I first wrote about ratings and recommendation platform Outbrain on Sunday , the same day I also added the service here at The Inquisitr. Without rehashing the full post, Outbrain is the star based rating system you’ll see at the bottom of this post and every other post. The system also provides related post style recommendations from the local site and other sites on the Outbrain network.
The last part to me was the key benefit: it gives contextual based recommendations to content on other sites, providing a value add for readers who may be seeking further information or views on a given startup or service (note not every post, but regularly). It’s a great blogging 2.0 idea, but here’s the catch: you can tell the recommendation engine that you don’t want to give recommendations to other sites, making it (when used this way) nothing more than a glorified 1.0 widget.
The star rating system isn’t for everyone (I’m happy to recommend it, but it shouldn’t be compulsory), but here’s my challenge: if you are using Outbrain use the social features.
The reasons: it’s a value add to your readers, but more importantly if you are on the Outbrain network you’re getting links from sites who are being social. You’re taking from others and not giving back….and that’s in part greedy, in part just not very cool. For those using Outbrain but not sure about how to set this up (or whether it’s on or not), make sure your recommendations are set to “Best Possible” as opposed to “Limited.”