Pinterest: Creating Word of Mouth in the Virtual World
September 12, 2013
Everything’s digital these days. Even a good portion of our
relationships have moved to the web. Word of mouth spreads differently than it
once did. Where women use to talk up products over tea, they now spread the
word over social media.
Businesses have taken advantage of this mass communication by using Facebook, Twitter and other social networks to reach their audience. Pinterest is also becoming a must-have tool for companies to disseminate information about their products. But very few companies have been able to tap into the viral opportunity the platform creates.
What’s Different About Pinterest
Women. We hold the majority of purchasing power and Pinterst is predominately a female audience. Women also have a need to share. We love to help other women find the best in life. This leads to our attraction to Pinterest where we can both share and be shared with. It’s the ultimate word of mouth group.
Intent. I rarely go to Facebook to look at products, and if I do it’s usually to complain to the company. I go to Facebook to catch up with friends, talk about my life, and stock people (don’t judge, I know you do it too). Facebook for me is more like a diary. I want to record my life and it just so happens I can view everyone else’s diary, too.
I hop on Twitter for news. It’s a great platform to start relationships and learn from others. Again, I don’t follow many companies and if I do their message is usually drowned out by the tweets of my other thousand followers.
But Pinterest. My mindset when I go to Pinterest is usually to find products. Even when I go on to get a recipe I pinned, the design of the site inevitably places appealing products on my home page. I end up spending hours looking at awesome products and tips and pinning what I want to remember down the road.
Trust. There’s a certain level of trust on Pinterest. If someone pins an item and places in the comments that it was the best thing ever, I’m going to repin it. Third party endorsements, like that comment provided, are the most power decision makers in a women’s mind. We even place endorsements over price tags. It’s worth the money to know you are getting a great product. And we know we’re getting a great product because a stranger on Pinterest said it was.
Three Ways to Encourage Word of Mouth on Pinterest
Pinterest presents companies with a new way to do word of mouth marketing that works. While creating a company Pinterest account is good, there are much better ways to use the power of Pinterest.
1) Find Ambassadors
If you’ve read The Tipping Point, you know every company should find a handful of mavens to tout their brand. You can find your target audience’s influencers on Pinterest through the tool Pinpuff. You can also find influencers just through Pinterest. Look up your industry niche in the search bar. Find pinners who have a large following and pins similar products to your company’s.
It’s best if these popular pinners also write on blogs. Email them about doing a product review on their blog, make sure your product is relevant to their site, and ask if they don’t mind sharing the product with their Pinterest followers. Not only do you get a very influential pin that targets potential consumers but you get an extended review to go along with it!
2) Pay for the Pin
Pinbooster is a relatively new site that allows companies to pay influential pinners to pin their product. The cost depends on how many followers the person has and a few other factors. Make sure to thoroughly check them out to confirm they will reach your target audience.
After finding the right pinner, put together a viral pin. If you don’t have any amazing products as is, think about how the product can help the user. Ask yourself why they would repin it. A mosquito trap may not be on someone’s top list but positioning it as the best mosquito trap and including a snippet of a testimony from one of your consumers will make a large difference in the repins. Remember, a personal testimony in the comment section of a pin plays a significant part to making your pin go viral.
3) Create a Contest
Everyone loves free stuff. Make the contest extremely easy to do. If it’s too difficult, has too many steps, or is confusing in any way it won’t catch on. The contest should bring your products to the forefront. Make sure you have a goal that can be easily measured like increase Pinterest followers, referral traffic, number of repins on a product.
Create a page on your website just for the contest with an attractive image to pin on Pinterest. Spread the word about the contest on all your social sites. You can even hire a few pinners through Pinbooster to give your contest a little more fire.
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