Ever thought sharing your favorite things graphically will become amazingly easy and interactive; no, yes, may be; I never thought it would be. But makers of Pinterest did think of an interactive way to share what you like. Pinterest is basically an interactive bulletin board that a person can use to post pictures, videos etc. that we find online or even have taken personally. Its 2012’s one of the hottest internet tool. It has already gained popularity among masses and as per CNN on April 6th 2012 has become the 3rd most used social site in the world.
- Market your products visually
- Increase traffic for your community
- Pin photo from your albums
- “Pin It” plugin for Social Networking Sites
So how would you look at Pinterest, what purpose it could serve for you?
The first thing that comes to my mind is Fun. I can create boards for various categories such as movies, places, food, fashion, quotes, apparel and lot other things you can think of. So basically it gives you power to express graphically or should I say visually. Also it allows you to follow your friends and being followed hence providing an additional tool of connection beyond facebook and twitter.
Moving away from fun, I think it helps enhancing your knowledge. It is factually proven that visual media aids learning and gaining knowledge that can be retained for long. Yes, I do find lot of knowledgeable stuff related to fitness, technology, health, society, and people in a most interactive manner. Lately, I have resorted to Pinterest for most of the fitness related information. Best part is it is easy to find. You can follow people who have created boards related to the content you are looking for and you find all kinds. Moment they will pin any new information on their boards you are going to see that on your account.
Another important objective you can accomplish is to promote your products, business or professional work. Yes, I have seen businesses using Pinterest to promote their products especially in the businesses related to fashion and apparel. You will find many boards related to Bridal wear that are created by fashion houses or even by small businesses to promote their products. Pinterest has potential to attract a handsome business value for your products because it is visual. Your customers can see what you do and what you can do. You can even find new customers by being active on Pinterest and posting regularly. Here is an image of how a Pin Board looks like.
Why Pinterest? Why not Facebook and Twitter?
Simple answer to that lies in whatever I have discussed till now, Graphically Interactive. Facebook and Twitter are great tools for connections and social networking but they come with a gamut of features and tools to use. They are majorly text oriented and photos and videos are there ancillary modes of sharing. But Pinterest is different since its primary focus is on sharing images and videos, and in that too images still dominate. At Pinterest you can know more about a person by simply looking at the boards they have created and pins they share. It gives a bird’s eye view of what a person likes. It shares more information graphically about a person’s life and lifestyle. And if you want to dig deeper you can follow them.
What we are doing for SocialEngine and phpFox?
We are a company working on Social Networking platforms such as SocialEngine and phpFox. These platforms have not yet provided easy integration with Pinterest to be able to share photos that a user sees or posts on these platforms. We have created Pinterest plugins for SocialEngine (Product) and phpFox (Product) using Pinterest Goodies. By using this plugin a Pin It button appears for all the images that allows the user to post the photo to their Pinterest board.
How Pin It button is added
Its quiet easy to do so, you just need to go to Pinterest Goodies. They have provided a Javascript and CSS tag that needs to be added to your page where the Pin It button is to be shown. Follow the instructions and you are all set. We have done this for SocialEngine and phpFox.
