The 2017 Beginner’s Guide to Pinterest Marketing: How to Improve Your Reach and Promote Your Brand
While Facebook may have more users than Pinterest, the 150 million monthly active users on Pinterest don’t add up to something marketers should ignore. In fact, this means that Pinterest has increased its monthly active user base by 50% since 2015, which means that it has enormous potential as a marketing platform.
Are you ready to harness the power of Pinterest and drive traffic to your eCommerce store?
Getting Started
We are assuming that you know a fair bit about Pinterest from your own personal account. However, there are a few significant differences when it comes to using Pinterest for your business.
Terms of Service
First, read through the Business Terms of Service that was updated recently (November 1st, 2016) to understand your responsibilities as a brand.
Other differences will become apparent once you create your business account and explore around, such as access to their web analytics tool (Pinterest Analytics), Promoted Pins in the Pinterest Ad Manager, Rich Pins, and the new Promoted Video option. Pinterest also just announced on December 1st that they are rolling out new business page features including a sleek new profile page.
Set Your Profile Up for Success
Once you have created a business account, the next step is to confirm your website so that your business’s logo is added to any pin that comes from your website (Pinterest recommends logos that are 165 x 165 pixels). Take the time to fill out your profile and give visitors a good sense of your brand and personality.
Create Your Boards
Now the fun begins (at least, we think it’s fun). Give your board a name that makes it clear what your board is about. Think about keywords that might help users find your content (same goes for the description). Don’t forget to add a captivating cover image for your board!
Also, keep in mind that users have the option of following just a few select boards, and they will expect a steady stream of pins to that board. Ideally, you should be pinning content to your boards every day.
Become a Pinterest Pro
Now that you’re all set up, here are a few quick tips to make you a lean, mean, pinning machine:
- Give pins variety: Only pinning content from your own website can turn your followers off. Pin content from other sources to add depth to your boards.
- Make your descriptions compelling: Every single pin should have a description that tells more about your pin. It’s also a good practice to add direct site links in your descriptions. Just make sure that you don’t over-promote yourself and push a sale too hard.
- Add the Pinterest widget to your site: Adding the Save Button to your site makes it easy for visitors to share your content to Pinterest.
- Put relevant boards on top: If you have created seasonal holiday boards, those should be at the top of your page so that users will see your most engaging boards.
Our Best Tips for Marketing on Pinterest
You’re on your way to becoming a Pinterest marketing master. Here are some of our best tips to help boost traffic and sales with Pinterest:
Apply for Rich Pins
On your personal Pinterest account, did you ever notice that some food pins have the recipe included in the pin? Or that movie pins list the rating and actors?
That’s all thanks to Pinterest’s Rich Pins which come with advantages such as automatically updating along with your website, increasing the visibility of your pins, and making shopping easier for customers. Apply for them as soon as you can to start experiencing their benefits!
Expand Visibility with Promoted Pins
Promoted Pins can significantly improve your reach by putting your pins in front of customers who are ready to buy. Getting started with Promoted Pins is similar to any other PPC platform, so those who have experience in PPC won’t have too much trouble getting started.
Just remember that it’s okay if your first campaign is not an instant success. Keep making changes and tracking results in order to optimize your ads for success.
Make Pinterest a Priority
We’ve seen it happen: Business owners go through the trouble of setting up their Pinterest accounts, only to let it slowly be neglected.
However, our new Social Hub feature takes care of this problem by allowing you to schedule pins and view real-time analytics in one dashboard along with other marketing channels.
