Leveraging a Pinterest presence into real audience engagement and brand exposure comes down to curation and integration. In a session at PR News' Big 3 Conference in New York this morning, Natanya Anderson, director of social media for Whole Foods Market, laid out a killer approach for making great things happen on Pinterest through an approach that includes these three elements: Curate, Integrate, and Evaluate.
It all starts with curation, she said, citing the "borrowing" ethos of Captain Jack Sparrow of “Pirates of the Caribbean.” It’s all about the leverage, and these points are a roadmap to effective leverage:
- Know your customers’ passion points
- Know team’s passion points
- Know the data—but in a visualized form
- Provide solutions—in a visualized form
- Always have fun—that’s what it has to be about
- Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good
- Start building a library of curated images
- Find inspiration all around you
- Take a photography class
- Explore a few good apps
- Build an extended team
- Bring in partners
- Pin video—it’s an effective visual medium and great for Pinterest
Examples of great curation, Anderson said, include the marketing automation company Eloqua, which created a campaign covering “40 Charts for Modern Marketers.” Neiman Marcus is another, with pins on “The Art of Celebration.” AMD, appropriately enough, has a campaign on getting “Technically Organized.”
In integration, Anderson says to follow the “Coach Phil Rule,” referring to Phil Jackson and focused on not forgetting the fundamentals. They include:
- Don’t lose track of your goals
- Stay focused on your audience
- Focus on powerful messages
- Consider share-ability and context
- Differentiate decoration and inspiration
- Link strategically
- Bring on role players
Finally, Anderson said, measure what you pin and understand what works for the audience. One campaign, she said, had only 179 pins but generated 70,000 impressions.
Follow Tony Silber: @tonysilber