5 top tips on using Pinterest for B2B

Pinterest is a great network for businesses that sell visual goods. Many are having a lot of success using it to promote themselves and gain new customers. But what about B2B organisations?

Following on from the recent DMA survey on B2B usage of Pinterest we thought it would be useful to share some hints, tips and real life examples of how B2B organisations can embrace Pinterest.

With the rapid growth of Pinterest’s user base, more and more B2B companies are seeing the potential to use it as a new traffic and lead generator. So if you’re in a B2B company and don’t want to miss the huge potential Pinterest has, here’s my top five tips for you to think about:

1. Use and create your visual content

Many B2B companies have a lack of visual content since they sell products and services that aren’t visual and therefore think Pinterest’s not for them. What you need to do however is to think creatively.

Pinterest is a good way to show and tell other things beside your products or services. Create a board that shows your company’s culture with images of your offices, staff, etc. Show the more human-side of your company. Many B2B companies also spend a lot of time going to trade shows, where they interact with potential clients. Create a board for each event and show interesting pictures. Incentivise your sales team to take their own pictures with smiling clients, to go on Pinterest.

The best way to incorporate Pinterest into your current blogging schedule is by creating very visual pieces. This might be an infographic based on research you’ve done, a well-designed set of instructions or you could go for something more simple…

When pinning from your blog, use an image that includes the title of your blog post. This is more likely to get people to click through to find out more about your top tips, latest news or advice.

Salesforce manages to make its services very visual with infographics, staff pictures, slides and information all presented in a really eye-catching way. This is most certainly going to get people to click through to find out more. The brand has more than 2,000 followers so it’s obviously working.

Quotes, ebooks, whitepapers, “how-to” guides and infographics are key trends at the moment on Pinterest, so why not create and pin your own? You’ll be educating your audience, adding value to your brand and generating leads all at the same time.

2. Use the right keywords and links

Like with Twitter and Linkedin, people on Pinterest also search using hashtags and keywords. Make sure that each of your pins has the right keyword(s) related to the image and to your product or service. This is key if you want your pin to be found by people who are searching for your type of products or services.

Make sure that each of your pins has the right link to a page on your website related to the image/product/service. This is important in order to drive traffic to your website as well as generating leads.

General Electric often includes hashtags in its board names. It also does a brilliant job of making the more technical offerings easily understandable. You can learn from this, make visuals simple and enticing enough that will make people want to click through to learn more.

3. Interact with others

Pinterest is not only about creating your own boards, it’s also about interacting, repining and commenting on other pins as well. Repinning is caring! When someone sees you interacting with his or her content, that person might check out yours and choose to follow you, too!

Another way to interact with others is to create boards that anyone can pin to. Hootsuite, does this brilliantly. The HootUp board that allows people who have been to Hootsuite events to pin any pictures they’ve taken.

Not only does this get people talking about those events but also makes users of the social networking platform feel more involved with the brand’s activities. The HootUp board has almost 1000 followers and features a number of amusing owl-themed images from clients around the world.

4. Spread the word

It’s likely a lot of your LinkedIn and Twitter followers are also on Pinterest. Give them a chance to start following you on Pinterest too by letting them know you’re there.

Add the link to Pinterest in to your company’s profile on LinkedIn. You can also connect your company’s Twitter account to your Pinterest so you automatically tweet all your new pins. And don’t forget to add a Pin It button to each of your business blog posts so the readers can easily share the article in their Pinterest boards. This would show up in their followers’ feeds, who would click it and end up back at your site.

You should also make sure your Pinterest profile is filled in with links to your other social networks. This gives users the chance to find you elsewhere on the web.

5. Measure your traffic and leads

Don’t just measure the source, track everything you are doing on the boards to know which pin works. After all, at the end of the day, what matters the most is how much traffic, leads and clients you generate.

It will also help you identify which specific images or topics are sending more traffic than others and help you drive your Pinterest strategy. Use Pinterest’s analytics tool to understand this.

These are my top five tips for you to drive your B2B forward on Pinterest. Are you already using it? Share your experience with us in the comments section below.

By DMA guest blogger Lynsey Sweales, CEO of SocialB and member of the DMA Social Media Council.