Is Pinterest the Right Platform for Your Business?

Social media marketing is a part of life for many entrepreneurs and businesses today. Customers and clients are using social platforms to share the latest trend they have found, watch the latest news video, catch up with family and friends, network for their business and so much more.

It’s important to be present online, but how can you keep up with every social media site on the internet? It is nearly impossible.

Here is Pinterest: A platform that garners much success through organic sharing (pinning) of valuable content (and products) with keyword rich descriptions.

Even though Pinterest gets lumped into the Social Media category, Pinterest is a visual search engine where people come to look for solutions, ideas and inspiration. Content on Pinterest has a longer shelf life than content shared on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

Pinterest has been steadily growing as a marketing platform for many entrepreneurs, bloggers, coaches and product-based businesses. There has been a lot of buzz on how great Pinterest can be for business. For some, it has been a game changer!

So, how do you know if Pinterest is worth the investment for your business?

Here are three ways to know if Pinterest is the right platform for your brand:

1. Research Your Audience

Research is necessary to find out whether your audience falls into the demographics of the average Pinterest user. Reviewing who is using Pinterest to get a feel if your average customer falls into the demographic groups using the platform.

According to these Pinterest stats,

• There are over 75 billion ideas on Pinterest.
• Millennials use Pinterest as much as Instagram.
• Median age of a Pinterest user is 40, however majority of active pinners are below 40.
• Half of Pinterest users is $50K or greater per year, with 10 percent of Pinteresting households making greater than $125K.
• 30% of all US social media users are Pinterest users.
• 60% of Pinterest users are from the US.

Here are some more facts that might help you determine if you should add Pinterest marketing for your business:

• 87% of Pinners have purchased a product because of Pinterest.
• 72% of Pinners use Pinterest to decide what to buy offline.
• 67% of Pinners are under 40-years-old.
• Over 5% of all referral traffic to websites comes from Pinterest.
• Pinterest said 80% of its users access Pinterest through a mobile device.
• 93% of active pinners said they use Pinterest to plan for purchases
• 87% said they’ve purchased something because of Pinterest.
• Two-thirds of pins represent brands and products.
• Food & Drink and Technology are the most popular categories for men.
• Shopping: Every day nearly 2M people Pin product rich Pins.

The vast majority of this platform’s users have always been female, with men increasingly signing up to use Pinterest.

Thus, it makes sense to consider spending some time here if your customers fall into any of the demographics listed above.

2. Decide Whether Your Brand Lends Itself to Visual Content

Pinterest is a curation site in which users pin the blog posts, articles and products that interest them.  Since this information is shared through graphics, pins must be visually appealing if they’re to stand out from the crowd.

Therefore, it would make sense to consider how and if your business and its products can be represented well through graphics. It is possible to create graphics related to your product or service if you don’t have a large variety of photo-worthy content. Creativity is necessary when it comes to using Pinterest.

Just be sure you feel confident in your ability to generate pin-worthy content on a regular basis to display your content. As with all social media, it pays to be consistent on the platform.

3. Evaluate Your Resources

Finally, take inventory of your resources you need in order to make an informed assessment of whether a Pinterest marketing effort is a sound plan for your company’s needs. Consider whether you have the staff to handle a profile. This means everything from deciding which things to pin, actually pinning them or scheduling pins into an automated program, monitoring any comments and maintaining boards.

Also, take into account if pin creation will be done in-house or outsourced. You may need to hire a graphic designer to create stunning images if you don’t currently have the talent on your staff.

Thus, your budget will also be a factor into whether you want to take on a Pinterest campaign or hiring a Pinterest Strategist as part of your digital marketing plan.

Final Thoughts

Pinterest can be an incredibly successful platform for use with online marketing. As with other parts of your efforts, you simply need to be strategic about its use. If you have the money, time, staff and image-heavy content material, your business could do well on the site and be quite popular with its users.

Give it a go and have fun with it!

And if you need help, contact a Pinterest Strategist like me! *wink*