springpad blog

“Enrich your advice. Extend your brand. Help turn the consumable web into the usable web.”

The amount of consumable content available on the web is almost infinite.  But only a portion of that content is actually usable.  As bloggers and publishers, you work hard to create useful information and advice.  However, in order to make it usable, your readers often need to transform your information into something usable.  To do this, they create personal task lists & shopping lists, print out recipes, add things to their calendars or address books, and write notes to themselves.  In most cases, your readers do these things on paper or in another application that’s not related to your website -  the result is that your brand is nowhere to be found.

What is usable content?

We like to think of “usable content” as any piece of content that allows a reader to a take action on it.   For example, if a reader finds an article about vacationing, the usable portion would be a suggested packing list or a restaurant’s phone number or website to make a reservation. Or if a reader finds a blog post about how to roast a chicken, the usable portion would be the shopping list for ingredients & supplies.

How does springpad help bloggers and publishers share their usable content?

Springpad allows bloggers and publishers to easily structure and embed usable content into their articles or blog posts.  The method of doing it is simple; create related springIt! links.  SpringIt! links allow your users to “spring” branded, structured, and usable content into their springpads.  The usable content can take the form of simple things like shopping lists, alarms, or recipes as well as more robust offerings like branded springpads (e.g. Meal Planner, Trip Planner, etc). 

Example SpringIt! Implementation

Let’s take a look at one of the posts from the Spring Partners employee blog, thesimpleme.  After the user reads the post and decides that they’d like to save the recipe for later, they can click on the “Spring the recipe!” link.

The reader then gets a copy of the recipe, with the author’s brand attached to it, links back to the original article & even links to a few related articles.

The author of this recipe has now given their reader the benefit of using this recipe in springpad, provinding many features that would otherwise not be available to the reader:
– Sharing with family & friends (the author’s brand & links stay intact)
– Saving the branded recipe to use again & again
– Automatically creating shopping lists, which can be organized & reused
– Including the recipe in weekly meal plans & other food-related springpads

Implementing SpringIt! Links

Currently, bloggers & publishers need to contact us to put branded SpringIt! links in their websites. Please get in touch with me to get started.  (mfusco AT springpartners DOT com)

To learn more: Check out this video featuring Rookie Moms
Or see try SpringIt! it out for yourself on these websites:
– Sex and the Knitty: (Pumpkin) Patch It Together (a shopping list)
– Midlife’s a Trip: Spring Karen’s Kick-Ass Cranberry Sauce Recipe (a recipe)
– Good Girl Gone Blog: Every day should be bagel day! (a restaurant)
– thesimpleme: Make smaller mortgage payments (a budget, a task list & an alarm)