Lisa Mende Design: Why You Should Use Olioboard....

Sunday, February 24, 2013

Why You Should Use Olioboard....

This past Thursday my presentation in the Baker Showroom at High Point Market for the Unity In Design Event was about Social Media and highlighted one of my favorite tools as a designer, "Olioboard". I can't say enough about this website. If you dont' have an Olioboard Account you should get one immediately. Why, you asked? Because it is sooo much easier than photoshop and does the same thing, but is also a social media platform. Once you create on Olioboard you are also connected to social media sharing. So what does Oliboard do? 2d and 3d mood boards can be created , shared and shopped on Olioboard.

Olioboard currently has 43 e-commerce partners. Did you know that you too can become an online affiliate with Olioboard if you currently have an online shop for only $250.00 per month? Think of the exposure your business would get!

Here is an example

of a board I created on Olioboard:

Or you can also create a 2d mood board like the one below:

Board by Jane Gianarelli

When You sign up for an account you can add a picture of yourself, your location, your services, and links to all your social media platforms...

Profile page:

about you

Lisa Mende of Lisa Mende Designs. Oct. 2012 winner of the High Point Style Spotter Contest. Eull service residential interior design practice in North Carolina since 1998.. She likes to use Olioboard for presentations & e-design. lmende@gmail.com

By filling out profile information you increase your chances of being found by people who are searching online for designers to collaborate with. Once they discover your boards they will be linked back to your website and interact with you. You can also put your email address on your boards they can click through and contact you.

Olioboard has over 103,000 members and growing my 4,000 members a month. That translates to 1.25 million page views a month. That can add up to a lot of eyes on your business.

For only 8.99 a month, you can become a pro member which gives you all kinds of extra benefits to create more professional looking boards such as access to Benjamin Moore Paint Samples, text to use on your mood and greater exposure in the Olioboard community.

My favorite feature of the Pro membership is the ability to create a budget from your boards. This is so helpful when working with clients. You can pull items of different prices to compare when you are trying to convince a client of the quality of the products you have specified. You also have the ability to print out a shopping list for yourself or your clients.

Your boards can be made public or private which is extremely helpful when working with clients. You might not want everyone to see your work for clients. When creating boards to display your design aesthetic, those public for everyone to view.

Another great feature of Olioboard is that you are not limited to their e-commerce partners. You may upload any products you want to use. Those items can be labeled and priced any way you wish.

Olioboard allows you maximize on Google SEO. You may tag your boards so that it is easier for Google search engines to find you. Make sure you are careful tag in ways that people use to search. Add keywords that relate to your business and city, that way it will be easier for potential clients to find you when searching. The more descriptive you get and more detailed, the better the chances that someone will find you.

Other uses for Olioboard:

Cost Effective: It takes the place of expensive and time consuming renderings. Something has to be replaced due to being over budget, you can eaisly remove from your board.

If you have a Facebook page, upload a board as your profile picture. It makes for good eye candy for your readers. You can use it to give your business page an update even if you don't have any new projects to share from real life clients.

Olioboards pinned to Pinterest can create a "virtual" portfolio for use like this one by Lynda Quintero Davis. Lynda now has 3.6 million followers on Pinterest because she has been creating a virtual portifolio. If you add your email address to your boards it's easier for potential clients who like what they see to contact you!. If you link all your boards pinned on Pinterest to your website, you can drive traffic back to your site.

Olioboard also has widgets you can put on your blog or website

that link to your Olioboards.

I use Olioboard all the time in my design business to create mood boards, quick concepts , for presentations and for the e-design division of my practice. My friend Jen Reynolds of Atlanta, Ga. taught me a great little trick. She uploaded her client's room and then put the furnishings in the room that she wanted to specify. Then then took a picture with instagram and made the photo black and white so it didn't confuse the client with the wrong colors since the items were as shown on the website not in the colors she wanted to use. The client was able to see how it could look in their space and was immediately

ready to let Jen start the work.

Olioboard offers so many great features to designers one of which is the opportunity to collaborate with influential brands. Members have had the chance to collerborate with Nate Berkus, The Today Show and Layla Grace to name a few.

No where else online can you find an application like Olioboard which also doubles as a social media platform and e-commerce platform. The combination of these three features gives you the best way to leverage yourself and your business.

Another fun aspect of Olioboard is they have contest for their community members. Sometimes there are monetary benefits other times things like their current contest Tobi Fairley's "Get Published" Contest which I have enter where they are giving away tickets to Tobi Fairley's "Get Published" Camp! Would love it if you voted for me. I was late to the party , so I am very far behind! Here is my board in the contest which is all about stripes!

The contest runs until March 6th! If you are already an Olioboard member

simply click the link below to vote:

http://olioboard.com/boards/177584-stripes-are-hot

If you don't have an Olioboard account, you will need to go to www.Olioboard.com and register for an account by entering a username and password. Then find my board by putting my board name "Stripes are Hot" in the search bar, make sure you choose boards from the drop down menu to the left of the search bar. I want to thank you in advance for voting for my board! I also want to highly recommend you try out Olioboard. I think you will love it. It isn't just for design either. You can upload anything you want to use to create a moodboard.

Olioboard is a global platform where people from all over the world can connect. Konstadina from Greece and another member of India created a board together featuring Nate Berkus's new collection and as a result, people in India and Greece now know about Nate Berkus's collection! Imagine how businesses could benefit from connections like this

Not sure how to maneuver on Olioboard? Check out the youtube
How To Create On Olioboard here!

As for the stripes they are definitely hot this season on the run way and in decor but in my world stripes have been hot forever! I love stripes, do you? I dont' think they ever go out of style!