MyPunchbowl has been one of my favorite event-planning services since it launched a couple years ago. Since then, the service has been constantly updating its tools, adding new themes and custom options for its users. Today, a new option is being released, called Reasons to Celebrate. Think of it as Facebook birthday notifications on sterioids.
Birthdays can get pretty lame. I mean, we all have them, and if you’re anything like me, you milk them for all they’re worth. As a side note, I’ll just go ahead and mention that September 27th is my one-and-only golden birthday, meaning I’ll be turning 27 on the 27th. It’s been a long time coming (26 years to be exact), and I expect birthday wishes and decadent gifts from each and every one of you.
But if you’d like to move beyond the birthday thing, check out Reasons to Celebrate. It’s a notification page of sorts, where MyPunchbowl informs you of all the fun and obscure national holidays that are out there. Did you know that today is National Gummy Worm Day? Well now you know. And that means it’s a perfect day for you to send out a MyPunchbowl party invite to your friends and tell them to grab a bag of gummy worms and head to your local theater for a Harry Potter sneak Preview. Yumm!
In all seriousness, MyPunchbowl is leveraging this new service as a recommendation tool and a way to get its users to utilize its tools more often. It’s a great ploy, and one that will be even more effective over time. As it currently stands, you can check out the upcoming Reasons to Celebrate on MyPunchbowl and send them out to friends.
In talking with MyPunchbowl founder Matt Douglas I was able to learn of some of his goals for Reasons to Celebrate. For starters MyPunchbowl has already integrated the new section with its retail vertical, which is readily getting into the virtual goods market.
Aside from passive recommendations for reasons to throw a party, MyPunchbowl could also leverage the new section as a direct recommendation tool to its existing users. Deeper integration with networks like Facebook and Twitter means more visibility for MyPunchbowl’s Reasons to Celebrate, along with more areas in which to incorporate calendar and event alerts. This approach to recommendatins could also easily spill over into the virtual goods realm of MyPunchbowl, further targeting party planners and atendees alike.