Intro to Pinterest Marketing - Is It The Right Fit?
Are you considering using Pinterest for your business, but unsure if it's the right fit? In this blog post, we’ll cover everything you need to know about Pinterest to decide if it's right for your brand, get started with marketing your business on Pinterest and follow best practices.
Similar to Instagram, Pinterest is a visual platform, perfect for visual storytelling, promoting products, and connecting with your target audience. However, it does differ slightly from other social media platforms because it is also a search engine, similar to Google. Users can easily search and find relevant content on Pinterest.
What does this mean for your business? Good question!
It means that you can optimize your content for search and improve your chances of being seen by a new audience and increasing your reach. It also means that the content you share on Pinterest will have a longer shelf life; there is a better chance of your content still being discovered days, weeks, or even months after you’ve posted it. For those of us who are used to the 24 hour engagement window of Instagram, this is a HUGE bonus.
Why Use Pinterest?
One of the best features of Pinterest is its ability to drive traffic to your website, as most pins you create will have a direct, clickable link back to your site. This is how Pinterest users are used to engaging with content which means they are more likely to click on your links and, if your website is optimized, potentially convert.
To take this a step further, Pinterest users have a higher purchasing intent compared to other social media platform users. According to a 2016 survey conducted by Pinterest, 50% of users have purchased a product after seeing it on Pinterest. So, if you have an online store, Pinterest could be a game changer for your business.
Pinterest also offers in-app shopping options and you can set up specific Product Pins that will display the price, availability, and information on where/how to buy the product.
Should Your Brand be on Pinterest?
We know that Pinterest probably isn’t the first platform that comes to mind when deciding where your business should be active. It’s not quite as large as some of the other platforms, such as Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter. However, Pinterest has 320 million monthly active users according to Pew Research. So, we think it deserves at least your consideration.
Some of the top Pinterest categories are:
Travel + Leisure
Health + Wellness
DIY Home Renos
Women’s Style
Beauty
Food + Drink
If your brand falls into one of these categories, we definitely recommend considering Pinterest for your marketing efforts because it's clear that your audience is using Pinterest and you want to meet your audience where they are.
If you fall outside of these categories, Pinterest could still be right for your business. While these are the top categories by search, there are many other people searching for many other categories every single day.
We suggest doing some market research into both your competitors and your target audience to determine if they are using Pinterest. If you discover that your ideal customers are active Pinterest users and are open to interacting with brands on the platform, that’s your sign to start marketing your business on Pinterest.
How to Use Pinterest for Your Business
The main activity on Pinterest is adding or “pinning” content to boards, organized by a common theme. There are three ways you can do this:
Upload your own original content
Pin other relevant content you find on Pinterest
Share content you find across the web
We recommend a combined strategy of both creating and curating content. Curating content from other accounts is an integral part of Pinterest marketing. This is how you interact with other accounts (i.e. the social part of social media marketing on Pinterest) and it ensures your followers are seeing content from you more frequently without having to create original content every day. When saving pins from other accounts, ensure they are aligned with your brand and message and provide value for your audience.
Top Tips for Marketing Your Brand on Pinterest
Create a business account
When setting up your Pinterest account, we recommend creating a business account. This allows you to set up shoppable posts, view analytics, and promote posts.
Claim your website
By claiming your website on Pinterest you will get access to analytics on the pins that you share from your website, the pins that other people share from your website, and you will be able to share where your audience can find more of your content.
To claim your website, you have to add an HTML tag to your website’s source code so that Pinterest knows that the site belongs to you and can track the analytics.
Apply for the Verified Merchant Program
Once you have a catalog of products available for purchase on your website, we recommend applying for the Pinterest Verified Merchant Program so that you can receive the exclusive badge, appear in shopping experiences, enable the shop tab on your profile, and measure conversions.
Optimize your content for SEO
As Pinterest is a visual search engine, it is vital to optimize your content for SEO. This includes having clear titles, descriptions, and hashtags with relevant keywords on all posts you create.
Create video content
As with most social media platforms, video content is increasingly important. As people are mindlessly scrolling through Pinterest, video content can help to stop their scroll and consume your content for a longer period of time. In addition, videos typically have a higher click through rate, which means more traffic to your website.
Link to your site
Pinterest is an amazing platform for driving traffic to your website. To help your audience out, ensure that most, if not all, of the posts you create on Pinterest link back to your website.
Cross promote your Pinterest account
Promote your Pinterest account and content across other social media platforms, as well as in person if you have a brick and mortar store. A unique way to do this is to highlight items in-store that are trending on Pinterest.
Think Pinterest can help you move the needle on your business goals? We’d love to help you create a content strategy that ensures you are posting with purpose, targeting your ideal customers, and driving traffic and conversions. Contact us to learn more about how we can help.