There’s another social networking site out there now. That may be a ho-hum way to begin an essay, but stay with me for a moment because the new site does many things well. “Glue” works because it takes a new approach to sharing – that is, the sharing of things you like, in large lists. While there are “plugins” that can do this on Facebook, Glue masters the concept as its main feature.

Think of Glue as Facebook-meets Foursquare-meets Amazon Recommendations. You start by telling the site different things you like – movies, TV shows, books, music, etc. It then generates recommendations based upon those choices. So far, no biggie. But your friends can see and share those choices, and that’s where things get interesting. I’m more likely to take the recommendation of a friend than I am of some website’s “bot.” You can subscribe to other people’s Glue, so you can see what a particular friend likes or recommends.

There’s a small but significant incentive at work here as well. You can earn badges based upon your activity. If you recommend 50 TV shows, you get a badge. This may seem, well, a little childish, but Foursquare has shown that we like to get these instant-gratification rewards. Glue also posts who has visited the most, making for a little competition.

The other thing Glue does well is it gives each person an easy-to-remember page URL to share. You can see what I like and dislike simply by going to getglue.com/steviesaf and poking around. You may think I’m nuts on some of my choices, but I dare say you’ll get to know me better than you would by looking at my Facebook profile.

Which brings me to one last point, and that is that Glue works wonderfully with Facebook and Twitter. You can log in to Glue via Facebook Connect or Twitter, and you can post your activities there. In this way, Glue becomes a social network that rides on the rails already laid down by Facebook and Twitter. Smart.

Give glue a shot and see if it sticks.

(This article was originally written for RTDNA.org)

UPDATE: A day after I wrote this, the Community/Marketing Analyst for Glue wrote me asking my thoughts on the experience. That’s good social marketing. Kudos.

No related posts.