Widget developer JS-Kit has joined with AOL’s Userplane in a widget cross-distribution partnership that should significantly increase the potential userbases for both companies.
Both companies produce popular sets of widgets that can be easily implemented with a minimal amount of code. Among Userplane’s offerings are a popular Webchat widget (which allows for full featured online chat), a media player, and an embeddable bulletin board. JS-Kit offers less media-centric widgets like Ratings, Comments, and Polls.
With the new partnership, these two companies will begin offering eachother’s widgets in the hopes of gaining further distribution. At first, Userplane will be offering the JS-Kit Ratings widget and JS-Kit will be offering the Userplane Webchat widget, with both companies splitting embedded advertising 50/50. In the future there are plans to include more of each company’s widgets in the deal.
JS-Kit CEO Khris Loux says that the partnership will expose his widgets to 300,000 potential new sites though Userplane’s distribution channels. The deal gives further credibility to the JS-Kit brand, which has recently been added to Brightcove 3 through its API and has scored a number of other large partnerships. Last week the company raised $3.6 million in Series B funding.