VisualDNA beta: Personalised ecommerce and analytics like you've never seen before

UK startup Imagini has launched the private beta version of its VisualDNA Shops widget to help monetise blogs and websites through a unique take on affiliate sales. The widget adds personalised product recommendations to any site, and immediately starts generating detailed demographic, psychographic and behavioural analytics of its visitors.

It does this using the company’s VisualDNA concept; working out people’s personality types based on the pictures they choose. Imagini draws the data from its consumer facing personality test site, Youniverse, which has profiled more than 15 million people since 2006.

VisualDNA Shop presents visitors with a few visual questions, and delivers real-time product recommendations from Amazon.com based on their responses. At the moment this means visitors can choose from mobile phones, digital cameras and gadgets. The company plans to include a broader range of products from sites like eBay and Shopping.com in the near future.

Imagini secured $13.5m in funding in February this year, a chunk of which no doubt went to getting Stephen Fry to explain the VisualDNA concept (doing a rather succinct job, too):

Anyone can try the concept with a free, limited VisualDNA Shop. There’s a Pro version for $2.99 a month which comes with  advanced analytics that tell site owners what their audience is like — coining titles like ‘funster’, ‘gamer’ and ‘active adventurer’ — and what appeals to them.

With the Pro version, site owners can make their own suggestions for new products to be advertised to different types of shopper, and show visitors other sites visited by people with similar preferences.

If you want to try it out, TechCrunch Europe has 50 access codes to give away using the invitation code ‘techcruncheuropevisualdnashop’.