How to use Pinterest in your marketing strategy

To quote Wikipedia, “Pinterest is a pinboard-style social photo sharing website that allows users to create and manage theme-based image collections such as events, interests, hobbies and more. Users can browse other pinboards for inspiration, ‘repin’ images to their own collections and / or ‘like’ photos”

Pinterest is one of the fastest growing social networks in the world and presents businesses with a unique opportunity to leverage it for marketing. Businesses that wish to use Pinterest as a marketing tool must first identify their market, then engage their customers, offer information and finally, present them with value. Viewed from the search engine optimisation angle, each pin on Pinterest can be seen as a back link, which is something all websites work hard to build. The key is to use keywords in the descriptions and board titles. As with any marketing tool, Pinterest activity must be tracked and analysed to assess what works.

Here are some case studies of businesses that are using Pinterest successfully to promote their brand and their products.

The Kotex campaign

Implemented in Israel, the Kotex brand identified fifty influential women based on what they were pinning on Pinterest. Each woman was sent a customised online gift pack. When she pinned the gift, she received a real gift pack via mail. Tracking revealed that each woman who was sent the gift posted about the gift, not just on Pinterest, but also on other social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and exploded the reach of the 50 gifts into over 2 200 interactions. It also resulted in close to 694 850 impressions, an incredible return for 50 gift packs.  The brand creatively leveraged Pinterest to attract high engagement based on the simple premise that free gifts are always appreciated and talked about.

The Pinterest Lottery from British Midland International

British Midland International held a contest called “Pinterest Lottery” where randomly chosen fans won trips.  Numbered posters with logos from five destinations were posted on the brand’s Pinterest boards and users were invited to repin at least six images. By the end of the week, British Midland selected a number and the users who repinned images with that number were eligible to win two free round trips to any British Midland International destinations.

Lands’ End Canvas’ “Pin it to Win it”

Apparel brand Lands’ End Canvas’ promotion called Lands’ End Canvas Pin It to Win It” invited fans to pin items from their website to their specific pin boards for a chance to win the items they pinned.

After a business launches its profile on Pinterest, the next step is to create highly engaging promotions, inspiring its fans to follow their profiles and pin items from their web pages.  This keeps the brand’s target audience connected, interacting with the brand and building brand loyalty. Here are some tips to achieve this:

  • Pinterest has over 1.5 million unique visitors every day and 80% of these users are women.  This is a highly prospective market for brands focused on women’s interests.
  • Make a plan to post pictures consistently, since pins at the top of the feed get the maximum views and repins / shares.
  • Cross promote via other channels by adding a follow on Pinterest button and connecting your Pinterest account to your other social media profiles and promoting it on Facebook, Blogs, Twitter and Google Plus.
  • Regular interaction by following users, commenting on their pins, repining and liking them is a must, so that they can follow you back.
  • Post product images, ideas and tips and encourage fans to pin their views and ideas to keep them engaged.

Pinterest can help brands build unique relationships with their target market and help them promote themselves through social media. Are you using Pinterest for business?

Writing a marketing plan

Designing and implementing a strong yet flexible marketing plan is the foundation of a successful business. A marketing plan must include a mix of different tactics based on an analysis of what has worked in the past and which activities did not yield the expected results.

A business usually defines its market as a particular group of buyers and before the marketing plan is conceived, the first step is to identify the target market, niches within the target market and understand its different needs for your product or service. This begins with market research to understand its expectations in order to devise strategies to meet them.  Although businesses set long term goals, detailed marketing plans are usually finalised for one year based on the year’s goals and budget.  A quarterly assessment shows any changes that must be made in the focus of the plan.

Here is a sequence of actions to write an effective marketing plan:

  • A mission statement stating the nature of the business, its services, its target markets.
  • A description of the target market, its size, its segments and user profile
  • A detailed description of products and services being offered
  • The budget required to reach the products and services to the market. This includes staff, services, logistics and other marketing and promotional costs
  • A break up of marketing and promotional tactics proposed to be used for different target market segments and the time frame for monitoring these activities. This includes keeping track of industry trends and forming strategic business alliances. Marketing strategies can include online and offline networking, direct marketing in the form of sales letters, email marketing, flyers, online advertising focused on specific target markets, campaigns to increase product awareness, online article marketing, direct sales, mobile marketing, social media marketing, brand building, trade shows, etc. Through constant monitoring and evaluation, tactics that work can be repeated while those that do not work must be dropped.
  • Competitor analysis. This is an on-going exercise and a part of the market plan in order to achieve the right positioning. This involves a SWOT analysis where you identify your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats vis-à-vis the competition. In general, competition revolves around a combination of price, product and benefits. This will help create your own Unique Selling Proposition (USP), which is the message that will go out in your marketing communication.
  • Quantifiable marketing goals. This covers what you want to accomplish in twelve months, the markets you plan to reach and how you plan to cover them and your revenue goals.
  • Monitoring and tracking results to see which strategies generate leads and sales, the customers’ response to these strategies and what appeals to them.

While evaluating the marketing plan periodically, it must answer the following questions:

  • Were the goals reached?
  • Were the marketing campaigns successful?
  • Did it achieve the expected return on investment?
  • Did it result in conversions as expected?

In the course of the assessment, if new markets emerge, the planning team looks at ways to explore and reach these markets.

In summary, the marketing plan must set clear and realistic targets that are measurable, specify clear deadlines for meeting these targets, indicate the budget for each market activity and also allocate accountability to the people responsible for each aspect of the plan.

Growing your business’ customer base

The goal of most businesses is to maximise its return on marketing investment. Growing its customer base on an on-going basis forms the foundation of this goal. In general people purchase a business’ products or services for three reasons, namely to help them satisfy a need, as a solution to a problem or to make them feel good.  As a starting point, the business must decide which of these reasons it plans to target. There are chances that more than one of these reasons applies.

Based on this, the business must find the niche to focus on. Target marketing lets you direct your marketing efforts, rand and brand message towards the specific market that is more likely to buy your products.  It is the most effective way to reach your buyers and grow your customer base.

How to identify your target market

A target market can be defined as a group of prospective customers with similar needs, who are most profitable for your business. Your marketing efforts will focus on these specific needs so that the final product appeals to the target customer.  The product will finally reach the customer via short-term and long-term marketing strategies.

  • Start by looking at your current customer base – who they are, why they buy from you. Identify common characteristics and zero in on what brings in the most and best business.
  • Look at your competition’s market, their current customers and find a niche that is being overlooked by them.
  • Analyse your product or service, listing its features, advantages and benefits.
  • Decide which demographics to target based on factors such as age, location, gender, income, education, occupation etc.
  • Now look at the psychographics based on factors such as personality, attitude, values, hobbies, lifestyles, behavior and decide where your product or service will fit in their lifestyle, the media they frequent for information.

Based on the above information, decide whether you have an adequate market based on your criteria and whether they will benefit from your offering. Based on your findings, you can design your marketing approach and sales activities to meet the needs of your target market.

How you target your prospective customers will depend on your short term and long term marketing goals as this will have a critical impact on which strategy you choose.

While long-term marketing strategies focus on building brand awareness in the specific niche in your target market through a gradual increase in sales, short-term marketing focuses on generating immediate revenue.

  • Long-term strategies include branding activities that aim to build the business’ image and customer loyalty, relationship building strategies focused on the business’ associates, partners and market and research and development efforts to create the right products for future sales.
  • Short-term strategies are focused on creating sales from the word go and the results are measurable.  Short-term strategies include activities like cold calling and setting up appointments for sales calls, product demonstrations or negotiations.  Short term strategies also use price discounts for a spurt in sales, group deals to promote to new customers, and other advertising methods that can yield immediate results.

Together, short-term and long-term strategies help the business meet its revenue goals while creating on-going relationships with customers, building its reputation and growing a loyal customer base in its chosen niche.

The impact of mobile phone technology on your business

During the past year, a number of businesses have begun to embrace mobile technology and integrate some form of mobile marketing in their marketing plan. The reason for this is an increase in smartphone and handheld device usage, with people using their phones to access information on the go. Many businesses offer free apps to engage and connect with their market to build brand loyalty. Web-friendly mobile phones such as the iPhone, BlackBerry and others make it even easier to communicate and facilitate quick buying decisions. People are depending on their mobile phones while out and about and spend less time on their computers. Thanks to various easy-to-download apps, users can quickly disseminate information and enjoy the process.

According to a recent survey on iPad usage by IDG Connect, “54% of global IT and business professionals say that their iPad has partly replaced their laptop, while a further 16% say it has completely replaced their laptop”. It follows from the results of the survey that mobile phones are poised to have a major impact on the way you do business in the coming years.

Why is mobile important?

Mobile technology has revolutionised the way people interact with a brand. Almost all business websites have a mobile-friendly version of their website. Creating a mobile version of your website is important as the regular features of your website, especially Flash and JavaScript do not appear on the mobile browser. Buyers reach for their mobile phones to do research on a product or service they want to buy and this naturally makes it critical for a business to be mobile-friendly . Mobile phones also help increase social media interaction between your business and audience as most users access their social media profiles via their phones.

With rapidly changing mobile technology, here are some questions to help you assess the degree of impact mobile can have on your business:

  • Can your customers order and pay for your products or services via their mobile phones?
  • Can mobile phone GPS technology increase the productivity of your field staff?
  • Can you increase the response rate to your special offers by sending them to your customers’ mobile phones?
  • Will your business benefit from using cloud computing technology, helping you access information on the go via a mobile phone?
  • Can your staff reach you instantly for quicker decisions via a handheld device or smartphone?
  • Will using mobile phones reduce your travel costs while increasing interaction with prospects via virtual sales, training and product demonstrations?
  • Can your business use Bluetooth technology or QR codes your logistics solutions?
  • Will QR codes attract more visitors to your business website and motivate them to engage with your products?
  • Is your business compatible for video marketing, which can be viewed by mobile phone users?

If you answered yes to some of all of the above, then it is time to adopt mobile technology and leverage it for your business.

How to market your business with Pinterest

market your business with pinterest

Image source

Pinterest is currently among the top five social networking sites that has grabbed the attention of internet users in a big way. It can be described as an online pinboard where users “pin” images and videos that appeal to them on theme-based pinboards. It is similar to a social bookmarking tool but visually much more attractive. Here are some quick statistics about Pinterest:

  • Gets more page views than Etsy, the popular craft site
  • Has grown 2000% since June 2011
  • 59% of Pinterest’s users are women in the age group of 25 to 40
  • 58% of Pinterest’s unique visitors are women
  • Has a highly engaged audience of 3.3 million users and 421 million page views

Pinterest is currently in its beta version and by invitation only. Here are some ways in which your business can leverage Pinterest.

Create a profile for your business on Pinterest

Under settings, complete the about, website and other details on your profile. Connect your other social media profiles and enable “visible in search” so that visitors to your boards can connect and engage with your brand.

Generate website traffic

Pin images with titles and descriptions that link back to your website. Add a “Pin it” button to your own website or blog inviting readers and visitors to engage. You can pin the photos from your blog so that when visitors click your pin, it will drive traffic to your web page or blog. This is easy to do and effectively markets your website or blog.

Generate exposure for your business

Besides driving traffic with Pinterest, you can also promote your products and services by posting their images on your pinboard. This attracts exposure for your brand with the likelihood of customer acquisition. Pin images with links to your product catalogue so that prospective clients can follow these to your website. This is also a great way to advertise your business to millions of prospects on a daily basis.  They in turn, can comment on your images and repin them to their boards, widening your reach.

Customer engagement and interaction

Today, businesses must find innovative ways to reach their target audience engage them and interact with them. Pinterest is an excellent method to promote brand loyalty by soliciting customer feedback on your business and its products.

Contests and special deals

Pinterest is a great platform to hold contests and offer discounts on your products to your Pinterest followers and develop long term customer relationships, actively engaging with them, offering them incentives to appreciate their loyalty.

Other ways to use Pinterest for your business are:

  • As an online brochure or catalogue with prices
  • For event announcements
  • New product launch and exclusive rebate announcements
  • Market research as you can track what your followers are pinning
  • Creating a testimonial board to connect with customers

As a highly visual medium Pinterest is an effective, free marketing tool that you can use to promote your business and acquire customers. You can also pin images via an iPhone app, which means access to the mobile market. Make sure to tag and categorise all images so that your content can be suitably amplified.

Although Pinterest may not be ideal for all brands right now, it is a great way to build relationships with your market. What are your thoughts on Pinterest?

Achieving your marketing goals in 2012

To achieve better marketing results in 2012, it is important to measure it before managing it. A business’ marketing plan usually includes a full SWOT analysis, situation analysis, pricing policy, statement of USP and sales strategy. But before you plan your marketing for the next 12 months, here are a few quick questions to get you started to evaluate your last year’s marketing efforts:

  • What worked last year and what is the proof?
  • What results were generated and how do they compared with the plan?
  • If a strategy was successful last year, chances are it will work this year as well. But do the costs justify the results?
  • What did not work?
  • What was the most successful marketing strategy that generated the maximum sales?
  • Which critical tasks have the potential to impact your future marketing activities?
  • How effective was your social media marketing?
  • Did your website convert as expected?

Begin your evaluation by reviewing your past marketing activities and the results. To identify what worked, look at the activities that brought in the most clients, sales and profits and impacted your business in a positive way. This will help you direct your efforts on the activities that were effective and steer clear of those that were not. It is important to have a tracking system in place so that you measure the return on investment on each marketing activity.

Based on the above, you must consider exploring new marketing channels or platforms frequented by your target market and design marketing materials that help you reach your target market quickly and effectively.

Some of your marketing tasks to achieve better results in 2012 may be:

  • Revamp your newsletter, make it more engaging and increase/decrease its frequency
  • Add new pages to your website focused on new keywords and key phrases
  • Explore new niches to market your products
  • Use customer feedback to improve your customer service and create new products
  • Add a new social media network to your social media marketing strategy to increase engagement
  • If your target market spends most of its time on Facebook, consider creating a custom Facebook Fan page to engage with them there
  • If your customers are receptive to mobile marketing, consider developing an app for mobile devices

While evaluation must be a periodic process, the year-end evaluation should scrutinise the following areas:

  • Your budget vs. actual expenditure
  • The various marketing channels used
  • Target audience reached
  • Results in relation to your marketing goals in terms of lead generation, sales and brand promotion
  • Product and service strategies

The new marketing plan must define your marketing goals and factor in the results of last year, the current business environment and competition activity.

It all begins with a solid marketing plan with effective marketing strategies, regardless of the size of your business as this will help you track results and manage your marketing budget. An evaluation of last year’s results will enable you to make the necessary changes and come up with new strategies and goals for the next year.

Outsourcing your social media marketing

The decision to outsource your social media marketing can be a daunting one since no one understands your brand and business better than you do. The marketing agency you hire must be trustworthy, understand your business and brand objectives and be capable of getting your message across to your target audience effectively. Social media marketing is a highly effective way to increase your customers and achieve your marketing goals, while establishing your brand. Here are suggestions to help you successfully outsource your social media marketing:

  • Strategise and plan together

Outsourcing does not end with providing a brief. Even if the agency you hire handles your social media marketing, make sure that you are fully involved in the strategy planning process. Listen to the agency’s ideas and together, determine which of these are feasible for your own business. Communicate your goals clearly to the agency so that they understand your objectives and help you achieve them. Be actively involved and have a detailed plan of action.

  • Maintain a consistent voice

Let your social media marketing agency know the unique voice you would like to adopt in your communication so that they can maintain it. If you already have a social media campaign in progress, your agency can take a look at your previous posts to get an idea of what tone of voice to use. Help the agency learn more by sharing your marketing and promotional material, newsletters and other company material so that a unified voice can be developed.

  • Establish norms

Create guidelines and rules for your social media marketing campaign. If there are certain taboo topics, competitors or words that you want to avoid, let the agency know. This can prevent problems later. Let the agency know which topics to focus on and ask for their ideas as well. Offer a list of your favourite websites, blogs and other web pages you are interested in connecting with or referring to.

  • Keep your social media agency informed

Make sure your social media manager is aware of events in your organisation as this will influence the content you post in your social media networks. If you plan to launch a sale or promotional event, let your agency know so that you can leverage social media to get the best ROI.

  • Feedback

After you have the above in place, ensure that you offer feedback, both good and bad. This should be in specific terms so that improvements can be made where necessary.

Social media is proving to be a marketing platform to be taken seriously. Leveraged in the right way, it spells major benefits for your business, whether you outsource the process or do it yourself.  Establish a comfortable business relationship with your social media agency for smooth sailing.

Take your business’ marketing to the next level

In an ever-changing and highly competitive market, business owners must always look for new and innovative ways to take their business’ marketing to the next level, so that they can increase their market share. While there are many strategies you can employ, you must focus on engaging your customers, adding value to your brand in a way that will build you a loyal customer base and get you the maximum return on your marketing Rand.

Here are three ways that can help you steer your business in the direction you are aiming for.

Exploring new ways to promote and sell your products or services

One effective way to diversify your brand and increase your customer base is to identify new sales channels and new markets for your product. For example, an offline business that sells solely through its brick and mortar store may decide to establish its website online and use digital marketing to explore new markets and gain more customers. It may look at new market segments to promote its products. A health and beauty business which sells through its retail stores may decide to expand its sales to salons, fitness centres and spas. A business that sells directly to the market may decide to switch to a distributor network to capture new markets and increase its sales.

Increase product range to add value to the customer

Creating new products or add-ons that complement or add value to an existing product is an effective way to engage customers and grow sales. A company that sells coffee-makers might decide to introduce its own flavoured blends and mixes to use with the equipment. Another example is the classic McDonald’s “would you like fries with that?” with their basic products. Each time a customer orders a food item, the sales rep automatically asks if they want fries with that. The customer says yes without thinking, usually. A company that manufactures shampoos may decide to expand its products to offer a complete range of hair care products to include conditioners, hair strengthening products, hair gels and more. Loyal customers are usually ready to try and recommend new products from a brand they trust.

Organise your business for success

To grow your brand, engage your customers and realise your marketing return on investment, it is important to ensure that your business structure and staff are organised for sales and customer service. Traditional methods do have a degree of success, but when you decide to explore new markets and expand your product line, you may need to revamp the way you operate. For example, if you have decided to sell through a distributor network, your focus shifts to logistics and product quality rather than hiring more sales people to cold-call and sell your products. You may want to now concentrate on building brand awareness using online marketing strategies and social media marketing to engage your customers and get to know them better.

Taking your business to the next level takes vision and planning, understanding your market and your customers, knowing what you want and implementing your plan successfully.

Set your brand apart through positioning

Every business aims to build and position their brand so that its target market can easily recognise and engage with it. When the brand is memorable and creates positive feelings with its users, it results in sales, making the business profitable and resulting in long term loyal customers. Achieving this however is no easy task.  It takes strategy and hard work to position a brand.

A brand is essentially the business’ identity with its customers since it defines the business. It can take the form of a logo, the business’ name, product quality or business strategy. Branding can give the business the edge to stay competitive in its market and grow, while representing value to the customer. To do this, the first step is to position the brand properly in its market. This involves the following steps:

  • Target market identification

You must identify your target market in order to design and present your brand to them in an appealing way.

  • Letting your market know about the product

Information about your product must be communicated to your market in such a way that it attracts them and motivates them to buy the product. The customer must understand why your product scores over the competition and its “unique selling proposition”. They must know why they want to buy your product / should buy your product.

  • Impacting brand perception

You may want to run a quick survey to find out your brand’s current position in the market. Design an improvement strategy to set it apart from the competition.  Positioning your brand in a specific segment will attract the customers your business wishes to reach.

  • Determine where your product should be placed in the market

To do this, take stock of your competitive advantage. You must also conduct a competitor analysis so that you can design your marketing message in such a way that shows the customer why they should buy from you and not from competitors.

  • Design the marketing message

It is important to remember that the meaning of the words you use to communicate creates a perception in the customer’s mind. This means learning the effect of words (and also colours and other images) on people and the emotions they can trigger, and using the right choice of words to advantage as this can influence the buyer’s thinking process.

To ensure that your brand is effectively positioned, a thorough understanding of the competition is critical. Often, creating an entirely new niche works best, since it may not always be feasible to compete with a market leader. An example is the motorcycle brand Honda, which made an entry into a market where the Harley Davidson brand was already well-established. Honda introduced mini-bikes aimed at pre-teens. Eventually, Harley had to reposition its motorcycle as a high-end bike for the serious adult biker. A strategy that works for the market leader need not necessarily be effective for a follower brand.

Developing a personalised branding strategy for your business can help you stand out in your industry and build a compelling brand. Positioning your brand is about conditioning your customer’s mind about how to perceive your product and telling them why you are better than competitors. Even though you may know your product is the best, this has to be communicated to your potential buyer through your marketing message, distribution and packaging to increase your market share.