Last week we talked about listening to your followers. This
week we will explore how you can take charge of your growth.
Be aware of what people are responding to. In aviation it is
called situational awareness. With Pinterest it is called analytics. When I first started on Pinterest, I
literally made hand drawn tables listing my boards. Every morning I would
write down how many followers each board had so I could track my growth. There
were pages of data that I put on an Excel spreadsheet. Know what
type of pins get the biggest response.
I believe you will find that each board will develop it’s own personality
based on your particular followers taste.
As Pinterest evolved several companies that track analytics started up. If you are interested in your analytics, you don’t have to do it by hand like I did. Some of these new companies also provide a photo editing capability.
Be creative. Start boards on subjects that are different. The big hitters already dominate the most popular categories. Community boards also cover most of the common categories as well. The chances of you finding a new pin that will go viral in these categories is pretty slim.
My first “viral” pin was a tree house picture. My “Cool Tree Houses” board quickly became my most popular board. I believe that the biggest reason for this was the fact that there were only a couple of tree house boards on all of Pinterest and I was offering something new.
“In the Garden” is now my biggest board by far. How did that happen? “In the Garden” board was purely flower
pictures for the first several months. There are lots of great flower pictures all over Pinterest. I decided to mix things up. It seemed the more I pushed the boundaries of what “In the Garden” included, the more my followers responded. Over time I found that DIY projects or tips about home made bug spray became way more popular with my followers than plain old flower pictures. Very rarely do I get a big response from a great flower picture anymore.
In fact it is the flower pins that I have to edit the most.
Thanks for following Dan330. Next time we will discuss Pinterest boards.
