If your business publishes season-themed Flipbooks, or has business-critical sales periods in-line with popular holidays, you likely already create Flipbooks that cater specifically to these occasions. Often, this comes with designing a digital catalog with a specific look, involving custom images, products, and offers.

Did you know that you can also enhance your seasonal catalogs with fun, and immersive, on-screen effects through Custom Scripting?

That's right! Why not take a look at our seasonally-enhanced, Flipbooks, live:

With Custom Scripting, we’ve added a fun snowfall effect, and festive audio to our winter catalog, that visitors can toggle on.

In fact, we enjoyed our own demo so much, we’ve created a guide on how you can implement it on your own Flipbooks:

Happy holidays! ❄️

There are some exciting changes coming to iPaper: we’re creating a seamless transition between browsing and purchasing in iPaper Flipbooks. These changes aim to refine how products are presented in your digital catalogs’ cart, through:

Stage 1: A redesigned cart experience (Q1 2024)

We’re ushering in these changes with a revamped cart. This redesign will offer a more inspirational, and informative view of a customer’s cart, allowing for a seamless transition between browsing and purchasing.

Getting an overview of the products you’ve put in your cart, and finalizing your purchase is a key part, and often the culmination of your shopping journey. The redesigned cart feature is designed to put this in focus, by moving from the sidebar, to a dedicated cart modal. We’ve done this to make the cart more in line with established e-commerce design principles.

Additionally, this feature will inform visitors about when a product is added to the cart through informative toast-notifications, which include the ability to quickly add multiples of products to the cart.

Stage 2: Introducing the new Product concept (Q1 2024)

Complementing the redesigned cart, we’re also introducing a new concept to iPaper – the ‘Product’ feature – which will bring together all of a product’s specifications, including product images and variants, into an expanded product view modal.

Using Products, you’ll now be able to group different variants, including unique product images and descriptions, under a single product.

With the introduction of product images, we’re now able to enrich the cart experience further by including these in the cart, and the toasts that display when a product is added to it.

Experience the redesigned cart for yourself, live!

You can see, and interact with, the redesigned cart experience live in our demo Flipbooks:

What happens next?

We aim to deliver this new shopping experience across multiple stages, with the first being the launch, and testing, of the new cart concept including the new, modal-based layout.

Stage 1: A redesigned cart experience

• We expect to roll out the new cart experience to everyone in early 2024.
• Early Access will become available in November (read more below).

At present, it will not include the ability to display product thumbnails within the cart, or the introduction of the Product concept.

Stage 2: Introducing the Product concept

• We expect Early Access to become available in Q1, 2024.
• More information on how you can register your interest will follow.

How do I sign up for Early Access?

We will be inviting iPaper customers to opt-in for the new cart experience. If you’d like to participate, and be the among the first to test the new cart features, you can register your interest via the link below.

💡 You'll need to be logged in to your iPaper account to be able to register your interest in Early Access.

Early Access disclaimer & requirements:

• To participate in the Early Access program, you must have an active iPaper subscription, which includes the Shop feature.
• You must have Administrator-level access to opt-in on behalf of your account.
• Opt-in registers your interest in participation, but does not guarantee Early Access.
• Opt-in will transform the cart experience on the whole account, and cannot be enabled on individual flipbooks only.

When your visitors share your digital catalog with others, it’s a great way of increasing traffic to your Flipbook. We’re replacing the in-built Flipbook sharing function with the native sharing feature of users' mobile devices to make sharing easier.

Previously, our inbuilt sharing function allowed you to share easily to preset platforms, such as Facebook or Twitter with one click, but sharing to other platforms required users to copy, and paste the catalog link manually, which is neither quick, nor intuitive.

By using the same sharing function that is used to share all content on a mobile, we think that sharing your Flipbook, will become easier, and more intuitive for your visitors. Users will also be able to make full use of their sharing shortcuts via their device’s sharing function, meaning that they can share, quickly and easily, to all the usual platforms they are used to using.

Custom sharing interfaces now possible via API

If you prefer to have a greater control over how, and to what channels your Flipbook is shared, you also have the option to create a custom sharing solution for your Flipbook using our Frontend API.

As we transition to native sharing, our current sharing feature will be entirely replaced. iPaper customers who have integrated a custom interface via our Frontend API should prepare for these changes and modify their interface accordingly. The good news is that we've extended our API to facilitate exactly that!

For detailed technical documentation on our Frontend API, please refer to the complete guide available, here.

When will this happen?

iPaper will implement the new sharing feature on

October 2, 2023.

How will this affect me?

If you already use our sharing options for your Flipbooks, on October 2, 2023, these will cease to be active, and instead your Flipbook visitors will be able to share via the device’s native sharing settings.

If you already use a custom interface for your iPaper Flipbook, you will need to accommodate for creating custom share settings for your desktop visitors, via our API. The share button requires an HTTPS connection in order to present custom sharing options to desktop visitors. These will not trigger, nor be visible, for Flipbooks served over HTTP connections.

What do I need to do?

If you are using our in-built sharing options today, you do not need to take action.

If you are using a custom interface today, and require custom sharing options for your Flipbook, you will need to build these into your interface. You will also need to ensure that your Flipbook is served over an HTTPS connection.

You can read more on the different ways you'll be able to share your Flipbook after October 2, 2023, in our new guide, below:

If your organization is already using a Single Sign-On (SSO) service in order to control access to different areas of your business online, you can integrate your SSO solution with your iPaper Enterprise+ account!

Integrating your SSO solution with iPaper:

• Unifies login processes across platforms, simplifying user access.
• Reduces password management hassle.
• Provides centralized control over iPaper account access, reinforcing security.
  ​

Best of all, setting up SSO with iPaper is easy – our setup guide takes the guesswork out of integrating:

Hi there,

We’ve just released our updated JavaScript (JS) API v.3!

If you're not already familiar with it, the JS API allows you to pass events to, and receive events from, the Flipbook viewer via JavaScript. In short, it enables direct communication between your iPaper Flipbooks, and your website.

This is beneficial when you:

• Want to build a custom interface for your embedded catalogs.
• Want to enable shopping from the catalog directly to your website basket.

Our latest version of the JS API introduces almost complete parity between what you can achieve via the API and the native iPaper interface.

💭 Wondering how you can use the JS API with your own Flipbooks?

Some of the functions that that can be accessed from the API v.3 include:

• Open basket
• Search for query X
• Open the Table of Contents
• Open Build a Flipbook
• Get the total number of pages
• Get the current page number(s)

🎉 But there’s even more!

With this new version, you can access all JS events from the custom scripting field in Flipbooks.

This means that your catalog no longer needs to be embedded for you to utilize JS API functionality—perfect, for example, if you would like to enable custom tracking functionality.

You can find full documentation of what you can achieve with our JS API over on our Technical Documentation page, below:

💡 If you're currently using JS API v.2

If you're already using the previous version of our JS API, you'll want to migrate over to the latest version.

v.3 comes with the added benefits of:

• New commands & events
• Improved stability & performance
• Better integration with multiple Flipbooks
• The API can now be used via Custom Scripting

Migrating to v.3 is easy, when you use our migration guide to help you:

If you’re familiar with using our Backend API, you’ll be happy to hear that we’ve expanded it with new Ecommerce API functions, available to all accounts with existing, Backend API access!

Ecommerce API functions include two calls that return all orders completed over the last 3 months.

• GetFlipbookOrdersByType
  Returns all orders submitted from any Flipbook, via a specific checkout type.

• GetLicenseOrdersByType
  Returns all orders submitted from any Flipbook in your account, via a specific checkout type.

If you’re already using our Backend API, please see our documentation below for how to use these Ecommerce API functions:

💡If you’re not using our Backend API, but are interested in learning more about how it can work for you, reach out to our Customer Care team via the messenger in the corner!

Making media-rich, engaging Flipbook experiences just got better: say hello to the Popup Media Gallery!

Our newest feature expands upon the functions previously offered by Popup Image, Popup Image Gallery and Popup Video, all rolled into one.

Popup Media Gallery is now your unified solution for surfacing all kinds of visual media, from single to multiple images and videos. However, Popup Media Gallery does even more.

We know that the more engaging an experience you can provide your visitors, the longer they remain engaged with your Flipbook. The Popup Media Gallery feature allows you to create curated asset galleries that include both images and galleries, including from external sources—everything you need to create the rich experiences your Flipbook deserves!

What will happen to my existing Popup Image, Popup Image Gallery and Popup Video enrichments?

All your existing Popup Image-, Image Gallery- and Video enrichments will be migrated to the new Popup Media Gallery format. No functionality will change within your Flipbooks, so you don’t need to lift a finger!

Moving forward, these enrichments types will be replaced by a single Popup Media Gallery enrichment, in the Enrichment editor.

Is it as simple to implement as the previous Popup media types?

If it wasn’t simple to use, it wouldn’t be iPaper! You can populate your Popup Media Gallery in one of two ways:
​

• Individually select images and videos, and customize the order in which you want to show them when a visitor clicks on your Popup Media Gallery, or
  ​
• Selecting a folder from your Media Library containing assets you’ve already uploaded.

When you individually pick your media assets, you can choose from:

• Any files from your Media Library
• Any externally uploaded MP4 video
• Any externally uploaded images
• Externally hosted, public videos from YouTube, or Vimeo

Alternatively, if you already have all the assets uploaded in your Media Library, you can select an entire folder of mixed image and video assets, and create a Popup Media Gallery from it.

How do I set up a Popup Media Gallery in my Flipbook?

Setting up your new Popup Media Galleries is simple: you select it from the list of enrichment actions in the Enrichment editor just as you would any other Enrichment.

Take a look at our guide on how to use Pop Up Media Galleries, below:

While it’s not something you may often do, we want you to be able to remove folders and Flipbooks with confidence.

We’ve implemented better security features to the deletion process to make it clearer what folders, or Flipbooks you are deleting:

A bolder hover-over color

The new, blue hover-over color in iPaper allows you to accurately see which folder, or Flipbook you are interacting with.

More information on what you are deleting

The new deletion warning pane now informs you:

• Whether you’re deleting a folder or a Flipbook,
• The number of Flipbooks contained within, when deleting a folder
• The name of the Flipbook or folder you are deleting
• The accrued 30-day session count for the Flipbook or folder you are deleting

Additional fail-safes

You’ll also find a final fail-safe feature, whereby you confirm the deletion command by typing the name of said folder or Flipbook.

With these additional checks, we’re minimizing the risk of deletion accidents, meaning you are more confident that you’re deleting the right Flipbook or folder.

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”, claimed Da Vinci, and at iPaper, we believe that simplifying our products, without compromising on functionality, leads to higher user adoption and greater ease of use.

We’ve simplified our checkout options by merging Email sharing and Email checkout into one, unified checkout option, called Email.

As Email checkout already achieves the same task as Email sharing—allowing you to share your basket contents via email—while being much more customizable, it’s a no-brainer to merge them into one. Any existing Email sharing options have automatically been migrated to the new, Email checkout option.

With Email checkout, all the fields are fully customizable, meaning you can tailor it to exactly how you want.

The options available to you are quite broad:

• Single line of text
• E-mail field
• Multiple lines of text
• Dropdown menu
• Checkbox
• Checkbox list
• Multiple choice
• Email list
• Consent checkbox

You can get a full rundown of the Email checkout option, as well as how to implement it in your shop configuration, in our guide, below:

You can add as many, or as few, fields as you need to make sure your visitors provide you with the data you need to complete the transaction.

Now, you only need to implement 1 Email checkout option, to allow your Flipbook visitors to check out to a vendor’s email address, or share their basket with someone else by entering another email address in the field. Simple!

Of course, if you have any questions about the new Email checkout option, just reach out to our Customer Care team via the messenger bubble in the corner, and we’ll be happy to help. ✌️

The world and the Internet are changing, with more focus on browsing privacy. In a recent survey, 68% of respondents expressed that they wanted to control the conditions in which their data was collected online.

To support this, we have chosen to enable every customer with the ability to use the Cookie Consent Manager they already use on their website, in their Flipbooks.

We’ve got great news: Custom Scripting is no longer restricted to higher tiers, but available on every iPaper account 🥳

Our Custom Scripting allows you to inject third-party, or completely customized scripts into your Flipbook, and can be managed by anyone with Administrator-level access.

It’s this feature that allows you, for example, to show the same cookie banner in your Flipbook, as you do on your website.

The possibilities are vast! For example, you can use Custom Scripting to:

• Implement tracking and analytics solutions other than our direct integrations with Google and Adobe
• Display the same cookie consent banner as you use on your website or other parts of your online business
• Inject a chatbot to offer your visitors direct access to your customer support, straight from your Flipbook, and so much more!

To find out more about, and how to get started with Custom Scripting, check out our guide, below: