Pinterest recently added business account capabilities to its social media platform, making it possible for companies to register by company name and not under an individual.This is great news for any subscription sites focused on hobby niches, like crafting, cooking or photography. While Pinterest’s reputation is a bit inflated, it’s still a strong social media platform for B2C publications that use a lot of images or photographs.However, subscription sites should also be careful in how they employ the tools associated with a business account. During sign-up, Pinterest will encourage you to add “Pin It” and follow buttons on your site. But the “Pin It” button can jeopardize your copyright. In fact, you may actually want to install the “No Pin” code to certain areas or images on your site.To get an idea of how your subscription sites can best use Pinterest, take a look at these subscription sites’ pinboards:
- Angie’s List — 19 pinboards related to lifestyle topics like home décor, home improvement tricks, and weddings. They also have an “Around the Office” pinboard with quotes relevant to their office culture (“Coffee Solves Everything”) and local photos.
- Consumer Reports Online — 14 pinboards with a lot of product photos, but also some great ideas for legacy publications, such as a pinboard celebrating their 75th anniversary and pinboards dedicated to vintage photos from the magazine.
- Demand Metric — A B2B site with a pinboard dedicated to images of their premium tools and templates for businesses. The images are colorful, which makes them appealing to Pinterest users, but too small to view on Pinterest, which makes users go to Demand Metric’s site.
- Wall Street Journal — Two great pinboards you should check out — one dedicated to pull quotes, which is a great way to make ideas visual, and a pinboard for WSJ’s iconic “headcuts” illustrations, which makes staff photos more artistic. They also have a pinboard titled “An Introduction to Pinterest,” indicating that they really know their readers!
