Filled with recipes, wedding dresses, pictures of exotic places, and workout routines, at first glance Pinterest may not seem like the next place to grow your small business’s online presence. However, Pinterest holds the potential to reach new clients and foster communication with existing customers.
Pinterest is a site that allows users to curate images and links called “pins” into different online boards. Pinners can search through thousands of pins, add new pins, and discover others who share similar interests.
Your small business can utilize Pinterest to find new clients by pinning and creating boards with content that relates to your industry. You can pin content from your own business, products, news, or articles, or content from other businesses like yours. Here are some tips to help your business becoming a Pinterest powerhouse:
Keep Things Interesting. In order to attract pinners, you need to keep your boards unique and enticing. Keep everything organized with boards that you can categorize your pins within. Think of unique, but simple, names for boards. Update each board with as much content as possible. Pinners look for intriguing and unique pins. According to the site brands like Sony use Pinterest and “added Pins that matched what pinners liked, including new products, vintage ads, and unique gadgets.” Find out what your clients like and match your boards and pins to what they are looking for on the site.
Consistency As with most other social media sites, the more you use Pinterest the more effective it will become. Pin and re-pin content frequently to attract attention on your boards. Add fresh content from your own business and find content on Pinterest applicable to your industry and what your followers are interested in.
Keep an Eye Out Follow other interesting pinners with content you can re-pin and learn from. This will help you see more content and keep your feed updated so that you can re-pin and add to your own boards. There are a few different ways to find more users to follow:
- Categories On the side of the search bar, there is a drop down menu where a list of some of the popular categories on Pinterest. Clicking one will take you to all the pins that fall within that category
- Other Pinners By looking around another pinners profile to see who they follow and who follows them you will be able to discover pinners who will keep your feed fresh and interesting
- Keywords By simply searching for some keywords that are of interest to you and your followers, hundreds of pins will be brought up. You can discover new pinners, by finding others who pins similar things your business.
Pinterest has a separate account type for business’ and a guide to using their logos and branding on your website to link back to Pinterest and your account. They offer a way to promote your pins, like an advertisement, placing it at the top of result pages for a fee. They are accommodating and ready to help improve your business’s account by helping you reach a new and broader audience. All it takes is a few pins before your own your way!
