12 Holiday Pinterest Marketing Tips

Need to know how to get the most out of Pinterest this holiday season?

You’re already promoting your business on Pinterest. But have you optimized it for the holiday season? If you are, are you getting the most engagement out of your Pins as you can?

It’s not too late to increase your sales. Here are 12 Pinterest tips to give your holiday marketing the boost it deserves.

1. Remember the Details

Before you dive into optimizing your Pinterest profile for the holidays, you need to be sure you’ve got the basics sorted out.

Make sure your brand description is focused on the holidays, and don’t ignore SEO-friendly keywords.

Oh, and make sure your brand profile is searchable on Google (check your Pinterest account settings for that one).

It’s easy to forget about the little things on Pinterest, but the words you use can make the difference between your brand’s Pin being seen and not
Keep general SEO rules in mind. Include keywords in your product and board descriptions.
Remember to change your brand description to focus on the holidays as well

2. Offer Recipes

The holiday season is about food, seeing family, and hosting. Post beautiful and appealing images of food, with links to the recipe on your website.

An optimized landing page with great lead generation or links to your products is how you make money from Pinterest.

Holiday recipes are a great way to encourage engagement
They elicit responses of ‘my favorite!’, or ‘I added more nutmeg’. Comments are currency on social media
If your brand isn’t suited to recipes, make the recipe post personal like ‘Our CEO made a delicious apple-cherry crumble, here’s the recipe!’

3. Go Warm and Cuddly

During the festive season focus on making your brand profile festive (it makes sense). Make your persona even more personal and emotionally connected.

Go for personal (and personable). Focus on pictures of family, relationships, warmth, tradition, etc. ‘Tis the season for those warm memories – past and future.

Focus on cozy and festive images this holiday season
Use images with the color red, and green. Avoid blue and black (as they’re perceived as cold and clean – we’re going for warm and cozy)
Creative, distinct, boards like ‘Everyday Aww’ help your brand stand out on Pinterest

4. Focus on Standing Out

Don’t just throw a picture up and leave it there. Put time into which board it goes on. Does it need a rich pin (see #8 below)? And don’t skimp on the description as this not only increases SEO, but it inspires comments.

Put time and energy into your images and your pin descriptions
Anybody can post on Pinterest. You want to post awesome pictures with creative descriptions that inspire engagement

5. Use Contests

Pinterest contests are more effective during the holidays than they are at any other time of year.

People are spending a lot. There’s buying excitement in the air. For many, though, money is tight. People can go nuts on any opportunity to win or save.

Take advantage of this with a pin-it-to-win-it photo contest on Pinterest.

Pinterest Contests are especially successful in the holiday season, as money is tight and people will take any opportunity to save (or win)
Try a recurring contest, in which a smaller prize is given away each day for 12 days.
Focus it around the holidays, with either the prize being holiday-related or the theme.

6. Inspire Comments

Comments increase the virality of your pin – which increases the chance of a sale or other form of engagement. I seriously recommend responding to any comments which deserve it. People love being social during the holidays, and replying to comments makes your business more relatable.

Inspire comments by asking questions or asserting your own opinions
Be pro-active during the Holidays by commenting and responding to comments you receive. People like interaction during the festive season
Comments increase the visibility of your Pins – which increases brand awareness

7. Segment your Gifts

More boards mean more interaction and more chance of a re-pin. This is especially important if you have a lot of gifts to promote this holiday season. Get creative with your board titles, as well. Try to steer clear of ‘gift ideas for him’. Instead, how about ‘gifts he’ll love’?

Creating more boards is Pinterest best practice as it increases the reach of your brand
Keep your main (during the holidays, your holiday-related) boards above the Pinterest fold
Get creative with your board names and themes. Try to get beyond ‘gifts for him’ or ‘gifts for her’

8. Use Rich Pins

Rich pins make Pinterest awesome for brands – they’re what make the ROI make sense. Yes, the process to get them for your brand is a bit complex, but it’s worth it in the future.

They allow you to give more links to your site and for the product, as well as provide price and availability for the products Pinterest users love.

Rich Pins have an 82% higher re-pin rate than normal pins
Product pins include more business links, the price, availability, and where you can purchase the item.
With repins, you’re going to get more people seeing more of your products on Pinterest, with the information you want to communicate most right there.

9. Get Creative

I can’t stress enough how important it is to put time and energy, and creativity, into your pinning this holiday season.

You need to stand out from the million other brands on Pinterest.

Make your images awesome, and don’t be afraid to re-pin awesome images from other people (though, probably, not your competitors). For instance, if you pin an image of the coolest, most expensive hot tub in the world and people love it they’ll be more likely to buy a realistically-priced one from you.

Focus on creativity this holiday season to stand out from other brands
Everybody’s pushing their products, find a way to push the happiness your products will cause, or the problem they’ll solve
Don’t be afraid to promote products, or pictures, that aren’t your own. Keeping your brand active and awesome on Pinterest is more important than pushing a product every couple hours

10. Ask Questions

Questions within your pin descriptions are important in inspiring comments. Sometimes it’s the little things that can change your brand’s performance on Pinterest. Don’t neglect it.

Ask questions in your pin descriptions, to inspire people to comment and engage
Comments increase virality and also increase the chance of more people commenting and pinning themselves
People like interaction during the holidays, and they like brands that come across as personable and human. This is also why you need to respond comments as well as inspire them.

11. Get the Family Involved

Focusing on family during the holidays is simply best practice. Try children-related crafts, or ideas of how to get your whole family involved in decoration, the Christmas dinner, etc. Offer ideas of holiday games for the whole family (with awesome and relevant pictures).

Getting the family involved is a great way to make your brand relatable and appealing
Try children-oriented craft ideas, pictures with festive families, or
This is another instance of how important it is to put the social in social media during the holidays

12. Include a CTA

CTAs are essential on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. See if the same is true for your brand on Pinterest. Track your Pinterest analytics and check if CTAs are working for you.

Test out a CTA in your pin description
Try ‘Click for more details’ or ‘Click through to learn more’
Test this for yourself to see if it improves your Pinterest engagement. It results in huge virality and participation increases on Facebook and Twitter so it’s worth a shot!

Conclusion

Hopefully you’ve now got some ideas of how to market on Pinterest this holiday season. Focus on getting creative, don’t be afraid to market your brand as much as you’re promoting your products. Make your brand look awesome and you’ll increase sales, I promise.

Further Reading:

By James Scherer @ Wishpond

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