Using Pinterest to Get Customers through the Door

A picture is worth a thousand words. You’ve heard that before, right? But, how often do you profit from it? With Pinterest, you can. A beautiful image is your best friend on the Internet. Pinterest is a website dedicated to beautiful images. It’s almost like a match made in heaven. Here’s how to make use of it, and how to capitalize on a new feature: Place Pins.

Place Pins For Local Business
Place pins are a way for you to tag places you’ve been (or want to visit). But, for businesses, they’re a way to garner free advertising. What you do is pin your business, using images, and tag them to a location – your store.

Think of it as a mix between Foursquare and Yelp. Because users can access pins from their mobile device, they can find you pretty easily when they’re tooling around town.

These pins are like other rich pins in the sense that they will contain things like your phone number, address, and other pertinent details. Why is this important?

Let’s say your customers are out getting groceries. They’re tired from all that shopping and they want a bite to eat. You’re a deli owner and your customers are out there – hungry. They stop in and they love the place. They want to pin your business and so they do. Guess what? Other pinners find your place through Pinterest. They see what their friends pinned and, more importantly, where you are. It’s free advertising.

Arranging Images On Your Site
When you put images up on your site, make sure they are place pins. That way, when users pin them, they pin your business location so that others can see it.

Creating Your Pinterest Board
Create an interesting board that will resonate with your target audience. This is something you should be doing regardless of whether or not you’re using place pins, but it’s more important if you are. Think locally.

According to marketing firm Yodle, Inc., things like a “things to do” list for out-of-town travelers or a local guide that includes your store location work well. You could even make a game out of it. If you’re a larger store, create a scavenger hunt.

Outreach
Reach out to other bloggers in your niche, or those who write about your industry, and let them know what you’re doing. Create a news story out of it, if at all possible. That will make it very easy to write about, and it will also give the blogger or reporter a motivation to write about you.

Signage In your Store
If you want to encourage users (customers) to pin your store (and you do), hang signs inside and out that encourage people to pin you. Give them some kind of incentive to do so too. You can offer them a discount on their next purchase or a freebie of some kind.

Of course, it doesn’t have to be a promotional offer from your store. You could also enter them into a contest to win something – a “VIP” prize of sorts.

(Flickr / mkhmarketing)

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