Social Media Marketing

February 24, 2012

56 Ways to Market Your Business on Pinterest

So if you are interested in Pinterest as a small business marketing tool, here is another great post by CopyBlogger that guides you to use Pinterest as a social media marketing too.

In case you’ve been living in a mountain cave in Bhutan for the past couple of months, Pinterest is a relatively new social networking site that allows users to create online image collages, then quickly and easily share those collages — called “pinboards” — with other Pinterest users.

It’s fun, easy, and catching on like wildfire right now.

Part of Pinterest’s appeal is that it’s beautiful. Enter the lovely world of Pinterest, and all the troubles of your day-to-day life just seem to slip away in a stream of perfect little black dresses, baby otters, and cherubic children who never seem to get dirty or mouth off to their parents.

Because it’s image-based, the core of Pinterest is overwhelmingly positive. I like to think of Pinterest as Facebook without the whining.

Yes, Pinterest is beautiful. And yes, its users love it. But don’t let all the hearts and flowers fool you. Behind those lovely images, Pinterest is fast becoming a heavy hitting marketing tool for brands and businesses … like yours.

Let’s take a quick look at why this is, and then we’ll get into 56 specific Pinterest tactics you can use to your own marketing advantage.
What is Pinterest and why should I care?

Once you’ve got a Pinterest account, you can create online collages (“boards”) for different topics you’re interested in, and then add images and videos to your boards by “pinning” them (the equivalent of using glue sticks on old-school vision boards, but faster, slicker, and considerably cooler.)

Pinterest has nearly five million users, and is rapidly growing. Nearly 1.5 million unique users visit Pinterest daily, spending an average of 15 minutes a day on the site.

Think those inspiring vision boards don’t result in referral traffic to websites and blogs? Think again. In January 2012, Pinterest drove greater traffic to websites than LinkedIn, Google Plus, Reddit, and Youtube — combined.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about how beginner, intermediate, and black-belt Pinterest users are using it to grow their businesses and connect with their customers using these appealing online collages.

Here are 56 powerful ways I’ve come up with to incorporate Pinterest into your content marketing mix …
Pinterest marketing for beginner pinners …

Make sure you feature your business name on your profile for maximum exposure. Use your business name as your username, or change your profile name to your business name after your profile is set up.
Add a paragraph about who you are and what you’re interested in to the “About” section on your Pinterest profile. It will show up right under your photo, and will be one way that users can find out more about you.
Connect your account with your Facebook and Twitter accounts. Not only will it help you gain followers, but making this connection adds social media icons under your profile picture that link to your Facebook and Twitter profiles.
Don’t forget to add your website URL in your profile, too!
Pin lots of stuff. Pin content steadily, instead of in huge bursts, to maximize your exposure and engagement.
Come up with creative and interesting board names. They get shared whenever you pin something, so make them enticing. But be creative — you need to keep your board names short. There isn’t a lot of room for long descriptive titles.
Tag other Pinterest users in your pins by using “@username” in your descriptions. Network with other professionals and vendors in your field by using this feature. Not many people are doing this yet, so it’s a great way to build your following and stand out.
Comment on other people’s pins. Just like with tagging, this feature hasn’t really caught on yet, so use it regularly to really engage with other users. Obviously, use the same good manners and common sense you would when commenting on a blog or other social media site.
“Like” other people’s pins to give a thumbs-up when you want to recognize great content.
Pin from lots of different sources, instead of just from one or two sites. Variety is important on Pinterest.
Mix pinning your own unique finds with doing lots of “repinning,” which is repeating someone else’s pin to your followers (just like a Retweet on Twitter). The person whose image you repin gets notified via email, and they also get a credit on your pin, which increases their following.
Feel free to pin your own blog posts, but don’t over-promote. Follow the usual etiquette rules of any other social media site, and don’t be the boorish one at the party who only talks about himself.
Pin videos! Pinterest has a special section just for pinned videos, and there are far fewer videos than images on Pinterest at this point, so use them to distinguish yourself. Any YouTube video is easy to pin.
When you pin an image, add a description under it. Be smart about these descriptions — a good description will stay with an image as it gets repinned all over the Pinterest world. If the image is something from your own site, definitely use your business name in the description.
After you pin a new image using the very handy Pinterest browser bookmarklet (a great tool in its own right,) use its built-in social media prompts to re-share your pin on Twitter and Facebook, too.
Use Pinterest’s embed option to publish pins as content in your blog posts and website pages. Note: As Pinterest is catching on, you may need to tell your users that they need to click on a Pinterest image to get to the original source. When I tried this last week, a reader wrote to me and asked, “Is there more to that Pin thing? Or is it just a pretty image?”
Get the Pinterest iPhone app, so you can repin on the go, pin from your camera and add a location to your pins so others can find your images.
Optimize your website content for Pinterest sharing (Part One): Use images in every single post you write, so your post can be shared on Pinterest. When you find yourself getting lazy about this, remember –- not using an image in your post means no one will pin it. And remember — the prettier the picture is, the more it will get pinned. The images that appeal to Pinterest members are powerful and emotive, so keep that in mind when choosing your pictures. That combination tends to work well for your blog readers, too.
Optimize your website content for Pinterest sharing (Part Two): Consider watermarking your images, or adding text to them. If you’re using your own images on Pinterest, one of the best ways to help your image stand out is by adding a clear description to the image itself, or adding a watermark with your business name. Make sure it’s clear, but that it doesn’t block out the main subject of the photo.
Create seasonal or holiday boards that relate to your brand. Example: New Year’s Resolutions, Fourth of July, etc. Users love these.
Add a prominent Follow Me on Pinterest button to your website to advertise that you’re a pinner!

Pinterest marketing for intermediate pinners …

Search for new images to pin (or for trends) by using Pinterest’s search function. The search bar is in the top left of every Pinterest page.
Use keywords in descriptions of pins, so pinners can find your images and boards when they do their own searches.
Make sure you’ve got a Pin It! button added to the footer of each of your blog posts so your readers can quickly and easily share your content on Pinterest.
Your Pinterest page has its own RSS feed! Find your Pinterest feed by clicking on the RSS symbol under your profile photo, then use it anywhere you can use a feed (Facebook, LinkedIn, for syndication on other sites, etc.) Advertise your Pinterest feed to your readers and ask them to add you to their RSS feedreaders.
Got a WordPress site? Feature your recent pins in a widget in your WordPress sidebar by using a Pinterest widget.
You can add contributors to any of your boards. Use this feature to engage your staff and let them contribute to your Pinterest presence by using adding to your company boards. Your staff will love this, and your boards will be richer for it!
Want to find out who’s been pinning your stuff? Go to: http://pinterest.com/source/yoursitehere. For an example, check out Copyblogger’s source page. Look at your site’s page often to discover which posts and images are resonating with Pinterest users. Use that information to shape your content strategy.
Add prices to your pins to create your own Pinterest shop. To add a price to a pin, type the $ or £ symbol followed by item’s price in the pin’s description. When you add prices to your pins, they may be featured in Pinterest’s “Gifts” section.
Create a board that tells the story of your company and communicates your core values. Make this board available to people as part of your sales process.
Consider creating “thank you” boards for current or past clients that send special appreciative messages. Could you create a holiday thank you card? Or one that celebrate the launch of a new client’s big project with your company?
Pin tutorials on your boards. Need to walk a client through how to use your products or services? Or do you want to create free how-to videos to use as promotional materials? Pin your videos and presentations on special “How-To” or “Tutorial” boards. Anything you teach your clients can be made into a tutorial.
Watch for trends. Click on the “Popular” link on your Pinterest home page to research what’s catching on with pinners, then integrate those trends into your content strategy.
Be yourself. Pinterest is all about personal expression, so don’t be afraid to pin stuff that represents who you really are.
Create a special board to highlight your company’s team members. Use the description under each photo to write a bio of each person.
Show behind-the-scenes photos of your company. People love knowing how you make things!
Become an information curator for your niche. Gather the newest and best resources on your boards. Become a trusted source of information on Pinterest, and your following will grow by leaps and bounds.
Integrate your Pinterest account with Facebook’s timeline feature, so you post content in both places at once.
Highlight old content on your blog so that people can repin your archived posts. The LinkWithin tool will add a footer to your blog posts that features images and links pulled from old content, giving people the opportunity to pin previous articles.
Thinking about freshening up old photos, or going back through your blog archives and adding photos to those text-only posts? Now is the time! Remember — the prettier the picture, the more pins you will get.

Pinterest marketing for black-belt pinners …

Find out when you’re getting the most repins, likes, comments and referral traffic by regularly analyzing both your Pinterest profile and your site traffic stats. Test out pinning on different days of the week and times of day to maximize traffic and audience engagement.
Connect your clients who use Pinterest by introducing them to each other. Recognize your best pinners by sending out a weekly “Best of Pinterest” email that includes spotlighted boards and pins from your clients’ profiles.
Create moderated boards for your fans to express their support for you. They can add videos, blog posts and photos from your events.
Do you have a number of different ideal client personas? Create a separate board to represent each client persona, then use those boards during your sales cycle and embed them into your website pages so people are clear about the kinds of clients you’re trying to attract.
Create boards for the classes and webinars you teach, and use them as supplemental material for your students. You can use the boards during your class or presentation, or send your students home with Pinterest boards to explore after class. If you’re teaching a live class or workshop, include pictures from the actual event.
Create boards for referral sources, affiliates and strategic partners, and let them add to the boards. Engage with the partners so they know they are included and appreciated.
Allow your best customers or star students to join in on certain boards and pin ideas and suggestions about how to use your product, or themes that go along with your products and services.
What could be better for showcasing how awesome your business is than creating a dedicated testimonials board?
Use Pinterest boards to tell client stories. Turn boring written case studies into powerful visual stories.
Check out your VIP clients’ boards to get ideas for special thank you or holiday gifts.
Create quick-start guides or owner’s manual boards for your products. Or if you’re primarily a service provider, create a “How to Get the Most Out of Working with Me” board with ideas and suggestions on maximizing your service relationship.
Create boards for conferences that you attend. Carry cards with instructions on getting invited to post on that board — conference attendees will love this!
Create beautiful, visually interesting coupons, and add them to your boards.
Your clients will be blown away if you create special boards just for them that include resources and ideas tailored to their individual situations. This will really make your company shine is done regularly and well.
Offer exclusive Pinterest promotions. Create pins that give special promotions for following you on Pinterest.
Run a Pinterest contest. Invite your readers to pin links and images from your site that inspire, motivate, move or entertain them. Then judge the winners by creativity or ingenuity and offer a juicy prize. Offer to promote the winners’ Pinterest boards on your site as part of the contest.

Pinterest is a beautiful (and effective) content marketing tool

Pinterest is not only picking up steam in social media circles, it has become a proven source of traffic for blogs and websites, quickly surpassing current favorites like LinkedIn and YouTube.

While lots of folks are flapping their jaws about the impressive statistics of Pinterest, some companies are quietly using this fabulous new tool to pin their way to better customer engagement and a visually interesting, personally appealing brand.

My advice? Take a long, hard look at including Pinterest as part of your 2012 content marketing plan.

And start making your social media strategy more beautiful, one little pin at a time.

February 16, 2012December 23, 2016

Facebook Sucks: Google+ Blows Away Facebook for User Visibility

Awesome post by Jon Cilley

So why does Google+ – in my opinion – work so much better for smaller businesses than Facebook? Why can unknowns become known so much easier on Google+? There are a couple reasons. Let’s start with the most important: Google Search. Of course, like all social media platforms, Google+ has its very own search feature. But what makes this feature fundamentally different from Facebook is how it is utilized.

For instance, I want each of you reading this to go into Facebook’s search engine and type one simple word: “photos.” What you will find are pages that have this keyword within the title of the page, maybe someone named “photo,” and four relevant photos from your friend’s recent posts. You won’t even see every page relating to photos or content, you’ll just see the ones who thought to put it in the main name of the page. One thing you won’t see is a photo from an unknown content provider, the very thing you would want someone to see – if you are looking for exposure. What you will see is the very thing your News Feed should have produced in the first place: content from your friends – which is hidden and tucked below at the very bottom.

What you have here is a very closed system. Putting friends first, not content. This makes it very hard for individuals or brands that are not known commodities to reach new followers. Now I want you to type the same word “photos” into Google+’s search engine. What you will find is exactly what you searched for: photos.

You will see two different options, “most recent” and “best of.” Most, if not all of the search results, are from individuals the current user does not know – if these posts have been posted publicly. Also, right from these search results the user can then add individuals or pages to their circles. They can click “best of” to see which content is getting the most engagement and visibility, and if you agree with the magnitude of engagement a particular post has acquired you can add right from these results as well. This is how the unknown becomes known: putting content first.

This is virtually impossible on Facebook, which relies on a one-to-one friend network to expand word-of-mouth endorsements. Because of this, Facebook provides a virtual speed bump for the rapid expansion of content that might deserve the added visibility.

Google+ is a search-first social network. Facebook is a friend-first social network. Just notice when you first type something into Facebook. Friends popup first, and you have to scroll down with the arrow keys or cursor to get to search results as opposed to friends. On Google+ it’s the opposite, a keyword search appears first before individuals in your circles.

The next reason Google+ increases the ability to rapidly expand your follower base is “Shared Circles.” Getting in a shared circle can be an additional way to gain followers and grow visibility for the content you produce. Because the framework of Google+ makes it much more appealing to add individuals you may not know than Facebook, an individual might not hesitate to add a shared circle containing hundreds of individuals relating to their interests. Getting in one of these is usually a gift that keeps on giving. Also, relating this back to Google+ search, people can find your shared circles without even following you beforehand – again, if it is shared publicly.

So if you want to grow followers and increase engagement on the content you produce: first create great content, second post it publicly, and third do it on Google+. Facebook sucks.

October 9, 2011December 23, 2016

Are social media marketing agencies for small businesses?

I know ours is but the other day at an event listening to speaker after speaker on how they create their strategies for their clients I did question that several times.

The speakers were all employed by different social media agencies talking on what they were doing and the audience was composed of small business owners most with less than 10 employees. By the look on their faces, it was easy to see there was some disconnection in place.

One common strategy to attract Facebook people to like a page was to give something like an Ipad a day as a giveaway. Just on this the investment on the devices alone was around $24 thousand a month. Were there anything in place to convert those Ipad winners into buyers? Not really but the number of people liking your page will be really high.

Lots of people seeking free stuff with no intention of buying now or ever, not necessarily a very targeted audience seems to be a good thing. What is the use of having thousands of people like a page if they are not potential buyers? None. Not for a business.

It seems that is not clear to marketers that every action in business needs to have a clear path to profit since that is what business is all about. Even engagement needs to lead to increased level of trust and at some point to sales.

Another popular strategy is the use of infographics. Don’t get me wrong, I think this one can be very useful, but I couldn’t help but laugh when the speaker pointed out that it does bring a lot of traffic to a site while the bounce rate (number of people that visit that page and leave without doing nothing) goes over 90% and conversion rates are below 1/2 percent.

Again, if it is not going to bring targeted prospects, I’ll not build a list, they will go away without looking at anything else and they won’t ever buy, why would this traffic matter?

For big dumb companies that can afford to spend a lot of money just to be more visible and claim they are popular this makes sense. For the small business owner where money spent needs to bring results in the form of hot prospects and profits, these strategies are a waste of time. They may be cool, but they are not money well spent.

September 15, 2011

Facebook subscribe button: Keep your page or not

This is going to be the next big question: Should small businesses and solopreneurs keep a Facebook page or just rely on the new Facebook subscribe button?

It depends. Companies that need awareness for their brand need a page (even if they are ran by 1 or 2 people like ours)

Facebook pages offer tracking so you can understand your audience better and conversion.

Pages allow multiple admins to update the content.

Facebook pages allow you to customize tabs, create lead capture pages, show products and even sell.

You can use sponsored ads to promote the page and bring more people.

If these factors are not important for you, then the subscribe feature may be better for you. Less work and maybe more interaction.

Here is a comparison chart:

To allow subscribers click on edit profile and then on family and friends.

Below is an article by Mashable showing you how to benefit from the subscription feature:

When Facebook launched its Subscribe button on Wednesday, many were quick to note its implications for journalists, celebrities and other thought leaders. The new feature allows for users to follow public updates, and these are the people most often broadcasting their ideas.

Yet there’s more the average user can get on board with than meets the eye. The release came with a slew of additional features — including a more customizable News Feed and increased privacy — that users have been wanting for years. The trouble is, there are so many moving parts in this product launch. Users are now presented with a number of options, and they’ll need to dig deep to understand which pieces to take and which to leave.

We hope to make that process a little easier for you. Here are some key points you should know based on what type of user you are:

Super Users & Celebrities

If you’re kind of a big deal, you likely already have a Facebook fan page to update your followers on what you’re up to. The launch of the Subscribe button leaves you with two options:

1. Keep the fan page and continue to maintain two separate Facebook presences: profile and page. This strategy’s main pro is that pages are optimized for marketing. Profiles can’t be updated by multiple admins and fans are more acclimated to updates with an on-brand feel. Perhaps more importantly, profiles don’t have Facebook’s analytics tool Insights — and “they probably never will,” says Vadim Lavrusik, journalist program manager at Facebook and former Mashable community manger.
2. Do away with the fan page and merge your page likers into profile subscribers. By deleting your fan page, you will lose all page content. However, your likers will automatically be subscribed to your public updates. The biggest advantages? Profiles are easier to update via mobile than pages and people are prioritized over pages in search.
With either of these methods, you’ll have direct messaging capability (from your profile to your page likers or from your profile to your subscribers) and neither has a limit on the number of people who can follow your content (subscribers or likers — though profiles do have a limit of 5,000 friends).

Journalists & Artists

The Subscribe button is arguably most beneficial for journalists and artists. Though, in a sense, they’re public figures, these types of Facebook users likely aren’t well-known enough to justify a fan page.

If this sounds like you, the first thing you need to do is actively opt-in to allow subscriptions to your profile. You can then choose to allow subscribers to comment on your updates and control your notifications.

Another change to note is that when you unfriend someone, they stay subscribed to your public updates. This is important if you’ve been accepting friend requests from people you don’t know who want to follow your work. It can be uncomfortable to friend someone without knowing them personally. The Subscribe button allows you to unfriend these people and still reach them via public updates.

Finally, when composing updates you want your subscribers to see, be sure to set the privacy to Public. They won’t see it otherwise.

Parents & Teachers

The relationships parents and teachers should have with their kids and students on Facebook has always been a touchy subject. The Subscribe feature can help to make crossing the Facebook connection threshold less awkward.

Users can subscribe to others without enabling others to subscribe to them. This means teachers can allow their students to follow their public updates about school and classes without actually friending them (and accessing more personal information). That way, students can continue to update friends about their lives without worrying what might pop up in their teachers’ News Feeds.

For parents, this feature may work the other way around. Instead of asking your son or daughter what that Jaime So-and-So they used to hang out with is up to, you could subscribe to Jaime, whereas friending her might be uncomfortable. The feature could also be helpful if your kids aren’t OK with you watching their every virtual move. Brace yourself for a sensitive conversation at the dinner table.

Students & Average Users

For the occasional Facebookers who mostly use the service to keep up with friends and post photos, here’s the bottom line: You never have to see your Aunt Suzie’s FarmVille updates ever again. But, you can still see her photos, videos and status updates if you’d like.

Before the Subscribe button launch, it was either all or nothing when it came to blocking a person’s updates from your News Feed. Now you can control what types of updates you see from a person and how often. That means you can skip the virtual sheep without missing out on engagement notifications and puppy albums.

As of now, the feature is only available for tailoring updates from non-friends that you’re subscribed to. The Subscribe button, and this feature, will be rolled out to friend pages in the next few days, Lavrusik says.

Conclusion

As the virtual world grows, relationships and the ways we’re connecting with others are changing. The Subscribe button addresses issues about the depth of connection the term “friend” implies on Facebook.

Some critics say the feature goes against Facebook’s nature — that it was built on “friending,” not “following.” It’s important to note that the News Feed algorithm weights updates from friends as well as private posts more heavily than public ones. In addition, the Close Friends list Facebook rolled out on Tuesday makes the updates from your strongest relationships more prominent in your News Feed, and you can enable notifications specifically from friends in this list.

With the number of new social networks gaining speed, Facebook is and should be making changes to stay competitive. What’s important is that it doesn’t divert too far from its core. In this update, Facebook is only giving its users more options — which the majority may or may not take advantage.