Marketing Fun with Pinterest by Dora Hiers

Last month, I offered three reasons why writers should love Pinterest, so today, let’s have some fun with marketing. Marketing…fun? Eeek! Those two words couldn’t possibly go together, right? :)

Snickers Brownie Bites

Food rocks!

Books rank #14 for what women find “pinteresting” while Food/Drinks rank #1.* Not bad news for writers, but how can we capitalize on this information? If your books involve any food/drinks, it wouldn’t hurt to pin some delicious looking food items to your book boards. My heroine in When Love Triumphs whips up a batch of macaroni and cheese instead of digging into the ice cream bucket when she needs comfort food, so why not pin a scrumptious, nicely browned mac and cheese recipe? 

Wow them with unique pins

I’ve used a couple of cool sites to create unique pins: Canva and PicMonkey. Both are fairly easy to use. PicMonkey is free, and Canva offers free designs as well as some premium options for $1, so any extra dazzles you’d like to include won’t break any marketing budgets. Use your own pictures or Pixabay is a great resource for free images. 

Jazz up your boards

Be creative. Check these out: 

• Inspirational setting ideas 
• Book quotes 
• Reading and writing boards 
• Inspirational boards 
• Writing Tips
• Bio with pictures

Diversify

Don’t just pin/repin book covers. Spread the Pinterest love around. What are your interests? Hobbies? I created boards for adorable animals, recipes, decorating ideas, seasonals, landscapes, coffee, etc. When I allow myself the freedom to venture outside the box, I find marketing much more enjoyable. And rather than following the same friends from Facebook or Twitter and seeing the same faces, why not consider Pinterest as an entirely new venue to make friends?

Consider

• Since a pinterester can click to follow through on a link, it makes sense to pin your book covers from a “retailer,” right? Pin your covers from a “buy” site.
• Follow boards, rather than pinners, or you will wade through a feed clogged with meaningless pins. Make your feed what you’d like…whatever inspires, excites or relaxes you. 

Thanks so much for allowing me to share Pinterest, my favorite spot to hangout online. I hope you enjoyed this series and that I convinced you to give it a try. Have fun with it!

What boards inspire you?

Have you tried Canva, PicMonkey or other graphic applications? Which is your favorite?

*http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2344068/4-Statistics-About-Pinterest-Users-You-Need-to-Know-Study

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Pelican Book Group

Art teacher Shelby Coltman transforms junk into treasure and longs for a place to showcase her creations. She’s thrilled when her friend volunteers to room with her. Shelby can finally buy a storefront. Unfortunately, Kennedi’s brother can't seem to let go.

Abandoned as a teenager, guidance counselor Tate Malone has become surrogate and over-protective father to his sister. Life is great until Shelby Coltman wheedles his impressionable sister into sharing an apartment. Raised in wealth, the beautiful Shelby could never understand poverty or rejection, and Tate doesn't appreciate her uprooting his sister.


When Shelby hands over her savings to a homeless student, will God obliterate Tate's fears and deliver all of Shelby’s dreams...when hope rises?

Dora Hiers

Dora Hiers is a multi-published author of Heart Racing, God-Gracing romances. Connect with her on Seriously Write, Fiction Faith & Foodies, Twitter, Facebook or Pinterest. 

Pinterest 101 for Writers by Dora Hiers

Last month, I introduced you to Pinterest. Have you checked it out yet? What do you think? Love it or leave it?

Today I’ll share some reasons why writers should love it. Lol.

Pinterest is viral. 
Here’s a quick example of the viral effect of Pinterest. Let’s say my sweet friend and fellow SW hostess, Sandy Ardoin pins several “late eighteenth century” gowns to showcase what her heroines might wear in her historical novels. Actually, take a second and check out this real board. Beautiful gowns, but aren’t you thankful that you don’t have to dress like that now? 

Let’s say Carla, a collector of vintage gowns and famous fashion designer, stumbles upon Sandy’s board. If Carla appreciates Sandy’s taste in late eighteenth century clothing, she can “follow” the board. Or, if Carla’s only impressed by a particular pin, she can “like” it using the little heart symbol, comment on it, “repin” it to one of her boards, or even “share” it on another social media site. Cool, huh? 

So Carla repins a gown to one of her boards, and her 20k followers see it in their feed. Also, because Carla’s board is categorized as “women’s fashion,” everybody who searches that category will see the pin. All these people have the same choice as Carla: like, comment, repin, or share. Similar to other social media sites, but more image centric.

You probably already knew all that, right? Here’s something you might not know. 

Pinterest is a popular hangout for females.

Courtesy of 2014 Media Bistro infogram

Out of 70 million total Pinterest users, 80% are women and 9 million connect their Pinterest accounts to Facebook*, doubling the value of a pin.

Surprising, huh? For those of you on the fence, did Pinterest just become a little more interesting?

We’re all writers here, and specifically, I’m a romance writer with a target female audience. Seems like Pinterest is a place I should hang out, right? Browsing Pinterest is something I enjoy in the evenings, more like a hobby than actual work, but I also use it as a marketing tool, which we’ll discuss more in length next month.

Pinterest offers analytics.
Did you know that Pinterest now offers the option of signing up as a business or converting? When I joined, a business account wasn’t an option (that I recall), so I just converted recently. During the conversion, I was also permitted to add “author” to my account name. That means that every time someone sees one of my pins, they will connect my name as a writer.

Also, converting to a business allows you to gather analytics, information such as most “repinned” pins, your audience’s interests, and what businesses they follow, and based on this data, they’ll offer strategic tips to reach more people.

If you’re already on Pinterest and would like to convert, the CONVERT HERE option is directly underneath the red JOIN US AS A BUSINESS button.

https://business.pinterest.com/en-gb

Although I converted, I haven’t uploaded the metatag to verify my website yet. Has anybody tried this already? What do you think? Positives? Negatives?

Make sure you stop by next month for Pinterest 101 for Writers, Take 2, and we’ll finish our Pinterest conversation. Until then, did I change your opinion about Pinterest? Any questions?

Oh, and if you love reading, writing and inspirational pins, check out my boards. Click the RED follow button upper right to follow all of them or the gray follow button under each board. Thanks! :)
*http://expandedramblings.com/index.php/pinterest-stats/#.U-PMpvl3J_8

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Police Officer Winter Evan and Navy SEAL Tanner Random are wrong for each other. Winter fears the water. Tanner skims through seas for a living. So four years ago, Winter convinced herself she’d be better off not worrying about his months at sea and his increased cajoling for physical intimacy.

But when she walked away, she lost a giant chunk of her heart.

Now Tanner’s back in town to care for his abandoned niece. No longer a SEAL, he’s sticking to the safety of the North Carolina mountains as a paramedic. Should Winter risk losing her heart all over again? Will God help them build what started years ago into something solid and secure? When love triumphs...

Dora Hiers is a multi-published author of Heart Racing, God-Gracing romances. She’s a member of RWA, and her local chapter, CRW. Connect with her on Seriously Write, her personal blog, Twitter, Facebook or Pinterest.