Pinterest For Business - Social Media Workshops in Sydney

Brands serious about leveraging Pinterest to boost revenues from online and mobile channels are advised to get themselves firmly ‘pinned’ to the Pinterest ‘board’ as opposed to hanging on its fringes … or so the story goes … is that true or not?

Let me begin this article with a straight-out tip for business folk on Pinterest – you can do plenty of “buy our stuff” pins, but mix them up with pins that can go viral, such as pins on …. cats! The other day when I did a cute cat pin, within just 10 minutes I got the following notification email from Ben and the crew at Pinterest:

Hi …
Leslie Bridges likes your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Angie Haubrich likes your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Mary Kay Scott likes your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Crista Fisher likes your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Titania Amyx repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Amanda Fay repinned your pin ‘Hovercat…’
Teagan Raher repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Amelia Ary repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Gabrielle Morrow repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
April Grunwald repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Brittany Deacon repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … LOL @Lauren Lewis’
Mandy Lawler repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Carley Carris repinned your pin ‘Hovercat … #cats’
Happy Pinning!
– Ben and the Pinterest Team

Despite the frivolous nature of social-media-going-viral, Pinterest continues to show all the right signs that it’s fast becoming a mainstream player on the social media front.

Conceived in November 2009 and launched four months later, this ‘visually styled’ social network platform is already driving the social shopping experience. It offers a way for consumers to share images of anything – from fashion to pets, pots to plants. Users can create their own online pin boards to suit any theme and share it with likeminded people.

“Users are often ‘buy hungry’ when they visit Pinterest. As such, it presents a very ‘ready’ opportunity for brands to sell products to users actively seeking them out,” says Charlie Elliot of British branding firm Greenlight.

“By joining Pinterest and sharing, brands can learn a huge amount from their followers as they are offering up a whole load of information into their personal interests. It is typically the sort of insight and intelligence a brand needs and would have to go to great lengths to get, in order to create and/or tailor its product offering to its target audiences taste. Among others, those retailers early to the game include Gap, ASOS and Etsy.”

Pinterest is Pull, Not Push Media

Pinterest is not a broadcast mechanism in the same way as other social networks.

“Pinterest does not encourage product pushing. Therefore brands will need a different approach to the likes of Twitter and Facebook and will have to be creative in their output,” says Elliott.

There is proof aplenty that Pinterest already has a sizeable and importantly a loyal user base.

“Exact user numbers have not as yet been released. However, Pinterest is one of the top 10 social networking sites currently being tracked by Hitwise (who estimate visits in December 2011 reached 11 million). It featured in TIME magazine’s 2011 top 50 websites. Moreover, it has also just been introduced as one of 60 new apps available on Facebook’s Open Graph. This is bound to vastly increase user numbers and raise awareness of it further.”

The pace of change within the social media sphere is rapid and impacting extremely on retail and brand visibility dynamics.

“In all of this remains the constant competition for a share of the customer wallet. Brands would therefore do well to steer clear of coming in late, playing a costly game of catch up or worse still, being completely left behind as this sphere continues to evolve,” says Elliot.

Brands Getting Pinned For Profit

Below are just some of the topics being covered in a new ‘Pinterest for Business’ presentation which has recently emerged in Sydney:

You and Your Global Brand Optimising your Pinterest Profile
How to use Pinterest as an Active Resume
Deciding on your Pinterest Settings
Branding Yourself on Pinterest key elements for standing out and the importance of consistency
Integrating Pinterest with your Social Media strategy
Boost your online sales How to use Pinterest’s “Gift” section
Connecting with other industry Profiles & Pages
Abiding to Pinterest’s terms of use don’t get shut down by being a spammer.

Pinterest Essentials

Sydney social media workshop presenter Nicole Greentree also says that there are more Pinterest insights coming to the fore such as:

Transcending ‘Critical Mass’ Pinterest when tweeted grows both profiles for you
How to get 10 Minutes on Pinterest done Every Day so you’re never off the pace
The Best Ways to Use Pinterest On Your Smartphone
How to Best Use Pinterest in harmony with Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and Your Website
How Even Small Businesses can Outsource to a highly professional Social Media Manager
What Not To Do on Pinterest and What You Should Always Do
Building a staff army of Pinners
The Fastest ways to use Pinterest to organically grow an Authentic and Targeted Audience

Australians on Pinterest

While in the USA& UK they’re miles ahead of us on Pinterest, there are a number of Australians – both individuals and business people – embracing Pinterest – here’s a small sample:

http://pinterest.com/bondichai/

http://pinterest.com/thehealtharts/

http://pinterest.com/francoisesydney/

http://pinterest.com/dcidercider/