11 hot tech start-ups from 2011 (and lessons learnt)

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One of the best things to happen to PR and marketing agencies in recent times has been the explosion of the social web.

Not only has it placed a renewed emphasis on quality editorial content, but it has also triggered a raft of innovative web-shaped start-up businesses.

We’ve been involved in the launch a several successful start-ups over the years, including SIM4travel and Butterfly World, so we’re always keeping track of the businesses that look set to make waves.

With this in mind, and with so many innovative web, tech, e-commerce and mobile-based start-ups doing great things in 2011, we thought we’d profile 11 start-up companies that have captured our imagination this year.

1. AppDirect.com

Web-based business applications are big business, but until now, being able to browse and buy all of them from one marketplace has virtually been non-existent. AppDirect has answered the call with nearly every possible business solution under one roof, ranging from collaboration tools to marketing platforms.

Start-up lesson(s): AppDirect.com could be considered best practice as far as online set up in concerned. Upon arrival, visitors are immediately encouraged to sign up for an account (impossible to miss), handy ‘how-to’ videos are easily accessible from the homepage and the AppDirect blog serves up useful information to help you make informed decisions about your own business.

2. Wanderfly.com

We profiled Wanderfly on this blog back in February this year as it took a fresh approach to holiday travel by placing your interests at the heart of your search journey.

Start-up lesson(s): Wanderfly has seamlessly integrated Facebook into the platform so you can see where your friends are traveling and teamed up with some great brands to create themed Wanderlists, bringing the depth of Wanderfly to life (check out the awesome ‘places to find creativity’ list courtesy of Cool Hunting).

3. SwipeGood.com

This is such a clever and simple idea! SwipeGood rounds up all of your credit and debit card purchases to the nearest dollar and then allows you to donate this ‘loose change’ to a charity of your choice.

Start-up lesson(s): SwipeGood has clearly being paying a lot of attention to the way people discover new start ups online. It is no coincidence that the three biggest blogs in the world (HuffPost, TechCrunch and Mashable) have all featured SwipeGood on several occasions. The reason why these profile pieces are so important is because these three blogs generate quality editorial referrals, high-ranking in-bound links and provide some serious credibility. The equivalent to PR launch heaven.

4. PeopleBrowsr.com

We got a little excited about this last week on Platform Five and for good reason too! PeopleBrowsr is a social media analytics dashboard that will make social media audits and analysis a much easier proposition for business of all sizes.

Start-up lesson(s): One of the most impressive elements of PeopleBrowsr’s offer is the customer service provided via Twitter.  While you’d expect a business like this to ‘walk the walk’ in this area, only a few do it really well and PeopleBrowsr is one of them.

5. Instagr.am

Did you know Instagram isn’t even one year old yet?!? Founded in October 2010, this simple photo sharing app for the iPhone has become one of the hottest start ups of the last few years.

Start-up lesson(s): Instagram is only available on iPhone (at the moment). Instead of trying to master every mobile operating system at once, they have put all their energy into the iPhone and have been rewarded with more than four million loyal users who have done their PR for them.

6 – 11 (coming soon)

We’ve got six more start-ups on our list but before we publish our nominations, we wanted to open the floor to you!

So, if you’d like to influence the final make-up of this list, drop your suggestions in the comments section below, paying special attention to the lessons learnt by those companies (good or bad).

And remember, you can keep up to date with us via Twitter and Facebook.