Why Bloggers Should Use Pinterest
By Lori Hatcher
When I
needed decorating ideas for my daughter’s baby shower, I went to Pinterest.
When I searched for a recipe for a French toast casserole, I went to Pinterest.
When I lost the directions for how to make reindeer Christmas tree ornaments, I
went to Pinterest.
As the
fastest growing social media site, Pinterest has become the go-to place for
information. But is it also a valuable platform for writers? I say YES.
Today I’d
like to build a case for why writers, especially bloggers, should use
Pinterest. I’ll share some stats, then tell you about my personal Pinterest
experience
Digital Marketing
Research website reveals that 72.8 million people use Pinterest.
Eighty-five percent of them are women, and an estimated 42 percent of online
adult women use Pinterest.
Did you
catch that last statistic? Almost half
of online adult women use Pinterest.
If someone
offered you a marketing strategy to reach half the online women in America, and
all it cost was some time and creativity, how quickly would you say YES? Well
here you go—my gift to you.
In the
summer of 2014, thanks to the encouragement of a kind and successful fellow blogger,
I took the Pinterest plunge. Although my efforts were rudimentary and somewhat
haphazard, I saw a 33 percent increase in my page views in the first month.
Even more important, I gained dozens of new subscribers.
In the two
years since, I’ve had several months with 100 percent increases in page views
and have almost quadrupled my subscriber base. Pinterest has been the single
most effective strategy I’ve employed for growing my blog and sharing the words
God gives me.
Another
powerful reason for directing your time and creative talents toward Pinterest
is its sustainability. Unlike Facebook and Twitter, Pinterest images (with
links to your blog posts) have an amazing lifespan. Social
Marketing Writing website states, “The half-life of a Pinterest pin is 3.5
months. i.e. it takes a pin 3.5 months to get 50% of its engagement. The half-life
of a tweet is only 24 minutes and the half-life of a Facebook post is only 90
minutes. This means that the half-life of a Pinterest pin is 1,680 times longer
than a Facebook post.”
These
statistics show that if you create a pin that catches people’s attention, it can
linger, growing in the blogosphere for months or even years, continuing to
reach more and more people with little or no ongoing effort on your part.
I’ve experienced
this amazing phenomenon. Twice a week I create pinnable images for one of my
blog posts. I share the images on Facebook and Pinterest. Two years ago, I
shared an image from my post called “How
To Know It’s God Speaking to You.” It received 15 likes on Facebook and
four people shared it. Six people clicked through to read the blog post.
I pinned a
similar image on Pinterest and shared it on several group boards. As of January
31, 2017, Pinterest users have repinned that pin more than 144,000 times. One
hundred and four thousand (104,000) readers have clicked through to read the corresponding
blog post. Because of Pinterest, this post continues to receive the most page views
of all the posts on my blog almost every single day—two years after I pinned
it.
I hope I’ve
convinced you to take a serious look at Pinterest as a way to promote your blog
and get your message out. It could be a serious game changer.
Do you have a comment about how Pinterest has helped you with your writing platform? We would love to hear from you.
(Photos courtesy of Pinterest.com and Lori Hatcher.)
TWEETABLES
Lori Hatcher is the editor of Reach
Out, Columbia magazine and the author of
two devotional books, Hungry for God …
Starving for Time, Five-Minute Devotions for Busy Women and Joy
in the Journey – Encouragement for Homeschooling Moms. A blogger, writing instructor, and inspirational speaker,
her goal is to help women connect with God in the craziness of life You’ll find
her pondering the marvelous and the mundane on her blog, Hungry for God. . . Starving for
Time . Connect with her on Facebook, Twitter
(@LoriHatcher2), or Pinterest (Hungry for God).
You've convinced me. Now to take the time to do a few boards.
ReplyDeleteYou can do it!
ReplyDeleteHi Lori, I had read one of your blogs before about using Pintrest for authors and decided to try it. I realize that I am just getting started and it may take some time to grow it, but your line above about group boards intrigued me. "I pinned a similar image on Pinterest and shared it on several group boards." What is a group board and how do they work?
ReplyDeleteGreat blog by the way. I am ready to try this again.
Sheryl, I'm wanting to learn how to this too. Lori said there is a one-day seminar coming up April 1st in Lexington. When she gives me details, I will share them on the blog.
Delete