Sexy Widget: Kaboodle Shopping Widget

September 18, 2006

Kaboodle Shopping Widget – A Review

Kaboodle is a social shopping service that allows members to collect and save product information from around the Web, and to share that product information with others. The Kaboodle widget is an extension of this service, and allows users to generate a snippet of code that will display their product recommendations on their own blog or personal Web site (the site must accept scripts).

Each new user begins with four separate pages that can be widgetized – a shopping page, a top movies page, a vacation plan page, and a wish list page. Additional pages can be added should the user so choose.

The strength of Kaboodle would appear to be in its browser extensions which allow users to easily extract data (product titles, images, etc.) from any Web page and add them to their recommendation page on Kaboodle, where they can be shared with others through community tools or widgets.

Applications & Opportunity

Given my recent coverage on the social shopping space (see here and here), I’m not going to repeat my thoughts on the prospects for a social shopping widget here. Let’s just say that the combination of an exploding number of blogs with data that says that people value the recommendations of shoppers above all else when making a purchasing decision makes the concept of a social shopping widget pretty interesting.

Configuration

The Kaboodle widget does not get much emphasis on the site. Nowhere on the home page is there any mention of the ability to embed your product recommendations on other sites, and their definition of the activity “share” seems to be limited to “share everything on one simple page.”

However, as you browse main recommendation pages on the site, you’ll notice links in the right hand column that say “Put this page on your blog or website.” Clicking this link triggers a widget configuration tool that allows you to set how many images you want to display, what the width should be (100px or 75px), if the widget should be horizontal or vertical, and what the colors should make up the background, border, and links.

There’s a very slick, ajaxy preview tool that displays in real time what your widget will look like as you mess with the various configuration options.

Interestingly, there doesn’t seem to be an option to create a single product widget – the widget configuration tool only shows up on the main recommendation pages for each user. Also, the widget only displays the image associated with the product - there doesn’t seem to be any option to display the comments or review that the recommender has associated with the product.

Besides the lack of airplay that Kaboodle gives to their widgets, the only issues I have with the configuration process – and these are very nitpicky – are that when configuring someone a widget from somebody else’s product page, the language implies that it’s your product page, and the tool displays the text “image size” instead of “image width.” Yes, these are very minor points.

Testing

As mentioned earlier, the Kaboodle widget uses a script, so it’s not compatible with MySpace or Blogger posts. I was able to add the widget without a problem to my Typepad template, and to a Blogger sidebar.

Editorial

It just doesn’t seem to me that Kaboodle is putting a lot of emphasis (yet?) on the widgetization of their service. From the absence of a widget mention on the home page, to the lack of an individual product widget, there seem to be a few signs that the Kaboodle widget is an afterthought. This is stark contrast to a site like ThisNext which defines shopcasting as one of the core activities of the site.

I also think that it’s a mistake to make the widget consist solely of an image of the product. Without any context, it’s sort of difficult for the reader of a blog to understand why a random product pic is showing up in the sidebar. When I look at the ThisNext widget side by side with the Kaboodle widget, it’s much clearer to me that the ThisNext widget represents a personal recommendation from me to my readers (though it takes up a lot more real estate.)

Social shopping is a very new space, and nobody really knows what are going to be the key features / emphases that lead one service to success, and another to failure. But it seems to me that effectively empowering members to broadcast their product picks around the Web will play a big role.

To be fair, it’s very difficult for small, young companies to cover every base. Kaboodle has done a tremendous job on the Bizdev front, most notably with the eBay deal. Their browser bookmarklets are extremely impressive. The introduction of their widget is another step in the right direction, but the current iteration still needs some work.

Click through to write your own review of the Kaboodle shopping widget.

Posted at 01:55 PM | Permalink

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Sexy Widget

Reviews and analysis of widgets, toolbars, and distributed businesses of all flavors.

September 18, 2006

Kaboodle Shopping Widget – A Review

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