Digital Lab TV: Flipboard in the Digital Lab

Smart device penetration in the US is booming; there were 821 million smart devices purchased in 2012 and it is estimated that 1.2 billion smart devices will be purchased in 2013. This is great news for Flipboard, an incredibly visual social reader app that just released its version 2.0 at the end of last month.

Flipboard joined the Digital Lab to give us a look at their take on beautiful, native advertising on their platform as well as give us a tour of the functionalities of Flipboard 2.0.

For those of you who aren’t so familiar with the app, here are a few quick facts:

Flipboard launched in December 2010 and has over $60 million in funding.
Its user base is 53 million.
Over 500,000 magazines have been created by users since Flipboard released version 2.0 of its app. (http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/11/flipboard-adds-3-million-users-since-launch-of-personalized-magazines-over-500000-magazines-created-to-date/)
50% of Flipboard 2.0 users use the app daily.
Flipboard 2.0 new features focus on personalization, such as allowing others to subscribe to fellow users’ magazines.

So where exactly does Flipboard sit in the mobile media ecosystem? On the one hand, it is a content publishing app, which stands to reason given its 100+ magazine partners whose users can access digital subscriptions through Flipboard. It is a social app, where users can read articles posted on their social network walls on the Flipboard platform, and share magazines they create with friends. It’s an app that combines scale, content, and social, which gives marketers and publishers alike access to a completely new audience.

Flipboard creates custom templates for each publication they partner with, so that the reader feels immersed in the branded experience of the publication. Flipboard works similarly with brands as they do with their publisher partners. Instead of a rich media experience, they offer interactive advertising experiences that fit within publications housed within the app. These are similar to native ads, but take it a step further, allowing the user to step into a brand experience within the app itself—or flip past it, if they so desire. Take Levi’s, for example. Levi’s has essentially built a branded magazine that features articles, photos and products. Tapping on the product brings the user into a template-based product page with a buy now button, which directs them to the Levi’s e-commerce site in a window within the app itself.

Brands also can create their own feeds and magazines with Flipboard, which usually consist of a mix of original content from the brand and content from third-party publishers. These brand magazines can work with Flipboard to create a template so that it has the same look and feel as the brand itself.