When crafting your social media marketing plan, it’s hard to ignore Pinterest as a key player. With almost 30 million unique visitors and the fastest-growing social media site on the block, this virtual pinboard drives more site traffic than Google+, LinkedIn and YouTube combined. So, you might think that you can just create a Pinterest account and it will grow like wildfire, right? Wrong. It’s proven that Pinterest is an extremely powerful tool for certain brands and not for others — but why? The entire site is a visual experience that allows its users to escape their realities and express their passions, inspiration and interests. To be successful on Pinterest, your brand must be visually enticing, which is why design, cooking and fashion are the top categories pinned daily.
Food brands and products, for example, do particularly well on this platform because they can promote their own products and recipes, while also pin external recipes that are relevant to the product or brand. For instance, one of our clients, Better than Bouillon, pins not only its own products and recipes, but also recipes by other chefs, cooks and foodies that would benefit from the Better than Bouillon flavor base.
Designers — particularly interior, fashion and graphic — do well also because their Pinterest accounts allow them promote their own style and services, while also inspiring users for future projects. River Glass Designs, also one of our clients, pins photos of their own work in homes throughout Northern Virginia and Maryland, but it also creates boards that pull inspiration for common home design projects, such as bathrooms and kitchens, from other design experts in the industry. Rather than a spirit of competition within an industry, Pinterest fosters a feeling of unified inspiration and passion for a shared interest.
Just as any social media platform has the potential to be a great marketing tool for you, it’s imperative to ask if it’s the right tool for you. Not every brand can successfully exist on Pinterest, but for the right brand, it could be one of the smartest marketing decisions you make.
