and makes it a truly personalized experience. And since I use SmugMug, this makes it that much better.

Check out the launch video from Demo last autumn with Alex Iskold, founder of AdaptiveBlue.

Disclaimer: BlueOrganizer is a current advertiser on CenterNetworks