Pinterest is pretty much one giant endorsement of goods, for women by women. And thus far, emphasis has been placed on crafts, home interiors and gardens, cooking, entertaining and art. However, Pinterest is growing faster than Facebook when it was its size, with more seven million unique visitors in December. And it’s driving more traffic to company websites and blogs than YouTube, Google+ and LinkedIn combined.
The online social pinboard harnesses the power of personal referral. Word of mouth is arguably the most effective selling tool, and a strong presence on Pinterest empowers just that.
Promoting your business on Pinterest: What you need to know
Pinterest can be a useful tool to promote new products and interact with potential customers. You can create pinboards for the type of products or services you sell (with links back to your website) and add pinboards like, “Things We Love” or “Sale Items.”
However, you should be incorporating outside pins to your profile so that your profile is not entirely all about your business. This is pretty important, because thus far, Pinterest is NOT an e-commerce site. It is, however, a powerful social media tool that can drive people to your website. And with social media, comes sharing. So remember that if you only display images of your products without contributing other content or sharing other users’ pins, you will likely find that people won’t pay much attention.
Side note: Pinterest does not offer business-oriented features. Its search functions prioritize pin and board subjects ahead of people, which is the category that brands fall into.
