5 Reasons to Use Pinterest in Your Internet Marketing Strategy

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Most of the people today are dependent on internet. Surfing through their computer or smartphones. We are consuming an ocean of data in our everyday lives. Admit it or not, we are becoming less interested in reading long articles. We are now more on browsing images that is good in our eyes. And business see this as an opportunity to use Pinterest in their marketing strategy.

WHAT IS PINTEREST?

Pinterest is an image-based social network allowing their users to explore, manage and share images and videos from their theme-based image collections. Each user have their virtual bulletin boards where they can create their electronic pinboards for their images. It is a place for people to discover new things, browse interesting images and share the things that they love.

It has 70 millions users which is a good factor for a business to promote their products/services. Pinterest is a good way to establish a greater brand awareness and also to increase traffic to your website.

WHY USE PINTEREST?

There are a lot of reasons on why business should use Pinterest with their marketing. And here are few essential reasons to check out:

Create Brand Awareness

It is obvious that business can really use Pinterest to promote their products or services with other users. Capture your current audience interests by creating beautiful and unique images to promote your brand. Let them remember your business by browsing photos and videos in your board. You can also gain new customers by doing this thing on Pinterest. Keep in mind that when you are creating images, always put them in appropriate categories and share with the right people. You can also share your customer's photo using your brand to show your followers that they trusted your business.

Increase Website Traffic

Another positive point in using Pinterest for business is it's ability to increase traffic for your website. It is very useful in building traffic and a lot of exposure for your business because every pin that you will share has an embedded link back to its original source. When you and your followers use a photo that links to your products, then you can get a high-quality backlinks for that. Not only that, you can also improve your search engine ranking by writing a concise descriptions and using the right keywords for your brand.

Engage with Users

Pinterest is all about interesting and great images. But we can also say that it is a social network at the core. Why? Because we can also engage with users, follow, comment, like and 'repin' their great stuff. It is a good platform to establish a good relationship and interact with your customers. If your followers like or comment on your photo, don't forget to thank them. You can ask them to repin your images and return the favor by sharing interesting stuff on their board.

Connect with other Social Networks

You are not just using Pinterest alone when you are promoting your brand through this website. You also have the opportunity to integrate your Pinterest to your Facebook or Twitter accounts. Pushing your pins to your other social media accounts will help you redirect your customers in your Pinterest. Letting them explore more of your product/service images and videos. They can share those photos in their own FB/Twitter accounts if they want. That is the best way to gain more followers or more potential customers.

Conduct Market Research

You can improve your business marketing strategy with the use of Pinterest. It is not only about promotion and getting traffics for your website. It is also about improving the way you market your brand. You can conduct a market research by the use of this platform. How? By observing the result of your pins. You have to know if you are pinning the right images that people are looking. Are these images interest other people? Do they like it by repinning or commenting on your photos? Are you able to maintain your current customers and gain new followers? Are you targeting the right market for your products/services? Doing a good report about the result of using this platform for your business will help you a lot in achieving success for your business.

START USING PINTEREST FOR FREE!

It is very simple to get started. All you have to do is go to Pinterest business page, and join as a business. Set-up your account for free! After verifying your website, you can now add the 'Pin It' or Follow' buttons to your site. Doing this will let your current and potential customers know that you are already using this social network. After signing up, you can now start creating your boards, browsing images and videos, and participate with other users on Pinterest.

How to Get Customers to Post Instagram Pictures

Do you want to use Instagram to add value to your brand?

Are you looking for innovative ways to get your customers (and employees) to post Instagram pictures?

Then keep reading because I’m going to show you four ways to bring your “A game” to Instagram and wow your fans.

Why Customer Instagram Pictures?

Instagram was the fastest-rising social media channel for brands in 2013.

You probably already know it’s an effective platform for branding and marketing your products and growing your community.

But what you may not know is that Instagram is a powerful tool to collect customer-created content you can reuse to your advantage.

#1: Enhance Your Online (and Offline) Store With Customer Photos

Visuals greatly impact the behavior of shoppers. Most brands just snap a photo of the product and share it across all social channels, which may work sometimes. But you can take it a step further by crowdsourcing photos on Instagram.

When customers see photos of other “regular” people using a product, they’re more likely to buy. Why? This kind of social proof is a powerful motivator. Visitors gain trust by seeing others use the products they are about to buy.

Let’s take the clothing industry, for example. The biggest mistake clothing brands make on Instagram is showing bland product photos—clothing worn by hired models, usually with a white background.

Nasty Gal’s The Click gallery powered by olapic features selfies of fans wearing the brand’s clothes.

Nasty Gal clothing company saw an opportunity and started showcasing their fans’ Instagram pictures on their website via olapic. The company has had a 5% increase in overall conversions since implementing the olapic galleries.

#2: Make Instagram Fan Photos Into Stop-Motion Videos

Vine may have made stop-motion video easy to create and easy to consume, but Instagram video is winning the popularity contest. Your fans are using Instagram to take the photos you’re using, so it makes sense to share your videos there, where they’re most likely to see them.


Lexus reached a younger, tech-savvy audience by using its fans’ Instagram images to create this video.

Lexus took advantage of fan images for their aptly titled #LexusInstaFilm (shown above) where a group of 200 Instagrammers met on a racetrack to capture the brand’s new IS F model. Lexus pooled those photos and created a short video to share on Instagram and other social channels.

#3: Create Ads With Customer Instagram Submissions

In 2012, Instagram proposed changes to its terms of service that would allow it to sell your photos to brands for advertising purposes. There was uproar from the masses and Instagram quickly changed its tune.

Based on the uproar, you’d think Instagrammers wouldn’t want their images used in advertising at all. Who in their right mind would voluntarily send his or her own photos to brands so they can use them for advertising? A lot of people.

It’s all about choice and control. People are willing to give out their photos to be used as ads if the transaction between brands and fans is clear from the start. It helps if the fan gets something in return.

Wouldn’t you love to see your name in lights and get some new followers to boot?

That’s what Ben & Jerry’s banked on with their Capture Euphoria campaign. The social-friendly ice cream company ran a simple hashtag campaign to gather earned content. Fans were invited to share their pictures using the #CaptureEuphoria hashtag, then the photos were voted on and the best won a prize.

This is where it gets interesting. What was the prize in question? Taking the winner’s Instagram photo and transforming it into a real-life ad (including print, billboards and bus-stop posters) that included the winner’s Instagram username.

#4: Recruit Employees

Attracting and retaining talent are challenging for any brand. Most companies don’t consider Instagram as a recruiting tool, but Levi’s had great success with this unique idea.

The key to a great Instagram feed that people want to follow is sharing expertly shot Instagram photos on a regular basis. Levi’s leveraged their popular feed to lead a model-scouting campaign.

Levi’s launched an Instagram campaign to seek new talent.

Levi’s used photo and video sharing as a way to gather applications. They cut out the middlemen and directly sourced candidates via Instagram selfies.

Levi’s told fans up front that anyone using #iamlevis in their pictures or captions was granting Levi’s permission to use their photos in campaigns. Applicants knowingly used the hashtag to notify the brand of their interest in the job.

To track applications, Levi’s recruiters ran hashtag searches to scan applicants.

You could easily apply this type of campaign to any brand need. For example, nonprofits could do the same to hire volunteers.

What ideas do you have?

The diverse ways to get customers and fans to create content is one of the reasons Instagram is such a rich and growing platform for social marketers. Marketers are sure to appreciate this earned media and the level of engagement with their audience.

Does your audience share what they like with you online? Then you may want to look into ways to leverage this on Instagram.

What’s even better is that most of the examples here cost little to nothing and are easily replicated by businesses of all sizes.

What about you? Have you ever worked with Instagram fans to implement a grassroots marketing campaign? We’d love to hear about your experiences and ideas. Please leave your thoughts and comments below!