Pinterest has quickly grown into a very popular social networking site. It offers some great uses for small businesses just like other social networking sites such as Facebook or Twitter.

While we’d discussed how Pinterest can help small businesses to direct traffic to their website, collaborate with other businesses or individuals and for branding of one’s product or service, let’s look at some out-of-the box and offbeat yet effective ways to leverage this easy to use social networking tool.

Pinterest’s intuitive user platform makes it extremely easy for anyone to share and interact with other people or businesses. In its current avatar, though it does not offer any advertising or paid placements like other social media services do but it still offers plenty of opportunity for you to showcase your business, be it a product or a service.

Here are 6 creative Pinterest marketing tips for your small business:

1. Create Unique Graphics to Describe Your Business

Consider creating unique, pinnable graphics to highlight some of your finest, most helpful content. Check out some of these amazing pinnable graphics that awesome “unstucktor” Karen Gunton of build a little biz created for her niche.

You, too, can do the same.

For instance, you can share tips and tricks for your niche. If you’re a diaper reseller online boutique, then you can not only pin images of the diapers off your website but even share tips about how to use diapers effectively, disposable vs cloth diaper, what to do when your child has a diaper rash and link these pins to your blog or your website for more information.

Similarly, if you are an advertising agency then you can showcase some of your most popular ads, testimonials from clients, interesting facts about advertising and the likes in unique visual format. It is very easy to create your own pinnable graphics using a simple photo editing tool.

Remember to keep it visual and engaging and not always about your product or service but to add value to the follower.

2. Host a Contest

You can host a contest for your product or service as long as it does not infringe upon Pinterest’s terms of use and its guidelines. You can involve your fans or customers in sharing how your product or service makes a difference to them and why do they use it.

Here’s an example of a Pinterest Contest organized by ModCloth in January:

3. Connect with Your Customers

Create a sense of community by liking and re-pinning things that your followers are pinning in a dedicated pinboard. Better still, create a collaborative, community board. This will showcase that your brand is not only about your product or service but goes beyond that and really wants to build a relationship with its fans and customers

4. Add Seasonal and Holiday Boards

Add boards whenever the opportunity presents itself. Start a board for Mother’s day in May, Father’s Day in June, Independence Day in July and so on. But remember to keep the content engaging, visual and in sync with your brand’s personality.

5. Create a Video Gallery

Don’t limit your boards to just images but leverage any videos that you think your followers would like to watch. You can use some which can be associated with your business like a conference where one of your business associate spoke, any reviews or press releases. You can also place or ‘repin’ fun videos as long as they match the aesthetics of both your brand and your customers.

Need some help getting started? Here’s a great post on Pinterest and video marketing by the folks at Mashable.

6. Woo the Internal Customer

A lot of very successful businesses have the same kind of focus for their internal customers as they would have for their external ones. Create a board for your internal customers or your employees. Allow them to showcase their personality and how they associate with your brand. If you are a small business or a home-based one, then use your own interests and other people in your team to showcase the personality of your brand and the people associated with it.

What out-of-the- box Pinterest marketing tips have you tried so far?

 Interested in knowing more about using Pinterest for your business? Sign up for a FREE one-on-one strategy session today!

Photo Credit: JennyAnn Wheeler

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