Is Pinterest Right For Your Business?
On Tuesday, we briefly touched on the Top 7 Social Media Platforms currently out there (focusing on the business aspect). Recently, we received a question from a client regarding Pinterest. It seems many business owners are still unsure whether or not Pinterest is right for them.
There’s a common myth circling around that Pinterest is only for crafty people. While Pinterest does have a rather large following of crafters, not everyone on there is handy with a hammer or skilled with a sewing machine. In fact, one thing we mentioned in our post yesterday was how Pinterest actually increased revenue for many businesses on Black Friday and Cyber Monday. In fact, reports say that Pinterest more than tripled revenue on Cyber Monday, and not all of those businesses were crafters; many of the sales were actually electronics, furniture, and other goods! Keeping that in mind, let’s focus on the question at hand: Is Pinterest right for your business?
First, a quick recap from Tuesday’s post: Pinterest is a “pinning” social media platform where users can “pin” their favorite images, recipes, products, videos, and blog posts to a virtual board that is then shared to followers. Pinterest is a great platform to help spread products and services via “word-of-mouth.”
Now, for businesses that do not have some form of website or gallery available, Pinterest is not right for you. Unfortunately, Pinterest currently does not allow users to “pin” images off of other platforms such as Facebook, so if you rely solely on Facebook you could be missing out. Second, as Pinterest is a way for users to “pin” items, websites that offer services such as legal representation, business consultations, and so on will also find little benefit in using Pinterest, simply because they may have nothing to show for their service.
On the flip side, businesses such as woodworkers, cake bakers, chefs, etc. (going back to the “crafty” side) will find that Pinterest gives them the ability to spread their images and work further, reaching potential new clients. In addition, businesses that sell physical products can also benefit from Pinterest as users can directly pin the products they like from a website to their boards.
There’s one unique feature that Pinterest offers that I want to point out: Pinterest provides updates to prices to their users. This means, if a user pins an item from your online store, Pinterest not only pins the image it also pins the price. When you offer a sale or lower the price of this item, Pinterest may then send an email to the person who pinned it notifying them of the new price. This is a great way to secure a sale, but be sure to check with your store hosting provider (or try it yourself) first to confirm that this feature will work for your store.
Finally, Pinterest isn’t just for products and services, but can also be used to spread your videos, blogs, and photographs! Many businesses are finding that Pinterest is a great way for them to share their Vlogs or Blogs with their fan base. Photographers may also love the ability to “pin” their images, and then watch as others find them and share them.
Happy “Pinning”!
Aly
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