Many websites have found that linking to ParkWhiz is an easy way to serve their users better. CenterStageChicago.com makes their guide to Chicago even more informative by helping their users find parking, and TechCocktail links to ParkWhiz so that you never have to worry about parking when attending one of their awesome events.

Now linking is pretty cool and all, but sometimes it just feels a little too “Web 1.0″. What if there was an easy way to put live parking info directly on a website or blog? Maybe a map or something. Yeah, that’d be neat.

Introducing the ParkWhiz Map Widget. We’ll generate all the code for you, and you just paste it into your website or blog. The map shows the 20 closest parking spots near a point, with links to ParkWhiz.com for detailed information and more results.

Sign up at ParkWhiz.com and log in to My ParkWhiz to access the widget maker. We hope you find it useful!

The Tech Cocktail events have become legendary in the Chicago tech scene, and ParkWhiz was lucky enough to demo at last Thursday’s TC4. Over 500 people came out, and Aashish and I enjoyed spreading the word about intelligent parking. Big thanks to Justin and John at Menuism who saved us when we realized we needed a power adapter.

As always Eric and Frank, the TC co-founders, did a great job making sure the even went off without a hitch. These guys are becoming superstars and are taking the Tech Cocktail event nationwide. Next stop…DC!

This past Friday was a cool day for me personally. I got to stand in the booth with radio personalities Eddie and JoBo of Chicago’s WBBM-FM B-96. Prior to founding ParkWhiz, I used to drive endless hours to my job and the only thing that kept me awake (and sane) in the morning was listening to these guys. It was a thrill to meet them. It’s amazing after all these years in the spotlight how friendly and approachable they are. They took the time to check out ParkWhiz.com and for a good 5 minutes everyone in the booth began bantering about where the best monthly parking space was around the area.

Overall, the staff at WBBM and B-96 was most gracious and extremely excited about ParkWhiz. Considering that people are in their car listening to the radio on their way to work, it can be a very effective medium to get the word out on ParkWhiz. Don’t touch that dial, because you’ll be hearing more of ParkWhiz soon.

Well, after a bustling 3 days of jam-packed meetings, pitches, and pow-wow sessions, we are finally settled back in Chicago. CTIA was an overwhelming, but great experience. Obviously, we are very excited to have won the Navteq LBS Challenge Navigation Category. Navteq and its sponsors were amazing and I highly encourage anyone with a LBS application to think about entering this competition. It’s great in terms of developing your product and the judges really provide some great feedback on what they think works and what does not.

We made some great friends at the LBS Challenge and hope to continue working with them, including the category winner of business applications, Jentro. Jentro is having a pretty good year as they just came from the 3GSM Conference in Barcelona where they won the European LBS Challenge Grand Prize. Jentro’s activepilot is the leading location-based end-to-end solution, offering local search, community tools, e911, and offboard navigation. They recently opened an office in Chicago, so we’ll be seeing them quite a bit now. They have a great platform and it’s no surprise they won their category, despite some stiff competition from the likes of loopt, which also has an amazing interface and userbase. We also want to mention our friends at Ten 23 Software, Chris and Chris, whose SpotKast app keeps your phone updated with the information relevant to users, helping them to save time and read their favorite web content, find a place to eat, avoid traffic jams, and find friends quickly through one easy to use interface. We’re hoping to get our parking information on their platform soon.

Aside from the competition, the CTIA convention was great as well. Although we missed out on seeing George Bush and Bill Clinton give their keynotes (due to hectic schedules), we met numerous carriers and providers who seem excited to work with ParkWhiz. Everyone seems to recognize what a pain parking can be and after seeing our app in motion, they all think we are on to something. The weather was gorgeous, albeit a bit windy, but overall was a nice break from the cold. We’re looking forward to next year’s CTIA and hope to return as contestants to the Navteq LBS Challenge with our eyes set on winning the grand prize!