Small Business | Forum « thank you pinterest…..

thank you pinterest….. (18 posts)

Ann at greenoak said
1 year, 1 month ago:
today im connecting   about 700$$ directly to pinterest….one buyer came here from about 100 miles away and bought   a lot….and was thrilled and will be back…. shes a party planner and had seen one of our pictures on pinterest……
the other connection was a simple picture of a centerpiece   which was a duh moment fo rme…since we have all the parts and just never put it together…. today we sold over 100$$ of the idea…. our version was a lot different, but the inspiration was from   pinterest…. …
i heard abnother   way t0 use pinterest from a buddy on a forum….he   sells in 3 venues and has a pinterest board for each….. made me think i could have a board for each of our areas,,,garden , foo foo, black, white   etc etc….but i already have lots of boards so not sure….
@annfurnivall | # | Top
Nichole Schlecht said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@annfurnivall
Congrats Ann! I love hearing success stories, thanks for sharing!
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April Welch said
1 year, 1 month ago:
That is awesome!! Do you have a link to your Pinterest profile? Would love to see what you’re doing ;D
@aprilwelch | # | Top
Ann at greenoak said
1 year, 1 month ago:
heres my page http://pinterest.com/annatgreenoak/ our store is all about home decor and recycling and all the neat junking trends….so we fit in pretty well…
@aprilwelch thanks for looking…
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Rich Brooks said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@annfurnivall
Good to hear it’s not ALL hype!
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Ann at greenoak said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@rich-brooks right rich!!!
ill be interested to see what other kinds of businesses benefit …. i know its huge for wedding folks….the brides and the companies…
do you think it will be used by the information businesses? like social media consultants and other web busnesses? its going to be interesting to see how it grows up..
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Renee St. Peter said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@annfurnivall Thank you for reigniting my interest in Pinterest…I’m glad to hear that you’re generating sales from it too! Congrats
I had started a couple of accounts for different business and for my own art business (http://pinterest.com/paintedhill/), but then starting hearing a lot of negatives about trademark and copyright issues. I always try to find the source of the image though rather than just blindly repin, which I think is ultimately better for the original poster as well as myself and my followers anyway…
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Ann at greenoak said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@reneestpeter good luck with your pinterest. .there is quite a tatoo community on there…
im watching the copyright talk too……. so far not too worried about it….im not making any money on any pictures and havent put my name on others work….
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Romy Singh said
1 year, 1 month ago:
Good To Hear Your Success Story….. All the best for more….
@romysingh | # | Top
Ann at greenoak said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@romysingh thanks…… i enjoyed your facebook and website…. nice facebook cover on your tmeline…..
blogs are fading away in my world….. thanks to facebook and pinterest imho….
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Suzanne Petryshyn said
1 year, 1 month ago:
CONGRATS Ann! I have been enjoying watching Pinterest grow in popularity and discourse from leading experts, businesses, brands, marketing strategists, etc. I have had a HUGE increase in traffic on my site because of Pinterest and am thankful for how the platform provides us with branding opportunities w/ our small businesses. I have been diving in primarily w/ Twitter (@brainjacks) and Pinterest (http://pinterest.com/brainjacks/) and feel like the 2 work really well for my business. My book sales have increased and I am tracking the # of hits directly from Pinterest to my site, thank you to Jim G. at Mashable for this article (http://mashable.com/2012/03/13/pinterest-track-traffic/). Like Ann, my sales have increased since I have been spending my time on different boards, commenting and connecting with other Pinners and sharing information. I am just in the process of copy editing my site and including Pins throughout- copyright is not an issue at this point for me and how I am sharing my information. I am not entirely sure what copyright means for Pinterest as far as any issues being different because of the pinning events, but suspect it won’t be much different for how copyright was laid out prior to Pinterest becoming popular. At the end of the day, it is up to the user, in this case Pinner, to be respectful and legally obligated to site all works- I am glad to see that Pinterest is taking this issue seriously and it looks like their agreements and user policies are a work in progress at this point and they are taking the time needed to explore this issue further. Again, great stuff Ann! Take care everyone, Suzanne
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Charlene Kingston said
1 year, 1 month ago:
I’m experimenting with adding blog posts to Pinterest for me and a couple of clients. I’m seeing traffic from Pinterest. Still in the data collection phase, though.
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Ann at greenoak said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@suzannepetryshyn looks like you are really busy on there!!! i like your variety….
. i read thru the mashable articles..thanks….. something new to me is the hash tags….i dont twitter so its not familiar at all to me…. where would you use them ? do you use them?
one of the hints said to put prices on things…i dont do that so far,feeling lke it is outside the sprit of pinterest…..
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Suzanne Petryshyn said
1 year, 1 month ago:
hi ann!
i use hashtags in everything so i am relating the information/content back from my boards to my brand, or at least so people can see that i am pinning content that they find in their searches. Hashtags are handy because you are more likely to show up in searches for the content you are hash-tagging. i am currently going through my boards and adding where they may be missing as i have been diving into Pinterest and repinning and not always ensuring due to time constraints when i am taking a Pinterest break at work and want to see what’s happing with fellow pinners! I have primarily been focusing on Pinterest and Twitter for myself and my clients and I find that Pinterest supports the sharing of content and Twitter broadcasts the content. Our site (www.brainjacks.com) is just going over some changes in how it is designed w/ Joomla! so it is going to be image heavy with Pins throughout or at least pin capabilities. We are getting there! I am an artist first, business second and I love connecting with people through their artistry, whether it is designing curriculum or clay projects, clothing, etc. it really doesn’t matter as I have found and believe that Pinterest can be very valuable for businesses with artistic leadership- and, from my perspective, the website a business uses is a form of art- so share it- Pinterest is trending right now and I predict it will remain a constant as far as social media goes- I like it much better than Facebook- I only use FB for personal use, not business. I like LinkedIn so people can see me as the professional I am with my education, experience, etc. and then Pinterest allows me to let my character/personal/human side shine through and Twitter lets me promote and broadcast. There is my social media strategy in a nutshell- lol. It all comes down to personal preference. Some are doing very VERY well w/ FB and it is a great engagement tool for your community and following. I am not there just yet. As far as including prices, I include them on my books. I figure if my prospective clients are interested in learning more about what I do from the content I share in pins or tweets, they can click on my site to learn more. As a consumer, I feel that it is respectful for me to offer them time and opportunity to want to learn more, then show them the value they will receive by choosing me and then sharing my price. I prefer this method myself when I am shopping around. Once I feel like 1) I am interested in learning more, 2) I will seek you out and 3) I will make a purchase. Ironically, I have made MORE purchases from Pinterest in the last 3 months just by feeling connected with who I am purchasing from by knowing what they like to eat, wear, books to read, movies, cartoons/funnies/sense of humor, and so on. It all comes down to personal preference in however a strategy is designed- this strategy comes from our own experiences as consumers and what we feel comfortable, all things considered, about buying in to.
Thanks Ann- happy Pinning!
s.
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Tyson Stevens said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@annfurnivall and @everyoneonthisthread
For those of you selling products, make sure to add the sales price in the description, along with a link to the product. I wasn’t selling the product below so I didn’t add the url.
Pinned!
Hopefully you can enlarge the picture below. You’ll see that my pin showed up in the “Gifts” section seconds after I posted it.

Good luck ya’all!

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Ann at greenoak said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@suzannepetryshyn great overview   suzANNE… its s nice hearing actually how someone uses   this new thing!!! i see it kind of the same, a great   background atmosphere for a business   and maybe not exactly where you order but still so   good…im going to look at your boards again to see your hash tags….. i assume i dont need to do that on facebook….???
. @tysonstevens my view after thinking about this is that major pricing wouldnt be good on my boards….im thinking it would interfere with my potential customers   experience of us…..because im more about inspiring and engaging not directly selling    on pinterest..
..hopefully   its good for you tho…
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Suzanne Petryshyn said
1 year, 1 month ago:
thank you Ann- the hashtags to look at are on my Social Media & Learning board (http://pinterest.com/brainjacks/social-media-learning/ ) here is one example:
#Curriculum designed for YOU to teach #youth about #problem solving and the bottom line of: #What is #conflict?
I tried uploading a picture here, but you will see it when you go to that particular board- it has a picture of a young girl facing the camera and other youth blurred in the background.
there are a couple of things with this description that set it out above others. Firstly, the hashtags are actually google keywords that ping people to my site in their searches. i decided to use these search words after seeing how they kept coming up over and over and over again in my google analytics. this takes a bit of time and technique, but worth it in the long run. so, when you are using hashtags, be sure to include the keywords and search terms that are the vehicles for landing people on your site. set your google analytics to pick up all referrals from Pinterest, as well as the conversions piece for the page that can be calculated and attributed to making a sale. For example, with the pin and the description i shared above, when people purchase my book off of my site, a special page comes up after the transaction. this page is coded to google analytics as my conversion that i can cross reference with the click from Pinterest so i know exactly where buyers are coming/referred from and what they are purchasing. this gives me my audience/market information in a couple of clicks. for the pins that go directly to amazon.com or any of the eReader sites to purchase, i am only able to track Pinterest hits and not conversion.
Ann, really, it is an art and a lot of science! lol
have a fantastic Thursday!

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Kira Pogge said
1 year, 1 month ago:
@annfurnivall Thanks for sharing your success story!! Congratulations!! Its great to hear positive feedback about Pinterest along with measurable results!
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