The Social Media Mermaid

March 27, 2014

Advice from a Pinterest user herself.

pinterest

Now there is a lot of advice out there on how to master Pinterest, how to use it efficiently for your business and so on. A lot of it is common sense, some of it is related to marketing strategies. I think there is something important to add to this, something that I don’t see a lot of times: Advice from an actual Pinterest user.

I will take myself as an example here.My Pinterest account is only for private use, I use it to pin hairstyles, fashion pictures, travel inspiration and food stuff. I am an easy target for businesses that fall in to this category: If I see a beautiful necklace I will buy it, if I see a recommended restaurant pinned, I will go there. It’s really that simple for me. I am open to suggestions and act based on these visuals.

It’s obviously harder for non-profits to achieve that sort of outcome. What they want is different: They try to get followers that support their mission, are loyal and will hopefully act on their desire to help.

So here are a couple of tips from myself: A Twenty something that is open for suggestions and willing to make changes to her life.

1. Have really good pictures.

There is almost no other way of actually standing out on Pinterest. Kick their butts with your amazing pictures! This doesn’t really take that much, most of the smartphones take really good pictures and filters make pretty much everything look adorable.

2. Have a good description underneath.

I think a lot of us are very lazy on Pinterest and never really change the blurb underneath when repinning pictures. Sometimes it doesn’t matter, but it does matter if you wanna come up for certain searches! Try to mention your city, important keywords etc.

3. Be persuasive, empathetic and sympathetic.

This is a very general statement, I admit that. However, what I love to see on Pinterest is friendly pins, full of love and inspiration, creative ones and smart ones. Charm them off their socks with your pins and followers will definitely be interested!

March 20, 2014

How social media can get you in trouble

Social media is all great and good until someone feels like trouble. There is always the possibility that someone on social media can publicize wrong information or just hurtful gossip about your company.

 

socialmediafail

Make sure you know your social media! Otherwise you will end up like Charlie Sheen, giving out your phone number to millions of followers.

Because everyone and anyone can get on Twitter or Facebook and share their bad experiences with your company, be careful how you handle those things. Taking care of online customer complaints in a friendly way is probably the only way to keep your customers. You don’t wanna end up like United Airlines!

Be careful about sending private or confidential information to the wrong person. This is not just for social media, more for the Internet in general. Seems like common sense, but if information like this ends up in the wrong hands, it can damage your reputation! And once it’s out, there’s almost nothing that can be done about it.

Make sure you know who is speaking on your behalf. If you have employees who blog, tweet or engage in other social media shenanigans, talk to them about the kind of information you do and don’t allow about the company and that you are on the same page about this topic!

 

 

March 6, 2014

Non profits on Pinterest- a case study

Today I will examine a non profit organization that is actively using Pinterest to get their message across. While there are quite a lot of non profits to chose from, I chose ‘Make-A-Wish America‘ for today’s case study. I know about this organization mostly through the book The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. The book tells the story of two teenagers with cancer and during the book, one of them uses their ‘wish’ to go to Amsterdam and visit the author of their favorite book.

Anyways, I think this foundation is great and has a touching goal. According to their Pinterest profile, they explain their mission as follows:

 We grant the wishes of children with life-threatening medical conditions to enrich the human experience with hope, strength and joy.

On Pinterest they have 3283 followers, which is not that much if you think about the amount of wished they grant every year. According to their website, it is around 14.000 wishes every year- which is about one every 38 minutes. They only follow about 122 other users, mostly other charities across the USA, other non profits and businesses that are related to their cause. While this does make sense for them and is helpful for users to maybe discover other charities worth supporting, it does not help to create a community of followers. Given the sensitive topic of cancer and the fact that a lot of kids that have been granted wishes might not be alive anymore, I think it is especially hard for them to create this kind of community- On the other hand, I also think that there could be an extraordinary sense of community among ‘participants’, especially because the bonding possibilities are so much greater than in other charities that support the rainforest for example.

They have 17 boards at the moment, and I think they make good use of them. There is one called ‘About Make-A-Wish’, where they combined touching pictures of their kids with text to explain who they are and what they do. Then they have a lot of boards for various events (mostly with hashtags, so its transferable to other platforms such as Twitter!), news stories about them, a board for products that will help them grant wishes and other boards just for inspiration. A board that I think is almost the most important is called ‘Wish Stories’. This pretty much does not need explanation- it shows pictures of kids that have been granted wishes. They are all shown with their ‘wishes’, which ranges from a visit to Disneyland to being a National Geographic photographer. It is a very sweet and emotional board but definitely helps to get their message across. The children look so happy in their pictures, it is hard not to share their joy and want to support the foundation.

In general I think that they are doing a pretty good job promoting their cause on Pinterest, all they need to do is keep posting and being engaged!

March 1, 2014

Why Pinterest can be amazing for your business

pinterestPinterest can be a great tool for businesses. It is basically online scrapbooking, but not limited to that. It has over 70 million users and if used right, can become a great tool to build a community and connect with your consumers/customers/followers. A lot of people use Pinterest for recipes, workout tips, fashion or travel inspiration, but it businesses can take advantage of it even if their business is not related to these areas. The great thing is that any pin can be linked to a website, which is great for driving traffic to your website. Pinterest is the best platform to do this, even better than Twitter and Facebook!

Not only has Pinterest a great guide for businesses on their website, they also have a extensive FAQ as well. It shows you how to get started, gives advice on how to start pinning and how to use the free web analytics. They also have several case studies to explain how other companies are using Pinterest, which is a great start and full of inspiration!

Here are just three general tips to consider when thinking about including Pinterest in your online presence.

1. Even if your business or organization is not all about visuals or if you don’t have products that are easily pinable, you can still create your own visually attractive pictures that will lead to your original content. (Look at this example from this great article) Make it easy for people to find your pin and content!

2. Go with the flow- be creative and incorporate seasonal things to your pins! Giveaways for Valentine’s Day, Easter or Christmas will always be ‘in demand’ and a trending topic, so take advantage of that!

3. Even on Pinterest you can get engaged with your community. Don’t just follow people that are following you, but answer comments underneath pins, reach out to fellow organizations or your local community and you will create a great relationship with them.

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