Sales Growth Strategy: Pin it to win it

Even though Pinterest is one of the fast-growing social media sites on the web, some businesses are struggling with how to use it to drive sales. There are some key design and content strategies you can follow to take advantage of this platform.  One of the key benefits our world wide web offers is the ability to learn from others and analyze our competitors.  As you build your Pinterest presence, begin by finding ideas from large brands like Lowes and Every Day Health, and tailor the designs to your industry.  Below are a few Pinterest Page content tactics our cafe contributors have pulled together.

Use your Pinterest page as a client resource center.  Many businesses are finding success by creating a Pinterest page that serves as a resource center for clients and prospective clients.  A resource board can be a key tactic for generating leads and learning more about what is important to your target audience.  A really good example is The Social Media Room.  Because Pinterest is so image-driven, it offers the opportunity to create a visual library of sorts for your clients. myMarketing Cafe is currently building a few resource boards for our Pinterest page.  Our first is the Free Marketing Resources board, which offers over 80 free tools to help market your business.  A sample resource center might include the following boards:

Frequently Asked Questions
Whitepapers, eBooks, and How-To Guides
Before and After using your product or service
Customer Testimonials
Worksheets and Free Templates
Free Resources Relating to your Industry

Create Group Boards to develop content and grow followers.  Project Eve provides a good example of a group board.  It’s called Eve’s Pin Exchange and members of Project Eve pin information related to starting a business.  Group boards can be managed by invitation only allowing you to strategically choose your guest pinners.  By nature, most people love to be invited to participate to share their expertise.  A group board provides your business with valuable content and gives your guest pinners the opportunity to gain exposure and share their expertise.  The pins on group boards are shared with your page followers but also all of the followers of your guest pinners.  Keep in mind, however, that a community group board must be well managed to ensure your guest pinners are following your pinning guidelines and posting the content intended for the board. Below are a few ideas for group boards.

Recipe Exchange for health industry related businesses
Do-It-Yourself Boards
Client Testimonials
Free Resources related to your industry or target audience
Local Discount Board – offering discounts at participating businesses
Design Idea Board – for design related industries
Time Management Strategies or Leadership Trainings – for Human Resources industry

Use a Promotions Board to drive sales.  Promotions boards serve many valuable purposes.  They provide your audience with a specific location to find your current promotions.  Past pins will also give your audience information about the kinds of promotions you tend to offer. Most importantly, promotions are some of the most shared content for Pinterest users.  A promotions board can also be used across social media channels and promoted through sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.  Ideas for Promotions boards are below.

Special discounts
Special Event promotions – This can be tied to an event photo album after the event
Contests – Contests can be designed around users comments which help generate activity for your Pinterest page

Learn more Pinterest small business ideas using our Social Grind page, 15 practical uses for Pinterest.  Have you found success with Pinterest? Please share your ideas in the comments below.