Today I want to talk to you about Pinterest and why it’s vital to have a Pinterest account for your small business or blog.
Why Pinterest Is Vital To Your Small Business Or Blog
The Quick Low Down
- 90+ Amazing Pinterest Stats
- 8 Pinterest Statistics That Marketers Can’t Ignore
- Thinking Outside The Sandbox’s Posts on Pinterest
Full Notes
Hey, it’s Katrina from Thinking Outside the Sandbox and How to Start A Mom Blog. Today, I want to talk to you about Pinterest and why it’s vital to have a Pinterest account for your small business or blog.
Before we get started: I’d like to give a few hi’s to a few people that commented on our FB page in response to our Niche Podcast (episode 3). Ruthie and Jim Gray who said “I love your stuff, I’m reading your post closely thank you so much.” Crystal Herron who said “Great information, luckily it was pretty easy to narrow down my niche when you started.” Thank you all, and I’m glad you’re getting info out of this podcast that you can use! If you have any feedback or information you’d like to talk about I’d love to hear from you!
What Is Pinterest And Why Should You Have It?
Pinterest is a virtual cork board. Back in the day you use to rip pictures you like or admire out of magazines and pin them to a cork board or glue them to a poster board to create a “dream board.” Pinterest has made that process virtual. Right now, in 2015, the amount of U.S. Pinterest users alone is estimated to be about 47.1 Million! 30% of all the U.S. social media users use Pinterest.
That is a huge number!
Pinterest is primarily dominated by women (about 85%), but men are starting to get into Pinterest. There’s a Pinterest podcast for men now, and 1/3 of new sign-ups are men!
If your customer or reader is online and searching for your product they are likely using Pinterest, so you want to be on there. The number one reason I feel you should be on Pinterest is because it’s a search engine.
How Is Pinterest Organized?
Everything is divided into boards, based on topic categories. This makes it very easy to narrow things down.
Who Should Have Pinterest?
If you have ANY type of written content, you should have Pinterest. Why? Your readers will pin images from your site to Pinterest, and they’ll be shared with your readers. If your content doesn’t have images, you are doing yourself a disservice.
Lots of people have amazing content, but no images. These people aren’t even in the game! You can’t pin text on Pinterest, only images. You WANT to be showing up in front of all of the Pinterest users.
How To Make Images
Any images you want to put on Pinterest, you want to be vertical and show what your content is about. Some people add titles to their images that make it easier to see what it’s about. They can be very simple. They don’t need to be crazy!
Pinterest images also need to be large. I like to use 650 pixels. That’s what I found works best for me on my blog. You can go larger as you like. It just needs to be the entire width of your content area. Most users are on mobile devices so you want to make sure it’s easy for them to see and click.
Still not convinced?
Head over to Pinterest and type in your niche into the search bar. Scroll down all of the results, and see when images catch your attention. You’ll notice the vertical ones are the ones that really catch your eyes. It’s like real estate. You want to take up the most real estate possible! Pinterest has standards that will keep yours from being soo big that they are obnoxious.
I personally don’t like borders either. I feel that’s valuable real estate.
Naming Your Pins
If you have a WordPress based site, you’ll use a basic layout: title, description, alt tag. This is likely similar with other platforms as well. Pinterest pulls from this area. This means that if you’re uploading photos with generic numerical titles from your camera, you are doing yourself a huge disservice. Also make your title information match what your post is about, and make it enticing. Think about what your ideal reader or viewer will be looking like.
If you don’t know what to name it, search the most popular pins on the topic in Pinterest. You may find that instead of “homemade ice cream” you may want to put “Creamy Homemade Vanilla Recipe.” This is even a helpful free trick to use if you are trying to decide what to name or rename your blog post!
That’s it for today since I don’t want to take up too much of your time. There is a lot more we could get into (like business Pinterest and such), but I just wanted to touch the basics of Pinterest today. The more eyes you can get on your content, the more views to your site. This means more money for you! If you have any questions at all, be sure to let us know!
Thanks for listening to the Sandbox to Success podcast, with your host: Katrina M. Thom. If you like what you just heard, leave us a message at iTunes or Stitcher. We would also love to hear what you have to say. Use the hash tag #totspodcast to connect with us on twitter. Don’t forget to check out the show notes, which can be found at www.totsbusiness.com. Join us next time for another edition of the Sandbox to Success podcast. Have an AWESOME day!
