So simply summarized Stormpulse's success came because: 1. They provided a better solution to a problem that people had, 2. They made the solution easi

So simply summarized Stormpulse's success came because: 1. They provided a better solution to a problem that people had, 2. They made the solution easily spreadable via an embedable widget, 3. Hurricane Ike hit the Gulf Coast. Two of the three ingredients they had control of, the third was a random event that they were well-placed to take advantage of. People who saw the Stormpulse widget remembered it and searched for it directly, rather than try to use the broken, or inefficient service of other online weather media.