In a world where Facebook and Twitter lead the social media market, Pinterest has typically taken a back seat. Many B2C companies haven’t yet tapped into Pinterest, primarily because they are unsure of its benefits. Pinterest offers a different approach to gaining market exposure through the use of pictures and videos that are linked to articles and can be utilized to supplement their existent social media outlets.

What is Pinterest?

Pinterest gives its users the opportunity to create “boards” based on a larger theme, each one containing related “pins” that the user has selected to save. The social media platform, essentially a virtual search engine, has a wealth of native categories for users to search through-ranging from Food and Drink to Health and Fitness. Your profile can contain as many boards as you would like and you can either create original pins or repin from other users onto your board.

Whole Foods Market's Pinterest profile containing
a variety of boards they have created.

You can follow other user’s profiles and their pins will appear on your main feed. Additionally, other users can follow your profile and look at the boards you have created with your pins. Each pin should have a link attached to the image, which will direct the user to the pin’s source. 

How Can I Make Pinterest Work for My Company?

Pinterest provides a centralized location for brands to repost their products, images, and more on a platform where users are already accustomed to searching and selecting pins to fit their preferences. Companies can simply upload an image to be used as the pin, attach a link that leads to the product’s source page, create a title, and add keywords so your pin shows up in search queries.

Lovelyclustershop.com posted a pin showing a pair of rainboots that leads back to
their original site it is listed on. They also added key words, "Women's Rain Boot"
and "Wellies" so that it would appear in searches on Pinterest.

With the use of these pins you can draw interested users to your main site, thus increasing qualified web traffic. Additionally, by repinning relative content onto your own page, you draw more users to the content on your boards through popular pins. However in order to successfully use Pinterest, you must actively post new pins and repin relevant, popular pins onto your own boards each day.

By frequently pinning content, you create an opportunity for users to notice your brand and potentially increase the number of followers on your profile.

ModCloth has a variety of boards with pins that represent their company's products and interest in order to attract and engage their audience with their posts.  

ModCloth has a variety of boards with pins that represent their company's products
and interest in order to attract and engage their audience with their posts..

You should shoot to post at least 5-10 pins a day in order to maintain an active account. Overall, you want to be consistent with the number of pins you post daily so followers can know what you expect. If you’re using Pinterest for your business, you will receive access to an analytics page (shown below) that tracks the effectiveness of your pins and boards, as well as the number of followers you have gained over time. Through these analytics, you will learn which content drives users to engage with your pins and boards, how to improve your Pinterest presence, and tactics to drive more exposure to your website.

What Can I Expect Out of My Pinterest Account?

Pinterest will help draw traffic and awareness to your brand with your commitment to engaging with users and posting quality content. If you are looking for more information on how you can use Pinterest to support your business, click here. You will find additional services you can pay for to further user interactions with your company such as promoted pins and buying pins

If you are interested in learning more about brand awareness and how to gain more exposure for your business, feel free to schedule a conversation!