Co-founded by Adam D’Angelo and Charlie Cheever, two former employees of social giant Facebook, Quora was launched in 2010 to much fanfare. Many called it the next big thing in the Q&A game, believing it would be a viable alternative to competitors like Yahoo! Answers and Wiki Answers. While the service is extremely useful, it wasn’t long before the hype died down and the internet community hopped on the next bandwagon. Quora has observers talking once again with the recent introduction of its new boards feature.

A Closer Look at Quora Boards

With boards, Quora is moving far beyond the question and answer format it is most known for. The feature makes the platform more like a combination between a blog and web forum. A board can be set to public or private, followed by readers interested in the topic and even edited by multiple authors. Perhaps the most exciting aspect of the new feature is the fact that it is not limited to content found on Quora. Boards allows users to curate content from blogs, social networks and various other sites around the web. This addition makes the almost forgotten knowledge platform much more compelling than before.

According to D’Angelo, the Quora team has learned that today’s internet users want to consume interesting content regardless of whether or not it is presented in a Q&A format. The boards feature opens things up by providing access to recommendations from friends, in addition to links, photos, videos and other content, essentially giving the site a deeper social component. If all this sounds familiar to you, it is because Quora’s new feature is heavily inspired by Pinterest. Owned by a startup operating out of Palo Alto, California, Pinterest is a new social network that utilizes the vision or “pinboard” concept to allow its users to collect, showcase and share content from around the web.

Quora Boards Marketing Potential

Quora had tremendous marketing potential from the moment it was unveiled to the general public, but the addition of boards takes the value up a notch. For example, a marketer could use the feature to share articles, blog posts or other engaging content with their target audience. Of course, the added benefit is having the ability to share content from other sources as well. This actually works to the marketer’s advantage by demonstrating that they are not all about self promoting. Quora has always been great for showcasing one’s expertise, but with boards, marketers can highlight their authority beyond answering questions.

Only time will tell whether Quora boards is really worth a marketer’s time. There is concern that it could ruin a good thing, but as long the site retains its core functionality, that shouldn’t be much of a problem. For now, boards looks to be a feature that could make Quora a marketing platform to keep an eye on.