Digital vs. social media, what is the difference?
 
Year after Year, technology evolves at what seems like an ever-faster pace. I realize that’s not shocking news – a bit like when your Great-Aunt Evelyn points out how tall you’re getting for the umpteenth time. Time flies and technology evolves quickly. However, whether it is a new gadget or a new operating system, it is fascinating to see how it impacts the way we go about our lives.
 
In the era of the Internet and social media, viral videos and memes, media is an integral part of our daily routines. It’s fair to say that if you’re reading this, you’re someone that would be more crushed to lose your smart phone than your wallet. You’ve also probably launched your very own personal social campaign. And you are no doubt guilty of tweeting, facebooking, instagraming, and pinning something that you thought was worth sharing in order to enhance your social presence. That’s what we do with media these days.
 
I was struck by an article by Rebecca Leib positing that ‘digital’ and ‘social’ media are the same. She states that ‘all media is digital.’ Upon examination, that’s hard to refute. Perhaps we have focused on separating the two based upon who distributes the content. If a consumer posts something, it falls in the category of social media, whereas if a brand posts something it is known as a digital media campaign. The assumption could be that the individual is simply sharing while the brand is using more sophistication and analysis in order to sell stuff.
 
Media is everywhere, whether it is print, broadcast, digital, or social. What we see from both consumers and brands is that they are sharing media of the digital variety. Over time the lines have blurred to the point that the lines don’t really exist anymore. What we are left with is an ever-evolving set of tools. A decade ago, we shared silly jokes or photos via e-mail. Now we share them via Pinterest. In between there was MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Digg and a slew of others, some of which fell by the wayside. The point is, they were all digital and they all offered us the ability to share something about ourselves, or something we liked, or something that reflected our personality. In other words, they allowed us to launch our very own social campaign.
 
As proof, look no further than the painful demise of Barnes & Noble’s Nook. The e-reader created by the only remaining national bookseller just couldn’t keep up with the advancements made by other tablets. It wasn’t full-featured enough, including its e-mail functionality and social media components. Its ability to be a digital and social portal was inadequate, and people didn’t adopt it despite the bookseller pushing it at every turn. Folks don’t want a device or a broadsheet that only allows them to take in content. They want that device to do more. They want to be able to share.
 
From the brand side, look at how campaigns are launched. The majority of the commercials shown during the Super Bowl were shared prior to the big game and utilized hashtags, Facebook pages and other sharing options. Viewers expected to be able to join the conversation, bridging the gap between broadcast and digital. This is a trend that companies have adopted across all their digital campaigns.
 
So what does this all mean? It means that we might no longer be able to draw a distinction. Digital media has gone social, and social media has gone digital.
 
 
 

As a creative service provider we value the creative process. Every agency has its own approach, depending upon the medium in which they work and their resources. However, the process is what ensures that we, as the “creatives”, do not stray from the needs of the client. That is the key, because video and digital media for marketers and advertisers isn’t about making art or being creative for the sake of creativity. As a collaborative team, we commit to a process that will achieve desired results for the client and the brand.
 
On top of that, clients expect an agency to be able to help them navigate those waters. The creative process acts as the chart, or the road map. It helps the client understand how to get from an idea and need to a successfully developed tactic. We believe that in order to sustain a good relationship and to execute our work efficiently, effectively and creatively, we need both the client and creative to understand and grasp the process.
 
In The Subjectivity of Creative we provided a list of ways to ensure alignment. Here is an overview of the Creative Process that BARS+TONE has developed.
 
• Develop the Strategy – Understanding what the client hopes to achieve with a given campaign or tactic is crucial to developing the right creative concept. At the outset, we work with the client to hone in on the strategy. There are two key components: 
 

 
• Creative Team Reviews Creative Brief and Brand Research – Once we have the necessary background information in hand, it is crucial that the creative team meet to review the materials together. As part of the collaborative process, it is extremely helpful that a kick-off meeting gets everyone on the same page. 
 
• Individual Creative Time – At BARS+TONE, we value the individual creativity our team members bring to the project. Our team members are given time and freedom to come up with ideas that will achieve the objectives detailed in the creative brief. 
 
• Group Creative Time – Once the individuals have developed ideas, the creative team reconvenes to flush out concepts. While the number of concepts varies from project-to-project, we typically select three that we will develop and present to the client. Again, we ensure that we have made our decisions based on the brand overview, client objectives, key message and audience. Frequently the concepts will vary in style and budget, providing the client a range from which to choose. 
 
• Present Concepts to Client – If we’ve done our job right up to this point, we should be successful in pitching one of our three concepts to the client.  
 
• Develop Concept – It’s not enough to agree on a strategy and a concept. As we’ve discussed before, creativity is subjective. Collaboration, input and feedback between the client and creatives will help ensure that the agreed upon concept is developed in a manner that meets expectations. In the case of developing a video project – especially one that is largely cgi or animation – we use tools to help facilitate this process: 
 

 
The creative process is more than providing a unique, one-of-a-kind idea. It is about creating a relationship and remaining in alignment with a client in order to fulfill their needs. Anything less is missing the mark.
 
 
 

Another Super Bowl has come and gone, and if you’re a Niner fan, all you have to do now is dissect what could have been. That is, unless you’re also a marketer, in which case you can dissect the good, the bad and the ugly ads that were served up to us. Here are some thoughts from our team.
 
User Generated, Hits and Misses – User-generated ads continued to be a trend this year, accounting for three of the top ten Tivo’d ads. Doritos offered up two “humorous” crowd-sourced commercials. Unfortunately, humor is subjective, and these spots fell flat in our opinion. Audi of America’s “Prom” and Coca Cola’s “Coke Chase” gave fans the opportunity to choose the ending via online voting prior to the game. Audi’s “Prom” was cute, until the protagonist puts the Prom Queen in a lip-lock and gets hit by her date. Brave? Perhaps. Stupid. Undoubtedly. What’s it say about Audi? Not entirely sure. Coca Cola’s “Coke Chase” generated a lot of excitement prior to the game. Unfortunately the short “diversion” clips and the clip announcing the winner didn’t quite live up to the hype. Not exactly Old Spice stuff, I have to say.
 
Previewing Ads didn’t hurt, But Racial Stereotyping Will – As we discussed prior to the big game, many major brands once again previewed their spots. According to Tivo, nine of the top ten spots were released ahead of time, and the #10-ranked Volkswagen’s “Get In. Get Happy” received more than 8,373,067 views on YouTube before the live airings. So, folks had a chance to see them before the game and still rewound to watch them again? I guess the luster of it all hadn’t worn off. That said, VW has gotten skewered for blatant racial stereotyping. Sure it was a humorous spot, but brands should reconsider using stereotypes to get a few laughs. It’s not likely to lead to sales but it sure can damage the brand name.
 
Chrysler Breaks Even… Maybe – Speaking of another brand to step in it. The Dodge “Farmer” spot was one of my favorites this year. It came from the heart and spoke to the essence of the Dodge Ram brand. Like last year’s “Imported From Detroit” it really struck a tone. Not so the “Whole Again” spot. Jeep’s crass product placement in an otherwise touching narrative smacked of exploitation. Did “Farmer” exploit the hardships of the American farmer? Perhaps, but that’s altogether different than exploiting veterans who sacrificed everything for their country. I’m not sure how the court of public opinion sees it, but if Chrysler is lucky, they break even on this one.
 
Bud Light and Go Daddy Buck the Trend – I never hold out much hope for Bud Light or Go Daddy, but I have to say that they upped their intelligence quotient just a bit. I actually really liked “Superstition” spots. It was a great extension of an existing campaign and took good advantage of the New Orleans locale and voodoo. Mix in a bit of Stevie Wonder and I have to say, the two spots “Journey” and “Lucky Chair” hit the mark. As for Go Daddy, the only way for them was up, but year after year they seemed to stay right there in the gutter. “Your Big Idea” was an ode to procrastinators that actually spoke to the Go Daddy brand, with just a small Danica Patrick cameo. Of course, they also served up “Perfect Match” but then, Rome wasn’t built in a day.
 
Amy Poehler Said “Dongle” – We’re no fans of Best Buy, but we love the word “dongle”.
 
Finally, Taco Bell’s “Viva Young” captured the message ‘You Only Live Once’. Is this what retirement looks like at Taco Bell? Not too bad, though if you haven’t gotten tattooed by 80, isn’t it a wee bit late?
 
What did you think of this year’s ads? Did the industry serve up the best they had? Or did it fall flat? What were your favorites? Let us know and join the conversation.
 
 

As the Super Bowl approaches, companies are preparing their ads, showing snippets and getting consumers involved.
 
Sure, the 49ers and the Ravens will be playing a big game, but like many marketers (and non-marketers) I am more excited about the ads. I think I pay more attention to the ads than the actual game. Some ads hit and some are miss; some are funny, some are confusing and some simply lack creativity. In order for an ad to stand out, especially during half time, it has to be engaging and interesting, elevating the brand above the considerable clutter.
 
This year, there’s been a lot of buzz around Super Bowl Campaigns, especially brands “leaking” their Super Bowl spots. A recent MediaPost article indicates “Pre-game campaigns on average generated 2.1 million social views, twice the average of total views for post-game releases.” Therefore, showing a snippet of the ad before the game will have more views and involvement after the game. On the other hand, an article in the New York Times interviewed executives who “…see disadvantages to previewing Super Bowl spots in full because doing so could diminish…the shock and awe.” Some fans are anxiously waiting until game day to see the ads, because the ads are part of super bowl experience. So while the verdict may still be out, both sides are correct to some degree: the most important thing is that the ad has to be memorable.
 
Many companies such as Coca cola, Bud Light, and Toyota are going big, pushing their campaigns far beyond just the 30-second commercial. They are creating longer format ads and an engaging online and social experience for their consumers. At the end of their ad there is a hash tag so fans can tweet and be part of the conversation, before and during the game. For example, Coca Cola encourages viewers to vote on how the spot ends.
 
Another example is Target, who has created a mobile game called Snack Bowl. Consumers who play the game will see products such as Coke Zero, Stride Gum and Digornio frozen pizzas. This helps consumers create a list of snacks they can purchase at Target to create the best Super Bowl party. These experiences are helping consumers interact with the brand on a personal level, even before the game, and making it easier for the brand to communicate directly to consumers.
 
I have seen a few super bowls in my lifetime and I still remember some ads from previous years. It wasn’t that I saw it early, or that it was a surprise, but that it was an interesting and engaging ad. For example last year’s M&Ms ad was one of my favorites. It was funny, entertaining and memorable.
 
Consumers want to see funny and entertaining ads, so it doesn’t matter the time it was shown, but how well it executed. Whether the ad is leaked or truly premiers on game day, marketers need to maximize their investment. Super Bowl ads need to extend beyond the four quarters of football and they need to rise above the clutter. It’s a risk, but those who get it right will be the big winners on Super Sunday.
 
 

 
“Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.” – Erich Fromm
 
Uh oh, that could be trouble. Because in business, when we set expectations with clients, and enter into agreements, both sides expect a degree of certainty. But when creativity is part of the equation, certainty becomes altogether uncertain.
 
Put another way, you have your opinion and I have mine. Creativity being a subjective matter, we will both be entitled to our opinions. As a B2B creative services provider, we are challenged to manage the uncertainties of creative, balance expectations and deliver to the client what they expected when we established a business relationship.
 
With everyone entitled to their own opinion, the juggling act is not always an easy one to manage.
 
I recently read a blog post by Brian Solis. The premise of the post is that social media won’t save you, but good client relationships and experiences will. He has this to say: “From experience, there are two other ingredients that serve as harbingers to the future of any business, under-scoping or underestimating sales and marketing and underemphasizing product quality and customer experiences.” What resonates with me is that a good service provider will first be on target with the sale and then secondly provide quality and good customer experience. There are two parts of the equation, but both require an agreement between client and provider, and there’s the rub.
 
Creativity is not a commodity, something that can be easily packaged and sold for a fee. What happens when that lack of certainty plays havoc with agreement? What happens when creative is met with “I don’t think that is very good”? It requires careful management of expectations, and that can only be truly achieved by maintaining close relationships with the client. Solis goes on to write about how social media can help forge those relationships. He talks about “Listening with Intent” and “Designing the Experience.”
 
Listening should never be underestimated. As the saying goes: “We have two ears and one mouth. Use them in that ratio.” Every service provider says that they “listen to the client to provide a truly collaborative experience.” It’s a bit of a cliché, but like many clichés, there is a strong whiff of truth.
 
However, there is another important benefit to listening – you discover when things are amiss. In our creative world, that usually refers to a creative disconnect.
 
By listening with intent we can catch creative disconnect at an early stage. It won’t do away with creative disconnect, but the earlier it is addressed the more likely a solution will be found.
 
Designing the experience is also crucial. Like most professions, the client comes to us and assumes we will be the expert. Consciously or unconsciously, clients expect continuity in relationships. Some of the ways of ensuring they remain “in the loop”:
 
• Research is crucial. Conduct or reference existing research that indicates your creative approach is designed to resonate with the client’s targeted market segments.
 
• Creative briefs act as a roadmap. Establish clear creative briefs that explain the strategy behind the tactic and the potential creative direction.
 
• Communicate. Maintain clear communication through regular check-ins with clients. Any recommendations or updated concepts should be clearly communicated, understood and agreed upon.
 
• Reviews and feedback are important. First, know who needs to give feedback. Second, get feedback from all key stakeholders ASAP. This makes sure everyone is on the same page and avoids backtracking.
 
• Make sure you have client alignment and approval of storyboards before production.
 
• Reach a mutual understanding that connotations and tone of any media tools are consistent with client brand positioning – whether it’s a video, an online ad or an app – before it approaches the stage for final sign-off.
 
The client experience and the creative process are inextricably linked. If the experience is poor, or the creative process unconvincing, it is most likely due to a weak foundation — the absence of a relationship built on continuity in communication.
 
Another blog entry got me thinking more about client relationships. Hank Blank wonders if agencies are teaching their people how to establish client relationships. After all, social media alone will not get you there, and neither will e-mails and text messages.  
 
Are we doing enough to engage our clients and build that relationship? Because uncertainty in creative is going to lead to tough discussions and even tougher decisions. Is your client relationship strong enough to survive? What are agencies doing to build and maintain relationships? I’m very curious about this, because in the end, that seems to be the best way to ensure that the business agreement survives uncertainty.
 
 

As we kick off our Mobile Marketing edition of the Static Newsletter, it would be good to establish two key thoughts:
 
1. Mobile marketing is crucial to reaching your target audience, where they are, utilizing a device through which they will engage with you.
2. Most marketers still don’t have a handle on how to effectively utilize mobile marketing.
 
The following statistics are astounding and back up claim number 1. According to Smart Media Tips:
 
• The average response time to an email is 90 minutes. The average response time to a text message is 90 seconds.
• By 2015, more people will access the Internet through a smartphone or tablet than a PC.
• 79% of people use their phone to make or influence a purchasing decision.
• 91% of smartphone owners have their phone within 3 feet at all times.
 
In other words, they are literally hooked to their mobile device, are reacting to messages faster than via PC and are influenced to purchase based upon these messages. If you’re not interacting with them via the mobile device then you are missing a massive opportunity to reach and engage that client.
 
That leads us to point number 2. According to an e-Marketer report, despite the promise of mobile marketing, it still represents just over 1% of the global advertising spend worldwide. But that number only accounts for mobile ad spend. According to a StrongMail survey of business leaders and marketers conducted in conjunction with Zoomerang:
 
• Just 45% have adopted mobile marketing; while 57% have been doing it for 12 months or less
• 37% cite lack of strategy as top reason for lack of adoption, followed by lack of resources (22%)
 
In other words, not only is the ad spend just 1% of budget, but business leaders are acknowledging the fact that they have been slow to adopt a sound mobile strategy. When we consider the promise of mobile marketing, these conclusions are unfortunate, but represent a great opportunity for marketers and digital agencies.
 
While mobile marketing isn’t exactly new, marketers and agencies need to find a way to leverage the promise of mobile. I discussed this with Anthony Volpe, a marketing executive who implemented mobile and social marketing tactics for Travelocity. “We found out at Travelocity years ago that displaying advertising to consumers on their mobile devices was definitely a winning proposition. As the number of smartphones proliferated and consumers began using them to book online travel of all sorts (flights, hotels, etc.), it was helpful to be right there at their fingertips with relevant ads and retail offers.” For marketers, it means learning a slightly new language, developing new strategies and implementing new tactics. It means taking some risk in order to finally get a handle on mobile.
 
For Volpe, the results were conclusive. “Consumers were engaged with the ads and our CTR and engagement were significant and higher than we anticipated. As a result of our growing success, and in looking to optimize our cross-channel marketing spend, we looked to continually increase our mobile advertising budget to take advantage of the increasing revenue opportunities that mobile afforded us.”
 
As we explore mobile marketing, it is important to understand the power that the mobile device represents and the many ways we have of reaching our target audience via that device. From SMS texting to QR Codes and NFC; from mobile site development and mobile optimized e-mail marketing to social media engagement. As marketers integrate their mobile marketing initiatives into their online efforts, the options are limitless. However, it requires an understanding of the power of mobile marketing and a commitment to a strategy. Until a marketer understands the value of mobile and commits, it will be a golden opportunity lost. But there is hope yet. Keep reading as we explore the unfulfilled promise of mobile marketing.
 

As a digital marketing agency, we always strive to be more efficient. Like we tell our clients – if you have the option of saying it in 90-seconds or saying it in 3-minutes, say it in 90. Economy of words is important. It keeps people engaged and makes it more likely that you’ll keep them around to the end. In both video and in IT, that’s often easier said than done. As the Technical Director, my goal is to make things more efficient for the client and more efficient for the creative and production team. As such, I’m faced with two problems: making ourselves more efficient internally, and making the client experience better through increased efficiency. This blog entry is the first of two, and it focuses on internal efficiency. If you’re looking to do this for your agency, a good place to look is your software.
In any small business, different departments are likely to use different software to accomplish their daily tasks. This is pretty normal and nothing to worry about. What can go unnoticed, however, is that the same data must often be entered into each piece of software, because the programs don’t talk to each other. There also needs to be a strategy to make sure that if existing data is updated by one department, the others all receive the new information. This redundancy can be a huge waste of time, and it can also create confusion if people use outdated information by mistake.
For a good example, look at employee and customer information. At my office, the sales team uses a web-based CRM database to manage customer relations and also as a contact list. The HR department uses web-based HR software for employees and contractor info. The accounting department uses QuickBooks to pay workers and bill customers. The same employee, contractor, and customer information needs to go in all three places, and each department needs its respective software in order to accomplish its goals.
 
What you want to do is either have the software products share information between each other, or have one big software product that can be used by all departments. The second option is great but prohibitively expensive for all except large enterprises, so let’s focus on getting individual software products to talk to each other.
 
The first thing to do is make a list of all the data that needs to be shared, and the way it needs to be shared given how your business works. Looking at my example above, what needs to be shared is primarily customer contact info and contractor contact info. The way it needs to be shared is more complicated. The Sales Team brings in leads that become new customers, and the HR Team makes first contact with contractors. But all this info needs to be in QuickBooks. So at the very least, information must pass from the CRM software to QuickBooks once a day, and from the HR software to QuickBooks maybe once every few months because we get new contractors less frequently than we get new customers.
 
Since the Sales and HR software must both talk to QuickBooks, it makes sense to try and integrate them with QuickBooks. The first thing to find out is whether automatic integration is possible, and if not, what other options you have. Google is your friend here – search for something like “[your software] quickbooks integration” and see what you get. If you’re using modern web-based software, your chances are better than if you’re using an older program that needs to be installed on each person’s desktop.
 
If you’re lucky and your software has an automatic two-way QB integration option, go for it! If not, you’ve got two choices. The first is to have a regularly scheduled process where you export new data from your software and import it into QB manually. This can often be done with a CSV (comma-separated value) file, which can be exported and imported by most database programs. This can work, but it can be annoying and cumbersome if you have to do it too often.
 
The second choice is to stop using your existing software and find new software that comes with automatic two-way QuickBooks integration out of the box. We’re doing this at my office with our CRM database. We’ve found one that tightly integrates with QB, and it has better features than our existing CRM software!
 
That being said, migrating from one software product to another – or even just adding a manual export process – can be difficult. It’s up to you to figure out whether the time you would save by reducing data entry is worth the potential difficulty of moving to new software or adding new processes. But if you can make the jump to new software that satisfies your needs and also talks to other software, you’ll never want to go back.
 
These internal efficiencies in our software and technical architecture have made things easier and faster for our entire team. That frees the production and creative department to focus on providing stellar solutions to our clients, and for our business development team to spend more energy doing what they do best. And in the words of Steven Covey, that’s a “win-win” situation.
 

Marketing on Pinterest
 
If you are deciding whether or not to use Pinterest, take a look at your target market and decide if they can be reached via this social network. If you can, here are some best practices for optimizing marketing results.
 
Marketing on Pinterest is all about filling boards with beautiful and thought-provoking images that sell products and drive traffic. The main benefits that Pinterest provides businesses are simultaneously driving traffic while increasing SEO rankings. When you add a pin that links to your website and users “repin” your images, they are creating inbound links to your website, which increases the visibility of your brand and your SEO.
 
In terms of creating a sound profile, make sure to have a completed profile that is keyword dense and links back to your website. Moreover, by integrating Facebook and Twitter, you can gain more exposure for your content and also increase your follower base more rapidly.  Another way of getting followers is by engaging with other users. The most common forms of engagement in Pinterest are “liking”, commenting, “repining” and, whenever appropriate, tagging other users with the @ symbol. Lastly, measure your influence and find people to follow with Pinfluence or Pinclout.

You can also optimize your pins by adding creative titles and using keywords that are relevant to your target market in the description. If you own the images you are “pinning”, consider using a watermark to highlight your brand.  If you don’t, make sure to either use a Creative Commons image that has no copyrights or state the source where you got the image from. If you are selling products, here are a few more tips to increase your sales. Add the price including the $ or £ symbol depending on the currency. This will not only create a header over the image with the price, but also gives your product the possibility of being added to the “Gifts” section, which increases exposure.

To encourage a viral sharing of your products, make sure to add the “Pin It Button” to your website because it invites your readers to pin your products onto their Pinterest board. Likewise, the “Follow Button” invites your readers to follow you on Pinterest. More importantly, don’t just pin pictures of your products, create a lifestyle around them.  For example, if you have a cookware line, don’t just pin pictures of pans, post pictures of scrumptious meals that can be prepared with those pans or How-To videos of how to cook with your line of cookware. For example, Circulon Cooks has a Pinterest account that showcases their merchandise as well as visually stunning meals and recipes (see screenshot to the left).

Since every product or audience is different, marketers can only suggest broad stroke guidelines. However,   in order to tailor your strategy, you must constantly repeat the process of experimenting, analyzing, and optimizing your campaigns.  A few examples of experimenting with Pinterest would be using different media, like sound, video, or images, post them at different times and different days. This not only   maximizes traffic and audience engagement, but it reveals which pins got more traction.  In order to analyze your Pinterest traffic, go to pinterest.com/source/yourdomain.  To gain more insights, you can cross check the Pinterest data with Google Analytics.  After you cross reference these two sets of data, analyze the elements from your most popular pins and you will discover what resonates with your audience. Lastly, the optimization comes from using these popular pins as ideal examples to model the rest of your pins after. By using these optimized posts, you increase your amplification chances, which results in incremental exposure. Then, repeat the process constantly to generate a responsive, optimized marketing campaign.
 
Stay abreast of trends by following us on Twitter and Liking our Facebook page!
 
 

By: Angela Romero, Marketing Associate

Angela@bars-tone.com

@AngelaLRomero

We are doing a two part series on the newest and shiniest social media platform, Pinterest. In the first section, we will cover the anatomy of Pinterest and how it compares to other social networks. In the upcoming blog post, we will cover in-depth strategies and best practices when marketing with Pinterest. We’ll keep you posted!

Anatomy of Pinterest

Think of Pinterest as a content curation platform packaged in an image-based, social bookmarking network. In the Pinterest ecosystem, users can upload, save, and manage images, videos, PowerPoints and SoundCloud files, known as pins. The content curation process involves selecting particular images or videos and “pinning” them to theme-based “pinboards”. Users can select the theme for their pinboard, which is like an album on Facebook.  The social networking features involve “repining”, which saves another user’s image to your pinboard, so basically it’s like sharing content to your Facebook’s timeline and commenting on other people’s pins. Also, you can follow not only other users, but other pinboards as well. The people or pinboards that you follow then show up in a Facebook-like feed on your homepage. Moreover, Pinterest has a social bookmarking feature where you can save images from websites to pinboards with the “Pin It” Button that can be downloaded here.  Users create a master collection of images that can by browsed Categories, Popularity or by Gifts.

Pinterest Compared with other Social Networks

By hitting 10 million unique visitors per month in the U.S. in just a few months, Pinterest took other social networking sites by storm.  With alluring images of dream-like vacation spots, stunning vintage couture and, yes, tons of cupcakes, Pinterest has captured the hearts and most importantly the time of users. comScore reports that users spend  98 minutes per month on Pinterest. Only Facebook and Tumblr gobble more of user’s time with 7 hours and 2.5 hours, respectively. But who is using Pinterest? The graph below showcases the demographics of Pinterest users who are  mostly women between the ages of 18 and 34 year old who belong to the upper income bracket.

This unprecedented growth took the attention of marketers who have since developed best practices to promote their products. With its inherent visual appeal Pinterest has turned into a full-fledged online catalog where online retailers, travel destinations, fashion brands, home décor, and design products can gain exposure by leveraging an ever-growing online community.  Taking into consideration Pinterest’s demographics and its visually driven interface, it’s no surprise that Nordstrom’s, Whole Foods, and the Travel Channel are some of the brands with the biggest follower base. Granted Pinterest might be better suited for visual content, brands like the Wall Street Journal have taken a creative approach to tap into the Pinterest market. For example, the Wall Street Journal pins images and links them to related articles on their website. For other non-visually driven businesses creating visuals like infographics or showcasing pictures of staff are decent approaches for marketing in Pinterest.

Stayed tuned for part two -Very Pinterest-Ing: How to Create a Killer Marketing Strategy – where will cover in-depth strategies and best practices when marketing with Pinterest.

Stay abreast of trends by following us on Twitter and Liking our Facebook page!

By: Angela Romero, Marketing Associate

Angela@bars-tone.com

@AngelaLRomero