Pinterest is fun, and a very useful social media tool
Pinterest is one of the most popular social media sites, and plenty of posts tell you how you should use it to best promote yourself and your business. Most of these posts forget to mention one of the main reasons for it’s popularity: it’s FUN!
I can’t wait to click on it every morning to see what the people I follow have pinned. It inspires me, and I often repin images that take my fancy.
21st century scrapbook
I also use Pinterest as a personal themed scrapbook. One of my boards is Design Inspiration where I pin images which may help me in my work as a graphic designer. This may be a beautiful picture of a peacock from which I can make a colour scheme, a logo which I’ve liked because it makes great use of negative space, or a poster that explains the psychology of colour in great detail.
Although I would never copy a design by someone else, Pinterest is great in helping my ideas to flow; looking at the mixtures of typefaces, images, colours and textures I have collected gets me fired-up and ready to create.
You can see my Pinterest boards here.
A useful social media tool
LIke Twitter and Facebook, Pinterest is also a useful social media tool if you use it strategically. Create boards that interest and reflect you and your business (make sure you put them in the right category for search engine optimisation), populate your boards with relevant pins, then publicise them through other social media platforms. People will start to follow you and you can raise your profile. If you follow your clients and prospects – and your pins are interesting – there’s a good chance they’ll follow back.
Secret boards
If for any reason you don’t want others to see your board (for example, you may be compiling a Christmas shopping list with links to presents for your nearest and dearest), you can choose to make your board private.
How to get an account
If you don’t already have a Pinterest account, it’s easy to open one. Log on to https://www.pinterest.com/join/ and you’ll get to a sign up form. Once you’ve filled this out, you’ll be taken to the Welcome page. Click on to the ‘Site Tour’ and Pinterest will give you a simple explanation of how everything works.
A word of warning: like Twitter, Pinterest is very addictive, so keep an eye on the amount of time you spend on it!
