Pinterest is a visual discovery and bookmarking platform with over 400 million monthly active users. People use Pinterest for business to connect with their target audience through visually appealing content. The platform offers various advertising options, including promoted pins and videos. Here’s why fashion, beauty, home, garden, or DIY brands should consider adding Pinterest to their social media marketing strategy to showcase their products and services. 

 

Understanding Your Audience on Pinterest

Before diving into best practices, it’s crucial to understand the demographics and behavior of your target audience. Pinterest has a predominantly female user base, with women accounting for a significant portion of its users. Users on Pinterest often have a higher purchase intent compared to other social media platforms. Pinterest users are 7x more likely to purchase products they have pinned. Unlike other social networks, where content has a short shelf life, Pinterest pins can have a long-lasting impact. Users can discover and engage with pins months or even years after their initial posting. Since it is a visual platform, high-quality images and graphics are essential to capturing user attention and driving engagement.

 

Pinterest Best Practices for Brands

Pinterest is a visual search engine, meaning brands with the most striking pins will capture users’ attention. One of the features that sets it apart from other social media platforms is that it does not increase FOMO in users like other photo or engagement-based platforms. Pinterest gathers a collective community around a desire for inspiration and creation. Follow along with these tips to learn the best practices for using Pinterest for business:

 

Create Your Brand Presence

Develop a consistent visual style, color scheme, and branding across your pins to create a cohesive brand identity. You will want to experiment with different pin formats and overlays to determine which options work best for your branded content. You can use tools like Canva to create text overlays and graphics with your brand palette and logo. You must also ensure your posts are optimized for mobile users since many Pinterest users access the app through mobile devices. 

 

Pin Regularly and Consistently

Like other social platforms, consistency is key to using Pinterest for business. Your followers can opt-in to receive a notification when you create a new pin, which helps to establish a consistent posting schedule and build relationships. Regular pinning ensures that your profile stays active, your content stays fresh, and your audience has new inspiration. 

 

Utilize Keywords Strategically

Since Pinterest is a search engine, incorporating keywords into your pin descriptions, board titles, and board descriptions is crucial. You can research trending and relevant terms by typing your industry, niche, product, or service into Pinterest’s search bar. Tools like Google Keyword Planner, Answer the Public, and Spyfu will give you insight into which keywords you should incorporate into your descriptions.  

 

Leverage Rich Pins

Rich pins allow brands to provide additional information about a pin synced directly from their website. They give users valuable information at a glance, making them more likely to engage with your content. Depending on your business, you can choose the most relevant type to enhance your pins.

 

• Product Pins are ideal for e-commerce businesses since they include real-time pricing and availability.
• Recipe Pins are helpful for food bloggers and culinary brands to display ingredients, cooking instructions, and serving details.
• Article Pins allow content creators and publishers to showcase headlines, authors, and descriptions.

Optimize Pinterest for Shopping

Pinterest offers a shopping feature for e-commerce brands; however, brands should use the platform for more than just selling their products. Try to create a mix of original content, helpful tutorials, and e-commerce pins. Your audience will appreciate this type of fun and engaging content! When you use Pinterest shopping, here are some tips to make the most of this feature:

 

• Create a Pinterest Shop to display your products and make them shoppable directly on the platform.
• Connect your product catalog to Pinterest to automatically turn your products into shoppable pins.
• Consider investing in promoted pins to reach a broader audience and drive more sales.

 

Experiment With Pinterest Ads

Pinterest recommends selecting high-quality, vertical images for your ads. Your product or service should be the image’s focal point, along with your brand logo and color palette. This keeps your advertising and brand image cohesive across all your pins. You must also optimize your ad copy by using precise wording and incorporating keywords. Optimizing your copy will help your ads to rank in relevant search queries. Here are the ad formats Pinterest currently offers for brands:

 

• Video ads
• Idea ads
• Carousel ads
• Shopping ads
• Collections ads

 

You will want to experiment with which ad format works best for your business as you learn how to use Pinterest to promote your brand.

Analyze and Adapt

Pinterest offers analytics tools that allow you to track the performance of your pins and boards. Regularly analyze these metrics to understand what pin formats, ad campaigns, and posting schedules work best for your brand. Some key metrics to monitor include:

 

• Impressions – the number of times users see your pins.
• Engagement – the likes, saves, and clicks on your pins.
• Click-through rate – the percentage of users who clicked on your pin after seeing it.
• Conversion rate – the percentage of users who completed a desired action, like making a purchase.

 

Pinterest is a unique platform for brands seeking to inspire their audience with fresh and engaging content. These best practices for using Pinterest for business can elevate your marketing strategy and maximize your brand exposure. Remember to prioritize high-quality visuals, consistency, keyword optimization, and engagement to create a lasting impact on Pinterest.

Understanding how to use Pinterest for business is essential for B2C companies to increase brand awareness and engage with their target audience. Read these other articles in our Social Media Best Practices series for marketing best practices on various social platforms!