What can you do with the Workspace 365 RSS feed? Twelve examples!

Many people think: “RSS, does that still exist?” Yes it does, it’s one of the most undervalued technologies and that’s why in this blog I want to show you twelve powerful examples of RSS in your digital workplace, Workspace 365. Because of the RSS integration, you as an IT administrator or communication specialist are capable of keeping your entire organisation up to date.

1. News from your industry or occupational group

To stay the best in your industry it is important that your employees are up to date on the most recent developments. As an example I’d like to show you this marketing workspace. By integrating an RSS feed from BBC Tech into the workspace, we instantly see important articles to which we should respond. This enables us to advise the product team on new feature developments and to learn the latest trics to communicate information to our target group.

You can apply this to any position. An IT support employee can see the latest technical news, while a store employee can view the best articles on customer satisfaction. For instance, put the latest executive news or a news feed of Entrepreneur in the news feeds of members of management, so that they gladly open the workspace to see the news.

2. Internal news from SharePoint through RSS

In Office 365 you have the possibility to write articles and create an intranet with SharePoint. One of the disadvantages is that SharePoint is often experienced as complicated, which leads to disappointing adoption. By integrating these news articles in the workspace, you place it in a location employees already visit daily to open their applications, documents, information and e-mail. This increases the adoption of the intranet, and more importantly, the company news reaches even more employees.

3. Important documents or links through SharePoint lists

By creating SharePoint lists you can provide easy access to important documents. For example, you can add procedures, policy and work specifications to the workspace. When employees click on an article, they will get a description and a direct link to the document.

4. Add mailings from your company through RSS

Does your organisation send a lot of mailings? Make sure you integrate them into the workspace. Consequently, all employees will be up to date on the latest actions and updates towards customers and they can also easily find older mailings to get inspired for their sales conversations. Many mailing tools, like MailChimp, support this. With MailChimp you can find the RSS feed by opening a mailing in the browser and clicking on RSS in the top right corner.

5. Instantly respond to procurements thanks to RSS

I recently spotted a strong example of RSS at a company specialised in procurements. By integrating several sources on the subject of procurement opportunities through RSS, they could see the latest procurements directly in their workspace. This way, they could stay ahead of their competition by responding quickly.

6. Create a video playlist

You can also add YouTube videos to your workspace with RSS. Every YouTube channel has a unique code which you can easily convert to an RSS feed. Read our blog on RSS feeds for YouTube for a complete explanation on how to do this.

7. Add podcasts to your workspace

Did you know that podcasts are actually also RSS feeds, but with audio? So you can also add podcasts that are interesting to employees; perhaps a podcast on inspiring entrepreneurs on or your own company podcast?

8. Twitter in your digital workspace

Does your company use Twitter? Integrate it in the workspace by adding a Twitter feed with RSS. This way, everyone can see the organisation’s latest tweets instantly. This is easy to do with RSS.app.

9. Modifications to documents or folders

Do you want to stay completely updated on a project? Create an RSS feed in which you can directly see when someone edits a document or file. Discover how you set this up here.

10. Encourage public transportation

One of the Workspace 365 customers is located in Utrecht nearby the main train station. Most employees come to work by train. Especially for these employees, they’ve created a tile in which they can see when a train is not running. This way, employees won’t be faced with unpleasant surprises.

11. Create your own tiles and combine RSS feeds

Within the digital workspace we offer you the possibility to create multiple tabs. However, you might want to view several RSS feed within one single tab. To make this possible there’s a variety of tools available online. I use the tool RSSMix myself.

12. Come up with and create your own RSS feeds

Are you excited about the possibilities of RSS yet? Then I have a little something extra for you. With tools like Zapier or IFTT you can also create your own RSS feeds. So if you have a creative idea, I would recommend having a look at these tools. You could for instance create an RSS notification for whenever someone creates a new task in OneNote.

Let us know which RSS feeds you prefer to use in your digital workspace. I’m very interested to see creative RSS feeds.