What Should Your Business Be Pinning On Pinterest?

Pinterest, the social pinboard site, has grown astronomically in the last two years, hitting 48.7 million users in February. Like Twitter and Facebook, the two powerhouses in social media, businesses have realised that Pinterest has great potential as a marketing and networking platform. The powers that be at Pinterest have also realised the potential of their site, creating business pages and releasing in-depth analytic tools for companies to measure the impact and success of their pins.

One of the best things about Pinterest is that users can pick and choose what sort of content they see by following pinboards rather than pinners. You need to make sure that your business’ pins are interesting and, just as importantly, that your pinboards are well named, well maintained and relevant to your business.

1. The Basics

Even before you start looking for images, there are a few things you need to keep in mind. Firstly, the names of your pinboards are extremely important. To differentiate your pinboards from the crowd, use original names. There are so many boards entitled ‘For The Home’, which is one of the default names on Pinterest. Make sure that your titles contain industry keywords, of course, so that they can be found by relevant searches, but be creative with the rest of your title. Be concise as well: convey as much about the pins on each pinboard as you can with only a few words.
When you start searching for and uploading images, make sure that they are of a good quality and that they are suitable for Pinterest. Pinterest images can only be 554 pixels wide, so panorama-like images are not particularly suitable. The best images are long and thin, requiring the user to scroll down to see their entirety. If a whole image gets cut to fit in the usual Pinterest column view, make sure that enough is on show to persuade users to click and enlarge it. My final piece of advice in this section is that you should make sure that the file name of your image reflects the subject shown.

2. Stay Relevant

Ensuring that the majority of your pins are relevant to your industry is of vital importance. There is no point in creating boards that have nothing to do with the products or services you offer because, even if they become very popular, you will be promoting completely the wrong image for your company. If you are new to pinterest, why don’t you search for industry keywords to get some inspiration. Have a look at your competitors and compatriots boards, see what they pin. If you already have some boards set up, you could repin images you come across while searching.

Don’t get too caught up in looking for inspiration, however. There are an awful lot of pins on Pinterest and an awful lot of pinboards as well, so it is of vital importance that you identify your company’s niche: what makes you different to all your competitors and how you can illustrate this niche in your pins. It could be your commitment to staying green, or the family atmosphere you have within the business. Once you’ve worked out what makes you stand out, try to work this into your pinning strategy. Finding something that differentiates you from the millions of other pinners on the site will help you stand out from the crowd.

Separate your ideas into categories which will later become pinboards. If you sell tangible objects, you could just have a pinboard entitled “Our Products”, containing photographs of each product you sell. This, however, is a bit boring, especially if your products aren’t very photogenic. Try to be creative in the way you display your products. Many home retailers, for example, create virtual show homes containing their products arranged in an aesthetically pleasing fashion. If you sell products that aren’t photogenic, why not show them in action. If you own a B2B company selling industrial printers, for instance, create pinboards of images showing what your printers can print.

If you are particularly proud of your advertising, show it off. Create a pinboard showing all the advertising banners and copy that you have displayed. You could even create image-focused advertising campaigns specifically for Pinterest. Make sure you don’t go overboard with advertising, however, only pin the best designed adverts that you have created – after all, Pinterest is a social media site first and foremost.

As I said earlier, if your business has a family atmosphere, celebrate it. Post images of your staff members enjoying themselves in the office. You could even post pictures of the office you work in. If you attend any conferences or hold any events, take pictures and create a board. By posting pictures of your employees hard at work, you are humanising your company and making it more approachable. On the SMF Pinterest profile, there is a whole pinboard devoted to the most recent business show we attended. You could also celebrate milestones achieved by your company, such as a move to a new office or a successful business venture.

3. Have Fun

Not all of your pinboards have to be solely about your business, or even your industry. Create some pinboards about the things that interest you and might interest potential customers. Arguably the three biggest categories on Pinterest are Fashion, Food & Drink and Humour. We at SMF have created pinboards which celebrate elements of the industry we work in as well as one of the big categories: ‘Geek Treats’ contains images combining the world of baking which that of geek culture; ‘Web Humour’ contains funny images from around the web, many of which are about the web; on ‘Digital Meets Fashion’, we have pinned some images of cool technology-themed clothing items.

Combining your industry with a sense of fun isn’t difficult, especially when one of the greatest tools in your arsenal is the infographic. Infographics have shot to popularity in the last few years, exploring subjects as diverse as the Syrian crisis and Dr Who villains. Infographics display data and information in a visual, easily-digested, attractive way. Think of what infographics you could create with information relevant to your business.

If your images are fun and interesting, they are more likely to be repinned, hence widening their potential audience and getting your company noticed. Don’t be afraid to repin things on your ‘fun’ boards, however, as the better the pins on the board, the more likely people are to follow it.

4. Group Boards

Creating group boards is a great way of networking and building up a following on Pinterest. To create a group board, all you need to do is invite other pinners when you are given the option. You can also make existing boards into group boards using the same process.

Be discerning with your invitations. Invite clients, affiliates and employees to pin on boards that are relevant to them. Don’t just invite everyone, as not everyone will want to be involved. Likewise, don’t just accept any invitation to a group board, only contribute to those that could benefit you.

Group boards are labelled with a little group emblem – the silhouette of three heads – beside the number of pins they contain. There are numerous benefits to creating group boards: the ‘Follow All’ button on group boards encourages users to follow all the pinners on said board, which could help build your following; the increase in traffic could lead to more repins and hence a wider audience for your pins; inviting certain users to pin on your boards could make them into brand advocates; there will be less work for you as everyone else will be pinning content on your boards.

Of course, don’t forget to moderate and monitor boards that you are involved with, so that you can leave them or delete them if they get off-topic.

5. It’s Not Just About The Images

The writing you surround your images with is just as important as the image itself. You are allowed 500 characters to describe you image which, if anything, is too much. In this description you should put a link to the page where it originated. For example, if you post a picture of one of your products, include a link to a page from which it can be purchased.

Include keywords and hashtags in your description so that your images can be easily found. It is also a good tactic to include relevant hashtags which are popular or trending at the time, as it could get your pin a wider audience. In the case of your pinboards, a well titled pinboard, with an original but relevant name, could get to the top of a search.

The rest of the description needs to be relevant to the image and relatable for the audience. There is no point in writing complex technical descriptions if your target audience won’t understand it. Write something understandable, informative and compelling that potential customers will understand and enjoy.

How do you manage your Pinterest account?     

Pinterest Updates iOS App to Make Editing Pins Easier

Pinterest updated its iOS apps Monday, adding some new editing options as well as improving how users scroll while navigating the app.

Now, users can edit a pin's description, change its board location or delete the pin entirely — directly from the mobile app. Comments can also be deleted anywhere on Pinterest using the app, so users can remove offensive comments from their own pins, or fix typos in comments they make on other pins.

Pinterest first launched its app for iPad last August, alongside the first version of its Android app.
The latest version of Pinterest's iPad app is now available on the App Store.

Thumbnail image via iStockphoto, maxphotography; screenshot courtesy of Pinterest

Science Inc. Launch Analytics Tool to Measure Marketing Success on Pinterest

Tech incubator, Science Inc. have funded a start-up service which can be used to measure the success of marketing campaigns on Pinterest.
‘HelloInsights’ is an analytics platform which will target the brands who wish to run a marketing campaign on the social media site as well as maintaining the core essence of Pinterest.
The analytics tool was originally started as a means to interpret their own portfolio, but eventually expanded, providing the service to other companies.


HelloInsights allows users to review their overall influence managing campaigns on Pinterest with the use of their measurement and monitoring tools.
A streamlined and lightweight version has been released out to companies at no cost to assist them in thinking more strategically when it comes to their marketing methods on Pinterest.
As there is currently no obvious way to measure any data on the social network site, the analytics tool is being targeted by retailers and other businesses as a way to optimize and measure their campaign’s success.



HelloInsights shows its users comparison charts, Twitter streams, information of the biggest pinner, a seamless integration with Google Analytics as well as other data.
Up till now, only a few companies have taken advantage of the analytics and since February the company has tracked over 1 million user acquisitions, 8 million page views, and tons of revenue for companies.
Although there are plans to charge for the service soon through deeper campaign integration consulting, it is currently free for everyone to use and gives users the chance to schedule pins to their account whilst also reviewing customised charts. These can then be compared to competitors by combining the analytics.
250 companies are currently using the service ranging from small, individually-owned companies up to Fortune 500 organisations.

HelloInsights say that they are opening up their service to start getting people involved, little bits at a time.

What do you make of this new analytic tool? Will you be taking advantage of it?

Facebook Barely Beats Twitter, Trounces Google+ Among Teens

It came as little surprise that Facebook was the social network of choice in a recent survey of 7,700 teens across the U.S. But now that the study’s authors have revealed its numbers, we can see just how much — or indeed, how little — Facebook won by.

The teenagers in the survey, conducted by Gene Munster and Douglas Clinton at analyst firm Piper Jaffray, were asked to rank social networks in order of preference, from 1 to 3. Alternatives to Facebook included Twitter, Google+, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr and LinkedIn.

Facebook was the first choice for 3,280 of the teens, followed by Twitter with 2,118 and Instagram with 928. Google+ won the hearts of 430 teens, while Tumblr and Pinterest, respectively, trailed behind. (We don’t know the identities of the five teens who ranked LinkedIn first, but you should probably hire them.)
However, Twitter (1,874) and Instagram (1,680) both outranked Facebook (1,580) when it came to second-choice votes. Google+ had its best performance in the third-choice voting, where it just managed to outperform Twitter — but still got beaten by Facebook and Instagram.

Still, the search giant’s nascent network (Google+ is still little more than a year old) can take some solace from the survey. More teens chose it over the supposedly hot services Tumblr and Pinterest, both of which, we imagine, would perform well among twenty-somethings.

But there’s little doubt that Facebook remains king of the hill. “We believe Facebook is well positioned to maintain its spot as the top social network despite competition from Twitter,” Munster and Clinton wrote, reiterating that they think the stock is undervalued — and that the Instagram purchase looks increasingly smart.

What is your preferred social network? Tell us in the comments below.

Pinterest Drops Invites, Now Open to Everyone

Pinterest announced Wednesday that it began open registration, dropping its invite-only approach.

Users can now sign up for the social photo sharing website without waiting for an invitation, according to Pinterest’s official blog. Prospective pinners can register using their email addresses, or log in with their Facebook or Twitter accounts.

“We’re really excited to have the capacity to offer Pinterest to more people and if you’re a Pinner with friends who’ve been waiting on the sidelines, we hope you’ll let them know,” the blog said.

Prior to opening up, users had to click “Request an Invite” on Pinterest.com, and enter their email address.

The California-based company announced in late July the addition of new categories, including, “Quotes,” “Tattoos” and “Weddings,” which joined old standbys, “Food and Drink,” “Architecture” and “Home Decor.” Some category names were tweaked: “Pets” became “Animals,” and “Prints and Posters” is now “Illustrations and Posters.”

Pinterest also reported that it had improved old categories, so users see less miscategorized pins as they peruse boards

The site, a virtual pinboard where members organize and share photos of their favorite things, is one of the fastest-growing social networks online. Reports suggest that Pinterest is the third-largest social network in the U.S., behind only Facebook and Twitter. It is currently looking to expand into overseas markets, such as France, Germany and Japan.

In May, Pinterest raised $100 million in a round of funding that values the company at $1.5 billion.

8 Strategies for Pinterest for Business

Pinterest has become a running joke to many. Still, the traffic reported coming from this site cannot be ignored, and the ways people are leveraging it’s popularity to market their businesses is very interesting.Here are just a few.

1. It’s not about you
You don’t need to be blatant about what you offer your customers. Be subtle. Post pins that are interesting and tangentially related to your product. Best example? Oreck on Pinterest. They barely mention vacuum cleaners or air filters but when you visit their page and see all the pins you can’t help but think of them.

2. Everybody loves a story
Nordstrom has quite a few fashion boards, including this one from New York Fashion week. Notice that the photos are from fashion week backstage, but the photos link to the products in the shop on their website. Users love the backstage glimpse of Fashion Week, and then end up on the Nordstrom shop pages.What stories does your market love to hear about?

3. Have one board that’s pure showoff
You don’t have to bury your brand identity to do a good job on Pinterest. Go ahead and show off a little. Here’s a good example of a brand page for Vineyard Brands, a wine importer on Pinterest. Notice how they appeal to the fun, crafty side of people with their boards, and they also have a board for press on the wines in their portfolio. After people browse the other boards they’ll explore this one too.

4. Reach for the sweet spot
Food is one of the most shared topics on Pinterest, often the more decadent the better, still not everybody wants decadence all the time. Take The Mother Company for example. They are all about the social and emotional issues of raising young kids. Of course food plays a big role and on their board “Sometimes Food”. they explain that while you can’t eat these goodies all the time, once in a while it’s OK to splurge a little. They balance this page with healthy snacks the kids will still love but with a healthier attitude called “Kid Friendly Food“.

5. Give away the good stuff
If your job revolves around sharing information, then share great links to resources your clients will love. Here’s a great example of this from entrepreneur Alyssa Gregory. Her small business resource boards are a great model to follow for any service business. Alyssa knows you can’t give away too much information. If people like what you say they’ll come to you for more focused information for their business.

6. Collaborate
You don’t have to do it alone, in fact, if you know a bunch of people who share good information, why not leverage your networks and share information together? Letting others posts to your board takes the pressure off one individual and allows everyone who contributes to benefit when everybody posts. Win win. Here’s a collaborative board I participate on with some of my social media pals pinning infographics, created by Mark Ivey. And here’s another collaborative board from Thirsty Girl and their fans “Share a Glass” with 190 pins related to wine and other tasty beverages.

7. Use Pinterest as a focus group
Just look at what West Elm is doing with their Pinterest pages. They have several boards focused around design, colors and landscaping. You can bet they are watching these closely to see what’s shared most and what isn’t, what gets collected on other boards and what the content on those boards tells them about their market. What do you want to know about? Ask it in videos and pictures on Pinterest.

8. Don’t be all business
Like in the case of Oreck, this is not about the widget you sell, it’s about the mindset of the person who might be interested in it and also to show a bit of the human side of the company. Be funny. Be inspirational. Whatever suits your corporate culture. Whole Foods has boards about food, strength, recycling, gadgets and even buildings. It’s about the culture around what they sell.

Missing Links In Pinterest

If 2012 is going to go down the history books as the Facebook year then it would also be remembered as the year of Pinterest. Although Pinterest has been around since 2010, it only came into limelight from last year. One of the few reasons being the launch of its iPhone app, Facebook integrating it into it’s open graph, etc. Today Pinterest is the third most visited website in US but then outside of US, it is yet to achieve the same success.

Pinterest, which has been branded as a network for women, had attracted me initially but with time I have lost interest. Not because it was labeled as a women’s site but because of some of it’s shortcomings in usability. I logged in some days ago just to witness the same problems that existed before. Here’s a list of them:

1. Home page: The biggest problem I have is when I land up on my home page. Yes it is appealing for the first few times but later on, it has appeared as a visual junk yard to me. Not that I follow too many people but since people today share more than they consume so an alternative way to display could be thought of. I think a similar situation persisted in Twitter and that’s the reason why we have lists to control them and be able to consume them. Can Pinterest allow me to have lists in the profile page, which can be tailored to my needs?

2. Search: I spend maximum time on social media and when I join any network I look for the “Search” feature to explore more. Once you have joined all your friends, you would love to find more people or boards to explore more. In the case of Pinterest, the search becomes more important since it is a site about pictures and we love to see more and more of them. Definitely Pinterest has a search but then it can make it better, which would allow pinners to connect to others easily. Certainly, some advanced features are required to the basic search Pinterest is providing as of now.

3. Interest based content: From consuming everything, we are moving onto curated information and I think it can be done in Pinterest. Other than following the same set of friends from Facebook and Twittter, can Pinterest show me content from people that is of my interest. For example, since I love glass painting I would love to follow people who have the same interest and share the same kind of content. Pinterest has categories but they are very broad and again neither can they be sorted nor displayed in a way that I would want. Along with this, Pinterest can add a feature saying “People To Follow” based on interests like it has “Friends To Follow” which would definitely increase the levels of engagement in the site.

4. Popular: The Popular tab is useful to explore more but lacks features like customizations and showing me what is popular in my network. Can the tab have categories so that it can list all popular pins or boards under one category, wouldn’t that be helpful? Besides this, it would be great if Pinterest can populate a small feed which will show me what is popular in my network too. Popular is a great feature but right now it has not been designed to be used to it’s full extent.

5. Social Sharing: Initially, I had a thought that open graph by Facebook has extensively helped developers. It has, no doubt but at the expense of user experience. Social sharing apps are becoming a spam with every passing day. Pinterest has an option to disable social sharing to your networks but why is it that every time it has to populate all my activities and show people on other networks. Wouldn’t it be great if I have the control on what to show and what not to? Time for Pinterest to think on this direction too.

6. Analytics: Finally we all love numbers don’t we? Can Pinterest have an added feature, which could give some more insights other than the number of likes and comments. We have third-party apps like Pinerly who do the job but it would be great to have it from Pinterest rather than logging into another site to get the services.

7. Brand Integration: Recently, Simply Zesty had published some interesting case studies on how brands are using Pinterest. All good but how does one know which are the brands that are using it? For example, the other day I was looking for Indian brands that are using Pinterest. The only way possible was via search and the results were not helpful. Wonder if Pinterest plans to integrate brands and show them in different categories. So that users can quickly search about them and follow them.

I am sure most of the points that I have mentioned here would have been discussed or may be on the to-do list of the Pinterest team. However I hope that Pinterest doesn’t adopt the route of Google Plus or Twitter in releasing required features. Otherwise, it will affect the user’s experience, which could turn away users from the network.

Do you face any other problem apart from what I have mentioned or do you consider that the network is perfect right now.

Pinterest Involving Your Customers With Your Boards

If you have an idea you find interesting and wish to share, or something you want post as an important discussion on better ways of communication, there is a good way relaying this to your customers.

I believe that the old ways of using notepads and other avenues of keeping information and ideas afloat to both your business and its customers are still in use.

Nonetheless, if you want to make it big then you should consider using Pinterest for business growth and ideas.

It may not be a vibrantly known social networking platform but it has grown to have ample recognition for its role in the development of new businesses and business concepts.

Pinterest gives you ample space to express your thoughts to your customers and business partners.

The online clipboard can be a good marketing avenue, which is if you have the wits on how to make the best of visual impressions.

If you have an idea that springs from something you saw, you can take a picture of it and then pin it on the Pinterest board.

Leave a comment directed to your customers and ask for their ideas.

As a way of passing on ideas, let them comment or pin their own pictures that they find relevant to your idea.

You can then create another board that takes the customers through your choice of the various ideas passed and what you have come up with, out them.

The earlier board acts like a stepping-stone on which the customers get to pass varied ideas with limited actual dictates of picking on all the ideas.

You use it to source the best of these ideas and the pin them on the second board. On this board, you can have solid business ideas that you can work with.

You still should pin more note comments and pictures indicating how things are going for your customers to view and remark on.

The emergence and use of Pinterest for business has come full circle within just two years of its existence.

You may wonder how some businesses have made it big with such a short time. Social circles created on Pinterest boards can come up without your knowledge.

You create a board full of ideas and present products that your business has and in no time, you have new online clients and potential customers.

The icing on it is they help you along with developing you small business into an empire as you keep them engaged on the Pinterest boards.

If used in the right way Pinterest can really benefit your social marketing campaign.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6964098

Use Pinterest for Business

Pinterest is among the quickest expanding social networking sites out there. In actual fact, it was one in all the quickest online websites to reach more than ten million users within the shortest time, outbidding YouTube and Facebook.

Now, what is Pinterest? Well, essentially, it is a virtual pin board and it allows you to organize and share all the beautiful stuff that you uncover on the internet. It is a fantastic website to start pinning photographs and visuals which you obtain on the web or from your hard drive into an area on a social network. Best of all, you may look through pin boards designed by other people and publish those interests also.

There are numerous brands that are getting to Pinterest and using it for their enterprise. So, how can corporations apply it for their advantage?

Below are the 5 main things you ought to keep in mind when utilizing Pinterest:

1) The first thing to recall is the fact that Pinterest is graphic, which means that it's virtually like Twitter except it's executed in images. The Pinterest visual design and style, which allows you to place a entire quantity of diverse images into a collage subsequent to each other, is exactly what separates it from all the other social media systems around and certainly one of the great things is the fact that every time you see a picture on the internet, no matter whether it is your own photos from your hard disk or other pictures online, you'll be able to pin that on to your various pin boards. You may group your pin boards into several unique groups to ensure that other people can do a search for them and find them.

2) Always remember that whenever you are working with Pinterest, you have to continue to keep the end-consumer in mind, what exactly are your clients thinking? For anyone who is likely to pin particular things regarding your business enterprise or particular pictures from your business on Pinterest, you would like to make certain that you are holding your consumer in mind by knowing exactly what are they trying to find and what sort of things might they be enthusiastic about finding on your diverse pin boards.

3) Ensure that you are letting your clients take part in your pin boards. Certainly one of the good things regarding Pinterest is that people can provide feedback, they are able to share, they are able to examine pinned things so that in turn, will share your content material amongst their network. You want to make certain that you are letting your community take part. It's not merely the engagement here either, it's the opportunity to crowd source your organisation, letting your buyers contribute their own data to your boards which is going to become a really wonderful viral potential.

4) It is very important to get your brand on Pinterest to the real world. So, basically, what you're heading to be undertaking will not only be having your brand inside your personal pin boards but you will be going to be letting people use those photographs to distribute the material out to their friends who are looking at their pins.

5) Ultimately, you need to be fast be early. Pinterest is very young; in truth, it's not even a year old and it's quickly expanding. Get out there and be one of the first inside your market to use Pinterest. It is going to be pretty effective when you begin making use of it ahead of all of your competition so sign up, play and have fun with it!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6910537