Clearspring Announces Launchpad to Empower Developers to Accelerate Widget Creation and Distribution
Clearspring strengthens its developer community with new toolset for widget creators
McLean, VA. - Oct 29, 2007 — Clearspring Technologies Inc., the market leader in widget syndication and tracking, today announced the release of Launchpad, a free Web-based developer toolset that dramatically reduces the time and effort required to convert Web content into easily sharable widgets. Developers now have a powerful toolset to convert an entire Web site into widgets in minutes, dramatically increasing the content's viral distribution capabilities. With Launchpad, Clearspring opens the world's most widely used widget syndication service to developers everywhere.
Launchpad lets end users recognize Web content that can be shared as widgets and makes it easy for them to post widgets to the participating social network, start page or blog of their choice, like MySpace, Facebook, Blogger, Windows Live and iGoogle. Launchpad also lets end users email newly created widgets to friends, or save them with popular bookmarking services like Digg, Slashdot, Technorati and Furl. Developers or end users can also use a single block of code to embed a widget into a Web site.
"The developer community has been very vocal in its desire to simplify widget creation and maximize distribution," said Hooman Radfar, Clearspring founder and chief executive officer. "With Launchpad, developers can 'widgetize' their entire Web site in less than 20 minutes. We're opening our widget platform to developers everywhere, giving them access to the same service used by the world's leading media, e-commerce and advertising companies."
How Launchpad Works
The way Launchpad works is simple. Using code provided by Clearspring, developers can quickly embed a sharing menu or button onto their Web site. Using this menu or button, end users can easily post, bookmark or embed widgets to their social network, start page or blog, or email them to friends or associates. Developers may also embed the sharing menu or button into an existing widget, providing end users another easy way to virally share widgets.
Developers using Launchpad also have access to Clearspring's powerful analytics and reporting tools. These tools enable widget creators to track widget views, placements, unique viewers, time spent, interaction and more. Clearspring tracks this information by widget and domain and offers a variety of visualization options. The data can also be exported to Excel.
Launchpad also makes it simple for developers to leverage their existing assets. Developers can customize the sharing menu to complement their Web site's color scheme and design or to determine what sharing options to offer. Launchpad integrates with the developers' existing content management systems and HTML template software, allowing them to work and remain within a single familiar system.
For more information, go to www.clearspring.com/services/launchpad.
About Clearspring
Clearspring is the leader in social distribution, connecting publishers and advertisers to audiences on the social Web. Clearspring's content sharing products, ranked No. 1 by comScore, enable publishers, developers and advertisers to easily distribute and track digital content such as widgets, videos, photos and links to the most popular destinations, including social networks, start pages, bookmarking sites, blogs, mobile devices and desktop platforms. The company provides additional distribution of content on a paid performance basis to the world's leading brands through a targeted social distribution network of affiliate partners. The company reaches over 534 millionusers worldwide. Its tools are served billions of times monthly and they power programs for many major brands and over 400,000 other long-tail developers. To learn more, visit www.clearspring.com.