What Makes Businesses Pinteresting?

In just over 12 months, Pinterest has gone from a social network of choice to an essential marketing tool for many brands. Its online bulletin boards can help humanize a brand and display personality.

With more than 1.36 million visitors every day, Pinterest also gives businesses a platform to tell a compelling story, driving traffic back to their website in the process. In fact, Pinterest has more referral traffic than LinkedIn, Google+ and YouTube combined.

For many brands, it’s the next step once they have established a digital presence
elsewhere, combining two of the most compelling elements of social media: visual content and sharing who you are.

Before you take the Pinterest plunge, here are some tips for building your brand’s presence:

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#1 Make a Business Page

Like Facebook, Pinterest has an optionto establish a business page, providing access to analytical tools that allow you to track the number of unique users, repins, , impressions and visits to your boards.

#2 Write a Good Description

You have only 200 characters to describe your business to the Pinterest world, but with such a visually driven site, that’s plenty. Google Analytics is a great place to start when writing your description; it will tell you what keywords drive people to your site.

#3 Use your Current Website Images (To Start)

Certain industries are more visually driven than others, and while it may seem like building a Pinterest presence will require significant effort that’s not always the case. To start, take an inventory of the photos on your website and post those that best personify your brand. Be sure to consider all of your audiences and look for images and content that speak to their needs.

#4 Follow Other Businesses

Follow other businesses to see what they are doing to generate content and traffic. Pinterest is a platform where many businesses share content not found elsewhere. In most cases, when you follow someone they will follow you back, building your Pinterest presence.

#5 Explore Rich Pins

This may be the most important tip for the Pinterest skeptics out there. Rich pins add more information to a pin, beyond just using a picture.

Pinterest has 5 types of topic-specific rich pins, which you can include various details related to the pin.

Article Pins – Headline, Author Story description and link

Product Pins – Real-time pricing, availability and where to buy

Recipe Pins – Ingredients, cooking times and serving information

Movie Pins – Ratings, cast members and reviews

Place Pins – Address, phone number and map

You must apply for, add information to and validate your Rich Pins before you can use them, but in the end it’s worth it! These Rich Pins give users and followers more information about the topics they are interested in (YOU!)