Published on: 05 March 2019
Last Updated on: 09 August 2019
Pinterest is one of the most popular social media platforms that widely makes use of images. The site it full of amazing photos and you could be wondering how you can use it to promote your brand. Here are some tips on how to use Pinterest for business.
1. Add Save Button to Your Website
If you would like your visitors to act, you must allow them to do so with a lot of ease. When you add a save button to your site, people will be able to pin your content with a single click. This will take place even if you have not installed the Pinterest browser. It will significantly increase the number od content that pinners save from your website. If you choose the automatic buttons, there will be a clickable Pinterest save button on all the images that are on your site. You can also use hover buttons that only appear when a person hovers the mouse over the images. The last option is to add the Pinterest save button to a particular image on your website.
2. Pin Consistency
Pinners suggest that you pin at least one thing every day especially during the peak season. For most U.S-based brands, the peak times are in the evenings and over the weekend. The other element that Pinterest highlight to be crucial is consistency. In case you want to post huge number of posts during the week, it is good to divide them up so that you can post a few each day instead of posting all of them at once. If you want to create pins that will coincide with an upcoming event, season, or holiday, be careful to start posting them approximately 45 days in advance.
3. Pay Attention to Great Visuals
Pinterest is a largely visual platform and hence you have no choice but to create high-quality imagery. Make sure you have clear, well-composed, and well-lit photos. In case you lack the skills, the time or the tools to create the images by yourself, we have thousands of stock photography sites that have high-quality photos that you can use. Think of the most creative ways of showcasing your brand and products visually. From recent studies on the performance of 50,000 pins that are promoted, Pinterest discovered that lifestyle images tend to outperform the product images. For example, style and fashion pins displaying products that were in real life use had 30% more clickthrough and 170% higher rates of checkout that the ones that were showing the product alone.
4. Don’t Neglect the Words
Yes, Pinterest is a highly visual medium but you cannot create serious engagements with great visuals alone. Make good use of the description field by telling viewers what they will exactly get by clicking through the linked content that is on your website. Use relevant keywords so that your pins can appear in the search. However, do this in a helpful and natural manner and don’t practice keyword stuffing.
5. Use Rich Pins Where Appropriate
The term rich pins refer to enhanced pins that utilize metadata that is pulled from your website to offer additional information on what pinners will get by clicking on a certain pin. You can find Rich Pins for articles, products, recipes, and apps. Therefore, you will get them for almost all the content you would like to pin or expecting other users to pin from your site.
6. Go Social
Pinterest is a social network and not a billboard. Therefore, people will not engage with your pins unless you get engaged yourself. Follow accounts or board from the non-competitive but relevant brands within your niche. Be keen to actively like and also engage with pins that are related to your industry. You may also involve your brand evangelists and employees. You can invite these individuals to contribute to your Pinterest group boards.
7. Improve Results by Using Analytics
Pinterest analytics offers critical insights about the kind of content that performs well on your network. Therefore, you may tweak and advance your Pinterest for business outcome over time. You will be able to observe the most popular pins and the ones that drive the highest amount of traffic. You can focus on the specific metrics that are particular to your specific business. You will also view the boards where your pins are included in and this will help you to understand how people are thinking about your products and business. You will get some new ideas on the best way to position your efforts on Pinterest. You will also get some tips on the interests and demographics of people who are interacting with your pins. It will give you valuable insights that will assist you to precisely target your strategy to the right audience.
8. Try the Pinterest Promoted Pins
Pinterest ads or promoted pins is an excellent way to allow more people to see your pins. It also helps in creating new exposure to your brand. Promoted pins can give you an exposure that go beyond the payment you make. To know a promoted pin on interest, you will find the word ‘promoted’ below it. However, when a pinner saves the promoted on their personal board, it will become the regular organic pin. Therefore, it strips off the promotional label.
9. Make the Pins More Accessible
Pinterest is highly super-visual and relies heavily on images to establish meaning and context. Therefore, users who have low visibility, certain disabilities, or need screen-readers will struggle to use this platform. Therefore, you have to pay more focus on the text. You can use several strategies to make your pins more accessible. It is a good thing to connect with a long list of members from your target audience. Your primary goal should be to make your content accessible to all users. One strategy would be to add context through the descriptions. You can also use strong typography and incorporate color contrasts. Lastly, make sure that you use large texts so that people with visual problems can read with a lot of ease. This article should have answered your questions on how to use Pinterest for business.
I enjoy writing and I write quality guest posts on topics of my interest and passion. I have been doing this since my college days. My special interests are in health, fitness, food and following the latest trends in these areas. I am an editor at Content Rally.
A business can't succeed today without the help of marketing on social media platforms. More people than ever before are using social media to find the products and services they need, so it's important that your business is there to meet them. IdeaPros is a firm that specializes in working with entrepreneurs to navigate this competitive field by crafting custom, effective marketing strategies that position businesses for success. Here, one of the founders of IdeaPros outlines a few simple ways to have a successful and profitable marketing campaign on social media.
Hire Copywriters for Ads:
While free updates such as photos, videos, and links work well, and comprehensive social media campaign will include the utilization of paid advertisements. These ads will be displayed to social media users you choose based on a wide range of demographics. It's a good idea to entrust the creation of these advertisements to copywriting professionals, as you'll want to be sure that your ads will succeed and offer a positive return on your investment. Experienced copywriters know exactly how to craft your advertisements so that they will attract attention, speak to your ideal customers, and help you stand out among your competitors.
Learn from Failures:
Every business experiences marketing failure from time to time. Whenever a social media campaign underperforms, look as deeply as you can into the reasons why that may have happened. Past failures provide useful insights that will help you create valuable and better ideas for future campaigns.
Embrace Transparency:
Consumers today love to see behind the scenes updates from the businesses they shop at. Including these kinds of posts in your campaigns can easily improve your transparency and make your followers feel a more personal connection with your brand. Share information, photos, and videos relating to the inner workings of your business, its dedicated employees, your production practices and more.
Go Live:
Social media platforms now offer the capability to broadcast live updates to your followers. You can either schedule these live broadcasts around specific events, such as sales or other promotions or go live whenever you have something interesting going on at your business. Live broadcasts through social media are yet another great way to add a degree of transparency to your brand and interact with current and potential customers in a way that is fresh and fun. Many businesses also see great results by doing live question and answer sessions with their followers.
These are just a few of the many ways that you can get better results from a social media marketing campaign. By learning from past failures, ensuring that your ads are put together professionally, utilizing live broadcasts, and showing more transparency, your brand will only continue to flourish and grow with the help of social media.
About IdeaPros:
IdeaPros is a Super Venture Partner™, who guides entrepreneurs with great ideas through the complexities and pitfalls of the startup world. Set on elevating the success rate of new innovative products and apps, their team leverages their collective experience to create demand among consumers and maximize upside potential for their partners.
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Social media has been the cornerstone of B2C marketing for a long time. However, when it comes to B2B marketing and sales, it is only fairly recently that social media channels have started to dominate.
And while most B2B marketers now realize the enormous potential of this type of marketing, only true experts have figured out that simple presence on social media is far from enough. To raise awareness of your business, you need to be social on social media, which is, after all, very logical.
In other words, you need to initiate relationships, interact with people in a personal way and absorb your customer’s feedback. But apart from this, you also have to showcase your expertise in a humble way, listen to the voices and trends in your industry and keep an eye on competitors.
Marketing your business on social media can help you generate leads, improve website traffic, increase sales and create a brand identity with your target audience.
That being said, the sooner you realize that investing time and money in social media is necessary, the better results you will get. However, this type of marketing, just like crafting a Sales Enablement Strategy, takes time and skills.
Let this article be the first step on your journey to improving your B2B social media marketing. In it, you will find out the reasons why social media is essential for B2B sales and the tips on how to improve your sales through social media channels.
Why is social media so important?
Have you heard of social validation? Social validation is a basic human necessity and its presence has but skyrocketed thanks to social media.
According to the Content Marketing Institute’s report from 2017, as much as 83% of B2B marketers use social media as their preferred marketing channel. And even though increased brand awareness is one of the main goals of social media campaigns, it is far from being the only impact of this type of marketing.
As the matter of fact, social media is right at the top when it comes to the factors making the biggest impact on purchasing decisions, closely following industry analysts and web search. Therefore, it is obvious that social media is essential for B2B sales.
If you want to increase your B2B sales, you need to use the following social media platforms:
Facebook
Without a shadow of a doubt, Facebook is the number one platform. It is important for creating a community, marketing, and advertising, as well as influencing decision makers.
LinkedIn
As a platform originally intended for business purposes, LinkedIn is as influential as Facebook in some segments.
Twitter
Twitter is the final element of the social media triad, but slightly less important than Facebook and LinkedIn.
You may be wondering why Instagram and Snapchat are not on this list. And indeed, these two platforms, especially Instagram, are great for marketing. However, they are more effective for B2C marketers.
Benefits of social media marketing for B2B sales
To give you a clear picture of how social media can increase B2B sales, we will list some of the main benefits of social media marketing.
- Firstly, it builds brand awareness and visibility.
- It serves as an effective distribution channel for your business’ ideas, content and offers.
- You can create PR opportunities, brand loyalty, SEO, as well as positive web mentions by building brand advocates.
- Social media marketing drives new leads into the funnel when combined with whitepapers, fact sheets, eBooks and other content offers.
- Have you tried to use social media to increase the number of email subscribers? If you want to add more people to your mailing list, this will do wonders for your business.
- Moreover, this type of marketing is great for B2B customer feedback program and understanding the needs of your leads, customers, prospects, and advocates.
- Social media marketing can greatly improve your SEO results through third-party links, mentions, and interest in your content.
- You can build trust with your buyers by educating them and helping them understand the major factors that influence their purchasing decisions.
- Social media is perfect for B2B loyalty rewards programs and customer care.
Challenges of B2B social media marketing
There are always two sides of a coin. In spite of the numerous benefits of B2B social marketing, there are also certain challenges that B2B marketers face on a daily basis when it comes to social media.
When in Rome…
If consumers use social media for connection and entertainment, your message needs to address these requirements.
In other words, you shouldn’t slip into business jargon on Facebook or post silly memes on LinkedIn. Apart from that, you should try to establish a deeper connection with your customers by finding out what they read, what they comment on and who they follow.
This will help you better understand your prospects and existing customers, and tell them what they want to hear and how they want to hear it.
Being present 24/7
When your audience needs guidance or asks a question, you should be there for them. It is all about responding when they reach out for help.
The challenge here is to anticipate such moments and be ready to shine. Create a list of tips, reviews, product demonstrations, and video tutorials, and promote them through paid search and social advertising.
For this and similar reasons, you should constantly use social media for real-time marketing, an increasingly popular method which allows you to engage with your customers instantly.
Cherishing your influencers
Finding your perfect influencer and starting a conversation with them is one of the keys to a successful social media campaign.
To choose the right influencer for your brand, you need to study their audience, understand why they engage, what is their reach, style, and many additional aspects.
Getting serious about selling on social media
Once you have put in a lot of effort toward entertainment and connection, you need to sell. After all, that is the main goal of each business.
To grow your website traffic and nurture leads, you need to match your marketing efforts and sales goals. When you engage with the knowledgeable, empowered and well-connected customers, you practically close the gap between the social world and the business world.
The elusive ROI
Oh, the infamous ROI… This is definitely among the top challenges for all marketers, not only in the B2B field.
To get a satisfactory return on investment, you always need to give your customers new and fresh content on social media, as well as attend to their needs and join conversations with influencers. Then, when everybody starts listening to what you have to say, seize the moment and make the final move.
It is all about timing. With the right timing, you can sell everything, even ice to Eskimos.
The future of B2B sales
Everybody is wondering what the future of B2B sales will look like. So far, we can identify three main trends.
The buying process will become easier
In essence, a more open approach to purchasing is obviously emerging, as well as a multi-channel unified experience closely resembling the B2C experience.
Moreover, along with those two, the need for highly personalized interactions will result in increasing buyer trust and lead to more data becoming available.
The focus will shift to long-term customer value
Businesses will have to focus on customer needs and customize their selling approaches, Also, adding value to products and services will be an indispensable part of every sales process.
In addition, selling will become more intelligent. In other words, sales teams will need to educate customers about their needs and engage with stakeholders and decision makers to discover and highlight those needs.
Data and analytics will play a major role in creating customer value
The days of guessing in sales have long gone. To create value for customers and interact with them effectively, social media marketers will have to use data and analytics through:
- science and sales
- AI and the virtual experience
- sales and the social business
In many of these strategies, social media will play an important role. From the multi-channel approach and market intelligence to education and connection, B2B sales will be impossible without social media platforms.
Finally, from a technical point of view, it is evident that outsourcing social media is becoming increasingly popular. This is a strategy that can be very effective, especially for small businesses. However, if you decide to do this, we advise you to be careful and avoid the most common social media outsourcing mistakes.
How to Sell More on Social Media
Now that you have learned why social media is so important for the B2B sales process, you probably want to know how to use social media to increase sales.
Here are the five useful tips on how to sell more and better on social media.
Choose the right social network(s)
Not all the platforms will work for all businesses. When choosing the best social media channels for your business, you need to consider several factors:
- your niche
- your audience
- your goals
For example, according to a study by Google and Millward Brown Digital published in 2015, the number of decision makers aged between 18 and 34 years increased by 19% in only two years (from 27% in 2012 to 46% in 2014).
This is why you need to find out the favorite platform of your customers and tailor your message to them, the network and your brand.
Remember – no business jargon on Facebook or crazy memes on LinkedIn.
Be active on LinkedIn
Whatever other networks you choose, keep in mind that LinkedIn is a must. When it comes to B2B marketing, this platform is essential and you can’t risk not using it.
To shine on LinkedIn, you will have to be very active. This means that you should:
- use LinkedIn’s Saved Search feature in order to create a search based on your ideal customer profile and be notified each time such a person signs up
- join and participate in LinkedIn groups to build your network and referrals
- connect with potential customers to start conversations
Contribute to existing conversations
This goes for all the social media networks you are active on. When you contribute to conversations about your brand and interesting topics in your industry, customers see this as adding value.
The best way to do this is Twitter and its search function, but you can use other networks too.
Share relevant content
More and more B2B buyers search for information on services and products on social media. Your answer to this should be simple ‒ sharing relevant content.
This is another way to add value, and you can do it by providing white papers, product sheets, case studies, webinars, comparison worksheets and so on.
In addition, you can share useful blog posts, infographics, tutorials and other types of content. In a nutshell, you can share anything that you think could help your customers.
Use the right tools
Finally, using social media for marketing purposes without different kinds of tools is practically impossible. There are so many aspects software tools can improve and so many ways they can help you rock your campaigns that not using them is a real waste of time.
Using effective social media marketing tools will help you find more relevant content, schedule your posts, measure and analyze the effectiveness of your campaigns, as well as use that data to improve your future campaigns.
Wrapping up :
Social media networks are becoming an essential part of every B2B sales process. However, in order to sell more on social media, you need to understand all the benefits and challenges of this process.
This is definitely not a one-time activity. Rather, think of it as of a long journey that includes a lot of small steps. It’s a long way to the top if you want to rock your B2B social media campaigns.
But if you take all the steps that we listed, you will find that the results will follow. This is one of those journeys that you have to enjoy if you want to reach your destination.
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It’s a known fact amongst successful leaders that you must measure and analyze what you want to improve. This couldn't be truer when it comes to social media analysis for the purpose of building brand equity through marketing. It’s the reason why many top brands use companies like Net Base to optimize their social media marketing campaigns. Most businesses have come to understand the critical importance of social media for brand development. What has become even more clear is how valuable social media is for collecting information that can be used to develop marketing strategies.
The key to successful marketing is leveraging the information obtained through analysis to draw conclusions that are actionable. The goal is to understand and reach your target audience. Data collected using Net Base can also help to ensure you choose the right channel. The best part is that it isn’t as time-consuming as other methods of collecting data. You can have an extensive amount of information at your disposal for the purpose of making informed decisions. Let’s review some of the benefits associated with social media analysis.
Understanding the ROI of Social Media:
Social media managers around the world have been challenged for years with trying to figure out if their social media efforts have been effective. Prior to the services offered by companies like Net Base, it was difficult to truly understand the ROI of social media marketing. While it’s crystal clear that social media is important, there are many platforms from which to choose, which means marketing efforts should be strategically based on your target customers. Not using social media certainly isn’t an option.
Optimizing Your Social Media Strategy:
Social media analysis offers an opportunity to have a more focused strategy. As aforementioned, it’s a way to measure what you want to improve. A sound social media strategy is based on real data that helps you to determine which social media platform and methods will yield the best results. It’s a way to avoid wasting your time on channels that simply don’t work for your brand and target customer base. In other words, you don’t want to spend time on marketing efforts that simply will not work because they don't reach the right people.
Another important way in which social media analysis is critical is it improves the way in which you engage with consumers. It can help you create more content based on the results of data from prior marketing campaigns. You are able to ascertain which type of content will yield the results you want. There’s no way around the fact that some marketing campaigns are more appealing than others. By analyzing your social media, you can see how others actually respond to what you might think is an amazing marketing campaign.
Understanding Your Audience:
As you probably know, social media is a crowded place and you have to work to build your audience. Ongoing engagement on social media takes time and effort. Success is more likely when you truly understand your audience and develop content that speaks to them in a way that’s compelling. This includes all aspects of your content, including photos. Net Base provides you with insights that can improve the conversations that you have with your customers.
The information provided by social media analytics enables you to hit the mark in your marketing campaigns more frequently, which results in a much higher ROI. You can review a wide range of information obtained through social media analytics for integration into your marketing strategies.
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