Assignment 2, Bootcamp #6 - Pinterest Marketing, Part 1

[iCraft Admin]

Hello Bootcampers,

So this week we'll focus on Pinterest.
I am going to post second assignment mid-week to make sure we deal with basics first, get into the habit of "pinning" things and then deal with more advanced features.

If you want to know why Pinterest is important for your store marketing, here are some stats for you.

Some Pinterest Stats
 
Pinterest launch date: March 2010
Monthly Pinterest pageviews: 2.5 billion (last updated 5/9/13)
Source: expandedramblings.com
 
•   As of September 2013, the three year-old social media site Pinterest has more than 70m global users, making it one of the fastest growing websites in history. And according to several studies, Pinterest drives more traffic to publishers than Twitter, LinkedIn, Reddit and Google+ combined.
•   Pinterest users spend more: Pinterest shoppers in the US spend an average of between $140-$180 per order, compared to Facebook and Twitter shoppers who spend on average $60-$80.
•   In the UK, Pinterest has seen a 786% increase in the last year, growing from 901,761 visits in September 2011 to 7,985,316 in September 2012. Pinterest has very quickly shed its niche image and is now in direct competition with Facebook and Twitter.
•   According to a study by Convertro, Pinterest represented 17.4% of social media revenue for ecommerce sites in April 2012, up from 1.2% in Q2 2011.
•   The same survey, which interviewed 7,431 online buyers from August 9 to 17 2012, also found that significantly more online consumers agree that Pinterest is a place to “get inspiration on what to buy” and “help keep track of or collect things I like".

user statistics: Total number of Pinterest users: 70 million (last updated 7/10/13)
Average user time spent on Pinterest per month: 98 minutes: (last updated 5/23/13)
Source: econsultancy.com
  
Data across 1.1 billion impressions resulted in an average click-through rate of 1.1%. That’s an incredibly strong number that blows away click-through rates of banners ads, which hover around 0.1%. Note that a click-through on Pinterest is a tougher “double click rate” because it takes one click to highlight an image on Pinterest, and a second click to leave for a website.
 
The viral nature of Pinterest is unprecedented in the social space. Pinterest is a content discovery and sharing utility in which 80% of pins are re-pins. With other social media, an update mainly stops with your follower base. But followers are only the “seed” of potential reach of Pinterest because of re-pinning. With re-pins, a single pin can bounce around repeatedly on Pinterest over the course of several weeks, multiplying reach (and thus multiplying re-pins, clicks and sales).
Source: marketingland.com
 
And a couple more interesting tidbits from socialmediastrategiessummit.com
 
As you plan your brand’s Pinterest strategy for 2014, here are 10 Pinterest Stats to consider:
• 81% of U.S. online consumers say they trust information & advice on Pinterest (BlogHer)  
• The average order placed by Pinterest shoppers is $169, the average from Facebook is $95 and the average from Twitter is $70. (RichRelevance)  
• 70% of Pinterest’s 70 million users are located in the U.S. (SemioCast)  
• 79% of Pinterest users who pinned, repined or liked were from the U.S. (SearchEngineWatch)  
• A call-to-action pin description renders 80% increase in engagement (Pinerly)  
• Pinterest pins with prices get 36% more likes than those without (econsultancy)  
• 69% of online consumers who visit Pinterest have found an item they have purchased (Bizrate)  
• 20% of total social referrals to commerce sites come from Pinterest (econsultancy)  
• 57% of Pinterest users pin, re-pin and interact with food-related content. (Wishpond)  
• 55% of all mobile devices used for pinning are iPads (Fast Company)  

The Assignment:

• Register an account on Pinterest, if you don't have one yet.
  Go to Pinterest for Business and click "Join as a Business". Right now, business and personal accounts have the same features. If you sign up as a business, you'll get updates on future products and services that will be build for businesses.
  Post your Pinterest name here, so we could all follow you. Here is iCraft's Pinterest account.
  
  
• Browse around to see what others are pinning and start following good boards.
  
  
• Create a few boards on Pinterest where you could pin your own products and organize them according to some theme or occasion, or target audience etc. Some ideas for you - "Jewelry for every day', "Party Ideas", "Woman's Fashion", "Pretty Things", "Shiny Things", "Echo Design", "Handmade Lovelies", "Inspirational", "Birthday Gifts", "Colorful" etc.
  Organize your pins however you want, but think about your target audience. What keywords would attract them to your board?
  
  
• Start pinning your own items from your iCraft store to your board by using "Pin it" button in the top right corner on the product page or by adding the "Pin It" button to your browser. Keep in mind that you can pin the same item to multiple boards. Follow people (boards) that pinned your items already (those could be your potential customers)
  
  
• If you like something on Pinterest, Pin it to your board, so you have a variety of interesting items in your boards (not just your own products)
  
  
• Browse other participant's stores and make sure you pin from each of them to your boards, at least once every day this week.

That's it for now. Please ask questions, if you have any, and try to have fun with this assignment.  

Reading for this week - Pinterest Resources for Small Business Marketing
(Do as much as you can)

Articles

1.   Getting Started: Get the most out of Pinterest for your business: http://business.pinterest.com/en/getting-started
2.   Using Pinterest for Small Business Marketing : http://www.social-networking-success.com/pinterest.html
3.   How To Use Pinterest for Your Small Business – 5 Simple Steps!: http://www.social-networking-success.com/how-to-use-pinterest.html
4.   3 Unique Ways to use Pinterest for Business: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/3-strategic-goals-on-pinterest/
5.   56 Ways to Market Your Business on Pinterest: http://www.copyblogger.com/pinterest-marketing/
6.   The 10 Commandments of Using Pinterest for Business: http://www.amyporterfield.com/2012/06/the-10-commandments-of-using-pinterest-for-business/
7.   How to Use Pinterest for Your Small Business: http://www.businessknowhow.com/internet/pinterestsmallbiz.htm
8.   How to get the most out of Pinterest for your Small Business: http://www.digitaltrends.com/social-media/how-to-use-pinterest-for-small-business/#!WpynD
9.   How small business can make the most of Pinterest : https://econsultancy.com/blog/63891-how-small-businesses-can-make-the-most-of-pinterest#i.1wv42bb12ubdn8
10.   Using Pinterest to Market Your Craft: https://icraftgifts.com/blog/using-pinterest-to-market-your-craft-426.php

E-Book

1.   Hubspot free ebook “An Introduction to Pinterest for Business”: http://offers.hubspot.com/how-to-use-pinterest-for-business

YouTube Videos

1.   Simple Pinterest Training https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNd9o_WoaSw
2.   Promoting your Products with Pinterest (the right way): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_DZEBFvvSk
3.   Online Pinterest Training - How to use Pinterest for your Business: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMPcTV5hfDM

[Jewelry Made With Love]

I'm having trouble setting up the website for pinintrrest.  It will not verify itself.    I've written to them and am just waiting for their reply.

[Lannie]

The Knitting Lady was kind enough to let me use her iCraft store to practice on Pinterest! Here's the address: http://www.pinterest.com/tinyknitting/ Every variation I could come up with on the name The Knitting Lady was already taken, and only letters and numbers are allowed, so I finally settled on 'tinyknitting". This doesn't change the name of the account, which is still The Knitting Lady.

After I set up the account, I went to http://business.pinterest.com/en and clicked on 'Convert' and now I have a business account!

I'm in the process of adding some pins now. Please check in and pin something on my board!

Jewelry Made With Love: When you enter all the info to set up your Pinterest account, it will ask you for your email. Then they send an email to you, and when you respond to it, that will verify your account and you can begin.

[Jewelry Made With Love]

I already had an account so they would only let me convert it and then iit won't verify my addy.

[Lannie]

Jewelry Made with Love: Did you use the same email address as you did for your existing account? Also, perhaps you could try again. (Sometimes I find that simply starting over works). Another thought - you could set up a new regular account with a new user name and password and then try converting it. This one would be for iCraft-related activity, and you could repin relevant pins from your original account. Any ideas from other Bootcamp participants?

[Jewelry Made With Love]

Could I maybe delete my old account and start over completely? If I did that would I loose my email to be used?

[iCraft Admin]

Jewelry Made With Love, what error message do you get on Pinterest? If you could send a screen shot of that page and send it to our tech support email, we'll try to figure it out.Though, I am not promising anything. It's not our site. 

I wouldn't delete your account as, like you said, you might not be able to use your email again to register a new account. Plus, you don't want to lose all your pins.

[NoriandChasesCorner]

I set up mine last night and it wouldn't let me use the email I had on my personal account. Nor did it give an option to convert it. However, it won't let me log in now. And yes, I know they will send me an email to solve the issue but my email isnt letting me log in either. Hope to resolve problem tomorrow. Once I know the account is working I will let the group know.

[iCraft Admin]

OK, change of plans for this week. I am not going to post the second part of this assignment today as planned, since some people have issue with Pinterest login screen and others didn't check-in yet. Please focus on the assignment posted on Monday and let us know about your every day progress. Thanks!

[Hofkissed]

Sorry for the late check-in! I've been doing some reading/thinking on this... I have a Pinterest account already with a decent following and am hesitant to switch that over to a business account. Unless I have a business account already? I signed up so long ago on Pinterest that I don't know.

www.pinterest.com/hofkissed

I have my site verified to my Blog that is business related.

Any thoughts/suggestions?

[Lannie]

Hofkissed: I checked on Pinterest Help section and it looks like converting your personal account to a business account won't change your boards at all. You'll have to fill in some more information, and you'll get updates etc. The address, content  etc would all be the same.

You have really interesting business-related boards, and I can see why you wouldn't want to start over! Luckily I don't think you have to.

[Hofkissed]

Thanks Lannie! I will definitely look into it then. I've worked too hard (a.k.a. spent countless hours searching & pinning!) on Pinterest to have to give it all up.

[Lannie]

I've updated The Knitting Lady's Pinterest boards. http://www.pinterest.com/tinyknitting/  Please have a look and give me your feedback.

BTW Hofkissed, the variety of your boards and the work and care you've clearly taken on this is very inspiring to me!

[Hofkissed]

OK. So I'm thinking this would be a good thing... I could create new boards like "My Work for Sale" (where I'd pin from iCraft) and "Custom Work" etc. Boards like this would allow me to hit different audiences.

I see why it's a huge benefit to pin directly from my iCraft store. But now I remember why I haven't been doing that... the pictures I have in my store do not have my copyright info on it. I used to do so, but stopped in hopes that my pictures would be used on the home-page banner ads. Is it still a rule to not have that type of information on your pictures?

In the paper crafting world, it's common to CASE (copy & share everything), but I guess that's sort of what Pinterest is... copying ideas & making them your own. Anyway, I personally know of people who have physically copied pictures off the internet & claimed them as their own on their Blogs. I know that people could still do that by using my iCraft photos, but I feel that I'd be making it easier if I "advertised" them on Pinterest without the copyright info on it.

Am I overreacting?

[Hofkissed]

Thanks Lannie! I'm glad that I've inspired you. That makes my day!!