Penned by Don Sturgill
Should a writer care about Pinterest, or would pinning time be better invested in other social media sites?
I asked that question to four writing and publishing professionals recently, and I received the perfect answer: “It all depends.”
That, my friends, is often the wisest advice possible.
Here’s why:
When I was beating the street on Nashville’s Music Row, trying to get a publisher excited about my songs, the writer who was getting the most play time and attention was often referred to as “The flavor of the week.”
Nashville can be fickle.
Isn’t it the same on the internet? With so many social media sites competing for your attention, a writer must be choosy. And the “sure bet” last month can quickly become this month’s “has been.”
Jennifer Evans Cario
She is president of SugarSpun Marketing and she wrote the book on Pinterest. Her recently released Pinterest Marketing: An Hour a Day offers real life, down in the trenches marketing savvy.
The first step, says Jennifer, is to know exactly what you hope to accomplish:
What it boils down to is the need to be familiar with enough social media channels to make an intelligent decision about which ones are best suited to the goals you’ve set and to the tactics needed to reach those goals.
Ann Smarty
Ann Smarty wears more hats than a team of construction workers. She is community and brand manager at Internet Marketing Ninja, runs her own SEO consulting service, owns the My Blog Guest website for guest blogging, is co-founder of Viral Content Buzz, and her articles show up just about everywhere you look on the internet. Ann, simply put, is absolutely amazing.
For Ann, Pinterest is an excellent spot for interaction with readers – and Ann is all about the social part of social media:
People write content, people rank in search, and people acquire friends on social media. You don’t need to sell anything … selling is the least effective social media marketing strategy. Building an active following is accomplished by interacting with real people and by treating them like real people, not like numbers!
Demian Farnworth
Demian is one talented writer. He is on staff at Copyblogger, and he’s owner of The CopyBot site. Demian isn’t using Pinterest for his own work, right now, but sees how the site can be valuable for those writers who produce primarily visual content (a cartooner, for instance).
Says Demian,
Pinterest is just such a visual field that it attracts the DIYers, fashion, and photo people—who may not be your target audience.
Andrew Melchior
Andrew is the co-founder and vice president of AvaLaunch Media. He is a regular conference speaker, and he’s a guy with a well-rounded feel for internet marketing best practices. Andrew says Pinterest has become too big to ignore:
I think you really do need to consider Pinterest, given the amount of traffic Pinterest is currently sending. As a writer, though, you really need to adjust your tactics to include visual elements, if you wish to succeed with Pinterest.
This discussion first came about in a conversation centered on how to get the word out about what has become the largest Independence Day fireworks display west of the Mississippi – the Melaleuca Freedom Celebration.
Could a fireworks show in little Idaho Falls, Idaho – no matter how spectacular – gain exposure on Pinterest?
Do the search. Pinterest loves fireworks.
How many people are using Pinterest, and what are the demographics? The most current (2012) stats I could find paint an interesting picture:
And even if you don’t happen to share age and gender with the majority of Pinterest users (females between the ages of 25 and 54), would you like to reach them with your message?
I thought so.
Because a number of the suggestions overlapped and intertwined, I’m going to list the basic principles here without trying to attribute each tip to a specific contributor.
Here is the distillation – powerful advice about how to build a presence on Pinterest.
That’s it, folks. Go forth and Pin … and should you run into trouble, leave a comment here for one of our experts. They know their success is largely due to the amount of help they have given others.
About the author:
Don Sturgill is interested in just about everything. He is a friend of entrepreneurs, an untamed believer, and author of The Roadmap To Freedom: Dream Into It.