How Can Pip.io Improve the Social Networking Profile of My Small Business?

Social media has shaped the way people communicate on the web.  More and more businesses are learning that creating profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter is a great way to expand their reach, network with other professionals, and engage new prospects.  The social networks are mounting up quickly, and so are the tools designed to build on their potential.  A relative newcomer, Pip.io is one that stands out from all the rest on first glance.    

Pip.io promotes itself as a social operating system that moves beyond aggregators and mass-publishing tools that allow you to publish tweets.  One major distinction is its powerful API that supports third-party applications.  For example, with the Netflix app, you can pretty much enjoy the entire Netflix experience directly from your Pip.io user account.  It also provides full support for Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.  Twitter functionality is made possible from a built-in client that gives you the ability to manage contact lists, follow or unfollow, view streams and other related functions.  Although Pip.io hasn’t been tried and test like other services on the market, it has tremendous potential as a tool small businesses can put to use. 

Pip.io’s Ecosystem, which is basically your homepage, is where most of the communications between you and your contacts take place.  These communications can either be private when directed to individuals, or publicly displayed to groups of users.  Pip.io allows you to target your communications with a feature called Channels.  With channels, you can divide your contacts and leverage one-way distribution.  For example, if you want to communicate with a certain group of users, instead of contacting everyone on your list, you can distribute your message through one particular channel and make sure it only reaches those participants. 

One Pip.io feature that has a lot of potential is the Global Updates function and its geo capabilities.  This feature lets you monitor updates by moving your way around the map to see just who is online and what they’re talking about.  As you proceed around the map, Pip.io refreshes the window according to what users are posting in that particular area.  Coming soon is the ability to reach out to your audience by location.  So if you were hosting an event and want to inform people in the area, you could simply choose the location, and deliver your message to the masses.  This feature offers so many possibilities and should really come in handy if Pip.io goes mobile as planned. 

Pip.io is loaded with features that give it distinct advantages over other social networking tools.  A perfect example is something the creators call rooms.  In the Pip.io world, a room is an environment the user can create and invite people to join.  Think of it as a virtual meeting place for real-time interactions where you invite people to have two-way communications.  The Pip.io API makes this feature even more interesting as it encourages developers to create rich applications that enhance the communication experience.  Leveraging the rooms feature and a real-time platform, small businesses can essentially communicate with the audience they want, in whatever manner they wish.  

Pip.io has a lot of potential as a tool that dramatically enhances the social networking experience.  It will definitely take some getting used to, but it provides a host of tutorials that explain all the functions and how they work.  If Pip.io catches on with users and developers, it could become a flourishing community that gives small businesses the edge they need to compete and come out on top.