May 27, 2011

Bre.ad Rises in June, Adding Billboards to Social Sharing

Everybody and their mom has a URL shortener these days. With 140 characters being the new 1,000 words, shrinkage is no longer a bad thing. But not all URL shorteners are the same. Bre.ad, which promises it will be opening to the public in June of this year, gives its users an option to deliver a customized digital billboard attached to every share, be it for a favorite brand, cause, charity or anything else. Have something to promote as well as something to share? Bre.ad hopes you'll join their bakery.

Bre.ad enables you to share to three places - their own site, aggregating all shares within the network, ordered by chronology, as well as the standbys, Facebook and Twitter.

I Make a Toast to Charity Water

Before you share on Bre.ad, you first select an interest, brand or charity that you want to promote to your friends and make "a toast" explaining why you selected that cause. Having selected this promo, then you're ready to bake some bre.ad links.

Sharing My Link to Bre.ad

From that point, sharing links is pretty similar to other shorteners, like bit.ly, goo.gl and the rest. Copy the original link, enter accompanying text, and you're on your way. But Bre.ad also lets you pick a thumbnail for the share and a category, helping the bre.ad network know how your link should be categorized.

The resulting Tweet and Link

When friends bump into your bre.ad links on Twitter or other services, before they reach your link, they see your promo, which can last five seconds. For me, I picked Charity: Water, the fast-growing and incredibly interesting charity that's bringing clean drinking water to places that need it. For you, you might pick Apple, Nike, Lady Gaga or whatever you find interesting.

Think your connections won't mind a small ad before your content? That's what Bre.ad is betting on. You can sign up for their beta now. Doors are opening soon.