Podcasts about promoted pins

social media technology stand entrepreneurship startups seo pinterest digital marketing online businesses business strategy internet marketing tailwinds pinterest marketing promoted pins

Play Episode Listen Later May 27, 2020 52:36

If you want to know how to successfully sell your products online, you are in for a treat. I'm interviewing my friend, Monica Froese, from Redefining Mom, on how to know what products to sell, how to find product opportunities, how to build highly converting sales funnels, and how to provide wins for your customers so they keep coming back. We do a deep dive into the strategies and frameworks you need to know to build compelling products for your audience and market them successfully so they happily buy. Show Notes MiloTree Pop-Up App MiloTree Membership Group Redefining Mom Catch My Party Host 0:04 Welcome to the Blogger Genius Podcast brought to you by MiloTree. Here's your host, Jillian Leslie. Jillian Leslie 0:11 Hello, everyone. Welcome back to The Blogger Genius. Looking for tech support, teaching, and community? Join our MiloTree Membership Group Before I get started, I want to announce that we have a program called the MiloTree Membership Group. We were listening to what you guys were telling us in terms of feedback. And one thing that you kept saying is getting tech support is difficult as a blogger. Bloggers have to wear so many hats. So the idea that you have to dig in and deal with all of the back end technology related to your blog can be difficult. Also, we've heard that you want ongoing teaching sessions and workshops, like in the podcast, and third, you're looking for a community of like-minded bloggers and entrepreneurs. So within the MiloTree Membership Group, we offer tech support. We offer workshops, and we offer community. It's all of that rolled into one. We're very excited about it. It's like having a whole support system behind you. So if you want to learn more head to milotree.com/membership. It's a monthly membership, but you can cancel at any time. We, as you can tell, are really committed to helping you succeed. For today's episode, I have my friend Monica Froese back on the show. What we are talking about is business building. And we are talking about how to think about your blog as a business, how to roll up your sleeves and really get to know your audience, how to solve problems for your audience, an dhow to sell to your audience. We give you the whole framework in this podcast episode. And I love Monica because she is so straight. And her advice is so clear. I think you are really going to get a ton out of this interview. So without further delay, here is my interview with my friend Monica Froese from Redefining Mom. Monica, welcome to the show. Monica Froese 2:51 Thank you so much for having me again. And I was just saying to you that your episodes are some of my most popular so I was very excited to get you back. Monica Froese 2:51 I think we've recorded some really good ones like the first one was right after I had the baby, which I still think is one of my favorite because it's a it's like a snapshot in time. I get to listen to how I was feeling in that postpartum period. Jillian Leslie 3:03 Yes. And I think that you were so authentic and honest about the struggles. Yeah. And I found that. Yeah, but I think that there was something. I think other people could see themselves in that struggle to go. Yeah, that explains all those feelings that I'm having. Monica Froese 3:19 Yeah, for real and that and I've gotten emails with people who told me that that really helped them. So I appreciate you having me on so that I can share that kind of stuff with people. How to Build Online Products Jillian Leslie 3:28 Absolutely. So what I wanted to talk about with you today is products. You've built your business— you tell me if this is true—by serving needs, finding needs, serving those needs to your audience. And we talked about this before, which is when you started Redefining Mom, you were a variety of different things. And I think that you've been able to potentially find your sweet spot. Monica Froese 3:58 Yes, even a lot has changed since the last time we talked in terms of my product strategy. So when Redefining Mom started in 2013, there were no products because I was working full-time corporate, didn't have time for that. When I decided to start taking it seriously, I knew that I really wanted to do products, but I needed somewhere to start. So I had this brand Redefining Mom, which is for working moms. Now it was for corporate working moms and like time management for corporate working moms, and we've morphed into helping moms balance running a business and motherhood. So it's taking them out of corporate and moving them into like the entrepreneurial space, but we still cater to the mom needs and the business needs. But what has happened is so when I got started with Redefining Mom and creating products, it was very much geared towards the stuff that moms needed to address. And I started with a product. The Importance of Experimentation in Building Products online Jillian Leslie 5:02 You started with like a Google Sheet or a spreadsheet or something for yourself. Monica Froese 5:07 still one of my best selling products. Yeah. So I basically when I in 2016, I remember this, it was June of 2016. And I wanted to accelerate the process of leaving my corporate job. And I wanted the quickest win I could get. And my husband actually said to me, because we had this really awesome family budget spreadsheet that we had developed while we were in corporate, to manage our finances, we got out of $65,000 in debt doing it or using it. And he's like, moms need this. Why don't you just throw this up as your product and see how it goes? Well, it ended up going very well. Which was like my first sign of understanding what people need and then how to fill that gap. Jillian Leslie 5:55 So it was like a light bulb moment. Monica Froese 5:57 It was a light bulb moment and I would say it took a few months for the light bulb moment because I, I didn't really know what I was looking at, like, why are all these people buying this stuff and or buying the spreadsheet and I had to like back into it. So it took a few months to try to dissect what was going on. Like, why was this such a big hit? And, you know, part of it was the uniqueness of Pinterest at the time, and still the uniqueness of Pinterest, which we can talk about. But at the time in 2016, you could get a lot of organic traffic pretty fast, like you could rank under keywords pretty fast in 2016. And this happened to take off for me. And now you can still rank but it's a little bit different. Creating a Product for Pinterest by Using Pinterest And I've I look at creating products for Pinterest a little bit differently than I used to, which I know you're probably gonna talk about, but what happened after the budget spreadsheet was I started creating more products for moms. Specifically, I had a course which I've since retired, which was to help moms take their corporate skills and repurpose them into the online world. But what happened was I ended up getting really good at Pinterest ads because I'm impatient. And I got to the point where I was sick of waiting for organic traffic to come to me. I really wanted to have more metrics that I could look at. I love looking at data, you only have so many metrics that you can go off of like you can't see specifically what keywords are getting you traffic clicks, conversions, but promoted pins would tell me that. So I got really good at that. And of course, as soon as you get good at something that nobody else is doing, everybody wants to know how you did that. And so teaching Promoted Pins took on this life of its own. I developed the Promoted Pins course right before I had the baby at the end of 2017. And I would say for all of 2018 and all of 2019, it was all about refining that course like I put all of my energy into making this the best Pinterest ads course that it could be. There's no recurring fee to be in my student group. And so like people who bought the course two years ago are still getting support. I do monthly office hours. And so I really became known as the Pinterest ads girl. But there was a part of me that still felt this pull to help moms and create products that I knew would help them. And for reasons that they were coming to Redefining Moms so we made the decision, which we hope to finish this year, which is to break off all of the Pinterest products under my own brand. Creating Products for Women Balancing Careers and Motherhood So just MonicaFroese.com and bring Redefining Mom back to what it was originally intended to do, which was to help moms, particularly with balancing motherhood and their careers, specifically bringing them from their corporate career into the online world. So this really has created this opportunity to create two distinct products sets for two different audiences. Jillian Leslie 9:00 That's terrific. Again, we have Catch My Party we have MiloTree. They don't look at all alike, but one came out of the other one. And one is a SaaS business, which means software-as-a-service and one is a B2C business which is, you know, consumer-facing. And most people have no idea I'm the person behind both, you know, there is some crossover, but not a lot. But again, it was organically how we grew our business. Right? Nobody said, you know, you didn't start off and go, I'm going to become Pinterest expert. You started using it. It started working for you. And you thought I can teach this. Monica Froese 9:37 And I really feel like now that I'm a few, like four years into really taking this as a serious full time business. My corporate skills were invaluable to me for where I ended up here because I looked at Pinterest differently. All the people who are teaching Pinterest back in 2016 were not looking at it in the same way. All I care about is ROI and what I'm getting from it. So, like I got very hyper hung up on the fact that everyone was talking about all the pageviews they could get from Pinterest. And I just was sitting there scratching my head thinking, why do I want a pageview? I don't like what comes after the page view and see, you know, sale. Yep. And that's the thing, like, you know, a lot of bloggers at the time and still, are monetizing through ads and sponsorships and stuff. But you don't have as much control over that. And I couldn't get, I could not get away from, why am I going to spend all of this time getting traffic to my site for them to click away from my site. It just never resonated with me. And when I put into place the principles that I executed in corporate, which was like the ROI principles that I was accountable for when I ran large marketing campaigns. It just seemed logical to me that paid advertising was the way to go, and the most targeted way to go. And that's kind of how it ended up happening. And honestly, I don't regret it at all. Because while I still have this pull, I want to help women get out of corporate into this world and repurpose their skills. I couldn't have funded that part of the business if I hadn't gotten to be known for something. And if that happened to be Pinterest ads, that's great. And that has served me too. So it's been an interesting ride, to be honest with you. I couldn't have predicted it a couple of years ago. How to Create Emergent Online Products Jillian Leslie 11:30 There is this concept that I think about a lot. I talk about it a lot, and it's called emergent business building. And what that means is bottom up, not top down. So top down would be, I have this hypothesis, and I'm going to go toward it and not be open to what my audience is saying to me. What people are coming to me, for that kind of thing. And, again, I have used this example I live in Austin. An Austin is all about emergent development, meaning it's the antithesis of the planned community. You go down some street and like there's a shopping mall, and it looks like it's out of the 70s. But there'll be one cool coffee shop in there. And then all of a sudden, you notice, like, there's the record store, or there's something else is coming, like right next to it. And it's because all of a sudden people are discovering this. And then other businesses are drawn to those businesses. So it looks really messy. Yes, but it's emergent. And I believe when you are building businesses on the internet, that is definitely the way to go. Because if you think you're going to plan this out, that it's going to work the way you think it's going to work, I think you are setting yourself up for a world of hurt. Should you Niche Your Blog Down? Monica Froese 12:53 I completely agree. And actually, because I originated in the blog world, I hear a lot of conflicting advice about you have to niche down right away, or it's okay to go broader and then niche down and I am all for the broader first to see what resonates. If you think about it, I had no business putting any budgeting stuff on Redefining Mom, it wasn't the purpose of the site. But I did it anyways, and it ended up being a huge smash hit, which has made me a ton of money. And I wouldn't have done it if all I listened to were the people who told me you have to niche down, you have to niche down, you have to niche down. I'm to the point where I firmly believe if you know how to drive targeted traffic, then you can really have a funnel about anything as long as you're, I mean, don't be a fraud, like be able to give the advice that you're saying that you can give, like for me with the budgeting spreadsheet. I literally had at that point used it for five years. We did use it to pay down $65,000 a debt. It's the only thing that saved us from literally going completely broke when we had our daughter because we were paid on commission, and it was how we estimated out, like the highs and lows if we hit commission if we didn't, how we, you know, literally could pay our bills. And because I used it, I was able to authentically speak about it and the tools that we use every day. Like, I would have sat back in 2016 and said, doesn't everyone have a budget spreadsheet? And my husband said to me, he's like, No, your father is a CPA, and drilled this into your head. Ordinary people don't actually do this all that often. And I was like, Really? Jillian Leslie 14:34 I know. Yes. Yes, yes. So we call them "at bats," which are, how many times are you at bat? And the goal is to increase the number of experiments that you are running, because you don't necessarily know what's going to hit, and you think you have a hypothesis, but I can't tell you how many times we've been wrong, or it's morphed into something. We could never anticipate it. And that is always the surprise. You are trying to attract the audience that you think is the right audience, but you have to be open to I always say like, hold your hypotheses, have them, but hold them lightly. Because you can get blinded thinking, Oh, no, you're the wrong audience for me. So I'm going to kind of push you aside trying to attract the quote-unquote, right audience, when you need to recognize No, no, this is the right audience. They just look different than I thought they were gonna look. How to Attract an Audience on the Internet Monica Froese 15:34 So I get asked all the time, because I bring on thousands of people through my budgeting stuff onto my list, which my email list is integrated with these both sides of the business, and I've gone back and forth about are we gonna divide out the email list or are we not at this point. I don't think I will. Because the thing is, if people are interested in saving money, they're also interested in making money and because my brand attracts, primarily moms. My messaging is actually very on point if they came in on the budgeting side, or they came in wanting to know more about how to build a business, how to get good at Pinterest, marketing, all of that stuff. I have done a really good job, in my opinion, at least of connecting the two. And the people who don't like the connection, they'll weed themselves out, and I've become okay with that. I just am because I this is how this is what resonates with me. This is how I like teaching. This is how I want to develop my products and so people who aren't okay with that, they'll just believe. Jillian Leslie 16:37 So let's talk about your products. You started with a budgeting spreadsheet, which surprisingly sold really well. And then you figured out Pinterest ads and started teaching people about Pinterest ads. Yes. Now you also then have other products. What are they and how did they emerge? Monica Froese 16:57 Yeah, I have a lot. So they're all digital. I'm actually in a mastermind with two girls who do physical products. And I think that's a lot of work. And I give them so many kudos because obviously we need physical products in the world, but it's a lot more work than digital products. Just there are a lot more intricacies that go into it to make sure it's profitable. So the order of things: I had the budgeting spreadsheet, then I launched the course, which was to help moms in similar positions to me who were in corporate and they're like, I want to have a career. But I also want more time with my kids. How do I make that happen? It's like, No, you are smart, you are smart, and you can take what you've learned in corporate and bring it over to this world. That was the next thing. From there. What ended up happening was because people were saying, How are you getting all of these leads? How are you selling these products, and I was selling them with Pinterest. So it started with a 13 video course that I made for friends because I got asked the same questions of what I did on Pinterest. I gave them I literally gave these 13 videos away just to friends and they're like, you should have people pay you for this. Like this is really good. This is better than other courses I've taken on Pinterest, and I wasn't even trying to make it a course. So then I put it up for sale and that was my original organic marketing course. How to Teach what You Already Know Monica Froese 18:23 This is how it started with me teaching organic Pinterest marketing to people who simply just in conversation, were asking me questions. And then I turned that into a course that I did an actual launch for that in like mid-2017. And that well. At the time, I was also very heavily invested and getting traffic to the mom side of my business with Pinterest using Pinterest ads, I had the budgeting spreadsheet. I have a few other templates, spreadsheets, a planner, stuff like that. And so my blogging friends who took my Pinterest organic course were then like, I want to learn how to do this next level things because it really at that time was definitely next level. I mean, I would argue it's still next level because not a lot of people actually do Pinterest ads still. But it was certainly next level at that point because all anyone talked about was organic. And nobody talked about the power of Pinterest ads. So during my third trimester, they pushed me into launching this course which I was so adamantly against. I didn't want to do it. I just wanted to have this baby. I want to go nesting. I am so thankful to my friends that pushed me to do this because clearly it was a huge gap out there was stuff that people wanted to know, but they didn't know they needed to know. It was like they didn't know they needed it until someone was there presenting it to them. It's kind of what ended up happening. When I was on maternity leave. I was getting very big influencers, like people that I had followed for years, sending me dm saying, Can I get this course? And I was sitting there saying I just had a baby I'm not working because I didn't have help or anything. At this point, so I was like, No, no, I had a baby. I don't have time for this. And my husband tapped me on the shoulder and said, maybe you should take a day and open the cart since these people are begging to give you money and let them in. And I was like, okay, so we did that. And then I came back from maternity leave. And I got really invested in making that course the best it could be, while having this calling to wanting to get back to creating other products that I could put behind funnels because as I was doing the Pinterest ads course, what was the prevailing thing that I kept running into was, when you are ready to run an ad, you need an offer that converts. Like you should not put money behind something that doesn't convert. Overwhelmingly, I was getting people joining my Pinterest ads course that didn't have a converting offer. And that could be converting someone onto your email list, converting someone into a sale. They didn't have an offer. How to Create Sales Funnels that Convert So then they would run an ad, and they'd come to me with data even though I said this is in the course. I don't think it necessarily resonated. They just wanted to get to the running ad part. So they'd run the ad and they come to me with data and they'd say, this didn't work. And I'd say, What is it? What is your objective? And overwhelmingly they'd say, to get traffic? Well, why then my question be like, Why? What is it for? Well, I don't know. Just I have ads on? Jillian Leslie 21:22 And by the way, we talked about this all the time to run an ad to for traffic never make sense. It will never be itself. So if you are thinking that you're going to boost now, if, for example, you're working with a brand, and you do some sort of sponsored content, and you want to show the brand that you've got traffic to make the brand happy because they've paid you a bunch of money for this. It's worth putting some money behind that to go look at my numbers. But if you think you can monetize that traffic, just because you're with AdThrive, or you're with MediaVine, it will never, you'll always be upside down. Always, you'll always be paying more than that traffic is worth to you with ads. Monica Froese 22:11 And if you think about it, you're literally running an ad that you're paying for to send people to another ad that you'll make back end money from it. It seems it's very goofy to me. Add the MiloTree Pop-Up to Your Blog and Grow Your Followers and Subscribers on Autopilot Jillian Leslie 22:22 Given this uncertain time as online entrepreneurs, all we crave is certainty. So what if I could promise you that growing your social media followers on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, plus your email list could happen automatically. All you need is a blog or a site you own and some visitors and I guarantee that the MiloTree pop-up app will automatically convert those visitors into followers and subscribers and you don't have to do a thing. We are no longer living in the world as it was. I think we're all realizing the importance of nurturing our online businesses. So we can have freedom to live the lives we want, but in order to get there, we have to manage our scarcest resource time. So let MiloTree do the heavy lifting for you when it comes to growing followers and email subscribers, and you spend your time creating content solutions products that serve your audience, so you can start seriously monetizing your blog. So here's my advice. stay consistent. Kill the perfectionist in you so you can get stuff out there quickly. Touch yourself with kindness, embrace the mess, and go make a couple of smart choices like using MiloTree on your blog to grow your followers and subscribers. So you don't have to worry about that. Get Your First 30 Days of MiloTree Free Sign up now for MiloTree and get your first 30 days free. There's really no risk 8,000 other bloggers just like you, are using MiloTree right now to grow their businesses. Please pause this episode and head to MiloTree.com to sign up for your free trial. With all the worry we're feeling this will give you one less thing to worry about. So what are you waiting for hit pause, head to MiloTree and sign up today. How to Start to See the Opportunities for Creating Products Monica Froese 24:07 So what ended up happening through running this course and getting very dedicated to being in it for these two years and not letting myself diverge off and create all these new products, is I started to see the gaps. And I took notes of these gaps, but I was resistant to filling them until I had that course so buttoned in, and just and the students were doing really well with it. Once I got to that point, and I would say that took just under two years. So I started the course in November of 2017. And in November of 2019 is really when we started launching, again, different products. So the first thing we did was we realized that some people have really ugly landing page and it matters for conversions, and I get super good opt-ins and tripwire conversions. And I have other different funnels that I teach, specific to Pinterest that I get really good conversion rates. And when I would be asked to review like my ad tanked, I'd go into the page that they're promoting. And I was like, you know, and it's hard to get feedback like that, but your page is ugly. You know, that's hard. That's hard feedback to give. So I thought, How can I solve that problem? I created templates in Elementor and LeadPages. I use LeadPages for all my funnels. And so that was my first. That was the first way I was going to solve the problem of people not having ugly pages. Unknown Speaker 25:39 Are you working with a designer? Are you designing them yourself? Selling High Converting Template Landing Pages Monica Froese 25:43 Funny enough, I don't feel like I am a designer at all, but yet I make pretty good landing pages. I like pretty things that convert. So first in my mind was, how do I get this to convert? Second in my mind is how do I make this look aesthetically appealing? Because and this is super important. Pinterest is a visual search engine people expect to come from Pinterest and see pretty things and I was seeing so many funnels that had ads popping up and pop-ups here and pop-ups there and it's like, guys, like a display ad should never be on a sales page Jillian Leslie 26:36 For MiloTree, we create it so that you can turn it off on certain pages and people say why would I turn it off? And I go, if you are selling something you do not want to distract from the sale even if it's my product, turn it Monica Froese 26:52 off. Yeah, exactly. And that's the stuff that Oh, I just feel like there was a big gap of understanding. Finding that and so when so we started with the templates and those went super well. Monica Froese 27:09 I created them on LeadPages. And we duplicated them on Elementor. So we have two solutions. Here's the difference between my templates and what you see on the market for other people's templates. A lot of templates sellers are giving you templates in different color palettes, right. Mine are designed with the conversion mechanism in mind and you have to plug in your branding to it. So it's like branding agnostic. I'm not giving you different color palettes or anything like that. I'm giving you a page that I know convert. You plug your messaging and your brand into it, which is, I found very different than pretty much anything out there that I've seen at this point. And it's very specific because I've spent years testing, where different buttons should go and different headlines. And so it's basically like, the best information I can give you for what has worked on Pinterest. Not just with me, though, with hundreds of my students, because as I've cultivated this promoted pins group, I help them to change their pages. So over time, you just get really good when you see the back end of hundreds, I mean, really thousands of campaigns, you just get good at knowing what works and what doesn't. If You Get People to Trust You, They Will Buy More From You So that's when that came out. But there was still a gap I had in the Pinterest suite of things. So I had the organic Pinterest marketing course which we were keeping updated, but it wasn't necessarily my passion. It was kind of like the on-ramp into getting to know how I teach. And I do think when you stick with the same teacher makes things more seamless. So by the time we get to my promoted pins course, it's like you already understand my logic of Pinterest. So I had an organic, I have an organic Pinterest course, then I did an affiliate marketing course, on Pinterest because not everyone is ready to move right to products. So affiliate marketing is a nice gap that can be filled on Pinterest. Then it went right to paid ads. What I realized was I had a gap between the affiliate marketing and the paid ads, which was I needed to teach people how to create Pinterest-friendly sales funnels. And so actually, as we speak, I am in the very last module right now I'm launching it. I have 125 people in the beta round and I would say probably 85% of them are promotion students so they're my students that know they trust me. They know I delivered in that course, and I'm telling them hey, this course is going to make your funnels just amazing so that when you go back to ads, they will convert like gangbusters. And they're like, yeah, we trust you. We know you you know what you're talking about. That launch I did on Black Friday went nuts. It was like, incredible. The power what I learned from that because all these are learning lessons like, every time I've launched the Promoted pins course, I've learned so many different things like from flash sales, to life challenges, to how long you should have between launches. When I launched them Black Friday, this new sales funnels course to my current students that taught me the power of cultivating your students and pouring into them, they will buy almost everything else you offer, because they trust you. And I'm like, Whoa, light bulb, like I mean, that's logic, right. It's actually very logical. But it was such a lightbulb moment for me to realize that people that everything I did over those two years, really meant something. So that's what we're doing now is teaching people and when this is over, it's kind of like the last installment of my Pinterest, then I have like really a whole framework in place. So there are a few things you have to decide one we want to move the Pinterest courses to MonicaFroese.com. So that Redefining Mom can go back to being for moms. I really feel passionate. The Importance of Integrity as An Online Entrepreneur Like my employee right now, Haley, she's pregnant. And it really reignited my passion for maternity leave. Because under the law in the US, I'm not required to pay her or give her a maternity leave. But I'm going to because I believe that I need to set an example if I'm going to sit here and preach about that stuff, which I did when I started Redefining Mom, that I need to live up to that. And it really reignited my passion to want to help moms. So my goal now is to get the Pinterest stuff buttoned up running. However, we ended up combining it maybe it's gonna be one framework we don't know yet. Like that's our questions there. And then that's going to be moved over into its own thing and then I want to dive back into creating more funnels in more products for the mom side of the house. Jillian Leslie 32:03 I love that. And just to go back for a second to filling in gaps, I noticed because I'm on your email list that you are always coming out with templates for pins and selling them or offering some I think for free. I don't know how you do it, but what I love about what you're saying, Have I noticed a gap? I fill it. Monica Froese 32:28 When I got started, there were a lot of like marketing people, gurus, experts that would say stuff like that, like listen to what your audience is telling you, and then create the product that they want. And for some reason that never clicked for me. I'm like I don't under I didn't. It didn't resonate until I was in the weeds. And this is part of the reason why I don't want people to get stuck. I see so many people getting stuck in the questions that they should not be getting stuck in because you don't know until you try. You have to start putting stuff out there so you understand what people want from you. And then you move forward. Like if I had never done the promoted pins course, I never would have realized how important teaching the sales funnel piece was. You know, it just all I needed all of that, Jillian Leslie 33:15 I would say, and you can tell me what you think the more you are willing to roll up your sleeves and get in the muck with your customers, the more success you'll have because it's in the muck. It's in the confusions. You can't be kind of above it all thinking you're gonna sell stuff to people. You need to get down and dirty. Like it's, you know, I always talk about this, get on the phone. Monica Froese 33:45 Oh, yeah. Jillian Leslie 33:46 Do things that do not scale. You know, you think you're going to set up all these automations are all going to be working in the background and the money's just going to come? And it's like, you take that person who's asking you questions and you say hey, can we do like a 10-minute phone call. And of course, you can't do that 100 times, but you could do it three times, you could do it five times. We've been successful in businesses where we understand where people are struggling, like from a visceral place, not from an intellectual place. Monica Froese 34:21 So one of the things that I like to tell people, because everyone always wants to look at where I am now, and they forget all the things I had to do to get here. I used to do 15 minute calls. All the time, I had a free Facebook group that I had regular teaching lives in that I never missed for like a year and a half, like so I had, I ended up having to close the group when the baby was born just because I could not keep I couldn't keep up with it. And I didn't have an employee at that point either. But the point is, like I showed up for free for a very, very long time to understand what people want it. It wasn't just a matter of I put up a funnel and it did well. I'm not gonna lie, I can put up a funnel now, and I can get it to do well without ever getting on the phone with someone. But I've learned so much over the four years. It's all of that experience that has gotten me to the point that I can do that now. Jillian Leslie 35:22 Absolutely, absolutely. So do it's messy. Like, those are always those are always my thing. Like, don't think it's neat. Don't think it's like you just kind of follow what you know, you pay thousands of dollars for a course and boom, all of a sudden you're gonna have business and it's all gonna work out. Ah, it's like nights of anxiety where you don't understand why this should work and it's not working and it's tweaking and it's making it ugly before it looks pretty and it's, it's getting down in the weeds. So if you're willing to like, get in the muck, that's how you grow business. It doesn't look you know you see people Like Goop with Gweneth Paltrow and it just looks so effortless. And so even though you look at it and go I want that. Like No, no, it's you in your pajamas. It's you. You know with a crying baby on your hip. It's you going Why isn't this working? It's you investing in Pinterest ads and sometimes losing money because you're trying to learn, right? So if you think it's glamorous or anything, trust me, it's totally not. But I think it's totally worth it. But know that your mess is not unique. It's the way through to ultimately find little nuggets of success. Why You Need to Treat Your Online Business Like a Full-Time Job Monica Froese 36:48 I absolutely agree with all that. I show up every day I treat this like a full time job. I get up every morning as if I'm going to work. I take my shower, I get changed. I make my coffee, I sit down, and I work for eight hours. It's not, I don't, I don't work in the margins. I personally don't feel like I'm wired to work in the margins. And I have seen women that do work in the margins. And they have made some really amazing things doing that. I would, I would argue that the majority of people who are going to be successful are going to need to treat it as if it's a full-time job and treat it like you would get up for a job. There are plenty of days like this morning, I got a migraine. And it would have been much easier for me to close my computer and not be on this podcast and not finish the Facebook ads. I'm going to finish when I get off this podcast and not finish the module. But I'm not going to because that's not what gets me to the next step. It's all building blocks. I say that all the time. Like my sister right now is trying to start a blog because she's at home with her kids. She's a health care worker, but she's, uh, she goes to people's houses. And so that's pretty much like not happening right now in the current environment. Um, so she's home. And she's thinking like 15 steps ahead, and I keep reminding her that like you have 15 building blocks you're missing here. You got to go back to the beginning. Everyone started from nothing, you got to go back there. You can't be where I am now, because I had four years to get here. Jillian Leslie 38:27 Absolutely. People ask me all the time. They want a magic bullet. They want something and they say, how did you grow Catch My Party to millions of pages a month? And I go, it's a long slog. That is the answer. And they don't like that. Because if I believe me, if there were a magic bullet, I'd be using it. And I'd be selling it for like millions of dollars. But the truth is, you make mistakes, you make a couple smart decisions along the way. You add some keywords in there, you know, work with your audience, you definitely are making decisions and you hope that those are the right decisions, or if they're not that you're able to pivot those decisions. But for me, I would argue it's all about showing up. Just what you're saying. Monica Froese 39:16 Yeah. And I went through a period in late 2018, where I was, I was in a pretty bad burnout stage. And I stopped emailing as much as I used to, and there's a direct correlation with communicating with your audience to sales, really, I mean, it's all about consistency and showing up and being a real person. Unknown Speaker 39:45 I feel like we're gonna have to do a part two, where you come back and talk more about this, like the nitty gritty, Monica Froese 39:51 I took notes before we got in. Okay, I know I know. At some point in my notes, I said, connection and more connection, especially when you're first getting started, tell us and then like how I have my free group and I went live every single day. And in my paid course I show up every single day, they didn't just pay me money, and then I disappear. Reputation is everything. And I've said this so many times, and I firmly believe that I will make money slower. If it means keeping my integrity and my ethics in place, and I love that. There are people that make money online that are not ethical and they don't keep their integrity in place. And I don't want to be that person. Jillian Leslie 40:44 And I feel if you want to be in it for the long term. That is the answer because people can ultimately I believe that it gets discovered. You know, like you can't, I don't believe that if you work in the internet, you have to weirdly believe in karma. Because eventually it comes back to you. So the more good you put out there, the more good you ultimately get back. Now, it might not be in the way you think it's going to be. And this is again, that idea of, you have to hold things, ideas lightly, because you don't know what it's going to look like you have an idea of what it's going to look like, like, I'm providing all this value, why isn't the money coming? Well, maybe something else is coming. You know, maybe, who knows, maybe you're attracting a person to you that you can ultimately work with. And that's gonna lead to something like it's not necessarily going to look the way you think it's going to look. But if you put enough good stuff out there, over time, you weirdly, I think, attract a lot of good stuff back. And the reverse is true, which is if you cut corners, if you don't walk your talk, if you don't deliver, you could probably survive for a year or so but eventually it will show. Yes, You Want to Make Money Online Monica Froese 42:02 So the thing is, I, okay, I find nothing wrong with being in business to make money. Like that's what we have to feed our families. Like I show up every day, I should get paid for my hard work. There's nothing wrong with running a business that's profitable, and making money at all. There's nothing wrong with it. I think the disconnect is when you don't, when a business owner doesn't understand the bigger impact that they're trying to make in the world, and it's just all about the money. If it's only about the money. It is very hard to wake up every day, stay motivated and keep doing it. Because absolutely, just money is great, but I'm going to tell you I firmly believe now and the thing, more money, more problems. That is a true statement in my opinion. It's not all rainbows and roses all the time. It's a lot of hard work and so if you lose sight of why you're doing it to begin with, and that's why, like when my employee got pregnant, and they put me in this position where I could walk the talk, which meant when I started Redefining Mom, my rant was about maternity leave in the US. I actually got to talk to President Obama about this to his face. And I will never forget when he said to me, he's like, so what are you going to do about it? That was what ignited me to start this, like to make this a business that served moms, not just about money, but it was about making a greater impact. So when she got pregnant, I actually can hear him saying I can see and hear him saying this to me. What are you going to do about it? Well, you know what, I am going to offer her a paid maternity leave because she deserves that. I ranted about that and I am not going to contribute to that problem. Jillian Leslie 43:50 And I would say by you doing that, which is it's a sacrifice to you, you're not going to have an employee, and money's going out out the door. However, She will love you and be so dedicated to you and go the extra mile because you saw her and you were there for her. Again, not a bad situation, but you know what I mean? Like, again, you do not know that you will, chances are get that back tenfold. Unknown Speaker 44:25 Oh, absolutely. Jillian Leslie 44:26 But it's about the faith of that. It's about putting out your best highest self and it gets rewarded. So I again, I don't mean to sound all woowoo about this, but think about how you show up and where your values are because I believe people can sniff it out. Monica Froese 44:45 They can. Okay, so this actually goes to like the topic of the tripwires because a lot of my students and a lot of people I teach, are afraid to sell. They are so afraid to sell and and I always ask them, Do you not believe in what you're selling because if you believe in what you're selling, you wouldn't be afraid to sell like I got to a point in this, I think was the last launch I did for the promoted pins course, I had someone emailed me and was not very kind about. They thought that I was charging too much. And all these course creators think they can charge all this money and they all suck and they don't provide. I wrote her back a very factual answer, which is that there are some crappy courses out there. I've taken them I've invested in them, and I understand where you're coming from, but mine's not crap. And I show up every single day, and it is worth what I'm charging you and I'm I stand behind it. I don't feel bad about charging it because I know I provide that plus more value. And so when people feel like they can't sell that, the question I always have is, do you not believe that what you're selling can actually help the person you're selling it to? Because if you believe it, there's no issue with selling because it's your expertise, you're giving them the shortcut, you know, selling is a good thing. Also selling is what keeps our economy going. People Value What They Pay For Jillian Leslie 46:08 Absolutely. And wait and I will say this. There's this weird reverse thing, which is, when I get something for free, I tend not to value it as much. But if I put money behind it, you better believe I'm going to show up, I'm more likely to show up. If I paid a couple of hundred bucks, let's say for something versus it's the exact same product, but now you're giving it to me for free. So if you want a more dedicated say, student, my hunch is those students that have made the decision to actually open up their wallets and pay you will be better students, which will make a better course which will make a better you know, the whole environment is better. So free is not always better. In fact, I would argue if you're if you are providing value, you charge for it because you want to attract the kind of customer who's willing to pay for it Monica Froese 47:04 Exactly. And so that when you offer something for free to get a conversion to get people on your list, you give them a taste of who you are and what you know and what you can offer them. But it doesn't give away the kitchen sink as they say. Pinterest is a visual search engine. So people come to Pinterest with a problem. They search it, they visually are looking to see their solutions. That's what they arrive on with search results. It's a visual solution that they're looking at. So I come they like to say like meal planning for a week. When I get there. I want to see a visual representations of what meal planning solutions, that's what I'm looking for. So when I click to the meal planning solution, let's say it's an opt-in, that opt-in is to solve, it's meant to solve a quick win. Your Opt-In Should Be a Quick Win It's to give them that immediate gratification that you can help them over that hump. And then your paid product is like, and it can go. There's two different ways, i Pinterest that often can be a layer of your solution, like the first prong of your solution. And the paid is the rest. It's how they take that first prong and make it an actual system. Or your opt-in can be the "what" and the "why,"like, this is why you need this. This is how it will help you and then your paid product is the how. So there's two different ways that you can look at it. I would say I lean more towards the "what" and the "why" and the paid product is the "how." Jillian Leslie 48:46 So I like that. Oh, I like that. Okay, so Monica. I feel like we could talk forever and I know that you have a hard stop. Will you come back? Can we put this in our calendars. We can talk about the tactics, I feel you and I, we are so like-minded. I'm so happy to know you as my online friend on the east coast. Because I feel like my audience loves the tactics, you know what not to do what to do that kind of thing. Monica Froese 49:19 So interesting that you say that because my course on sales funnels is broken down. Strategy is the first three modules. And the last three are tactics. And I say in the course, you cannot have the tactics without the strategy and everyone wants to go to the tactics always and not have the strategy and that's when you fail. And I seriously take my students kicking and screaming sometimes through the strategy, like they just want to tell me where to put this and tell me where to put that and No, I will not. I refuse because if you don't understand the strategy if you don't understand the problem you're solving if you don't get all of that and how it fits into the bigger picture. But you can have all the tactics in the world and it will not help you make sales. Jillian Leslie 50:05 Absolutely, absolutely. Okay Monica. I just I love talking to you so, so let's we're literally going to hang up this call and schedule part two. And I just love that you come on on the show and you share so much. Monica Froese 50:22 Well, I'm really glad that you have me. People listen, I love doing this. Jillian Leslie 50:28 Alright, so Okay, so until part two. Key Takeaways My big takeaway from this episode is how putting in some thought about your solution, how to attract your audience, how to provide them with a quick win and then ultimately sell them on the solution, I think is really powerful, I think to step back in your own business and think about putting these pieces together, lining them up. So they all make sense is what I recommend. Did it take some thought it really does. If you want to talk product with me, please reach out at Jillian@milotree.com. And I'd love to hear what you're thinking and give you some feedback. Also, I want to say do check out the military membership. So it's Milo tree.com/membership, if you are looking for tech support, ongoing tech support, so we've got your back. So when you want to make a change to your blog, we can do that for you. Also, it provides you with workshops, ongoing workshops of what is what are cutting edge strategies that we want to share with you both strategies that are working in our business, but also strategies that we are seeing work in people's businesses and also community because being an online entrepreneur can sometimes feel lonely. It can feel like you are yelling into the abyss and you're not sure anybody is listening. Well, I'm listening and this community is listening. So, if you if any of those things are interesting to you, and you can roll them all into one, please head to milotree.com/membership. And again, there are no contracts or anything so there's really no risk and I will see you here again next week. Imagine a world where growing your social media followers and email list was easy… It can be with MiloTree! Try the MiloTree pop-up app on your blog for 30 days risk-free! Let your MiloTree pop-ups help you get to that next level by turning your visitors into email subscribers and social media followers on Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, and YouTube. Sign up today! Install your MiloTree pop-ups on your site in under two minutes. Sign up for MiloTree now and get your first 30 DAYS FREE!

How Do Promoted Pins Work?

Pinterest Marketing

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 14, 2020 1:54

Stand out in a saturated market with Pinterest! Learn how to leverage Pinterest as a search engine tool, not a social media platform. We'll cover simple SEO tips, keyword searching, how to make your pins go viral, Tailwind strategies, and more! For more Pinterest marketing strategies, visit PinfiniteMarketing.com.Pinterest/Instagram: @PinfiniteMarketing

How Do Promoted Pins Work?

Pinterest Marketing

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 14, 2020 1:54

stand seo pinterest tailwinds promoted pins

Generate Sales Leads using Pinterest

Sales Strategies with Shanelle (Monday's)

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 13, 2020 33:46

Top 6 Tips for Lead Generation on Pinterest. Before you start to generate leads via Pinterest you gotta first Know who your audience is. Second, use the Pinterest Insight tools to discover if your content is reaching your target audience. #1 for Lead Generation on Pinterest: Create a Freebie. Find out a problem your target audience is having or something that your audience wants and give them that in exchange for their email. Tip- Quizzes have the highest conversion. Evergreen: The Content lives on FOREVER! And can produce for you now and then trend again two years from now, continuing to generate followers and leads. #2 for Lead Generation on Pinterest: Create Pins that Lead to Your Instagram. Instagram works as a blog from some people, and if that is you, pin your value-adding Instagram posts to Pinterest. Tip – Resize the Instagram images to a 2X3 ratio – Pinterest Optimized Image. Canva is a great place to resize Instagram images to Pinterest Optimized Images easily. #3 for Lead Generation on Pinterest: Showcase your portfolio work on your boards. This idea is excellent for designers and photographers. Tip: Use your location and your niche in the description of your images. Using your location and niche description will bring those images up during their search on Pinterest and Google as well. Optimize Pinterest Descriptions #4 for Lead Generation on Pinterest: Utilize Pinterest Bio. Use keywords to Target your audience in your Bio and what you offer to your audience. Then use a shortened bitly link to then send the viewer to your opt-in or Instagram. #5 for Lead Generation on Pinterest: Test out your pins. Create 4-5 different images and then wait 3-4 weeks to check Pinterest Analytics to see which pins are working the best. Tip: Tailwind is Awesome! #6 for Lead Generation on Pinterest: Accelerate Your Efforts with Promoted Pins. Find out which pins are naturally performing best and then promote those pins for $10 a day for a few months. Promote your lead generation posts. It takes a few weeks for those Pinterest promoted pins to begin to snowball, so promoting for a few months is optimal. Connect with Cali: https://thehalcyonhive.com Connect with Shanelle: https://www.shanellekunz.com Connect with Cali on Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/thehalcyonhive Pinterest Challenge: https://thehalcyonhive.com/pinterest-3-day-challenge Connect with Cali on Instagram: @cali.waege Connect with Shanelle on Instagram @shanelle.kunz

google tips forever target pinterest bio promote generate canva lead generation freebie using pinterest shanelle sales leads tip use promoted pins pinterest analytics

242: Social Trends - Pinterest in 2020 with Kate Ahl

The Food Blogger Pro Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 18, 2020 50:38

What fresh content is and why it's important for Pinterest, how to use Pinterest Trends, and how often you should be pinning with Kate Ahl. ----- Welcome to episode 242 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Kate Ahl talks about using Pinterest in 2020. Social Trends: Pinterest in 2020 Today marks Part 2 of our two-part series on social media in 2020. Last week we focused on Facebook and Instagram, and this week is all about Pinterest. Pinterest can be a huge traffic-driver for food bloggers. In fact, it’s consistently in one of the top three spots of traffic drivers for food bloggers. That said, Pinterest is constantly in pursuit of making the platform better for its users, so it changes quite a bit. That’s why we’re excited to focus on the best practices for Pinterest in 2020 in today’s episode. Kate Ahl is here to give you her recommendations for finding what’s trending on Pinterest, pinning fresh content, writing awesome Pin descriptions, using promoted Pins, and more. In this episode, you’ll learn: What Pinterest is focusing on in 2020 How going public changed how Pinterest works What type of Promoted Pins work best How to use Pinterest Trends How often you should be pinning Traits of successful pinners What fresh content is and why it’s important for Pinterest in 2020 What you should include in your Pin descriptions Whether or not you should be using Rich Pins Resources: Simple Pin Media WP Tasty Pinterest Trends Google Trends Tasty Pins Follow Simple Pin Media on Pinterest 166: Answering Your Questions about Pinterest with Kate Ahl 157: More Clicks, Subscribers, and Sales with Pinterest with Kate Ahl 026: How Pinterest Analytics can Boost your Blog with Kate Ahl from Simple Pin Media If you have any comments, questions, or suggestions for interviews, be sure to email them to podcast@foodbloggerpro.com.

sales blog boost pinterest traits pin answering your questions pins bjork kate ahl social trends promoted pins

7 Ad Design & Ad Testing Best Practices for Facebook & Social Creative (C/O:Tinuiti)

Inner Sircle

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 30, 2020 3:13

On this episode, I walk through this article put out by my friends over at Tinuiti. Check it out. 1. Design Your Ads With a Platform Focus 2. Fail Fast & Learn Fast With Split Testing 3. Make Your Offers Pop With GIFs and Video Assets in Ad Designs 4. Capture Attention Fast-paced Messaging and Concise Text 5. Showcase Customer Reviews in Ad Designs For Social Proof 6. Encourage Product Exploration With Shoppable Collection Units 7. Showcase Your Products in Promoted Pins to Drive Traffic & Sales

social design sales creative testing best practices messaging fail fast drive traffic promoted pins

Ready to try running paid advertising campaigns on Pinterest? If you’ve been confused - or downright afraid - to try Promoted Pins, this blog is going to walk you through everything you need to know to run your first paid ad on Pinterest. Learn: What to do before you get started The different types of campaigns Ad requirements Setting up your first traffic campaign (choosing your pins and step-by-step) Evaluating your campaign + troubleshooting READ THE FULL BLOG POST: https://www.carachace.com/blog/the-ultimate-how-to-guide-for-pinterest-promoted-pins Links Mentioned:

guide pinterest evaluating promoted pins

044 What to report to Clients as a Pinterest VA

Flourish to 7 Figures Podcast: Growing Your Online Business to 7 Figures and Beyond

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 6, 2019 22:12

We talk what stats to share with clients and how fancy those reports should be that you give them. Plus a great tip for ecommerce Promoted Pins. Full show notes available at https://pinconcierge.com/44

clients promoted pins pinterest va

How to Use Pinterest Promoted Pins to Grow Your Traffic, Email List, and Revenue

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 31, 2019 62:39

She loves purple, she loves paid advertising, she’s a work-from-home mom building a thriving business while raising two little ones, and her name is Monica. No, I’m not talking about me! I’m talking about my guest on today’s show, Monica Froese from Redefining Mom! My daughter would call us twinsies because we have so much in common, and I am so excited to share this interview with you. Monica Froese is a professional blogger and Pinterest marketing expert. She has an MBA degree in finance and marketing and blogs at Redefining Mom, a site for helping moms thrive in both motherhood and business. She spent 11 years working for a Fortune 100 company running multi-million dollar marketing campaigns with huge brands like Microsoft, HP, and Cisco. Now, she provides online marketing education to people who are looking to build profitable businesses through effective sales funnels and Pinterest ads! In this episode, Monica shares: Monica’s take on mom guilt and how she overcame it How to simultaneously drive traffic via promoted pins and retarget with Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram to drive more sales The biggest game-changer with promoted pins that you definitely should be testing ...and a whole lot more! You can find all of the links and resources that are mentioned in today’s episode at MonicaLouie.com/26.

marketing microsoft mom fortune mba pinterest revenue traffic hp cisco ads affiliate conversions email lists pins promoted use pinterest monica froese promoted pins

042 How to Optimize Pinterest Ads

optimize pinterest ads alisa meredith promoted pins

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 23, 2019 45:44

Alisa Meredith talks with us today about optimizing your Promoted Pins campaigns. She shares how to categorize your ad groups and deal with the ones with the most pressing need. We will cover all the categories and what to do with each one. Plus Alisa shares her ad dashboard hack. For pull show notes visit https://pinconcierge.com/40

040 How to Setup Ads on Pinterest

pinterest setup promoted pins

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 9, 2019 26:45

Learn how to set up an ad on Pinterest. We'll talk goal setting, total planning, getting your ducks in a row. How to target and what to do for images. All to get the most from Promoted Pins. for full show notes go to https://pinconcierge.com/40

#072: How to Make Promoted Pins Work for You With Monica Froese

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 12, 2019 43:04

Today, I have my friend, Monica Froese from Redefining Mom on the show. She will be sharing all things promoted pins and how to make promoted pins work for you. We talk about not only why it might make sense to pay for Pinterest Promoted Pins, but we break it down and share how Monica promotes her course using Pinterest and Facebook advertising. Why Advertise On Pinterest? Monica believes that advertising serves very different purposes from one social media platform to another. The first thing to keep in mind when you're thinking about Pinterest ads, aka Promoted Pins, is whether or not your demographic is even on Pinterest. Pinterest is mostly women, mostly in the US, and mostly millennials. If your target audience is older men, you're probably not going to find them on Pinterest. It's important to understand the difference between Pinterest and social media sites such as Facebook or Instagram. When you open Facebook, you do not hope to be served an ad about wedding planning. But if you are actively wedding planning, you will most likely be served an ad about that, simply because their targeting and retargeting strategies are the best out there. With Pinterest, you come with a problem, and you're proactively searching for the solution. When you open your Pinterest app, you come in with a buyer's mindset. You have a problem, you want a solution, and you're ready to pay for it. Will Promoted Pins Increase Sales? It's important to note that an ad on any platform won't solve a broken system or a broken funnel. If your product isn't selling organically, ads are not going to fix that problem. It's important to make sure your product sells from the platform that you're going to be promoting on. If you can't get any sales from Pinterest organically, you should not dive into Pinterest ads. You need to prove your product organically and build a relationship with your audience before you just jump into Pinterest ads. If you have proven your product, then you can even sell it to a cold audience on Pinterest. How to Market to a Cold Audience A cold audience is one that has no familiarity with you or what you sell. They have not interacted with you in any way. A warm audience is someone who has seen you or your product somewhere online. They have had an interaction with you. Most marketers are going to tell you to only target a warm audience; that a warm audience is going to convert better into monetary returns. On Pinterest, people are looking for a solution to their problem, so if they see a solution to their problem, whether they know that person or not, they are more willing to buy the service. They are not looking for someone they know, they are looking for answers. Warming Up An Audience to Get Them to Buy The caveat to selling to cold audiences on Pinterest is that the higher priced your product, the less likely a cold audience will buy it. The solution to this problem is to warm up your audience. Help them get to know you. There are several ways to do this, but Monica shared her favorite strategy with us. Strategy to Sell to a Warm Audience Run an ad on Pinterest People click on your ad and go to a landing page on your site You offer a freebie on the landing page You now have their email address Send an email with one of your products at a reduced price Add that person to your automated email list Nurture that relationship and turn them into a warm audience Pinterest is e-commerce focused and mostly on lower-priced products. So, Monica focuses on funneling those types of products to her audience. And then, when she wants to nurture for a higher-priced product, she focuses on building her email list from Pinterest. How to Get Email Subscribers From Pinterest Keep in mind that Pinterest is content driven. Most bloggers drive their ads to a blog post where they ask people to sign up for their email list. Monica turned that strategy on its head by driving people to a landing page through her ads. And then she uses "tripwires" once they've signed up for her email list to get them to make a purchase. Tripwires are an easy way to get people to buy from you immediately by reducing the price of the product for a limited amount of time. Pinterest Ads for Pageviews - Does it Make Sense? The question isn't whether you should want to drive page views, it's why do you want to drive page views? You have to understand your strategy before you promote it. It's not about increasing your page views; it's about what you are doing with those page views? If you're being paid by a brand to promote them, it's worth it to spend some money promoting your pins, so you get more page views. Look at how much money you're generating, and make sure it makes sense to be putting money behind promoting pins. If you have a funnel that you know works, page views can be very helpful if your strategy is to get those people into your funnel. Dig into your analytics, to know whether what you're doing is working or not. Monica's Courses Monica's Pinterest Ads course, Pin Practical Promotions, is open for enrollment through June 10, 2019. If the course isn't open for enrollment when you check it out, Monica offers a free course called Pin Practical Ads which is a great way to get started on your journey with Pinterest Ads. What Type of Online Entrepreneur is MiloTree Right For? Are you serious about growing your online business (advanced beginner and above)? Have you got some traffic but you know you need more? Let your MiloTree pop-ups help you get to that next level by converting your visitors into email subscribers and social media followers on Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook and YouTube. Sign up today! Install your MiloTree pop-ups on your site in under two minutes. Sign up for MiloTree now and get your first 30 DAYS FREE! Timestamp Intro 5:23 Why Advertise On Pinterest? 10:20 Will Promoted Pins Increase Sales? 10:25 Marketing to a Cold Audience 18:17 Warming Up An Audience 27:15 Email Subscribers From Pinterest 35:16 Pinterest Ads for Page Views 40:58 Monica's Courses Read the podcast transcript HERE: TOP 4 TAKEAWAYS FROM THIS EPISODE Pinterest users are ready to pay for a solution to their problem. You must prove your product is viable organically before promoting on Pinterest. If you are selling higher priced products, try getting people to sign up for your email list so you can warm them up to a purchase. Most users won't buy a higher priced product straight from your Pinterest ad. Before paying for ads to drive page views, know why you want more page views. More Blogger Genius Episodes You'll Like? #030: The Easiest Ways to Make Money as a Blogger with Monica Froese (Part 2) #029: How to Start a New Business When You're A New Mom with Monica Froese (Part 1) #019: How to Get Started with Promoted Pins on Pinterest with Alisa Meredith

150 Pinterest Promoted Pins 101

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 4, 2019 42:55

Paid advertising on Pinterest confuses some people. Do they work like Facebook ads, Instagram ads, and are they as inexpensive as other platforms? Today we're breaking down all the nitty gritty you need to know about how to get started with Pinterest Promoted Pins.

pinterest paid promoted pins

#150 – The Promoted Pins 101 Guide

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 4, 2019 42:55

Curious to know more about how promoted pins can work for your business? Welcome to the Promoted Pins 101 episode! Paid advertising on Pinterest can be confusing for some folks. Does it work like Facebook ads, Instagram ads, and is the paid advertising as inexpensive as on other platforms? Today we’re breaking down everything youContinue reading The post #150 – The Promoted Pins 101 Guide appeared first on Simple Pin Media.

social marketing guide media tips curious pinterest paid analytics blogging simple pin media promoted pins

#069: How to Get Traffic From Video on Pinterest with Kristen McDonnell

Play Episode Listen Later May 22, 2019 48:24

Pinterest continues to make changes to their platform for the good of the user. The latest update is video. Yes, you can now upload video pins to Pinterest. Listen to this episode to learn how to get traffic from video on Pinterest. Today I'm talking about Pinterest and video with my guest, Kristen McDonnell. She has a very successful Youtube channel, Studio Knit, where she teaches people how to knit. Her Youtube channel has over 90K subscribers, and she has published over 300 videos. Kristin is sharing what she's discovered on Pinterest with video and how to succeed. Knitting A Business Together Kristin's background is in marketing and communications. One of her hobbies is knitting. In January of 2014, she started her YouTube channel to offer better quality videos to teach knitting. Kristin was working full time, and after a couple of months on YouTube, she was signed on by a company for her videos. How to Do Video on Pinterest While it seems like video on Pinterest has good reach, many people are not seeing people click through to their sites. That has not been Kristin's experience however. Kristin has been focusing on video with Pinterest since December and she has seen amazing results. Out of her top 20 pins that are driving traffic, 18 of them are videos. Why You Should Start Experimenting With Video on Pinterest Kristin makes her videos for herself on her own time. Pinterest's three goals this year are IPO, video, and creators. If Pinterest identifies video as a priority, it's something you want to take seriously as a marketer. Monetizing Her Knitting Business About 50% of Kristin's income is from her website ad revenue. She uses MediaVine as her ad network. At MediaVine, they are very interested in video. Kirstin can track her RPM, (revenue per thousand) on YouTube and her blog. The money she's making per view is higher from people watching videos on her blog versus from YouTube. It's another reason Kristin is pulling back from focusing solely on YouTube. She makes more money driving people to her site. YouTube ads, Facebook videos, Amazon affiliates are all sources of income for Kristin. Kristin also sells digital products, such as her knitting patterns. Getting Click Throughs Kristin is going through her video library and re-editing everything specifically for Pinterest. A lot of people are posting videos that were made for a different social media platform, but the vertical video is doing better for Kristin. Pinterest is clear that for the static videos, they want 2x3 size videos. Kristin has lots of horizontal and square videos, but she's putting in the work to give Pinterest what it wants. Kristin will use a video with a static photo under the video, showing the final product. The most popular tool for making videos is called Filmora. It is a good way to get started editing videos for Pinterest. Preferred Video Format on Pinterest Kristin doesn't just use a static image with a video underneath. One simple video you can make is using a static photo, and having it move around. You can add some text over it, and just have the photo moving for extra depth. Kristin's best-performing image begins with a static photo of a piece of knitting and ends with a short video of her hands knitting. Kristin's videos range from 15-30 seconds. They're just long enough to entice people to repin or click through to her site. Kristin has done longer videos, about three minutes with her talking, but for the most part she has short, silent video. You need a call to action in your videos to give people something to respond to. Adding Videos To Pinterest To add a video to Pinterest, you just download the file and upload it like you would with a picture. Videos cannot be scheduled through Tailwind as of right now. Pinterest does have a scheduler. You can schedule up to 30 videos, but it seems a bit glitchy after 25. Kristin uses an Excel spreadsheet to make sure her videos are going to the right boards at the right time intervals. When Kristin is scheduling videos, she pulls up the website, and once the video is on Pinterest, she can add the click through, just like with a photo pin. Find your video on your desktop, add the title and description, your keywords, and hashtags. Kristin puts out three to four videos a day. Most are old pins that she is pinning to a new board. Sharing Videos Elsewhere Kristin will take the vertical videos she created and put them on Facebook, where they are performing very well. You could also take those videos and share them onto your Instagram stories or IGTV, because they are both vertical views. Using MiloTree For Blog Growth MiloTree is one of the very first things that Kristin did when she began to be intentional about growing her blog. She has had it since the fall of 2016. Kristin immediately started using her MiloTree Pinterest pop-up, and then after YouTube was added, and she began using that. Last week after listening to a podcast episode about Instagram, Kristin went to MiloTree and also got our pop-up for Instagram to grow her followers. The newest popup is for Etsy. It takes people from your blog to your Etsy shop. Kristin is also just starting to use that one. Kristin only just began focusing on Pinterest about two years ago. When she started using tactics from the Simple Pin Podcast, her website exploded over a short period of time. Since then she has been able to quit her job and move to full-time entrepreneur. Because of the MiloTree app, Kristin went from 0 to around 80K new followers. Paying For Ads on Pinterest Kristin promotes her blog on Pinterest, but once they're on her site, they can see all the other avenues she has, and products she offers. Pinterest ads are interesting because even though you stop paying for them, they continue to promote your pins. Kristin has put some money into a video pin to see what happens, and she is getting good return on that investment. Before, it was a long term game, but now videos are giving returns so much faster because Pinterest is promoting them above all else. Riches Are In the Niches People want to do so much, but I want to encourage you to go deep on the one thing you are passionate about. Kristin is the perfect example of that. She found her sweet spot and has dedicated her focus to that. Pinterest has invited Kristin to Knit Con, which is an employee conference. Kristin is going to Pinterest to teach a knitting class at the conference. What Type of Online Entrepreneur is MiloTree Right For? Are you serious about growing your online business (advanced beginner and above)? Have you got some traffic but you know you need more? Let your MiloTree pop-ups help you get to that next level by converting your visitors into email subscribers and social media followers on Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook and YouTube. Sign up today! Install your MiloTree pop-ups on your site in under two minutes. Sign up for MiloTree now and get your first 30 DAYS FREE! TIMESTAMP Intro 2:21 Knitting A Business Together 10:45 Video for Pinterest 12:00 Process For Creating Videos 12:58 Monetizing On Knitting 17:53 Getting Click-Throughs 24:04 Video Format 28:45 Adding Videos to Pinterest 33:45 Sharing Videos Elsewhere 35:03 Using Milotree For Growth 40:40 Paying For Ads on Pinterest 43:42 Riches Are In the Niches Read the podcast transcript here: Want to learn more about how to use Pinterest to grow your business? Here are more podcast episodes we recommend: #065: How to Keep Your Pinterest Account Growing and Out of Trouble with Alisa Meredith #059: What You Need to Know NOW to Get More Traffic From Pinterest with Kate Ahl #053: Powerful and Easy Pinterest Tips from Pinterest Insider, Tori Tait #044: How To Get More Pinterest Traffic by Crushing the Pinterest Algorithm with Jennifer Priest #019: How to Get Started with Promoted Pins on Pinterest with Alisa Meredith #012: How to Expand Your Business Using Group Boards on Pinterest with Kim Vij #009: How to Grow Pinterest NOW with Kate Ahl

015 Preparing Your Website for Promoted Pins

preparing pinterest promoted pins

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 17, 2019 25:43

Your client wants to run ads on Pinterest. But is their website ready for promoted pins? This episode we talk about the 4 necessary steps to complete before you run a promoted pin to make sure the data you get is reliable and how to make your website the best recipient of Pinterest visitors. Also our peculiar pin is about Steam Punk Weddings. For a full episode recap got to https://Pinconcierge.com/15

Mastering Pinterest For Business With Alisa Meredith

Social Media Marketing Made Simple Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 27, 2019 60:34

Key Takeaways Covered In The Podcast Whilst Pinterest may not give you instant gratification, it’s a great platform for getting results over a long period of time. Pinterest is not only a great tool for sharing your own posts, but a great place to search for information too! Whether you like searching for fashion ideas, travelling goals or recipes – Pinterest is a great place to see all the information you need presented to you visually. When you create a new piece of content you should pin it straight away to your most relevant board, that way, Pinterest will know that it’s your content. If you repin something you have already pinned, try changing the description to increase your chances of it being seen. You can do this manually or using Tailwind interval pinning (a scheduling tool for Pinterest). Pin every single day and not in a flurry – using a scheduling tool will help with this. Tailwind will be able to suggest the best times for you to pin, based on when your followers are online. The ideal size for a Pinterest image is 600 x 900. Don’t give too much away in your infographic or image, otherwise people won’t click through. Ensure it’s a clear, high quality image. When it comes to Pinterest, the best kind of engagement you can have is someone saving your pin. Promoted Pins on Pinterest are a lot more simple than Facebook Ads and when people save your promoted pin, it can lead to further repins and traffic to your site. If you have never used Pinterest for business before, you may need to start a new account if you want your engagement rate from the start. The one thing you need to remember above all else… There is very little negativity on Pinterest, so it’s a great place to find motivation and Inspiration. Above all else, that’s what people enjoy most about using the app. Highlights You Simply Can’t Miss Introducing Alisa – 06:15 The Beauty of Pinterest – 11:10 What is Pinterest and Why Should You Use It? - 14:10 Using Keywords on Pinterest - 18:30 How To Use Pinterest As a Business - 23:15 The Importance of a Pinterest Image - 29:40 Engagement and Pinterest: How Do You Do It? – 35:20 Using Promoted Pins On Pinterest - 43:40 Links to Resources Mentioned in Today’s Episode Tailwind Alisa Meredith Alisa Meredith Pinterest Alisa Meredith Instagram Want the full transcript? Click to Download!

business inspiration mastering pinterest ensure pin tailwinds alisa meredith promoted pins

# 116 – How Promoted Pins Can Boost Your Organic Pinterest Strategy

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 19, 2018 50:25

Did you know that promoted pins can boost your organic Pinterest strategy? Yep, it’s true. Today we’re getting into the nitty gritty of how it’s done. The post # 116 – How Promoted Pins Can Boost Your Organic Pinterest Strategy appeared first on Simple Pin Media®.

social marketing media tips boost pinterest analytics organic blogging simple pin media pinterest strategy promoted pins

116 Promoted Pins can boost your Pinterest strategy

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 18, 2018 50:26

Learn 6 ways to use Promoted pin data to boost your organic strategy.

boost promoted pinterest strategy promoted pins

#32 Advanced Strategy + Promoted Pins with Pinterest’s McKayla Amundsen

Boutique Chat

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 11, 2018 56:24

If you are not using Pinterest in your business you are missing a huge opportunity. Did you know women’s fashion is the number one most pinned category? We chatted with Partner Manager at Pinterest for this episode, she also joined us at The Boutique Summit this past June and let us tell you now… you’ll want to grab a pen. Pssst. Pinterest is contributing exclusive trainings for The Boutique Hub’s Members Only Training Library. Join here. For show notes & resources visit the episode webpage below or click here. Want more information on #BoutiqueChat? Visit www.theboutiquehub.com/boutiquechat ***Facebook: @boutiquehubashleyInstagram: @boutiquehubbusiness & @ajalderson Join our community of retailers, brands, influencers, service providers and insiders: www.theboutiquehub.com/join

strategy pinterest amundsen mckayla partner manager promoted pins

#030: The Easiest Ways to Make Money as a Blogger with Monica Froese (Part 2)

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 15, 2018 29:21

In this Part 2 interview with Monica Froese from the blog, Redefining Mom, we delve into the easiest ways to make money as a blogger. If you're trying to monetize your blog quickly, this episode is for you! Monica shares why Pinterest is the best platform for affiliate income and why you should invest in Promoted Pins. Plus we talk about how to pivot your business as you grow, and why you shouldn't be scared to do it! Resources: Redefining Mom Moolah Marketing ConvertKit Your Modern Family MiloTree *Some of these links may be affiliate links and I might make a small commission at no cost to you if you click. Transcript – The Easiest Ways to Make Money as a Blogger with Monica Froese (Part 2) Host: [00:00:03] Welcome to The Blogger Genius Podcast brought to you by MiloTree. Here's your host, Jillian Leslie. Jillian: [00:00:10] Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Blogger Genius podcast. I am here with Part 2 of my interview with Monica Froese. I don't know if you remember, but we left off with what to do if you've got six months and you need to make money and your husband isn't understanding what you're doing. So without further ado, here is Part 2 of my interview. Jillian: [00:00:35] Let's say I've done this and I've got a six month runway to make a business, to prove to my husband that this isn't just a pipe dream. Now what what are some of the easiest ways to start bringing income in? Easy ways to start making money as a blogger Jillian: [00:00:51] I put up a blog right. I get that up and running. Now I have no people. I don't even know what I'm doing. Where can I quickly make money? Monica: [00:01:01] The quickest wins I've ever had online came from Pinterest and affiliate marketing, these are the two quick wins. Especially affiliate marketing with Pinterest. You know they had cut it off for a while. They didn't allow affiliate links at all. Monica: [00:01:19] And I'm going to be honest, I'm not a big believer in putting direct affiliate links on Pinterest. I prefer to drive people to my site. Jillian: [00:01:30] OK so let's go through what each of those is. Monica: [00:01:35] The first way that you could do affiliate marketing on Pinterest is you could make a pin and link it to an affiliate link so that when someone clicks on it they're not going to your site. Make money with affiliate links on Pinterest Monica: [00:01:44] Let's say just as an example, you took a blogging course. You really love it. Now you're an affiliate of it and you want to promote it on Pinterest, so you would link directly to that person. Jillian: [00:01:56] And you would add your affiliate link to the pin. Monica: [00:02:00] Yes. Jillian: [00:02:01] Now Amazon is not happy about that anymore, is that correct? Monica: [00:02:05] That's correct. You cannot use Amazon affiliate links on Pinterest. Jillian: [00:02:10] OK, but you could for example though, let's say I love this pan from Amazon. Can you do this? I love this pan. I take pictures of my pan in my house. I then do a blog post about these awesome pans. Then I use that as a pin on Pinterest, it links back to my blog. But that is an affiliate. Monica: [00:02:33] Yes. And I strongly believe that is the better way to do it, even if Amazon was totally fine with you linking directly to them, even though they're not. Monica: [00:02:43] But even if they were, I strongly recommend getting the person to come to your site first. For so many reasons. The first reason being that you are, you're now getting the pageview. So you could choose to monetize your site with ads which could make you money. Monica: [00:02:58] But if you don't want to do ads, which I didn't do ads for the longest time and I'm actually just doing it now as an experiment, and I don't even know if I'll keep it. But right now I am running ads. Monica: [00:03:07] The other thing is I'm a huge huge believer in converting Pinterest traffic into email subscribers because once they're an email subscriber, you can market to them with affiliate links and all sorts of different ways forever as long as they stick around. Monica: [00:03:22] But if you think about it, if you get a click to an affiliate link to someone else's site you've lost them, you've lost all ability to do anything with them at that point. So that I just kind of take off the table personally. Monica: [00:03:34] Then if you take the tactic of getting them to your site with the purpose of explaining something affiliate driven. Whether it's like a course that you want to tell them about, or products on Amazon, that's great too. Monica: [00:03:49] But the method I actually prefer is giving them value in the post, a value driven blog post. And giving a single call to action that gets them on your email list and then once they're on your email list by all means direct them to your affiliates. Jillian: [00:04:09] Interesting. OK so you, because your business is all about helping moms grow businesses, you are picking affiliate programs or products that fit in with that. Monica: [00:04:23] So I have two sides a little bit. The side I focus on and my most revenue generating side is by far marketing tactics. So helping moms start their businesses and really understanding the data behind it. I like data driven stuff. Monica: [00:04:40] So how you can leverage different analytic things to bring traffic to your site. Mainly I focus on email marketing and Pinterest for that. Monica: [00:04:49] But I have a side of my business that is more passive that I have a lot of old content, mom driven content and especially when I had Maria this march. I had a lot of second-time mom content that I was putting up. Monica: [00:05:04] Like second time c-section stuff and things like that. And those I drive primarily using affiliate links I send them through a different funnel once they get on my email list, like a mom funnel kind of. Jillian: [00:05:20] That's so interesting. And then what kinds of products are you promoting? Promoting courses through affiliate links Monica: [00:05:26] So there's some Amazon but I have others. So Crystal Payne from Money Saving Mom, she has some really great courses for time management for moms with Make Over Your Mornings, Make Over Your Evenings which I actually found extremely beneficial balancing my own time. I took both and it really helped me. Monica: [00:05:44] So I recommend those, I try try to find courses, products, ebooks, checklists whatever it might be from other bloggers because I feel I would love to help other mom bloggers in the space grow their income and their following. Monica: [00:06:02] So when I was pregnant, and I was doing more c section posts and second time mom post I was looking for breastfeeding courses, and there is one that I found just by networking and Facebook groups and other blogging Facebook groups. I would just ask. "I have this post going up about you know C-section recovery. Do you have any products you recommend?" Monica: [00:06:28] So a lot of the products I linked from Amazon some of them from Target and I honestly I feel like that side of my business is very passive. Monica: [00:06:38] I know people say there's no such thing as passive income and it's not like I don't put work into it. A blog post is work, getting the affiliate links is work, setting up the email funnels is work and there's certainly work went into it and now they run pretty much on their own. Jillian: [00:06:53] Wow. So what's interesting about you is you've been able to take your life. The two sides of your life, your business side and your mom side and create small subset businesses out of both. Monica: [00:07:07] Under the same brand. Jillian: [00:07:08] Under the same brand, like you've been able to, and we talk about this on the podcast a lot of like niching down and not spreading yourself too thin. Monica: [00:07:17] So I just listened to your episode with Rachel Miller and I am in Rachel's course, her Facebook course and she is the niche down queen. She I mean she really hones in on things and builds them into explosive businesses. And she capitalizes on trends and all of that. Monica: [00:07:37] And I thought about this a lot. Especially when I was listening to that episode because I do feel like you can have a brand that is multifaceted but there are areas and different times within that brand that you are super focused. Monica: [00:07:52] Like right now, my business is super super focused on Promoted Pins. I found it as a spot that people needed education in. People were asking for it, so I created a course around it. Monica: [00:08:06] A lot of my day to day now is focused on helping people with Promoted Pins. Whether that's DIY or helping people actually get their campaigns up or running, campaigns for people. Monica: [00:08:21] I feel like I'm very niched there, but I didn't create a whole new website for it. I just pivot what I'm putting out at that time. And over time you get good at segmenting your email list, you send things to the right people. Jillian: [00:08:36] Right. And what email service are you using? Monica: [00:08:39] Convertkit. Jillian: [00:08:41] Convertkit. Yeah yeah okay. Monica: [00:08:43] So I have segments set up in there where I have a lot of funnels. I am a one woman show at this point. I have some contractors but very limited help that I get at this time, and I have a six figure business. Monica: [00:08:59] I'm a perfectionist and Type A, and I've had to learn to let go of some of that because not everything is perfect all the time. Sometimes I have typos and sometimes people cross pollinate in my funnels and so they might get more than one email in a day and it's unintentional but it happened. Monica: [00:09:21] I have this philosophy that I do the best I can. And I always have my reader at the forefront of my mind and I try to do what's best by her. And you know it might not be perfect all the time but it's as close as I can get it. Jillian: [00:09:36] Right and you know there was a previous episode with my friend, Becky Mansfield, and she is very similar in that she is a family lifestyle blog. Jillian: [00:09:46] But as her kids grow and she faces new things, she has seven different products, seven different lines to her business. And she too has different email funnels where she is being of service. But one could be about clean eating. And one could be about potty training. Monica: [00:10:09] Yeah I am follow her. Your Modern Family, right? Jillian: [00:10:12] Right exactly. Monica: [00:10:13] Yeah I watched her talk two years ago, that's where she was talking about her funnels how she sets them up. There are seven different ones that people go down each and they might cross over into the other one. Monica: [00:10:25] Actually I feel like she might have been one of the turning points for me, when I listened to her talk. Because I did feel the pressure that when I was pivoting. How to pivot as a blogger Monica: [00:10:34] Because I started as a working mom blog and it was a lot of corporate topics, talking to corporate working moms. A lot of time management, how to balance working outside the home. And as I got further away from that I couldn't really sustain a blog on that because I don't leave the house to work. Jillian: [00:10:49] Right. Right. Monica: [00:10:51] So I had to pivot but that doesn't mean the content that I had put up is bad content. It still drives me traffic. It still drives me sales and I don't even touch it anymore. So I don't see the problem with evolving with your brand. Monica: [00:11:07] My name was an accident. My brand is Redefining Mom. Which if you think about it, you can always redefine yourself like I can always use that brand for other things. Jillian: [00:11:16] Yes. You know what I like about this, is again your first piece of advice which is just start. And then it's like, you don't have to have all your ducks in a row. You don't have to know exactly what your niche is, like start with a niche and see how it goes. Jillian: [00:11:32] And as you change and evolve and as your baby grows or your family changes or who knows what, you can then do what you're doing. Jillian: [00:11:40] Which is now Promoted Pins. And again it's the internet, so maybe that will last forever, maybe it will be in six months you find something else. But that you can then figure out how to grow that. Monica: [00:11:58] There was a great post I just read from Michael Stelzner from Social Media Examiner. He said essentially that influencers come in and out of the space. People burn out of talking about the same topic. So they'll go. Monica: [00:12:16] And you can see it in a lot of big influencers, too. But someone will like hone in on Pinterest and they'll do it for a year or two maybe even three and then they'll get burned out and they'll start pivoting towards a different topic in the online marketing sphere. Monica: [00:12:31] And so it's OK to come and go from different topics based on where you are in life if you're a lifestyle blogger. You know in 10 years from now, I hope to still have my brand and you know I can't predict necessarily where I'll be in 10 years. But I know I'm not going be talking about c-sections in 10 years, I'm done having kids. Monica: [00:12:52] But that content is still there and it's just in the background. Even if you go to my site today, you're not going to see this splash page of c-section tips for new moms or second time moms. Monica: [00:13:04] Really the only way you're going to get to it is if you find it on Pinterest and I keyword it well. That's why I love Pinterest to be honest with you and Google, but I can't profess to be best at organic search on Google. But I am very good at keywording on Pinterest. Monica: [00:13:26] And so I could have all these different areas of my business because I can rank for c-section, I can rank for time management, I can rank for Pinterest tips on Pinterest. Monica: [00:13:37] But the people who are looking at that are not the same people. They're searching for what they need in the moment and arriving at that post that they need in the moment and they're taking action. Monica: [00:13:50] If I leave you with anything, it is that every post if you're a blogger should have a singular call to action. BLOGGING ADVICE: Every blog posts should have a singular call to action Jillian: [00:13:59] Singular. Yes. We talk about that. Yes. In fact we created MiloTree with that in mind. Which is one action. Jillian: [00:14:11] You know we have a variety of popups, but notice it's one pop up the shows to one user. It's not, hey follow me on Twitter. Wait, follow me on Instagram. Wait, join my email list, because you will burn out your user. They will have paralysis. So I am a huge believer in one call to action. Monica: [00:14:33] So now, I've actually had a student ask me that. So I think this is a good point with MiloTree. So when I was telling her about the single call to action she went to my site and she saw my MiloTree pop up and I have it set up so the first time you visit. you get the Follow me on Pinterest pop-up. Monica: [00:14:50] And she said OK is that your call to action? Because really the call to action at the post was to get on my email list which is 95 percent of the time what I want you to do. Monica: [00:14:58] I said, well if you think about it, if someone clicks the follow me on Pinterest, it's actually opening up a new browser so I'm not taking them away from my site. It's opening in the new browser for you to follow me on Pinterest but my site is still there with the original what I want you to do. Jillian: [00:15:13] Yes. Yes exactly. Exactly. And if they follow you on Pinterest then chances are they will see your content. And you know when they're on Pinterest or whatever because you'll show up and then they will end up back on your site. And then they will be joining different lists. Monica: [00:15:28] Which leads me back into the whole promote thing, because once they found you on Pinterest, then if you want to get in front of them. I always say Promote Pins are the way to skip the line. Jillian: [00:15:38] I like that. I like that. Explain that. Monica: [00:15:45] OK. So at the end of the day Pinterest needs to make money. They employ people, they need to make money. And they, like any platform, they don't make money by sending you away from their site. Monica: [00:15:59] And that's what their whole business model is based on, is actually sending people away from their site. So they need to make money. How do they make money? They make money on ads of people sponsoring content on their platform. Monica: [00:16:12] So if that's how they make money, and they're in the business of making money like we're in the business of making money, I'm a believer of giving them what they want. Jillian: [00:16:20] I like that. Why as a blogger you should invest in Promoted Pins on Pinterest Monica: [00:16:22] The thing about Promoted Pins is, it's the ad that keeps on giving. Like I do pretty well with Facebook ads and I love Facebook ads, but when they're done they're done. It disappears off their platform. Nobody's clicking on anymore. Monica: [00:16:37] When you run a Promoted Pin. I always run traffic campaigns, which is you pay for the click. But by the nature of Pinterest, people are also saving the pin. So I'm promoting it. People are clicking and saving it. Monica: [00:16:51] Those saves that I get from the promotion, I paid for the click. I'm not even paying for the person to save it. But they do. Now through that person's account, that person's board. Those are called earned clicks, so you can actually see it in your analytics. And I believe that's what they actually call it. Monica: [00:17:07] You can see your paid metrics and your earned metrics and most of my campaign that I promote. I'm seeing after it's done, I still see from last summer I ran a promoted pin campaign and Google Analytics at the end of the URL in your google analytics it will be P=0, that means that you paid for that click. Monica: [00:17:29] Or PP=1 which means you earned that click, it came from after, it came from like someone saved your pin and then someone else went and clicked on it from a promoted campaign. Monica: [00:17:41] And I have from last summer, I ran a campaign for a month and I still get earned clicks on that. Every single week. Jillian: [00:17:50] Yes. And tell me if this is right. Which is, you run a promoted pin campaign and somebody then saves it, clicks through and saves that pin. You don't even know that person. Jillian: [00:18:05] But I see that person's pin somehow or maybe I followed that person and it shows up in my feed or I'm doing a search and I see that person's saved pin and I click on it. You are not paying for me to click on somebody's pin they saved from you. Does that make sense? Monica: [00:18:22] Yes. You're not. Jillian: [00:18:24] That's free? Monica: [00:18:25] That's free, yeah. And that's what comes up through your Google Analytics that PP=1 Monica: [00:18:30] Or when you're looking at your analytics and the ads dashboard pictures actually called out paid metrics versus earned metrics and earned means you didn't actually pay for it. Jillian: [00:18:40] Yep yep. OK. It's amazing. So I'm a mom, I want to build a business. And you say, start a blog. Start it. That's the first important thing. Talk to your husband, negotiate, fight, whatever you need to do. Carve out some time, then start to figure out what your first niche is. Jillian: [00:19:03] OK. Doesn't have to be your final niche, just first niche. Go for it. Start writing blog posts. Start cultivating, figuring out how you can be of service to people within this niche. Hopefully it's a niche you know very well. Monica: [00:19:19] I recommend that it is a niche you know very well, it will make it a lot easier. Jillian: [00:19:23] Right. So it's not skydiving, if you've never gone skydiving. Pick something that feels right. You know, start doing some research on going deeper into this area. Jillian: [00:19:35] Start finding products that you either have used yourself, or courses you've taken, those kinds of things, join their affiliate programs. Start writing really useful blog posts that will help people, and your content in and of itself should be helpful. But add the links to those affiliate programs. Monica: [00:19:57] Yeah and you know, MiloTree is a great example. When you find something that you can talk about without even getting paid for it, like I was talking about MiloTree before there was an affiliate program for it all. Monica: [00:20:09] It just came so naturally because it was something that worked for me, so I would mention it all the time. So things like that. Monica: [00:20:16] If you're talking to a friend, if you have a lifestyle mom blog and you're talking to a friend about a product that you just love and you talk about it all the time. Write a post about what's so amazing about it and add your affiliate link, monetize it. Jillian: [00:20:30] Love that. I love that. I love that because somebody said to me, "but I feel like maybe my audience won't trust me if I'm monetizing off of these links." Get into the right mindset to do affiliate marketing Monica: [00:20:46] Okay, so blogging is at the end of the day it can be a huge mindset game. A lot of things can make you feel uncomfortable when you're first doing it, and you might get a negative comment and it can derail you. Monica: [00:21:01] I've gotten people tell me that I shouldn't have had kids if I didn't want to raise them and I mean crazy stuff I've had. And you know what, the first couple of those really did derail me. Monica: [00:21:11] I mean, for every 100 compliments one negative erases the 100 right? And so mindset wise and I've really started to just own things now. So what I say about the monetization side of it is, I'm not running a charity and it can't be a business if I'm running a charity and I'm doing this. Monica: [00:21:35] I'm taking time away from my family to run the business and I have to be compensated for it, and as long as you're talking about something that you genuinely use and believe in there is nothing wrong with you making money off of it. Jillian: [00:21:50] I like that. I agree. I like the idea of it's not a charity. Monica: [00:21:55] It is not. Otherwise it can't be a business. Jillian: [00:21:57] Right. And as women I think we're so used to giving you know and giving for free, that it is a mindset shift. Monica: [00:22:07] It is. And you are still giving. I mean you give so much value. A lot of bloggers are giving away a lot of value on their free content that they put out there. I tend to give more away and my email content. But still it's free. You're not paying to be on my email list. Monica: [00:22:25] I have one friend who runs a pretty big blog, and she got to the point where she actually says I welcome people to unsubscribe from me because if you were never going to pay me for anything then you know, this is not a two way relationship. Jillian: [00:22:45] Right. And by the way, email service providers are expensive. Monica: [00:22:49] They are. You are costing me money to be on my email list. So there's a level of, you shouldn't just look at everyone is just a dollar sign. Monica: [00:22:58] I think that that might be hard for women to do, especially moms who are just getting into this, but you should always have in the back of your mind that you're serving them and you wanted to serve them so well that they want to buy stuff that you recommend, or they want to buy something that you create because you've given them so much value. Jillian: [00:23:19] Right. I agree. OK, so the first way that I can make some money hopefully fast is through affiliates. Then what is the next place that you recommend I move? Monica: [00:23:33] So if you're doing typical blogging stuff, like a typical blogger model you can make money off ads and sponsorships with brands. Whether that's social media sponsorships or writing a blog post sponsorship. Monica: [00:23:46] I just started experimenting with ads five years in and that was just really like a way to enhance my own skills because it's something I didn't really do before. Monica: [00:23:55] But I personally don't like sponsorship work and that's a personal preference. And the reason that is is because it makes me feel like I'm working for someone and that's why I left corporate. I wanted to not feel like I was working for someone. Monica: [00:24:07] So it wasn't something that I really liked. But it is a way to quickly form some relationships with brands out there. So that's one way you can do it. BLOGGING ADVICE: Create your own products Monica: [00:24:17] The second thing, my preferred way, is to create something of your own and it really doesn't have to be something elaborate. You know I've I have bought printable packs from people for fourteen dollars. Monica: [00:24:35] Once you are driving traffic to your site and you understand what your audience wants to get. I have a spreadsheet, a budget spreadsheet is the best way I can illustrate this. I have a budget spreadsheet. I do not talk about budgeting. I don't talk about money. Besides how to make money online. I guess technically. How a budgeting spreadsheet made $10,000 Monica: [00:24:52] But I don't talk about budgeting at all. And I have a spreadsheet that my husband and I use when were both paid in commission in corporate and it's a very easy way to project out your finances for the year. And you know understand different levers you can pull with money coming in. Monica: [00:25:08] I put up the sales page on a lead page and I charge seventeen dollars for it. Last year it made me $10,000 and the only thing I do to promote it is I pin two pins on rotation through Tailwind and that's all I made $10,000. Jillian: [00:25:27] Wow I love that. OK I love it. Monica: [00:25:30] And who would have thought of that because it has nothing to do with my niche whatsoever. And if I listen to all the popular advice out there I never would have put it up for sale. Jillian: [00:25:40] And you just had created it for yourselves? Monica: [00:25:42] Yeah. My husband and I can remember clear as day when we did it because we missed commission on one paycheck and we're like. Now what? Because we lived paycheck to paycheck when our first daughter was born and so we came up with the system and it's really not difficult. Monica: [00:25:59] I have like a 22 minute video that I give you with it showing you how to use each tab. There's not complicated formulas. And I have like a intro video on the sales page so people know you don't have to have these wicked advanced Excel skills to figure it out or anything like that, and it sells only through Pinterest. Jillian: [00:26:22] Wow. Monica: [00:26:23] And that's the power of keywording right there. Jillian: [00:26:26] OK. This is terrific. This is absolutely terrific. All right, Monica, and you have a variety of products on your site, courses that you've created. Monica: [00:26:37] Yes I do. Now that I had my second, I really have to focus my time, and I just came to the realization that I have to lighten that load a little bit because it's hard to keep things updated, and I do feel a sense of responsibility to keep things updated for people who pay me money, so I'm really narrowing down and focusing on Promoted Pins. Monica: [00:27:01] But I also have an organic Pinterest course that goes hand in hand. Like if you don't understand Pinterest to drive free traffic, it's going to be really hard for you to understand Pinterest to drive paid traffic. Monica: [00:27:13] So I do feel like they both go hand in hand and those are those are my primary focuses right now. And then I have some evergreen. Monica: [00:27:20] I have a course about how to start an online business for moms, which is pretty evergreen because that doesn't really change, you are talking to your husband, setting up your finances, time management. All of that. That is what it is right. That doesn't really change so I have stuff like that up there too. Jillian: [00:27:36] That is incredible. And you also do coaching. Monica: [00:27:39] I do. I have a little bit less time for that now, but the primary way I work with people are in strategy sessions. Especially if you're just trying to wrap your mind around getting started. I get a lot of people that are in the beginning and they just need some advice on what to do next. Monica: [00:27:59] And then the second I would say the most popular way people work with me are in Promoted Pin strategy sessions. Jillian: [00:28:06] That is terrific OK. And if people want to reach out to you what is the best way? Monica: [00:28:11] Well you can just go to my site redefiningmom.com. I have a contact tab on there. And then I also have a Facebook group which is probably the easiest way to get me in real time because you can tag me, and I see it almost instantaneously and you can get that by going to redefiningmom.com/Facebook. Jillian: [00:28:30] Monica, thank you. Honestly, I've learned so much from you and congrats on your new baby. Monica: [00:28:37] Thank you so much for having me. Grow your Instagram followers authentically and for free Jillian: [00:28:39] Let's say you are a blogger or online entrepreneur and you want to grow your social media followers on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, or grow your e-mail list and you've been wanting to try MiloTree but you're not that technical. Jillian: [00:28:54] We have launched a service called MiloTree fast track where for $50 we will install it and optimize it for you. Jillian: [00:29:03] If you are interested just reach out to me and Jillian@Milotree.com and of course you will get your first 30 days of MiloTree free. Sign up for MiloTree now and get your first 30 DAYS FREE!

#019: How to Get Started with Promoted Pins on Pinterest with Alisa Meredith

business marketing planning creative businesses profit creatives planner burkhead promoted pins alisa meredith

Play Episode Listen Later May 30, 2018 58:23

Today I'm talking with Alisa Meredith, Content Marketing Manager at Tailwind, and owner of Alisa Meredith Marketing. If you were wondering how to get started with Promoted Pins on Pinterest, this is the episode for you! We go deep and explain everything! You will learn exactly how to set up your first promoted pin campaign on Pinterest and why it's such a powerful platform to drive sales. Resources: Tailwind Alisa Meredith Marketing DevaCurl MiloTree Some links may be affiliate. Subscribe to The Blogger Genius Podcast: iTunes Google Play Stitcher Transcript – How to Get Started with Promoted Pins on Pinterest with Alisa Meredith Jillian: [00:00:03] Welcome to the Blogger Genius Podcast by Milo Tree. Here is your host, Jillian Leslie. Jillian: [00:00:10] Hey, Everyone. Welcome back to the show. Today, my guest is Alisa Meredith. Jillian: [00:00:16] Alisa is the content marketing manager at Tailwind, which is a company we've talked a lot about on the show. She also has her own marketing agency where she focuses on promoted pins that is called Alisa Meredith Marketing. So Alisa, welcome to the show. Alisa: [00:00:35] Hey, Jillian. Thank you so much. So happy to be here. It was so great to meet you in person finally. Jillian: [00:00:41] I know. We were friends online and then obviously, we meet people in real life. Jillian: [00:00:45] I Remember we talked about hair because your curly hair looks so good. You gave me all your tips, you showed me all your products and we bonded over that from the beginning. Alisa: [00:01:00] We did. But I have been neglectful in following up on this. Jillian: [00:01:03] In terms of how my hair is going? Alisa: [00:01:06] Yeah. Jillian: [00:01:07] Well, I'm getting my hair cut and then, I'm going to launch into the products. I'll send you a photo after. Alisa: [00:01:15] I thought your hair was fabulous anyway. I think that's how the whole conversation started, but I'm anxious to see what you think if you try this method. Jillian: [00:01:22] Yes. Yes. But if anybody wants to know the special curly hair method, just email me and I will share it. I'll share what Alisa shared with me and the special products. Alisa: [00:01:33] Now, what are we talking about again? Jillian: [00:01:35] I know. I know. So let's talk about Pinterest. Pinterest comes up a lot on this show, and you were saying that you discovered it back how long ago? Starting to use Pinterest in the early days Alisa: [00:01:48] It was 2012 or 2013. Jillian: [00:01:50] Okay, and you, like me, loved it from the beginning. Alisa: [00:01:53] Oh, my goodness. Yes. I used to be a terrible bookmark hoarder in my browser. I just found that I never knew where anything was and of course, you never name them properly. Alisa: [00:02:08] Having this visual system to keep all these articles I want them to refer back to or wanted to read when I had time later, I loved it from the second I found it. Jillian: [00:02:18] Totally, for us, my husband is my partner, he's a technologist, I kept saying to him for Catch My Party, please build me something where I can bookmark stuff because then, I would use the content from our own site and blog posts. Jillian: [00:02:32] I never had a place to save stuff. All of a sudden, Pinterest showed up, and I was able to bookmark all of our own content for myself. Jillian: [00:02:39] And then what I realized was it was driving us traffic and then we were like "Whoa, this is weird. This is awesome." Jillian: [00:02:48] That's also why we then built Milo tree because we need to double down on Pinterest. We need to grow our following. We need to grow this because this is a juggernaut for us. Alisa: [00:03:00] Yes, indeed. And you must be really excited by some of the new stuff that came out from Pinterest recently. Jillian: [00:03:06] Like? Alisa: [00:03:07] Like the following tab that's rolling out to everybody. Jillian: [00:03:10] Yes. Can you explain what that is? Alisa: [00:03:13] Yeah, sure. A couple of years ago, if you went to your Pinterest home feed, you would see the pins from just the people you follow in the order like in reverse chronological order so the newest stuff first. Alisa: [00:03:25] Then when smart feed came in, they added all these filters because there was just too much content coming out, and Pinterest wanted to make it a great user experience.They kind of tried to prioritize what they show, when and to whom so the feed changed up a lot. Alisa: [00:03:39] A lot of people love it because you can discover new stuff but on the other hand, some people really miss the option to have that curated follower feed where you could decide what people and which boards to follow so you could really choose for yourself what you want to see. And now, we can do both. Following tab on Pinterest Jillian: [00:03:58] Yes, yes and there's a little tab on mobile. I haven't explored it on desktop but there's a little tab on mobile that says "following," I think, and if you click it, you will see the pins from only the people you follow. Alisa: [00:04:12] Yeah, I don't even have it on mobile yet. I have it on desktop. Jillian: [00:04:15] Oh, interesting. So weird how they roll stuff out. Alisa: [00:04:19] Yeah. And then there's a page on the Pinterest site that I have bookmarked, and I check all the time because they're always changing it. Alisa: [00:04:26] It's Setting Yourself up for Success on Pinterest page, and they've just changed it to let us know that they are sending out our content to our followers first and then based on the reaction of our followers, that's how they decide what should be seen more. Jillian: [00:04:41] Yes. In fact, I was just at a conference and a woman from Pinterest was there, sharing best practices. She said this interesting piece which is Pinterest tests your content. Jillian: [00:04:51] What they do is they show it initially to your followers to see what kind of response it gets. And if it gets a good response, that's content then that they will show to other people. First five pins of the day on Pinterest get priority Jillian: [00:05:04] The other piece of information this community manager from Pinterest shared is your first five pins of the day are prioritized and show to more of your followers. So if you're going to be optimizing your pins, focus on those five pins of the day. I would recommend that that be all of your content rather than pins from other people. Alisa: [00:05:31] Yes, that's a great idea. There are a lot of questions that came up after that was shared. I love that they're sharing more of that kind of deep dive tactical information. Alisa: [00:05:40] But of course, everyone wanted to know what are the first five? What time zone? So I did contact them, and I got a message back from support that it is midnight UTC. Jillian: [00:05:51] And what is UTC? Alisa: [00:05:52] GMT. Jillian: [00:05:52] It's Greenwich Mean Time. Alisa: [00:05:58] Yeah. It's the same thing. Here on the East Coast, we're on Daylight Saving Time. So I think now, we're four hours behind that. So for me, my first pins of the day start at 8 p.m. Jillian: [00:06:11] Got it. OK. So here in California then, it would be 5:00 p.m. Look, I could do that math really quick. Alisa: [00:06:18] Yeah, I did. I'm impressed. Jillian: [00:06:18] So one thing that you focus on is promoted pins. I feel like promoted pins do not get the same kind of attention that ads on Facebook do, and that people don't quite know how to start with promoted pins or what promoted pins will get them. How to get started with Promoted Pins on Pinterest Jillian: [00:06:39] Can you, in a nutshell, explain what promoted pins are, and what the value is behind them? Alisa: [00:06:49] Sure. I think that there's a good reason for that. On Facebook, if you don't pay, you don't get reached. On Pinterest, that's not the case. Alisa: [00:06:55] Pinterest is very generous in giving us exposure for our content. So I think a lot of people can get really great results on Pinterest without promoting. Alisa: [00:07:04] But If you're on a time crunch or you just want more, promoted pins are the way to go because all it is is just an ad but it is a pin that you've already pinned. Jillian: [00:07:16] So it's taking your clientele and kind of accelerating it. Alisa: [00:07:21] Exactly. It has fewer options in Facebook which, to me, is a good thing because it's not so overwhelming. But it does have one really cool feature which we can talk about in a bit but I don't think any other ad platform has. Alisa: [00:07:38] It is absolutely worth a look especially as you know prices start to rise on other networks as it gets more crowded. Fewer people are using promoted pins so there is room to get started. Alisa: [00:07:49] It Is the way it converts too. We know that 97 percent of the searches on Pinterest are non branded which means that people don't come into Pinterest with a preconceived idea of exactly what they want to buy and from whom. Alisa: [00:08:03] You have the opportunity to get into their minds at a much earlier stage in their decision making process which does mean that you have to be a little bit more patient with your ads on Pinterest, but it also means that you have a better shot against the people with the big ad budgets on Pinterest than you may somewhere else. On Pinterest you can get into the mind of the shopper earlier Jillian: [00:08:21] And what do you mean by that, that you can get into their minds earlier? Alisa: [00:08:25] So, when you're on Google or Amazon, you pretty much know exactly what you want. If you're on Pinterest, you're probably a lot of times in the beginning stages of planning for something. You may be planning a house remodel, and you might be looking for ideas on refreshing mid-century modern bathroom. Alisa: [00:08:46] You're not necessarily searching for a Moen faucet. You are searching for those bigger ideas. You can start to get people into your site, learning about your content, get them on your email list long before they're ready to pull the trigger. Alisa: [00:09:01] I mean people do buy from Pinterest promoted pins quite a bit. 1 in 2 have said they've purchased from a promoted pin but you can get in much earlier which is a huge benefit for smaller business. Jillian: [00:09:14] Got it. Let's walk through. Let's say I have an Etsy shop and I sell jewelry. Talk to me about how you would recommend, I used promoted pins. Jillian: [00:09:24] Let's say I'd take a bunch of photos of my bracelets and rings, and I'm pinning them to Pinterest. What would you say to me? How can I increase sales using Pinterest? Alisa: [00:09:40] The first thing to know is that lifestyle images convert at a much higher rate than do straight product shots. Jillian: [00:09:46] Right, so you don't want just that white background. Alisa: [00:09:48] If you look at the fashion pins on Pinterest and especially take note of the ones that are promoted because people are probably spending more time on those, you'll see very few faces. Alisa: [00:09:57] If it is a product like that, you do want to zoom in on it so people can see exactly what it is. You don't have to put the text on the image. Should you add text on your Promoted Pins on Pinterest? Jillian: [00:10:06] Got it. Would you recommend text on the image? Alisa: [00:10:09] It depends on what it is. In this example, we're talking about a piece of jewelry. If it's obvious what it is, no, you don't need that. I think it could be distracting and take away from it. Alisa: [00:10:19] If it's a service offering or something, absolutely, texts on images are really important. For products, not necessarily. Jillian: [00:10:27] Okay, so I've got this photo or this pin of a bracelet that I made, and it's doing well. It's got a bunch of free pins. And people seem to like it so I'm going to say, "That would be probably a good pin to promote." Jillian: [00:10:44] Would you agree with that as a strategy like put it out there first, see if it gets any kind of organic traction and then, choose that as a pin to promote or do you recommend "I'm going to start fresh, new pin and promote it then"? Alisa: [00:11:00] You can do either but I would say that we're probably not looking at the right thing. I would back up a little bit and see which products are converting from Pinterest. Alisa: [00:11:10] I'm not really familiar with the backend of Etsy. I've done quite a bit in Teachers Pay Teachers so I would want to know which products convert well when people come from Pinterest. Jillian: [00:11:21] Like let's say your Teachers Pay Teachers Page. Alisa: [00:11:25] Yeah. And that you can tell pretty well. But if we're talking about Etsy, hopefully, there's a way to do that. Is there? Jillian [00:11:35] I think there is, that you can see which products of yours are selling. Alisa: [00:11:38] Yeah. Okay. And hopefully, you can tell what source they come in from. If not, you kind of probably have to give your best guess. Alisa: [00:11:47] Generally speaking, I think the lower priced items do better on Pinterest promoted pins if you're looking to get sales immediately. Of course, little impulse buy. Alisa: [00:11:58] But instead of starting from the pin, I will start with the product. Think about what's going to convert. If you then can look at your pins, you have one that leads to that, it gets great engagement, it gets a lot of re-pins, then that's the one I would do. The real value of Promoted Pins on Pinterest Alisa: [00:12:13] The great thing about promoted pins of course is that it's already an existing pin. You promote it. You show it to tons of people. It gets a ton of re-pins. Anyone who clicks on any of those re-pins, you don't pay for the traffic to your site. Jillian: [00:12:27] Wait. Say that again. So explain that. This is where I think the value of promoted pins is really obvious. So explain. Alisa: [00:12:38] If you like a bargain, you want to hear this. When you promote a pin, you are paying to have it shown to many, many, more people. As many, many, more people see it and those many people re-pin your pin, if others then see those repackaged versions of your promoted pin and they click on it, you don't pay for those clicks. Jillian: [00:12:59] Great. So I've got this pin of my bracelet. You like it. You pin it. So it shows to you. I pay for it to show to you. Then you re-pin it. Jillian: [00:13:12] It's now in your Fabulous Jewelry board. And then somebody, your friend or whomever is following you, sees it there and they click on it. And they even end up on my shop. I'm not paying for that. Best bargain on Pinterest is Traffic Campaigns Alisa: [00:13:26] If you're using a traffic campaign, though that's where you get your best bargain that way, yeah. Jillian: [00:13:35] Okay, so versus what is it like, conversion, like where there's actually a purchase. Alisa: [00:13:40] No. The other options are you can pay for awareness. That one, it can generate re-pins but I find the best bargain overall is with traffic campaigns. Jillian: [00:13:52] Got it. Alisa: [00:13:53] Yes. Awareness really is just to get it in front of people. You're not paying for any action on it. You're just paying per impression. Alisa: [00:13:59] You c an pay for an engagement ad which I thought this will be good because I thought maybe I can increase the number re-pins for very little money and then, get clicks from that. . Alisa: [00:14:11] In My experience, and please try everything because it might be different for you, but in my experience, what I ended up paying for were close ups where people click on the pin and look at it enlarged, and then nothing else happened. Jillian: [00:14:24] That was when you were paying for that with engagement. Yeah. So engagement, you're paying any time somebody clicks on the pin but doesn't necessarily go to your site. They're just looking at it. Alisa: [00:14:33] Yes, so I always stick with traffic campaigns. Now, I tried to make that work for me but it just didn't. Jillian: [00:14:41] That's interesting. So I am going to promote this pin, my bracelet pin, and I'm going to do a traffic campaign so it just gets shown to more people. Alisa: [00:14:52] And you're paying for the clicks only. Jillian: [00:14:54] I'm paying for the clicks only so it's being shown to many more people than the number of people clicking. Alisa: [00:15:02] That's right. And so in effect, you're getting awareness on top of it. Jillian: [00:15:06] That's terrific. And then what do you recommend? Do you recommend a follow up pin? What else would you put in that stew? Alisa: [00:15:18] Okay, so what you could do with that, let's see, you have just the bracelet. I think for a product like that, a standalone promoted pin campaign can work really well. You don't necessarily have to get into a funnel if you're selling a piece of jewelry. Alisa: [00:15:35] What you could do then on top of that is you could build another traffic campaign where you're targeting people who engage with that pin. How to target people on Pinterest Alisa: [00:15:47] And here's why that might be cool: if you target your promoted pin by people who have engaged with it, and bear with me because I may have to say this twice, you could say "I want to target people who have not clicked on this pin. They've done something else with it but they haven't clicked on it." Jillian: [00:16:09] Clicked on it, meaning to see a big version of it or to actually go to my site? Alisa: [00:16:16] Close up. Click would be going to your site. I can then target anybody who has engaged with any version of that pin. Alisa: [00:16:27] So if I take, I have the bracelet product page URL and I'm going to say, "Okay, Pinterest, I want to target anybody who has engaged with my pin but has not clicked yet. This is the pin, whatever pin it is, has to lead to this page." Alisa: [00:16:42] So Pinterest will go out and find every version of every pin of the links to my page. It doesn't have to be something I pinned. It could be something you pinned or somebody down the street or somebody across the world. Alisa: [00:16:56] I can now target people who have engaged with my content even if they don't follow me or they didn't click on my particular instance of that pin. That's the one that I don't think is available on any other network. Jillian: [00:17:12] Wow. Okay, so back to that bracelet pin, if you pinned it, somebody sees your pin, had enlarged it, done a closeup of it, I can then target that person who doesn't follow me, who's never seen my account on Pinterest but I can then target that person? Alisa: [00:17:32] Right, because basically, what you're doing is saying, "I know this person showed some interest in this pin or one of the pins that goes to this page at some point but they didn't click on it to go to my website." Alisa: [00:17:43] So now, I want to hit them with a pin that takes them to my website. Jillian: [00:17:47] Wow. That's terrific. And how much are we talking about in terms of paying for promoted pins? Alisa: [00:17:56] Right. It's an auction like Facebook is. So it depends on your targeting and the competition of your targeting. You don't have to spend a ton of money. How to set up an ad group on Pinterest Alisa: [00:18:09] When I set up a campaign, I will typically set up multiple ad groups inside of it. Those ad groups will be separated by what kind of targeting I'm using. Jillian: [00:18:19] Is that the same? Explain what that means. Are you using the same pin but targeting different groups with it? Alisa: [00:18:25] Yes. So typically the way that I organize a campaign is the campaign will be for one product or one article. Underneath that campaign will be the different ad groups which are divided by targeting types. Alisa: [00:18:39] I might have one that's targeting by search keywords. I might have another one that's targeting by visitors to my site. I might have another one that's an act like audience of some audience that does really well for each of those ad groups. Alisa: [00:18:56] I would never want to try to make it work with less than five dollars a day. Because it will take forever to figure out if it's working. Jillian: [00:19:07] Exactly. And I just wanted to go over that again which is so we've done some for MiloTree. We've done some paid promotion on Facebook and Pinterest. Jillian: [00:19:17] And it's this weird thing which is you just put five dollars in per day. What you're really trying to do is learn. Jillian: [00:19:25] At five dollars a day or less than that, it's really hard. Your stuff is not going to be shown very much. What you're trying to do is get data. So in a weird way, you do want to spend upfront so that you can learn quickly. Alisa: [00:19:41] That's right. You have to consider too that even if it doesn't convert really well right away, you are building a re-targeting audience so that you can later on target people to that page because they saw your pin or you can use re-targeting on Facebook because now, they've been to your site. It's a little bit of an investment upfront. Jillian: [00:20:02] Yes. Let's say, you create a campaign and in it, you've got the same pin but you're targeting different audiences. You would put at least five dollars toward each of those pins, each of those audiences? Alisa: [00:20:23] Yes, absolutely. I typically will have a lot more than that. Usually, you have 12 to 14 because I also separate it out by mobile and on desktop. Because your cost per conversion can be so incredibly different. Jillian: [00:20:45] Interesting. What do you find because, do people buy on mobile? Alisa: [00:20:48] Yes, they do but it depends on your product. If you have a SaaS product or if you have a software product, people are probably going to find it on desktop. Jillian: [00:20:59] MiloTree, for example. We get very few conversions on mobile. You're not going to sit there on your phone and be optimizing your pop up. Almost all of our conversions are desktops so when we have run ads, we only target desktop. Can you get sales on mobile on Pinterest with Promoted Pins? Jillian: [00:21:17] If I'm a jewelry designer, could I get sales on mobile? Alisa: [00:21:21] Oh, totally and just talking to my ad rep at Pinterest, she shared with me that it doesn't matter what industry you're in, the vast majority of the conversions, the sales are happening on Apple products like your iPhone and your iPad. Jillian: [00:21:39] How about like Apple computer or does she mean more mobile? Alisa: [00:21:43] She's talking more mobile because Pinterest is so mobile. What we promote a lot of times is somewhat unique. We're not selling a physical product. Alisa: [00:21:52] For physical product, you're going to probably get a lot more on mobile but you might find it super expensive, and you still get a few on desktop, I would try it anyway. Jillian: [00:22:04] So you are now promoting to 12 to 14 different audiences at five dollars a day. Alisa: [00:22:10] Yeah. Jillian: [00:22:13] That is an investment. Alisa: [00:22:14] It is but you know what? I'm a bargain hunter. No one knew this about me. Jillian: [00:22:20] I like that. Alisa: [00:22:21] Because I told you to find some products on Groupon. Jillian: [00:22:25] Groupon. Totally. You just have to say the name of the hair products just so in case anybody sees. Alisa: [00:22:29] Yeah, Diva Curl. Jillian: [00:22:31] Diva Curl. Alisa: [00:22:36] So if I had an Etsy shop and I'm looking at this and I'm thinking, "No way", can I do 12 ad groups at five dollars a day for a month to figure this out? Alisa: [00:22:46] I totally understand that especially if you had 10 products you wanted to promote. It's just impossible. Alisa: [00:22:53] So there are two different ways you could do this. One way is you could create a promoted pin that had a whole collection of items that you wanted to promote. Jillian: [00:23:03] Within the pin? Alisa: [00:23:05] Yes, like a collage. That can work really well. Pinterest even recommends a strategy having multiple items in an image because it appeals to a much wider range of people when they see it. Jillian: [00:23:17] That makes a lot of sense. Alisa: [00:23:19] Yeah. And then, that's a way to really figure out what kind of audience is going to work for you without having to manage and pay for 10 different campaigns. Alisa: [00:23:29] You just have one and then, the pin would lead to a page where you would have all those items very easily purchased. Alisa: [00:23:38] Target does this really well. In my presentation for Social Media Marketing World, I showed a pin that they had of two different dining room setups and then if you click on that pin, it takes you to all their dining room setups. Alisa: [00:23:52] So you could do that in the pages. It's basically a catalog page with just all items that's easy to buy, easy to put in your cart. Jillian: [00:24:01] So I make bracelets. I have a variety of bracelets in a collage. I put, let's say, three bracelets and I link it to my bracelet page. So instead of just those specific products, I could link it to some sort of catalog of all of my 20 bracelets. Alisa: [00:24:21] That's right. You could do that. So that's one way to kind of keep the cost down when you're just starting. Alisa: [00:24:28] The other way is to try to prioritize your ad groups, prioritize what kind of targeting you're going to try. Different way to use Pinterest targeting Alisa: [00:24:37] There are a bunch of different ways you could target. You could target by broad match keywords which is basically Pinterest looks at your keywords, matches them to a prescribed interest and serves them up in the home for people they think might be interested in it. Alisa: [00:24:53] That's one way to reach strangers. You can also use phrase in exact match keywords which only will show your pin when somebody searches those terms. Broad match vs. exact match on Pinterest Jillian: [00:25:04] So broad matches exactly what it says which is if it's an exact match, you would have to say pearl bracelet. Somebody has to be searching for pearl bracelet but if it's a broad match, it could be some other type of bracelet or just the word "bracelet" like some sort that Pinterest knows. Alisa: [00:25:26] No. Jillian: [00:25:26] Okay, tell me. Alisa: [00:25:27] What you just described is exactly what you would think. And that's what I thought too. But then I exported some of my promoted pin campaigns that were just using broad match keywords, and I found that they were showing up in the home feed. Alisa: [00:25:43] And I said to Pinterest "What's this about?" Because I thought it would be people searching these broad topics. They said "No, it has nothing to do with search." Jillian: [00:25:53] Wow. That is different than Google ads, just so you know. Alisa: [00:25:57] I think it's different than everything. Jillian: [00:26:01] Definitely look into that. Broad match is not what I think it is. Alisa: [00:26:04] It is not. Jillian: [00:26:05] So broad match means it's going to show up in somebody's feed that they're not searching for bracelets. Pinterest thinks you might like bracelets so my pin's going to show up in your feed. Alisa: [00:26:16] Yeah, and they do have good reasons to think that. So they can look at the boards that I create the pins, that I engage with and think that person might be interested. Alisa: [00:26:23] But I ran an experiment, and the results will not surprise you. So I did two sets of 74 identical ad groups, same pin, same descriptions, same everything. Alisa: [00:26:34] The only difference in the two sets is that one, I used broad match keywords; the other one, I use the phrase in exact match type keywords. The phrase in exact match converted at 60 percent higher into sales. Jillian: [00:26:51] Interesting. Alisa: [00:26:53] The broad actually gave me, I think, it was two thirds more re-pins which makes a lot of sense because it's searching what you are going to buy. People who are just interested are probably going to save it for later. Jillian: [00:27:07] Exactly. They are higher up in the funnel. Alisa: [00:27:12] Yeah, which is fine. There's value in that as well. Jillian: [00:27:16] That's interesting. Alright. So sorry. I had taken you off the path. Alisa: [00:27:20] I know. We kind of had to go there because it was confusing to me as well. So we have our broad match, our phrase and the exact match. So those are how we can target strangers really easily. Alisa: [00:27:38] If I were going to do like three ad groups to start, I would probably do one that's phrase and exact match. Then I would do a visit or audience. Alisa: [00:27:47] So, depending on how big your email list is, you can just target people who went to any page on your site or you can really break it down. Alisa: [00:27:55] On Etsy, I don't think you can do this unfortunately because you can't put the pixel. If you think you're ever going to want to run a promoted pin ad, do this now. Alisa: [00:28:07] So go to your conversion tracking in Pinterest ads, grab the pixel, put it on the header of every page of your site. What that does is allows Pinterest to collect information on people coming to your site. Alisa: [00:28:21] You can even break it down by "I want to target someone who went to this page" or this list of pages but didn't go to this page, and that's how you can create a funnel once you get enough information. Alisa: [00:28:33] The tricky thing about Pinterest, of course, is it's not as big as Facebook or Google. So audiences that are below 100,000 in size, it can be difficult to scale. Alisa: [00:28:45] So for an Etsy seller , it's probably going to be tough to scale that kind of audience. Jillian: [00:28:52] So what you're saying is that you need at least a hundred thousand visitors? Alisa: [00:28:57] Yeah. Jillian: [00:28:57] To your site. Alisa: [00:28:59] Yes. Jillian: [00:29:00] Is that per month or there's a total? Alisa: [00:29:02] No, you can set the time frame. So when you create your audience, you can put in - I want to target people who've been to my site in the last, and it goes up to almost two years, I think. Jillian: [00:29:12] Wow. But remember, those people who came to your site two years ago are much less valuable to you than the people who came yesterday. Alisa: [00:29:19] That's right. Jillian: [00:29:22] So this might not work as well if you are a small shop, a small Shopify store, let's say. Alisa: [00:29:33] Getting into Etsy mode, I'm still going to stick with the phrase in exact match keywords. That's going to help us reach a new audience and then, it might make more sense to try to do an engagement audience. Alisa: [00:29:47] So, people who have engaged with pins that go to your site. Particularly if you have a lot of re-pins out there. You're probably going to get a bigger number that way and then, what else would I want to do? Alisa: [00:30:01] I think in that case where you don't have a lot, like you don't maybe have an email list, we'll say you don't have an email list, you don't have much of a visitor list. Alisa: [00:30:12] Phrase and engagement, and maybe try the broad match keywords. So that would be my three I would start with. Targeting your email list on Pinterest Jillian: [00:30:29] Okay. Now, if I do have, let's say, I happen to have a big email list, tell me what I could do with that. Alisa: [00:30:36] You could upload it and target those people who ever Pinterest could find. Jillian: [00:30:42] That's pretty interesting. I'm collecting emails on my site, let's say. So if I've been an Etsy shop member, I can't collect them on Etsy but let's say, I have a blog, which I highly recommend you do, that links to my Etsy shop. Jillian: [00:30:54] On my blog, I can collect email addresses. Again, you can do it with MiloTree. You can do it with a whole host of tools. You can give content away in exchange for their email address, whatever. Jillian: [00:31:06] Let's say I've got 40,000 email addresses. Alisa: [00:31:12] Awesome. My first question would be is it segmented at all? Jillian: [00:31:16] Let's say, and what that means is like I've tagged certain groups like maybe I collected a group of e-mails who loved my How to Clean Jewelry free content or something, like I know these people are interested in jewelry. Jillian: [00:31:33] I know this group is interested in scarves, let's say. Maybe I have added tags to those different emails, email addresses based on where they came from, how they got on my list. Alisa: [00:31:46] Yes, you can upload each of those separately. That's a different audience so then, you target smarter. Jillian: [00:31:52] So I've got my jewelry list, I've got my scarves list. Alisa: [00:31:55] You probably have a customer list too. Jillian: [00:31:58] Yes, definitely, who have actually made purchases. Alisa: [00:32:01] Every time you come out with a new item, you can promote that to them. Jillian: [00:32:05] So then I am going to upload these email address lists and then Pinterest is going to say "I know people's email addresses who are on Pinterest." Jillian: [00:32:15] If there's a match, if somebody is searching on Pinterest with the same email address that I have, I'm going to show them that promoted pin. Alisa: [00:32:25] That's right. Jillian: [00:32:27] And if they've purchased from me in the past, then chances are they might purchase from me again. And so I will put that in my, let's say, purchase email list, target and those people are probably the most valuable to me. Jillian: [00:32:42] That is incredibly cool. How have you found that working? Alisa: [00:32:47] It depends on the quality of the email list and what you're promoting. I always try everything. That's where I would start with the three. Alisa: [00:33:00] I would start with just a few to keep your budget down and then after a month or so, look at whichever one is not working as well as the other two. You can turn that one off and try something else. How long should you run ads on Pinterest? Jillian: [00:33:09] Okay. That's my question. How long does it take to learn? Alisa: [00:33:39] Count on about twice as long as other platforms. Jillian: [00:33:18] Because like Facebook, I've heard at least run them a week. Alisa: [00:33:20] Yes. I would go more than that for Pinterest. Jillian: [00:33:25] So you would go up to four weeks? Alisa: [00:33:28] You can tell in a couple days if it's just not going to get any impressions and then, you try something else. But as far as waiting to see about sales, yeah. Jillian: [00:33:37] And the one thing that I struggle with, I see my results, my early results, I want to get in there and I want to start mucking around. I want to start. It is hard. Jillian: [00:33:49] I want to let you know it is hard to watch that money going like you are spending. Every day seeing your bank account go down, and you're going, "Oh my God. It's just not working." Jillian: [00:34:02] I want to get in there too early and start turning ads off, turning ads on. And I kick myself. I really have to not look, force myself not to look at my results because my human nature is like I could figure this out. Bleeding money, how do you deal with that? Alisa: [00:34:24] I have the same issue. I mean if you're on Etsy, too, it's really hard because you're not seeing the conversion data. Alisa: [00:34:32] So on a site that you own, you can install pixels that will allow you to tell which promoted pins and which targeting is actually resulting in sign ups, resulting in purchases, resulting in add to cart, all these cool things. Jillian: [00:34:48] Can you explain what that means? Alisa: [00:34:50] Yeah. So when you install that conversion pixel on your site, all you're able to do at that point is basically track clicks and also keep track of the people who go to your website. Alisa: [00:35:05] So in your Pinterest ad dashboard, you're going to see conversions but you don't really know what that means. Was it converted to a click through to your website? Was it a sale? What was it? Alisa: [00:35:17] But if you do a little more advanced tracking, which I highly recommend for people who are going to spend a lot of money on promoted pins and/or who have a lot of products to sell and you really can't do it on a site like Etsy or Teachers Pay Teachers. Jillian: [00:35:32] Right, because you don't own that. Alisa: [00:35:35] So you'd want to do it on a store that you own. Unfortunately, I know that's not one of the options for everyone but if you can do that, then when you go to your ads dashboard, you're able to see over time what targeting does to impact your sales. Jillian: [00:35:51] Right. So when there is a sale, Pinterest can determine whether that sale came from that promoted pin so you're going to actually see, "Oh my God. I spent $20 on an ad but it drove $50 in sales." Alisa: [00:36:12] That's right. Jillian: [00:36:13] And that was good. That's worth investing more money in. Alisa: [00:36:18] Right. You can also do it with UTM codes. In Teachers Pay Teachers, they have a dashboard where you can see where the sales come in and you can see if there's a UTM code used. Alisa: [00:36:29] We can kind of figure it out that way but ideally, you want to be able to see it in the Pinterest ads dashboard if you can. I'll tell you what happens to me when I go in there, I had to do a little test to calm myself down. Alisa: [00:36:44] But when you go in and look, it'll be like a month ago, things were going along pretty good. And then, the last two weeks or so, it just tanks. It looks like you got no sales at all. Alisa: [00:36:56] But if you're patient and you wait a week or two and then you go back and screenshot that exact same time frame, you'll see the conversions were good all along in the past because of the way Pinterest tracks the conversion. Alisa: [00:37:12] If you saw the bracelet pin on April 1st and maybe you re-pinned it, then on, let's say, April 15th, you did a Google search and you ended up on that same bracelet page, then you bought it, Pinterest looks at that sale and says, "That was because of the promoted pin." Alisa: [00:37:35] It attributes that to April 1st, that day you acted on the pin. Not to April 15th." So on April 15th, you're looking at your ads dashboard and thinking nobody bought anything that day, but they did. It was just on April 1st to get credit. Understanding sales on Pinterest using Promoted Pins Alisa: [00:37:50] Got it. Jillian: [00:37:50] It's crazy but that plays into our little panic. Alisa: [00:37:55] Is this really working? Should I change it? Do I need to turn it off? Try to give it time. Go into it. I like how you said it's about learning so make a commitment that you're going to stick it out until you learn something. Jillian: [00:38:09] Yes. And a couple of other things: one, UTM parameters. I just want to say what they are. It's a unique URL. So I've got my URL to my bracelet. And then what I can do is I can add some code beyond just the regular Etsy URL that makes it a very specific URL. Jillian: [00:38:30] If somebody buys from that URL or comes to my site via that URL, I can get data on that specific URL which is going to land me on the same page, the same bracelet page but it's going to look different. Jillian: [00:38:44] I can tell where my traffic is coming from which is how you would describe it. If you don't know how to set up, Google it. Alisa: [00:38:52] It's really easy. You're right, and that's how we use it for Teachers Pay Teachers. But the limitation on that is if they don't purchase in that moment when they're using that UTM code, we aren't able to capture the sale. Alisa: [00:39:07] So if there's any way you can put that conversion tracking in that event tracking pixel on a website you own, that's what you want to do. Jillian: [00:39:16] Okay. Here's the other thing: Tell me if you think this is true which is you want your data to direct you to what is working. Jillian: [00:39:26] However, there are other times where, for example, we were running Facebook ads for MiloTree. We could not connect exactly how that sale came to our site but when we were running ads, our sales went up. Alisa: [00:39:44] Yeah, and I think a lot of people do it that way. Jillian: [00:39:46] So it's like it wasn't this direct. You want to be able to say ,"Wow, I read this ad. This ad led to this many sales. I can see that direct line. I could see the conversion pixel." But sometimes, the story is murkier. Alisa: [00:40:05] That is so true. Jillian: [00:40:07] So this is where by getting in there, experimenting and trying, you start to get a sixth sense. Do you agree? Alisa: [00:40:15] Yeah, I do. Jillian: [00:40:17] And so when you can't fully determine it, you have to look at it and say "Wow, I started ads on April 1st. My sales went up." I don't know. I can't tell you why or how that happened but they did so I'm going to keep running those ads or you can then do an experiment, turn off the ads and see if your sales drop. Alisa: [00:40:41] Yeah. And I think that's why it's important to not change anything else. If that's what you're relying on, then don't turn off your Facebook ads. Leave it all running to leave everything the same so you only change one item, and that's how you know it's working. Jillian: [00:40:57] And this is another piece of human nature that I fail this test and I have to like literally tie my hands. Jillian: [00:41:08] I wanna start changing more variables and then gets me in trouble because you want to only test one change at a time so that you can identify, "It was this, and I want to get in there and start changing audiences, whatever." And I then learned nothing. Jillian: [00:41:29] So I've spent a ton of money. Maybe I've gotten sales. Maybe I haven't. But at the end of the day, I know nothing. Alisa: [00:41:34] I know, like easier said than done. I totally understand. Jillian: [00:41:38] So if in fact, you're in this situation and you're like me in that you want to know immediately, you don't want to be kind of bleeding money, just know that your instincts are probably not going to help you. They might hurt you. Alisa: [00:41:53] Right. But over time, like you said, you will start to intuit it what's going to work, what is working and you'll be able to trust that a bit more. Jillian: [00:42:02] Exactly. Again, we talked and you were talking about promoted pins, do you recommend them? I am a small Etsy shop, and I sell bracelets, should I dig in, spend the time learn how to do this? Is it worth it? Alisa: [00:42:18] Yes, you should. Particularly, if you have tried advertising elsewhere and in it, the price has gone up. Alisa: [00:42:29] I wouldn't say if you've tried elsewhere and nothing works and you don't get any sales, then maybe there's a problem with the pricing, the presentation or something but if you're feeling priced out of other options for sure or if other things are working, you just want to try a new audience, yeah. Alisa: [00:42:46] You know your people are on Pinterest. You know you're getting sales from Pinterest. Yeah. Jillian: [00:42:52] And that is a really good point. I mean Pinterest's audience keeps growing, keeps evolving but if you are in that sweet spot of women who love beautiful things, who want to remodel their house. Isn't food like the number one category on Pinterest? Alisa: [00:43:11] I think so. Jillian: [00:43:15] Go where your people are. If they're not on Pinterest, don't advertise on Pinterest. But if on Facebook, there probably is that audience on Facebook Alisa: [00:43:26] Yeah. So if you know where your traffic comes from, if you know where your sales come from and you're seeing it's coming from Pinterest, obviously it's a good bet for you. Jillian: [00:43:36] Wow. I have learned so much. Jillian: [00:43:38] Dissect this with me: We ran two ads on Pinterest for MiloTree. They were traffic campaign ads which is what you recommend. One led to a blog post, and one led to our sign up page in our homepage. Jillian: [00:44:03] Our pin that led to a blog post, it was something like 10 Ways to Grow your Instagram Followers. It performed so much better than our pin and I think it was the same pin. Would that make sense? Alisa: [00:44:25] No. Jillian: [00:44:25] I know, then it was different pins. That's where, again, I have too many variables. The one that was like grow your social media followers, an email list or something that was more general that led directly to our home page did not perform anywhere near as well as our 10 Tips to Grow Instagram. Alisa: [00:44:42] Well, that didn't surprised me but let me ask you another question first. Jillian: [00:44:45] Go. Alisa: [00:44:46] When you say it didn't perform as well, what do you mean? Jillian: [00:44:49] Clicks. Alisa: [00:44:50] Okay, so what you really want to look at is conversions because if you think about it, people are going to click because they want to learn about 10 ways to make their Instagram better. But, does that mean that they're necessarily going to sign up your email list or sign up for your products? Not necessarily. Alisa: [00:45:06] You have two steps when you're doing that. They have to click on the pin. They have to go to the blog post, and they have to convert whereas if you're promoting a landing page with a sale sign up, definitely put a pin, they have to sign up. Alisa: [00:45:18] You have removed a step in between. I would guess that even if you got far fewer clicks to the landing page, you're probably still overall converted better than the blog post. Jillian: [00:45:29] Interesting because I think you're right. This is back, I don't know, maybe a year ago where I wasn't sophisticated to know this, and I was just looking at clicks. I have to check to make sure we have our conversion pixel on. I think we do. Alisa: [00:45:46] Okay, but remember, you can have your conversion pixel in there. It's tracking clicks. It's tracking traffic but you need to set up your event tracking in order to figure out what's really converting. Alisa: [00:46:00] It's going to depend so maybe your blog post converts amazingly well, the sign ups and then, that would be great. You should promote that. Alisa: [00:46:10] Maybe you could have a slide in for converting to sales. If your landing page converts ten times better than your blog post, then send them there. Jillian: [00:46:20] That's where I want to send them. I was just actually talking about Facebook funnels. What is your thought about setting up Pinterest funnels versus, I'm just going to advertise my bracelet? Are there Pinterest funnels like is that a thing? Sales funnels on Pinterest Alisa: [00:46:39] Yes, absolutely. So if you had a huge amount of traffic, you got a huge amount of engagement, you had just massive numbers going on, you could create a funnel exclusively in Pinterest. Alisa: [00:46:52] You could target a person who went to this blog post and then, target them with an ad that goes to the next blog post which is bringing them further down in the funnel. Alisa: [00:47:04] And then you could target the people who clicked on that pin with another ad that brings them to a landing page. So you could do that kind of all on Pinterest funnel if you had a huge audience. Alisa: [00:47:18] But, for most of us, what we're going to do for a funnel instead is to get them from Pinterest to our website to our e-mail list and then, we can work from there. Jillian: [00:47:28] So it's a way to drive email sign ups. Alisa: [00:47:32] Yeah. Jillian: [00:47:33] I'm just taking notes because this is so good. Jillian: [00:47:37] Okay. And then therefore sell them. The relationship that I can build once they've signed up for my list. Alisa: [00:47:43] That's right. Yes. Jillian: [00:47:44] So the final conversion probably then wouldn't happen on Pinterest. It would happen via the connection that we built. Alisa: [00:47:51] That's right. But if you had your event tracking set up on Pinterest and the conversion happened within a set period of time, you would be able to see that in your dashboard. Jillian: [00:48:00] Can you explain? So that means that Pinterest is watching, listening or tracking is a better word so that if in fact you've clicked on my pin, you've gone to my site and then ultimately, let's say, I put it for 30 days. 30 days later, you make a sale. Jillian: [00:48:17] I make a sale. You buy my product. Now, it might be that you're getting emails in the short term because I'm reaching out to you and telling you about my product. You make a purchase. Pinterest will say "Aha, that sale came from that pin." Alisa: [00:48:35] Yeah, that's right. I love the way that the Pinterest does that. It's not always that last touch attribute so it doesn't have to be that the last time before they bought was that they were on Pinterest. Alisa: [00:48:46] It's them kind of helping you see how it fits into your larger sales cycle. Jillian: [00:48:53] I love that. Alisa: [00:48:54] Yeah, me too. There are limitations though. Certain browsers will remove that tracking information, and certain ad blockers will remove it. Alisa: [00:49:01] You have to figure it's under reporting a little bit only because there's no way to get that information. Jillian: [00:49:08] And this is again where you get that sixth sense, and you start to like go ,"Well, I am getting sales even though it's not exactly showing me the direct path but there's something working there." Alisa: [00:49:25] That's right. Jillian: [00:49:26] Oh, gosh. We are going to have to do a part two to this because what I'm going to do is I'm going to use this information, and I am going to run some more ads, some more promoted pins and then I would love to check back in with you. Go over how that worked. Alisa: [00:49:46] It's a date. Jillian: [00:49:47] Is that a date? Alisa: [00:49:48] Yeah. Jillian: [00:49:48] And anybody else who wants to try, start with the first, the basic stuff that Alisa has talked about. Jillian: [00:49:56] Add a very simple campaign where you are doing a traffic campaign, you're targeting very few audiences, you're going to do five dollars a day and you're going to start collecting information. Jillian: [00:50:14] Start at your site, start at what is already selling and start promoting that. And in terms of imagery, do you then try different images and see which one of those is the best? Alisa: [00:50:31] Yes, you do. There are some suggestions for promoted pins like you should use a little bit of subtle branding so either your logo or your website. Then, you want to put it at the top, the bottom, in the middle so it doesn't get covered up by all the buttons. Text on image if it's not clear what it is. Alisa: [00:50:52] If you want to test images, you can put more than one image inside an ad group just like you do on Facebook. Alisa: [00:50:58] However, it does not test for you. On Facebook, if you have two ads in an ad group, it will figure out which one works best and show that one more. Pinterest, unfortunately, that does not work at this time so you could find that your pin that isn't doing very well is getting all the impressions and not converting; and the other one that maybe could do really well isn't. You have to break it out. You have to do two different ad groups. Jillian: [00:51:27] Got it. There is a lot of branching. I'm willing to dig in. Alisa: [00:51:35] Yeah, which is probably why you start with one or two products. Otherwise, it becomes unwieldy. Where are Promoted Pins on Pinterest heading? Jillian: [00:51:42] Totally. Where do you see promoted pins going? Alisa: [00:51:45] I love where they're going. They just released a brand new reporting dashboard which I adore. Alisa: [00:51:52] Because, the way that I run pins, I might have, like I said, 14 different ad groups. If I want to see what's working with this one piece of content, now, I can just search for that one piece of content. It will pull everything out of all the groups. Alisa: [00:52:05] It shows me everything I need. Love it. So their reporting is top notch, and they've put a lot into that. I appreciate that. Alisa: [00:52:14] The other thing that I can see coming is more targeting. We have some really great targeting options now but I think they're going to give us more because they learn so much about us. Alisa: [00:52:28] They learn so much about us that they could do more. Alisa: [00:52:31] They've been talking about doing like column personas so targeting like new parents, people getting ready to move or people in certain life stages. I'm anxious for that. They've been talking about that for a while. Jillian: [00:52:45] And are they look alike audiences? Act alike audiences on Pinterest Alisa: [00:52:47] Yeah, they call them "act alike." So, if you start running an audience ad like to your email list, and it's doing really well but you're just not getting enough impressions, definitely try an "act alike" on whatever audience works. Jillian: [00:53:00] And again, the beauty of that is that Pinterest understands your email list and then can create an audience that looks like your email list but isn't your email list and usually, that audience is bigger. Alisa: [00:53:14] Yes, it's always bigger even if you choose the one percent similarity. Jillian: [00:53:18] It's so true. Alisa: [00:53:19] 720,000 people or something big. Jillian: [00:53:23] Exactly, and like for me, I have found that's the power. That was the power of Facebook for us. It's the look alike audience . I haven't tried that yet on Pinterest. Alisa: [00:53:31] Yeah. I think that the challenge there, that what I have seen, is if you have a really tiny source audience. Alisa: [00:53:37] Let's say, your email list converts or works really well as an ad but it's only 3,000 people. So then if you're asking Pinterest to match your 3,000 with 720 million on their platform, that's a lot to ask. It may not be completely relevant. Alisa: [00:53:59] What I would do if that was the case, if I had a small audience source audience, I would add on top of that a couple of keywords. I try to make it a little bit more relevant for people. Jillian: [00:54:10] So you're kind of telling Pinterest here's my email list, and Pinterest is inferring stuff from these people. Jillian: [00:54:19] Let's say they're all married. Pinterest now knows that they're all married but if you say crafts or jewelry, then you go "Pinterest now has two pieces of data." Jillian: [00:54:32] They know that audience is all married, and they like jewelry so when they're building their audience for you, they can at least have more information. Alisa: [00:54:42] Yes, I like to give them help because that's a lot to ask. Jillian: [00:54:45] It is a lot to ask. That's terrific. And then explain how people can reach out to you like via Tailwind. Jillian: [00:54:52] Remember, Tailwind, again, we'd be lost without it. It's our scheduling service. We use it for Pinterest. We use it every single day. It's terrific. Definitely check it out. Jillian: [00:55:06] So how can people reach out to you via Tailwind or via Alisa Meredith Marketing? Alisa: [00:55:12] Yes, you can reach me on Twitter. It's a great place to find me. It's just @AlisaMMeredith. That's the same on Pinterest, Instagram. Tailwind, you can reach me at alisa@tailwindapp.com. Jillian: [00:55:29] Awesome. Well, Alisa, thank you so much for being on the show. I'm taking notes. I've got like two pages of notes just talking to you. Alisa: [00:55:38] I'm so excited to see what you do. Jillian: [00:55:41] Yes, I will be reporting back to you. Alisa: [00:55:42] Thank you. Jillian: [00:55:43] Alright. Thank you again. Alisa: [00:55:45] Yeah, my pleasure. Thank you. How to get free followers on Instagram fast Jillian: [00:54:55] Well, if you've got two minutes, I've got a product for you. It's MiloTree. Jillian: [00:54:59] MiloTree is a smart popup slider that you install on your site, and it pops up and asks visitors to follow you on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest or subscribe to your list. Jillian: [00:55:14] It takes two minutes to install. We offer a WordPress plugin or a simple line of code, and it's Google friendly on mobile and desktop. Jillian: [00:55:27] We show a Google friendly popup on desktop and a smaller Google friendly popup on mobile. Check it out. Sign up today and get your first 30 days free. Sign up for MiloTree now and get your first 30 DAYS FREE!

074: Promoted Pins with Alisa Meredith

CEO Vibes Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later May 28, 2018 45:34

Ep. 50: April Smith from Performing in Education and Angela Yorgey from Fun in 5th Grade

Elite Edupreneurs: Empowering Educators to Become Entrepreneurs

Play Episode Listen Later May 22, 2018 33:46

Show Notes & Links Elite Edupreneurs: Empowering Educators to Become Entrepreneurs 5/22/18 Episode 50: April Smith from Performing in Education and Angela Yorgey from Fun in 5th Grade Today I chat with Angie from Fun in 5th Grade and April from Performing in Education. They are fellow podcasters and hosts of the Grow With Angie and April podcast where they discuss time saving marketing techniques. In this episode we discuss everything you need to know regarding promoted pins. They share the components of a successful promoted pin, why you can’t be afraid of failure, and why your pin description could be a deal breaker. Convert Kit Deal from our Sponsor: teachwithfergy.com/emailsetup Promoted Pins on Pinterest UTM Links Kate Ahl’s Episode Grow With Angie and April Podcast Connect with Angie on social media:https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Fun-In-5th-Grade http://funin5thgrade.com/ https://www.instagram.com/funin5thgrade/ https://www.facebook.com/Funin5thGrade/ https://www.pinterest.com/funin5thgrade/ https://twitter.com/funin5thgrade Connect with April on social media:https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Performing-In-Education https://performingineducation.com/ https://www.instagram.com/performingineducation/ https://www.facebook.com/performingined https://www.pinterest.com/performingined/ https://twitter.com/performinginedu Connect with Rachel on social media: https://www.eliteedupreneurs.com/ https://www.instagram.com/eliteedupreneurs/ https://www.facebook.com/groups/148986755902763/ https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Bright-Futures-Counseling https://www.brightfutures-counseling.com/ https://www.facebook.com/brightfuturescounseling/ https://www.instagram.com/brightfuturescounseling/ https://www.pinterest.com/bfcounseling/ https://twitter.com/brightfuturesSC If you are enjoying Elite Edupreneurs please subscribe and leave a review! https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/id1237054193

education fun pinterest grade performing 5th grade kate ahl april podcast april smith promoted pins

Episode 2: Why aren't my promoted pins running?

Grow with Angie and April: A Podcast for Teacherpreneurs

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 30, 2018 25:45

running promoted pins

Why isn’t my promoted pin running?

Grow with Angie and April: A Podcast for Teacherpreneurs

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 30, 2018

Why isn’t my promoted pin running?! Lately we’ve noticed a lot of people asking about why their promoted pins aren’t taking off, or suddenly stop running. Angie and I have asked this ourselves many, many times. In this episode, we talk about some of the reasons we’ve discovered that promoted pins don’t perform. We only […]

running pinterest promoted promoted pins

Office Hours: Promoted Pins

And She Spoke

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 8, 2018 16:38

Pinterest is a powerful tool for anyone who runs an online business. A whopping 92% of our social traffic comes from the platform, so it's time we share with you our secret sauce: Promoted Pins. With Facebook Ads, you generally target people by demographic or psychographic information. With Pinterest, you can target by search terms (i.e., you only pay to expose your advertisement to people who are already looking for what you’re selling). In this episode, we share seven tips for optimizing your Promoted Pins: authenticity use text overlays strategically optimize pin descriptions with keywords create vertical pins to take up more real estate on the screen try out a collage (such as a yoga sequence broken down by pose or a recipe broken down by step) be sure to include your logo or website on your image (People steal!) don’t use hashtags

pinterest office hours promoted pins

084 What to pin in February

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 30, 2018 26:18

Learn what to pin in February, what to promote via Promoted Pins and then how to create a content strategy for the springtime. Then how to deep dive into Pinterest analytics to discover the interests of people who pin your pins.

pinterest promoted pins

067 Video Promoted Pins

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 4, 2017 46:48

Learn all about these new options for promoted pins.

promoted pins

Promoted Pins - New Features and Tactics with Alisa Meredith

pinterest tactics content marketing manager jeff sieh alisa meredith promoted pins

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 28, 2017 53:31

How can a business just getting started on Pinterest get in front of an audience and reap some benefits quickly? One of the best ways to get some quick results is with Promoted Pins. How much budget should I start with? How do I track and measure my progress? What products and services work best for promoted pins? Join Pinterest Promoted Pins expert Alisa Meredith and Jeff Sieh as they discuss how small businesses can leverage Promoted Pins to their advantage. Alisa Meredith is a content marketing strategist who has often been accused of a Pinterest obsession. She is also the Content Marketing Manager at tailwind. A big believer in the power of visual marketing, she's on a mission to help businesses find their creative side.

152: How to Build a Curation Site to 1 Million Pageviews a Month with Maggie Lord

Brilliant Business Moms with Beth Anne Schwamberger

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 10, 2017 32:17

Millions of people read Rustic Wedding Chic, which is the #1 resource for rustic and country weddings online. What you may not know is this popular wedding blog is run by a Mom of 2 with her 3rd on the way, Maggie Lord. Maggie calls herself a naptime entrepreneur and we SO resonate with that idea. Welcome to the show, Maggie! We’re so excited to have you! On the Podcast 1:10 - An Inspired Bride3:01 - Curating A Site5:50 - Solving Problems Through A Directory Site7:01 - Monetizing Your Platform9:52 - Advice For A Blogger Building A Platform12:20 - Working With A Team16:27 - Working with Freelance Photographers17:40 - Growing A Pinterest Following20:06 - Thoughts on Content Schedulers22:55 - What Makes A Popular Pin25:26 - A Frequent Pinner27:50 - Testing Out Promoted Pins29:34 - Maggie’s Embarrassing Mompreneur Moment Listen Now An Inspired Bride When Maggie and her husband were planning their wedding 9 years ago, she had a very clear vision for how she wanted things to look. She pictured a rustic but chic and elegant feel for her northern Wisconsin, small town wedding, but struggled to translate it to vendors. There was no Pinterest or Instagram 9 years ago (can you believe it!?) and Maggie found it difficult to plan a wedding without a quick way to save and share the magazines and images she loved. She thought if she was having trouble, surely other brides were, too. So she thought, “I bet I could start a blog.” And back then, starting a blog was super easy! There were a million different blog formats to choose from, so she picked one and set out to help other brides just like her. In the back of her mind, Maggie thought her new venture would be a great profession someday, but she wasn’t sure how the details would work out. In the meantime, she enjoyed planning her own wedding! And, of course, sharing the process on her blog. Where did she find inspiration? Where did she NOT find inspiration? Where did she struggle? She compiled these thoughts on her blog, and Rustic Wedding Chic began. Curating A Site How did Maggie go about gathering and sharing content that was the best of the best for rustic weddings? She thought if she could share ideas from other brides and photographers, then her readers could translate those ideas into their own weddings. Initially, she had the idea to reach out to photographers and ask if she could share photos of their beautiful, rustic weddings. She offered to do a write up on their work, with a link to their services. In the early days of blogging, this is how blogging was done. When Maggie started 8 years ago, there were maybe 3 wedding blogs in the niche: The Knot, Style Me Pretty, and Martha Stewart Weddings. She had access to ‘real weddings’ (not even a term yet) that she could showcase. As this virtual collection grew, brides all over the country were able to find the right florist or cake decorator for them. RWC started by asking to feature the work of vendors, and now they get hundreds of requests a month from vendors. Maggie quickly learned that ‘rustic’ was an umbrella term - and there were tons of wedding types you could call ‘rustic’, from lakeside to barn settings. Shortly after launching Rustic Wedding Chic, Maggie launched RusticWeddingGuide.com as a way to help couples connect with vendors and venues. Creating this resource came out of requests Maggie would constantly get about finding the best venues. It's fantastic to see savvy business owners become the solution to their own problems. Solving Problems Through A Directory Site Did Maggie need a bunch of expensive software to make a directory site? Did she have to become a tech whiz? She admits that putting together a directory site was a challenge. Maggie was very comfortable producing content in blog format. She had post-writing down to a science. Putting together this directory site forced her out of her comfort zone. She made the decision to start small, and build from there. RWC was getting requests from both sides: vendors wanting to get listed and brides wondering how to connect with vendors. Since the Rustic Wedding Chic team is small, they had to really focus their efforts. Maggie pulled everyone together and they made their plan. Starting small and building up worked in Maggie’s favor, as currently there are over 5,000 vendors listed on this directory site. Monetizing Your Platform Since Maggie has monetized successfully, I wondered if she could walk us through that process and break down her income streams. Early on she got help from her brother, who is the president of an internet company. He helped her brainstorm and make a plan to monetize WRC. She knew she had a strong readership and impressive social media numbers, but the path to starting a business wasn’t so cut and dry. Along with her brother, she tested ideas - and it turned out that advertising was her strong suit. Maggie intentionally wanted to make sure that she could work with smaller vendors like Etsy sellers, so they worked out a model that was more like direct sales. She also partnered with Google and used Adsense for selling ad spots. The wedding world is perfect for featuring sponsored posts or Instagram campaigns. The game has changed a bit now than when she started, but still, the model of featuring products and services on your platform works. Maggie is also an author! When she signed her first book deal, she was unsure of how the process worked. She signed with a good publishing company and invested in a book attorney to make sure she was making wise choices. We love how diverse Maggie’s income streams are. She’s got many pieces of the pie all fitting together. Advice For A Blogger Building A Platform What would Maggie say to a blogger who’s new and trying to build a platform and create a package that would be attractive to advertisers? Maggie’s advice is on-point: “People have to be really cautious of the niche they’re in. I felt comfortable being in the rustic country wedding space because it came from a very organic place, and people could tell I was passionate about it. I was going to be true to that topic.” Once you find a niche, spend a lot of time and effort learning how you can dominate that niche. You want to have the best site, be the most authoritative, and give readers a good experience. “Be brand conscious, even if you’re not a huge, well-known brand yet, you still have to think of yourself as a brand.” Maggie says that when bloggers try to work with bigger sponsors, they have to be confident in who they are as a brand. It’s difficult for any company to part with money, even if they have deep pockets! So you have to prove that your blog is worth investing in. The company wants to make sure that if they send you X dollars, it’s going to be worth their effort. If you can put a package together to explain who you are, why they should work for you, and who your readers are in a compelling way, that makes the decision ten times easier. A simple start is, "I am the expert in this world because...(your reason)" Brands have a million options when it comes to spending their advertising dollars. They want a blogger who will be the perfect fit. Working With A Team Maggie’s site is INCREDIBLY busy! She has lots of logistics going on behind the scenes to manage regular advertising spots, sponsored posts, working with publishers, and so on. She accomplishes all of this with a small team! We had to ask how she makes it work. When RWC first started out, she was a one-woman-show. All she had to do was create the content and publish it to social media. When the social scene exploded, especially with the development of Pinterest (Rustic Wedding Chic was one of the first Pinterest users) and her site gained more readers - she was responsible for more work. Maggie knew they had to grow as a company or she’d be limiting her potential and opportunity. When Rustic Wedding Chic decided to develop the Rustic Wedding Guide, she needed a team member solely dedicated to that project. Since their list of vendors is curated, Maggie had to make sure the vendors were high-quality - and this took a great amount of attention. She also needed a team member to handle paid subscribers advertising in Rustic Wedding Guide’s showcase listings. Maggie was able to hire someone to dedicate their time exclusively to the wedding guide and taking care of advertisers. A couple years ago, Maggie’s husband left a job he had for a long time and transitioned to managing advertising on the blog. RWC would get tons of requests asking for a media kit or ad prices for social posts, or to personall review a dress - her husband was able to completely take this responsibility off of Maggie’s plate. (We love wife-husband teams!) Maggie handles all of the content creation and does media appearances for Rustic Wedding Chic. Rustic Wedding Chic hires freelancers from all over, from California to New York. Maggie frequently hires photographers to do styled shoots, as well as freelance writers to assist here and there. Her team is a healthy mix of full-time and contract employees. Working with Freelance Photographers Sometimes Maggie will work with a company who wants her to review or showcase their product. In some instances, the company is very direct that they want Maggie’s special touch on these features. Maggie likes to be hands on with that content. Other times RWC will field a request for something like a sponsored post, and the sponsor wants Maggie’s team to only be responsible for creating images and sharing the product. She talks with the company to see what their vision is, and they find a solution that works for her and her team as well as the company. Maggie really wants Rustic Wedding Chic readers to know that they can expect only product and photos that will deliver high value to their lives. No matter your niche, this standard is great for any blogger. Growing A Pinterest Following Maggie has an impressive 161,000 followers on Pinterest, and has leveraged the platform well to grow her business. We had to hear more! At the time when Maggie joined Pinterest, it was still by invitation only during their small roll out! The friend who recommended Pinterest to Maggie wasn’t even thinking of her wedding business, just that the social media platform might be something Maggie would personally enjoy. But it wasn’t long before Maggie started looking at Pinterest that she thought it would be the perfect place to share their beautiful featured weddings, so she sign-up as a person, but with the first name "Rustic" and last name "Wedding." They grew very quickly and early because they saw the value of people being able to look at, and curate for themselves, hundreds of images at once. When RWC started on Pinterest, there weren’t a lot of Pinterest users or competition. She certainly credits that early adoption to their success. As we know, Pinterest isn’t perfect. Maggie says that now she will go onto Pinterest and it kills her to see other pinners stealing her images! Swiping an image that they have exclusive rights to, and linking to their site, which means her fabulous photographers don't get the credit they deserve. As great as Pinterest can be for business growth, there are certainly drawbacks. Nowadays if you were to search ‘rustic weddings’ on Pinterest, you would probably get thousands of images from so many people. But just a few years ago, you would have only seen Rustic Wedding Chic content. We think this is totally a lesson in being an early adopter of new technology; don’t be afraid to try something new for your business! Thoughts on Content Schedulers Maggie says she has seriously signed up or paid for practically EVERY content scheduler out there. Some she found helpful, and some were just downright frustrating. She did use Tailwind for a while, but wasn’t a fan that her items would be scheduled SO far out. She’s also worked with a company that uses a bulk uploader for Pinterest. But despite trying out these many different scheduling options, Maggie just didn’t see that her pins were performing as well as they did when she pinned organically. Maggie has gone back and forth as to whether or not a 3rd party service is useful. These days she still does take the time to daily pin organically and see what performs well. She will go back to her blog archives and see what post she could recirculate since there are always new brides needing to see past weddings. Bottom line: Maggie has paid for ALL of the scheduling tools, but still feels that the best return on her investment is organic pinning. That said, Maggie does use Pinterest Analytics. She thinks it’s very valuable to keep track of how many people you're reaching and which pins are most popular. Maggie did work with a social media expert to help her make sense of Pinterest Analytics. Her consultant asked Maggie if she’d ever notice that her pin view rate was about 4 million a month!! And then the consultant explained that a pin view rate means a number of times your pins are interacted with in a month - in Maggie’s case, 4 milion! It was one of the highest the consultant had seen. You can imagine that brides using Pinterest to plan their weddings are highly dedicated, if not a little obsessed! And the numbers show it. Maggie finds it helpful to use analytics to know how to hone her Pinterest strategy. While content schedulers weren’t right for Maggie’s business, the value of gauging performance and observing trends certainly has been. What Makes A Popular Pin So what ARE those insanely popular pins that keep driving traffic back to Maggie’s site? Maggie continues to be FLOORED that some of her content has been pinned over 145,000 times. Surprisingly, many of her top pins are fairly simple images. She’ll even see images of simple wedding features like mason jar centerpieces doing incredibly well. (Though the success does come with difficulty. You can imagine how annoying and frustrating it is when Maggie sees her amazing pins pointing to OTHER people’s content. Let this interview be a friendly PSA: don’t steal pins!) Highly popular pins are ones in which people feel like they’re going to get a piece of information or insight that can only be found at Rustic Wedding Chic. One of her pins is a lovely image with the title: ‘This Wedding Was Planned Under $10,000, See How They Did It’. A user can pin any pretty image, but it is highly valuable to be able to go to a site with solid information. Maggie has a pin called, ‘How To Have The Best Unique Guest Book’ that did very well, and another ‘Rustic Wedding Sign On Pallets’ which has had over 400,000 repins. This kind of success makes total sense! Maggie’s not just throwing around pretty images, she’s giving practical advice that helps others. One final note: while DIY projects aren’t a huge part of the Rustic Wedding Chic brand, those select posts do pin well. Again, Maggie wisely has observed that any pin through which the reader knows they’ll get exclusive information of how to recreate a look or complete a project will be a success. A Frequent Pinner Maggie’s favorite strategy is to pin content directly from her blog. On any given day, her site produces a few brand new featured pieces of content. Her daily Real Weddings posts will have between 12-24 images, each of which Maggie turns into a pin. She also spends time going back to more popular posts or seasonal interests and searches for pinable content. (For example, at the time of recording we’re heading into summer. So Maggie is looking for posts like ‘25 Beautiful Summer Wedding Ideas’ or ‘Best Outdoor Seating Ideas’.) She estimates that she’s pinning between 50-100 images a day. She is constantly checking her Pinterest analytics to see what pins are popular and resonating, looking at stats like the pins with the most impressions, saves or click throughs in the last 30 days. A lot of bloggers or business owners are curating content from not only their site, but also other related sites. Because Maggie has Sso much brand content, she could easily fill out a Pinterest profile with only her own images. But does she? Maggie says probably 90% of her boards feature pins from her own site. And considering they have 9 years’ worth of content, it makes sense! But Rustic Wedding Chic does believe in sharing the love. They do try to pin and share content from other brands that they know Rustic Wedding Chic fans will love. Though on the whole, of their 60,000 pins most, maybe 90%, are from Rustic Wedding Chic. Testing Out Promoted Pins Just like us, Maggie was excited to see Promoted Pins roll out. She thought it would be a great way to reach new followers on Pinterest, but admits that for her brand she’s always been a bit disappointed with the outcome--they got repins but not new followers. The best way for Rustic Wedding Chic to get new followers is still to create gorgeous content and work with great companies their readers will love. In Maggie’s opinion, she thinks promoted pins are probably a great tool for businesses just starting out and trying to gain more followers because you need to be seen. Personally, she likes seeing promoted pins because she gets amazing suggestions of ideas that she truly enjoys. Maggie’s Embarrassing Mompreneur Moment Maggie calls herself ‘The Naptime Entrepreneur’ and has written a few articles on that topic. She has 2 boys - and one on the way - so her house is a bit crazy! She used to try to work all hours of the day, but realized it wasn’t working when she made one embarrassing mompreneur mistake! She was at the park with her kids and drafted a hastily written email to a very prominent magazine, full of misspellings. She thought to herself that she would save the draft and polish the email once she was home. But when Maggie went to fix and send the email, she realized it had already sent! Enough was enough. She realized she really couldn’t do it all! So now, she works when her kids are napping or sleeping. As anyone with kids and a business or creative outlet knows, it’s never easy. Maggie says it well: “When my kids are awake I’m CEO of Mommyhood, and when they’re asleep or at school I’m CEO of Rustic Wedding Chic.” Connect with Maggie Site: RusticWeddingChic.comPinterest: @RusticWedChic Now It's Your Turn To Head Out There And Be Brilliant!

ceo new york california google starting putting weddings mom wisconsin diy millions pinterest bottom brands personally etsy psa incredibly knot curation tailwinds swiping wrc adsense rustic sso rwc floored martha stewart weddings style me pretty mommyhood pageviews promoted pins pinterest analytics maggie lord

Ep 81: How to Use Promoted Pins with Alisa Meredith

Begin Self-Publishing Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 28, 2016 21:23

In this show I talk to Alisa Meredith, who is an expert and speaker on Pinterest and is, to my mind, the world authority on Pinterest's advertising platform, Promoted Pins. Show notes can be found at http://beginselfpublishing.com/promoted-pins-alisa-meredith

pinterest alisa meredith promoted pins

030 Testing Out Promoted Pins

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 30, 2016 22:51

I've talk a lot about Promoted Pins and it's time to take action. I'm talking with my assistant Amanda about her campaign and sharing details behind my campaign.

testing promoted pins

020 Maximizing Promoted Pins

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 21, 2016 34:40

Jess Bahr manages $100K campaigns for her company's partners. She's sharing what she knows about the best way to run a campaign. I'm sharing my action items and how you and I can both dive into using Promoted Pins to boost traffic.

maximizing promoted pins

Tweets are longer except in Ads and Pinterest makes promoted pins easier

Digital Coffee

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 21, 2016 23:23

Today's EpisodeAds, they are a valuable tool This is what will drive sales for businesses. Social networks have their ad programs. They are mostly good if you have a great marketer doing some great ads. We are at an interesting time. The better campaign you have, the more likes, the revenue you could get. The problem is the blockers people are using. Each year people install these programs. Marketers and advertisers are not doing their jobs. We can do better. However, Google launched Allo. This messaging app is interesting. The question is, will it capture a chunk of the market?Next, I look at the tools that support Twitter “longer tweets.” This has finally been released. Many people are happy. Learn more below!Marketing News Analyzed:Twitter's “longer tweets” does not apply to adsInstagram redesigns call-to-action buttonsInstagram rolls out a save draft featureGoogle, Facebook, and IAB want to make better adsPinterest makes making promoted pins easierFacebook wants to show you how well their ads doThe short list of tools that support “longer tweets”The difference between Snapchat Stories and Instagram StoriesApps/Programs To Try:Record The CallPostableInvision + UsertestingTweetable Quotes:You can create a Pinterest campaign in 9 seconds!It should be interesting to see if Allo will be any good.Credit:outro music by http://www.bensound.com/royalty-free-music/track/sci-Support:Like these podcasts? Support me on Patreon! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

google social longer credit pinterest easier tweets marketers allo iab dothe snapchat stories promoted pins

Promoted Pins: How to Advertise on Pinterest - 215

Social Media Marketing Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 16, 2016 39:33

Do you use Pinterest promoted pins? Want to discover how they work? In this episode, I interview Vincent Ng, president of MCNG Marketing and author of Pinterest to Profits with Pintalysis. Vincent helps businesses succeed with Pinterest marketing and visual social media. Show notes: https://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/215

pinterest profits advertise promoted pins vincent ng

019 Using Promoted Pins for Teachers Pay Teachers

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 14, 2016 29:59

Jessica Boschen runs a very popular website promoting and seller her products from Teachers Pay Teachers. She's harnessed the power of Pinterest and Promoted Pins to not only drive traffic but more sales. Get inspired and motivated to experiment Promoted Pins.

pinterest teachers pay teachers promoted pins

MPT #5 Bezpieczeństwo Twojej strony, Jak zrobić dobrą infografikę? Pinterest Promoted Pins

Marketingowe Podsumowanie Tygodnia by Sprawny.Marketing

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 30, 2016

Cotygodniowy videocast publikowany na łamach Sprawny.Marketing, w materiale zawieramy najciekawsze marketingowe newsy z ostatniego tygodnia z naciskiem na praktyczność sugerowanych rozwiązań i treści.

marketing pinterest dobr zrobi stwo twojej bezpiecze strony infografik promoted pins

New Options For Pinterest Promoted Pins With Alisa Meredith

pinterest hubspot tailwinds social media examiner new options alisa meredith promoted pins

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 29, 2016 47:34

Just when you think you’ve got Pinterest all figured out they go and make a bunch of changes. So today we are going to be talking all about the new options for Promoted Pins with Alisa Meredith. Alisa is a content marketing strategist who has (more than once!) been accused of a Pinterest obsession. Content marketer and a blogger for HubSpot, Tailwind, Social Media Examiner and alisameredith.com, she’s also co-owner of a HubSpot partner agency and content and social media consultant for other agencies and small businesses. A big believer in the power of visual marketing, she’s on a mission to drag, err… coax businesses into making the most of it!

007: How To Use Pinterst Promoted Pins and Pinterest Ad Platform

Online Business Realm

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 15, 2016 8:36

How To Use Pinterest Ads To Make More Sales Many businesses overlook Pinterest when setting up a strategy for online marketing. With the introduction of Pinterest ads, the opportunities are endless. Pinterest could be one of your largest generators of traffic and sales. In this article, I'll share five ways your business can get the most out of Pinterest ads. What Are Promoted Pins Pinterest is a visual social sharing community; users visit Pinterest ready to be inspired and seek out products to purchase. Pinterest is a fantastic way to promote your brand and drive traffic to your business. With promoted pins, that is taken to the next level. Promoted pins look exactly like regular pins, BUT have additional capabilities to increase the number of views, as well as the ability to target an EXACT audience. How To Create A Pinterest Ad When you are logged into your Pinterest account, you will see an addition symbol in the upper right-hand side of the screen. Click that symbol, and then select the option that says "Create Ad." Next, you will choose what type of ad you want to run. The two different options are, "Boost engagement with your Pins" and "Get traffic to your website". The engagement option is best if you are wanting to grow your Pinterest account and following. The website traffic option is best if you want to direct people back to your product pages on Pinterest. (This is the best one for making sales) After you have chosen the type of ad you want to run, you will be presented with the options to name your ad and set a budget. This is where you will decide how much you want to spend each day and for how long you want the ad to run for. After you have set a budget and named your campaign, click the red button at the bottom that says "Pick a Pin." Select the pin that you want to boost and then continue to the next step. Creating A Targeted Audience This is where all of the magic will happen. In step three of the process, you can create a targeted audience for your pin to reach. Make sure that you think about this carefully and figure out what audience will respond the way you want them to the best. Here is a list of ways you can sort your audience by: Interests Keywords Locations Languages Devices Gender Depending on the product or service you are trying to sell you will want to tweak these options to best fit your target customer. After you have nailed down your target audience you will see a section to type in your Max CPC bid (This means how much you will be charged each time someone clicks on your promoted pins). You will want to choose a number in between what other advertisers are bidding. In the case above, I choose the lowest number and as you can see it is letting me know that this is a low bid. Business Information Pinterest Ads are only available for Businesses or commercial reasons. With that being said, you will need to provide Pinterest with your Business name and address in the next step. The final step of the process will be to provide Pinterest with your billing information. You will be able to pay for your ads via Credit Card. Here Is A Video Tutorial Showing You How To Setup Your Pinterest Ad Accoun5 Tips To Run A Successful Pinterest Ad Campaign 1.) Adjust your Campaign As You Go A great feature within the Pinterest promoted pins feature is the ability to adjust your campaign as you go. If you see that something isn't working, you can change it while the campaign is still running. Find images that draw the readers' attention. The images should be HIGH QUALITY, vertical images. Colorful images always work better, and believe it or not if it has a shade of BLUE it is shown to work better as well! After you have started your campaign, don't keep dong the same things. Change up your creative ideas and explore the split testing options that allow you to run different images within the same campaign. 2.) Use The Correct Keywords Begin thinking of creative keywords that are related to your pin. Think outside of the box, because Pinterest users are always looking for different things that stand out. On the other side of this, try not to go so crazy, if you target irrelevant keywords your ads are likely not to be approved by Pinterest. When coming up with keywords, go for very specific, broad, and general terms. This will allow your "net" to be extremely wide capturing all of the potential audience. 3.) Don't Be Afraid To Bid High As mentioned earlier when talking about your CPC or how much you are willing to pay per click, make sure you don't go too cheap here. Don't be afraid to start your campaign with an aggressive bid. These will also be more valuable clicks as your ad will be closer to the top of the page when someone searches for a particular term. Once you start seeing conversions, optimize your bids to achieve your ideal CPA and increase how much you are spending to maximize the number of conversions. As with everything else within the Pinterest Ad campaign, you can adjust this as your campaign is still running. 4.) Include A Call To Action In The Pin Description You are not allowed to include a CTA on your image, BUT you can include a non-salesy pitch in the pin description. Pinterest does not allow for direct "Buy Now" options, BUT you can add text that says "Sign Up Here" or "Download This Free Guide". Just make sure you are not over the top with your sales pitch. Remember that users are coming to Pinterest for the visual imagery and creative ideas not to be hit in the head with a sales pitch. 5.) Do NOT Include Hashtags With platforms such as Instagram, it is commonplace to see a wall of hashtags and terms related to the image. Pinterest users frown upon this strategy, and it just looks spammy. With that being said include some elegant copy in your Pin description and leave all of the hashtags for other social platforms. In closing, there's a lot still to learn about the promoted pins feature and what works and what doesn't. Try different things and experiment with different images, to see what works best f or your products and services. With Pinterest, it's all about the imagery and creative nature of the pins that you are promoting. If you have images that are colorful and unique, they will perform well. The Pinterest platform will only grow in the future, and if you are learning these strategies now, it will only improve your outcome later. Subscribe To Our Podcast Here For More Great Ways To Make Money Online

business change businesses boost platform pinterest cpa select exact pin high quality cta pins colorful promoted cpc promoted pins pinterst

009 How to Use Promoted Pins the Right Way

Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 6, 2016 25:26

An interview with Mary Diamond from Pinterest about how to use Promoted Pins effectively to boost your engagement and traffic.

pinterest right way promoted pins

Episode 178: Google Announces "Promoted Pins" on Maps

Small Business Marketing Minute

Play Episode Listen Later May 27, 2016 8:23

This week, Google announced that they will start allowing businesses to advertise on Google maps via "promoted pins". In today's episode, I go over what they mean by that, and speculate on how the program might work and what it means for the typical local business owner.

google maps promoted pins

Local Marketing Industry Weekly Update - #211 - 5/25/2016

Local Marketing Industry Updates

Play Episode Listen Later May 25, 2016 21:10

http://www.localmarketingsource.com Local Marketing Industry Weekly Update - #211 - 5/25/2016 This Week's Agenda: COLD CALLING APPSaying a third of mobile searches are local, Google brings “Promoted Pins” to MapsCONTENT MARKETING: SURVEYS Visit our Facebook Page to stay on top of all the latest LMS updates. The Local Marketing Industry Weekly Update, presented by Scott Gallagher. Scott is the co-founder of Local Marketing Source and has become the recognized expert in providing local marketing services to local businesses. SUBSCRIBE TO OUR CHANNEL TO BE NOTIFIED OF WEEKLY AND CRITICAL UPDATES IN THE LOCAL SEO INDUSTRY, ALONG WITH STRATEGY.

google lms weekly update local marketing marketing industry promoted pins

How to Drive Traffic and Sales with Promoted Pins - With Alisa Meredith

The Agents of Change: SEO, Social Media, and Mobile Marketing for Small Business

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 6, 2016 24:41

Hopefully by now we all know that Pinterest is more than wedding dresses, cupcakes and DIY projects. It can actually be a pretty powerful marketing tool used to drive business, if you follow a few key tips. Like with any platform, you should never just throw money behind a campaign for promotion unless organically it’s got some legs on it already. So, learning what content to pin - and what your audience is interested in - is vital to your success. Pinterest is an excellent way to promote your brand, and their “promoted pins” takes things a step further and increases visibility, so you get the right audience at the right time. Alisa Meredith is a Pinterest-obsessed content strategist and marketer. If you value more traffic, leads and customers, then Alisa’s tips and advice using Pinterest’s promoted pins will be a valuable addition to your current marketing strategy. www.agentsofchangecon.com/podcasts/131

marketing sales diy pinterest drive traffic alisa meredith promoted pins

3 Things you Must Know About Pinterest Ads

Hit the Mic with The Stacey Harris

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 6, 2015 13:57

Pinterest is a huge traffic driver for a lot of businesses, it can also be a powerful way to position your products. How can you get in front of new and targeted folks? That's where Promoted Pins come into play. In this episode we're getting clear on the three things you need to know before jumping in on Promoted Pins. Resources Join the VIP Community Join us Backstage - Full Pinterest Ads training inside The Stacey Harris on Pinterest Pinterest Ads Terms and Conditions Connect with Me Get YOUR question on a future episode Email me at hello@thestaceyharris.com Tweet with me and include #HittheMic Be sure to leave your review on iTunes or Stitcher for a shoutout on a future show

pinterest backstage things you must know pinterest ads promoted pins

111: After the Episode: Promoted Pins, SEO, and Life as a Mamapreneur with Erica Richards

Brilliant Business Moms with Beth Anne Schwamberger

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 15, 2015 16:58

This week, we're trying something new here at Brilliant Business Moms! Sometimes, after the podcast interview officially "wraps" this is when we all breathe a sigh of relief, and we just start chatting freely! We had such a great chat with Erica Richards of Rainey's Closet that we wanted you to hear what happens "after the episode". On the Podcast we Chat About: Promoted Pins - Rainey's Closet on Pinterest Pinterest SEO Etsy SEO Our Etsy Shop - The Amateur Naturalist Instagram Marketing Balancing life as a Mamapreneur Our Kids' Crazy Antics!

richards mamapreneur promoted pins brilliant business moms

The Power Of Promoted Pins With Alisa Meredith

alisa meredith promoted pins

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 5, 2015 46:45

The fairly recent addition of promoted pins on Pinterest provides another way to take full advantage of this platform. Promoted pins are basically ads on Pinterest. They can raise awareness, boost engagement, and increase traffic to your website- all while maintaining an organic look and feel. Maybe you've used promoted pins with some success, or maybe you're just wondering if they're right for you. Either way, you'll want to check out this interview with Alisa Meredith.

Episode 1127: Basic Sorganomics: Should I Spend Money on My Social Media?

Sorgatron Media Master Feed

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 23, 2015 12:36

Promoted Pins, Boost Posts, and Promoted Tweets are all coming for your marketing money. But as a smaller business, non profit, or small Podcast producer, is it necessary? I look at a few positions on the topic. What is your take on promoted posts, pins, and tweets? Are you finding success without it? Follow Basic Sorganomics on Youtube, Spreaker, iTunes, Stitcher or TalkShoe, or subscribe to the Sorgatron Media Master Feed on Stitcher and iTunes.

social media stitcher basic spreaker spend money talkshoe promoted pins promoted tweets

Getting Noticed On Pinterest With Cynthia Sanchez