Becoming a contributor on a popular shared board on Pinterest can really increase the number of repins and click throughs to your blog or website. This post will show you how to create shared boards and how to become a contributor as well as highlighting the many advantages.
As you can see from the screenshot above, less than 24 hours after pinning the same blog post to 3 different boards, the pin pinned to my own ‘Pinterest’ individual board (with 508 followers) received just one repin, the pin pinned to the ‘Pinterest community’ shared board which has 206 contributors and 1,590 followers received 3 repins and the pin pinned to the ‘Pinterest Day’ shared board with 52 contributers and 6,350 followers received 15 repins.
Pinning your blog posts to popular shared boards really increases the reach of your pins as well as the number of click throughs and thus, of conversions and increased brand awareness. I tend to find that my ‘how to / social media’ type pins generate significantly more click throughs than repins at a ratio of about 50:1
How Do You Find Suitable Contributor Boards?
You have to be invited to contributor boards. Shared boards are indicated by the presence of an icon showing 3 people. However, it’s not possible to search for shared boards under particular topics without it taking an extremely long time (at least that I can find!)
You can create your own shared boards and invite others to contribute. Become a thought leader in your field and invite others to contribute to a board in your specialist area. If you would like to contribute to my new contributor board entitled ‘Social Media 2013‘ do let me know.
How To Become a Contributor:
- You may receive invites to become a contributor to various boards. Always check out the board before agreeing to ensure it is suitable for your brand and business as it will show up on your boards page.
- You can invite others to contribute to your own shared boards or a shared board that you already contribute to. All you have to do is follow at least one of their boards and type in their name or email address, then click ‘send invite’.
How To Leave A Shared Pinterest Board:
It can happen that you may agree to contribute to a shared board and then find it is either of little interest to you or your email is flooded with notifications of pins and you become annoyed. If you wish to leave a shared board, just do the following:
- Click on the shared board in question
- Click ‘edit board’
- Click ‘remove’ which is beside your name
Secret Shared Pinterest Boards
Secret boards can become shared boards too and these offer a great way to plan with clients or colleagues. Remember, however, that any of the contributors to the secret board can put it public at any time.
See our post ‘12 Ideas for Using Secret Boards on Pinterest‘.
Advantages of Shared Boards For Your Business
1. Set yourself up as a Thought Leader in your field – particularly if you set up the contributor board and contribute regularly
2. Become part of a community
3. Get to know more pinners.
4. Benefit from more repins and click throughs.
5. Can collaborate with others on projects/ideas.
6. Increase brand awareness.
If you are interested in learning more about Pinterest, sign up to receive updates of our upcoming online courses which will be launched in April. Be in with a chance to win a free place on your course of choice too.
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