Flip It Good — 10 Ways to Use Flipboard to Promote Your Business
Business Blog / July 21, 2015
I’ve mentioned it before: I love Flipboard. (And no, I don’t work for them.) It’s a little app that gives me a sleek interface to view all the articles, pictures, and links that I gather from around the web. Sure, it won’t replace the efficiency of a good RSS reader — and if you find one, I want to know what it is — but it does the job of collecting information that you want to read in one neat package. And since I gather links like a house gathers dust, it takes a great UI for me to go back and actually read my massive collection of digitalia.
From the curator’s perspective however, there’s another interesting angle to Flipboard — namely, the many different ways people in various industries are using the app to promote their business. Below are some creative ideas and unique examples that you might want to try for your own projects or organization.
1. Use Flipboard as a Product Catalog or Brochure
If you have a large number of physical products or product lines, why not create product catalogs for your customers? Take a peek at the Nostalgic Gift Catalog with its links to Etsy items, the 2015 Aquascape Water Gardening Catalog that lists its various product lines for aquarium care, or even the Patriots Catalog that showcases merchandise for Patriots and Boston sports fans. Considering how drab many corporate websites look, it may just be more visually appealing to send a customer a link to a Flipboard magazine listing your various products.
2. Use Flipboard to Cover Your Industry’s News
What better way to show that your company is on top of its own niche than to collect relevant news items and articles relating to your industry? For example, you can follow magazines on the mobile industry, the design industry, the real estate industry, and loads more. If you can’t find a magazine for your industry, then you should start one right away. But just because there are others doesn’t mean you should step back. Join the fray! Just think of a more exciting name so you stand out from all the similar magazines surrounding yours in search results.
3. Use Flipboard for Internal Market Research
Put together a private magazine that collates all the latest articles from your competitors as market research, creating a snapshot in time of how they are positioning themselves.
4. Use Flipboard as a Press Kit
Prepare a Flipboard magazine that does nothing but collect all your press releases and press briefings, giving reporters a quick way to skim your most recent coverage.
5. Use Flipboard as a Photo Album
You’re not limited to just news stories, blog posts, and articles — you can also flip photos. So why not create a magazine to show off images of your corporate culture? For example create a magazine for: the daily office photo, what people wear for your Costumed Fridays, what’s being served at the office cafeteria, who attended the weekly Happy Hour, and more.
6. Use Flipboard to Document Special Events
In the same vein, you could use Flipboard to put together magazines for the year-end Sales Kickoff event, or your annual holiday party, or your semi-annual team outing, or even for the day when your startup files for IPO.
7. Use Flipboard to Create a Company History / Timeline
Another way to use Flipboard is to string together a timeline of critical events in your company’s history. Thus you get coverage of the founding, the organization’s early days, perhaps a smattering of press, and readers can enjoy it almost like a curated museum exhibit.
8. Use Flipboard to Brainstorm Ideas
Because you can easily invite contributors to a magazine, you can use Flipboard as a collaboration tool. Each member can quickly contribute ideas for anything from website design to holiday party themes.
9. Use Flipboard as a Newsletter for Your Customers and Fans
Because it’s a collection of links that your customers and fans may find useful, why not supplement your regular nurturing emails with a link to a newsletter-type magazine tailored specifically to your audience?
10. Use Flipboard to Showcase Customer’s Successes
You can use Flipboard to collect articles and blog posts that mention your customers using your product. Think of it almost like an external customer testimonial page. The benefits are twofold: you put the spotlight on your customers, and you highlight articles where they talk about your organization/service/product. Best of both worlds!
Need More Ideas? Start By Following These Magazines
Need more ideas about how to use Flipboard? Start by checking out the awesome and yet unofficial community of Flipboard curators, Flipboard Club. Then follow some good Flipboard magazines! Here are seven to start you off. These are the ones we curate for our company, Wrike. Check them out:
Productivity Works! for tips on getting things done.
Social Project Management, for project management tips in the age of the social enterprise.
Startup Spark Up for entrepreneurial advice, and startup culture.
Marketing Speak for all things digital marketing.
Work Humor, for a lighter, funnier take on this thing we do called work.
The Work Management Roundup, a weekly collection of must-reads regarding productivity, efficiency, and managing your work.
Wrike Culture, documenting what it’s like to work in Wrike — using photos!
Lionel Valdellon is a content marketer for work management software Wrike. At night he produces electronic downtempo music. He can found here on Twitter.
This post originally appeared on Medium on July 9, 2016, and is reprinted here with permission.
Image Credit: Flipboard by Johan Larsson on Flickr. Some rights reserved.
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