Pinterest has become a force to reckon with this past year. I also remember that there was a lot of suspicion and reluctance with some to use this new social medium. However, Pinterest has become such a large community, creating more revenue from purchases via their pins than Facebook and Twitter combined.
I myself have become a very dedicated Pinterest user myselfl and have collected a few tips that I would like to pass on to you!
1. Fact: a. 75% of Pinterest users are women. BAM!
b. Pinterest has higher actual sales resulting from postings and pins than Facebook and Twitter have.
2. Bizrate Insights has polled Pinterest users and determined that the following are reasons for browsing and pinning:
- 73% browse/pin to pass time
- 70% browse to get inspired in their next purchases
- 67% browse to keep track of or collect other things they like
- 67% browse to see latest trends (cooking, home decor, fashion)
- 51% browse to meet people with similar taste
- 43% browse to connect with retailers and brands that they identify with
- 39% browse to receive special offers from their favorite retailers, brands and bloggers/pinners
2. Pinterest just recently rolled out the option to convert or start a business page http://business.pinterest.com/. It really doesn't look any different, and neither converting nor signing up for Pinterest business page will take anymore time. Why change? You will receive additional tools to use in your social media mix. Currently, Pinterest is also working on more tools for businesses to use (like a "buy" or "more information" button), which is exciting.
3. Setting up boards: just like in your other social media websites is not about blatantly advertising but to provide information and connect.
4. What kind of boards should you have? Just like in all social media, you want to create relationships. Again:
- Show personality don't be afraid to show a private side of you. Make sure the business side is not in-your-face advertising.
- Think of what folks want to know: about neighborhoods, towns, county, state? Home decoration is usually a big one, oh and recipes!
- Maybe you can create boards that ‘feel’ like one big tutorial - Home Maintenance maybe? Home Buyers? Or do you want to become more specific: Military Home Buyers?
4. Pin like a person not like a company. Let people know what you like by what you pin. Food pins are very popular, fashion, home decoration (well, hello realtors and stagers!!!), but also city information is great and if course "houses" BUT read more about pinning further down this list.
5. Stagger your pinning, other pinners get overwhelmed if you pin too fast and too many pins. Personally, I have unfollowed other pinners if they’ve pinned too much- or I limited the boards I was following..
6. Make sure the images that you are pinning are big enough to fill the space. Avoid small images.
7. I DON'T pin Google images, Flickr images, and I only publish a pin from Tumblr if the pin is amazing. Pins from these places are usually just pretty pictures. If your followers want to know more about the pin (how, where, why) ,they get NOTHING. It's like hitting a 404-page when you browse. It's a dead end.
8. Avoiding trouble: A personal rule of mine is that anything "Hollywood" I do not pin. Be it movies, actors, singers ...stars. Too much [possible] trouble.
9. Always check the source of the pin BEFORE you re-pin. Make sure you know where the pin leads your followers and hopefully future clients. Make sure it's a place that is helpful to them, not offensive or spammy (YES! they are out there). Try and pin directly from blogs or sites.
9. Pinterest is VISUAL! Have appealing, interesting photos. Spruce up your photos with websites like picmonkey.com,ipiccy.com or apps like Instagram, BE FUNKY for mobile devices. Some folks will pin your pin because they love the info, others will pin it because of the image.
10. Adding words onto your image. Keywords, will help clarify what an image is about. Your website will let people know about the source. Or you can add credits to your image "Photo taken by...."
11. Pin listings. Pin a special feature of your listings, Maybe while you are at your listing look around for that special IT. It could be simple as your house in the sunset. People love sunsets and even if folks are not looking for a home, the sunset will get repinned and its all about exposure right?
12. Give a short but precise description of your pin. Keep it short and sweet.
13. Venture out! Find images on websites other than Pinterest itself. Original content is important here just like it is on other social media sites. Use your pin button that you have installed on your tool bar and use that for quick pinning directly to your boards.
It can be tempting to simply go to the "popular" tab and just start pinning from there and then be done with it. People can tell when you do it because you 'have to'.
14. You'll be surprised how fast you'll start accumulating boards. I started out with 7 and have now 25 - Keep your boards general yet precise.
15. Pinterest analytics. It didn't take long for these analytic websites to appear. They all do pretty much the same thing: They evaluate the amount of pins, followers and re-pins.
There is Pinerly.com but it was quickly sold and changed into Reachli.com. Pinreach.com
Pinalerts will alert you whenever an image from your site is being pinned! Then there is Pinfluencer.com and Pinalyzer.com - some have cost and some are free. I liked to check in to Pinreach every once in a while but I really didn't get much out of it. You decide how important these analytics are to you.
16. Secret boards. Did you know they existed? Why in the world would you need secret boards? You can keep your boards hidden until you figured out what you really want to do. I had started several secret boards of specific neighborhoods and then figured out very quickly that these were not going to work out.
17. If you ever wondered what has been pinned from your website/blog onto Pinterest then simply go to this link: http://www.pinterest.com/source/enteryourdomain.com
I love Pinterest - in case you can’t tell! It would be even better if I could connect with folks that are following my Pinterest stream.
FOLLOW ME: pinterest.com/COSprings
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