How to Optimize and Grow Your Business on Pinterest
Danielle Elderkin
Chances are if you have a business or blog you know that social media is the vehicle to get your name out into the digital universe. New updates and algorithms constantly changing make it overwhelming to maintain your social accounts, let alone ensuring they are optimized and helping to increase revenue, and with 72.8 million users on Pinterest alone, it’s crucial to be in the Pin game.
When developing your social media strategy, keep these tips in mind for fruitful results.
Here are tips to ensure you're getting the most out of Pinterest.
Images
Make sure they are crisp. They don't have to be taken with a fancy camera, but great lighting will tremendously increase how crisp and clean an image looks. Pinterest is 100% visual, so you need to have great photos. Another tip is to create text on the photo for a call-to-action. Studies show that by including text, it increases the chance of people re-pinning your pin and visiting the linked site.
Have you ever noticed the orientation of photos on Pinterest? Use vertical photos. Yes, those long photos are more well received than a landscape oriented photo. You also need to make sure that you’re styling your images in a way that is reflective of your branding and something that your audience will respond to.
Don’t know what styling is? Scroll to the bottom and send us an email.
Are you a business?
No this isn't a trick question, many don't realize that their brands Pinterest account needs to be registered as a business account. If you already have an account and are not registered as a business, no need to worry. It's an easy fix to convert over to a business account.
This is vital for several reasons, one is that you will now be able to get analytics and take a closer look at what is really going on with your efforts specific to the platform. While you may have Google analytics for your website, this will give you a snapshot of what pins are performing well on Pinterest -- which means you can then pin more of those that are well received and take a closer look to site traffic from the platform.
You'll also take advantage of the increased traffic to your site. This is an often overlooked tool by many business owners. A common misconception is that if you're not an ecommerce business you don't need social media, but that is entirely wrong. Pinterest in particular is a vehicle to share your company story, reach new audiences and strengthen loyalty to your existing customers.
With the business account activated, take advantage of installing the Pin-it buttons on your web images. This allows anyone who is on your website to save an image from your site on their Pinterest account—thus increasing your exposure.
24/7
Pinterest is always open. What I mean is that there truly isn't a “best” time to pin across the board. Users are pinning 24/7. Just think about your personal habits. More than likely, you are pinning throughout the day, maybe while in line at the coffee shop, etc.
People are pinning left and right, so the key here is to not get overwhelmed with "best times" on this platform, but rather make sure you are pinning frequently and consistently.What is worthy of noting is times best suited for your personal brand's audience. Analytics will help to decipher when your audience is most active, ignore the influx of new stats on this and just pay attention to your brands analytics.
The standard amount of pins for a healthy business account is around 25-40 pins per day. If finding the time is what you are worried about, there are several management platforms that enable you to schedule your pins. It can be a serious time saver, but requires some planning and work on the front end.
Captions
Did you know there are captions on Pinterest? Of course there are, we have to know what an image is about, don't we? NEVER leave the caption of the photo blank or leave what other people have pinned (unless it relates to your company's product). This is surprisingly an opportunity that brands let pass them by.
Captions are important because everyone's favorite friend, Google, reads all your digital information for the best search results. This means that what you include in the captions or don’t include is making an impact on search results. So just include a descriptive, but simple, sentence about the image.
Better search results ensure that you will stand out from the crowd, because, let’s be honest, who really looks at the fourth or fifth search result on the first page of Google? There are multiple pages that come up with search results -- don't end up on one of those following pages!
Wanna Get Rich?
I’m talking about Rich Pins. This is a very recent development with Pinterest and our clients couldn't have been more excited when we shared the details with them. Rich Pins are pins that include more detailed information about the pin. Currently 6 different types of rich pins exist. They are: app, movie, retail, recipe, travel, and reading.
Most business will likely want to utilize the “purchase” Rich Pins or perhaps a variety of Rich Pins depending on the goal. But what matters the most with Rich Pins is that they increase traffic to your site significantly. In terms of retail Rich Pins, they increase traffic to your site by including real time pricing and where to purchase. Users will even get updates if pricing changes.
Contributors
Another great way to increase your Pinterest following and traffic to your website is to invite contributors to pin to different Pinterest boards. You will need to have a strategy in place. It shouldn't just be your mom or Aunt Sue because they have time on their hands. You’ll need to make sure that the contributor aligns with your brand and they understand the platform well.
The upside of this situation is that it will increase how many pins are being pinned under the brands account, potentially saving you time. It also opens your brand up to an entirely new set of people that may not have been following you otherwise.
However, don’t get the new audience confused with demographics, while they go hand in hand, they aren't the same thing. While it is ideal to find new audiences that match your demographics, it’s not worth it to give effort to an audience that doesn't fit your demographic.
As long as you put the work in before you ask someone to be a contributor, this can be another successful tool to use Pinterest to grow your business.
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Image from workopolis.com