6 tips to getting your company started on Pinterest

You may understand how Pinterest can help plan a wedding but are you still wondering what it can do for your business? The latest craze in social media has been said to beat out major names like LinkedIn and Google when it comes to driving traffic. Pinterest is reportedly responsible for more than 3.6 percent of all referral traffic in January.

In fact, HubSpot reported that by simply adding the “Pin It” button to their pages, they accumulated more than 640 links from Pinterest in just two weeks. It’s clear that marketers need to be paying attention to this platform.

More than half of Pinterest’s users are women between the ages of 25-44, so the market you’re trying to reach may not yet be taking advantage of this platform. But the key word here is, “yet.” It’s important to use common sense when deciding how much time to spend on any social media endeavor based on its relevance to your audience, but it’s smart to reserve an account for your company now. We all know that the anatomy of a platform can change at any time and it only makes sense to be prepared.

Here are six tips to get your company going on Pinterest:

1. Make your boards SEO friendly. Since the title of a board is an H3 header (in the coding, this is how a search engine sees what your website is about in order to rank it), they’re great for search engine optimization.  In addition to putting each board into the correct category, be sure to use keywords when creating the title for your board.
2. Use hashtags. Pinterest recognizes hashtags. By using hashtags in your descriptions, you make the pin Twitter friendly and easier to share across platforms.
3. Create How-To or History-Of boards. If, for example, you’re in the business of data mining, sharing a little insight – without giving away company secrets – can be done graphically and in steps to create a how-to board. The same can be done for the history of how the industry has advanced over the years.
4. Share your blog posts. Part of making a blog post more visible online is adding a great photograph or graphic. If you’re not already doing this, now is the time to start. Images can be pinned from anywhere on the Web, and they will lead back to the source of the image. Be careful, though – Pinterest may be protected if you upload an image that doesn’t belong to you, but you aren’t. Always include source credit in your pin.
5. Don’t make it all about you. There is nothing worse than following someone that is constantly promoting themselves on any platform. In fact, Pinterest was created with the exact opposite message in mind. Share images, blog posts and quotes that inspire innovation in your company. Comment on, repin and like other users’ pins.
6. Give insight into your corporate culture. Create a board to share with employees and encourage them to pin things that represent or inspire them, with a little commentary as to why. Are there restaurants nearby that you regularly order lunch from? Take a picture and send a little traffic their way. Share photos from fun company events and tips on what made it such a success.