7 B2B Content Marketing Ideas for Pinterest

With 25 million members and growing, Pinterest has grown from a niche curation platform to a formidable presence among major social media networks. It may not have the massive membership of Facebook, but the network’s engagement rate is staggering: users spend more time on Pinterest than TikTok, LinkedIn, or Twitter combined. It’s a referral traffic powerhouse, and many Pinterest users view the network as a tool for discovering products to purchase.

However, is the network a viable tool to promote content in the B2B realm? Sure, but it’s a bit harder. Your company can stand out on the visually-driven network where pins of products with prices reign supreme, but it requires some ingenuity and effort. We’ve curated some of the brightest ideas on how you can develop a Pinterest for business presence to be reckoned with:

1. Create Custom Images

Behind every great piece of content marketing is a lot of effort and elbow grease. Content creators are tasked with conceptualizing, outlining, writing, editing, optimizing, and publishing; often multiple times daily. However, to truly stand out on Pinterest for business, it’s critical to customize your images to promote content. While you’re given 500 characters to tag your posts, it’s best to assume that your descriptions won’t be read.

Instead, overlay your images with descriptions to ensure the intent of your marketing can be grasped within a single glance. As entrepreneur Kelly Lester has found, “images with easy-to-read, bold text do particularly well.”

Image source: Six Sisters Stuff

The image above includes clear text, and a branded watermark to ensure the original source is clear even if the image is repinned. It’s quick and easy to brand your images even if you lack access to Adobe Photoshop. iPiccy and LunaPic are free online services for photo editing, while the “Add Text: Write On Photos” allows you to add text straight from your iPhone.

2. Start a Group Board

Networking has always been a key to success in many areas of business, and working to promote content is no exception. Creating an industry-specific group board can dramatically increase your following and exposure, and help you build brand advocates among other bloggers in your niche. Leading marketing blogger Jeff Bullas, who maintains a successful B2B presence on Pinterest, has several active group boards including Marketing Infographics:

3. Showcase Engagement

It’s a bit of a no-brainer to couple fan engagement with your plan to promote your content, but why not create a board or two solely dedicated to how you interact with fans and customers? Email and social media software Constant Contact have positioned themselves as a visionary in B2B Pinterest for business, creating boards dedicated to user-generated content, and videos of their staff experts answering small business owners’ questions.

4. Be Pinteresting

Your Pinterest presence will be less boring and more appealing if you don’t just promote content from your blog. By all means, pin, optimize, and share your work, but be sure to create a Pinterest presence with mass appeal, in order to gain the broadest exposure possible. HubSpot Marketing Automation software maintains a pretty vibrant presence that extends well beyond their software’s capacity and blog content. It’s fairly safe to assume that many of their inspiring quotes and fun facts were originally created for Pinterest, though they’re primed for repurposing:

5. Create Topical Boards

While you can dedicate a board solely to your business blog content, why not create topical boards in which you can curate others’ work? Positioning yourself as a leading resource in your industry can help you build an audience that’s receptive to your efforts to promote content. The following ideas can serve as a strong basis for Pinterest for business boards to separate and organize your content marketing:

• Infographics: Even if your company isn’t currently creating custom infographics, compile industry-related visualizations of facts, figures, and best practices.
• Type of Content: Take a note from many B2B companies with a content-focused culture, and showcase your eBooks, blog articles, webinars, and templates on their own boards.
• Customer Testimonials: Your customers almost certainly love publicity, so give their video testimonials, written statements, and company profiles a showcase with a dedicated board.

6. Create Persona-Specific Boards

It’s certainly possible to promote content without annoying anyone, and the key is getting the context right. If your B2B company serves a number of industries, it may be worth your while to create boards of resources specifically for each type of customer you’re trying to attract. Office supplies retailer Staples nailed Pinterest for business with their board solely dedicated to education resources for Art Directors:

7. Experiment

There’s no rule that says B2C companies get to have all the fun on Pinterest. In fact, the way you use boards to promote content and your company are only as limited as your imagination, so use it as license to be truly ingenious. Sassy wine brand Middle Sister took one of the most creative bents we’ve ever seen on the network by actually personifying their products. Their boards highlight their product by curating content around the perceived lifestyle of each wine they offer:

Image Credit: Middle Sister Wines

While your company’s service offerings may not initially translate well into personality-filled boards, take a page from Middle Sister’s book and focus on curating content your personas love. If you entertain, amaze, or engage your prospects using Pinterest for business, they’ll be a lot more likely to click through to your website when you promote content.

How do you successfully promote content on Pinterest?