Pinterest Tips

Pinterest is one of the hottest new social media tools available right now and it’s gaining in popularity.  Don’t wait to take advantage of its potential. Pinterest is a virtual pin board that allows you to “pin” or bookmark your favorite images into separate folders. People who like your pins (images) will follow your board, like your pins, and re-pin your pins to their own folders.

As with any other form of social media, the key is to connect and interact with your followers.  You need to offer them content that they want to return for and you need to connect with them regularly to keep their interest. It’s these connections that can drive viewers to your site and turn them into customers. As a pin is clicked on, it leads customers to the original location of the pin which for your products will be your website.

Here are a few Pinterest tips that will help you use Pinterest to your best advantage.

1. Make sure you fill out your profile completely.  After you sign up for Pinterest, go in and add connections to your website, Twitter, and Facebook accounts.  Don’t forget to add a picture. Customers like to connect to a real person behind a brand.
2. After you’ve created your profile, you can create folders which are called Boards to help organize your images. Make sure you give each Board a title, a description, and place it in the right categories. Pinterest is searchable and you want people to be able to find your pins easily.
3. When you pin a picture, you are able to give it a description. This description is searchable. If you pin a pair of red shoes, call it “red shoes with a bow” or “red high heel shoes” and not “These are so cute.” People searching on red shoes will only find your pin if you tell Pinterest what it’s about.
4. Don’t just pin your own content.  While we want to show off our own products and services,  you need to offer your viewers more than that. As an example, if you sell cupcake papers, it’s not enough to simply pin pictures of your cupcake papers. You need to consider other types of pins your target customers might be interested in. Consider having folders for cake plates & cupcake trees, printable party invitations, gorgeous party table settings, or other types of products that are closely related to your niche.
5. Create folders that are specific enough for you to track interest. With each new product line release, consider adding a specific folder for that line’s products. If you’ve just introduced a line of goat’s milk soap, show off each scent in a variety of settings in one folder.  Your line of coconut soap should have its own folder and so on. You can easily open that older and look at your pins, likes, comments, and re-pins for each product.
6. Make sure that your website has a Pinterest button on it so your customers can follow your boards.  If you don’t tell them where to find you, they’ll never know.
7. Reward your customers when they share your  products.  If a customer or reviewer showcases your product on their website or blog, pin that image to one of your folders.  Maybe they created a delicious soup using your spices or put together a cute outfit featuring one of your belts.  Either way, pin their image with a shout out telling your followers what they did. “Check out this delicious soup Jennifer made with our Italian spice mix.”
8. Be certain to re-pin, like, and comment on other people’s pins.  Interacting on Pinterest is just as important as interacting on any other social media site.  Be authentic. People can spot a fake a mile away.
9. Find out who is already pinning your images.  Simply using this link will show you the images that have been pinned from your site http://pinterest.com/source/yourwebsite.com
10. Search for people who regularly pin content related to your site and follow them. If you search on “coffee” it will bring up images tagged with that word, you can then choose users to follow and start interacting with them.

Now that you have a few Pinterest tips to get started, dive right in and get started. If you haven’t signed up for Pinterest yet, please email us for an invite: info@livingyourmoment.com

Please follow the new Living Your Moment board and follow Ellen Christian, CEO and Alicia Peiffer, COO & Co-founder.