Pinterest is the hot social media platform of the moment. It is suddenly the number one driver of traffic to retail websites, even more so than YouTube and Google + combined. Pinterest is a wild hit with the non tech savvy population and most especially with women.
Smart men are interested, but as my friend Jason remarked upon joining yesterday, it can at first seem like “estrogen overload”. I don’t know the demographic breakdown and I’m sure it’s evolving dramatically every day right now, but it is clearly dominated by women.
So it makes sense that when a guy signs up and Pinterest suggests which of his existing friends he should follow, he’s going to end up seeing a huge number of feminine pinboards. It could prompt the guy with average intelligence to conclude the platform is only for women and he’ll see no benefit. But writing off Pinterest entirely is a mistake and I’m pleased to be following at least a few chaps of above average social media acumen, not to mention great style. (I recommend following Brian Block, Caleb Gardner, and Philip Edsel just to name a few.)
So my first piece of advice is the same thing I said about Twitter years ago…don’t follow everyone that follows you. Don’t follow everyone of you Facebook contacts that happens to have a Pinterest account. Skim through the pins of each person you follow and make sure they have something to offer, something that interests you. Unfollow those with only a handful of girly pins.
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| Some of my various pinboards |
Here’s my biggest tip: when you decide which people to keep following, go to their list of boards and selectively unfollow the most gender specific ones. For example, unless you have a major fetish, it’s unlikely you, a guy, would be interested in my Shoes! board. Same goes for My Style. However guys might dig my Inked board or my Stuff I Want To Eat board. My photography board is pretty genderless, as is my board full of running quotes. I even have a Men’s Fashion board, though I need to find more stylish guys to follow so I can fill it up.
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| Who doesn’t love food? |
My last piece of advice is to create your own unique boards for specific interests and do searches to fill them with pins. That’s how I made my Inked board, since not many of my friends are into pinning tattoos. It’s also how I made my Office Renovation board which is for a real project I’m currently working on, not just some home fantasy.
Once you’ve got a good group of peeps to follow and a bunch of focused boards, you’ll find it easy to pop into Pinterest for a few minutes at a time and quickly repin your favorite finds for safe keeping. It’s much easier to stay on top of than Twitter or even Facebook, and it’s the perfect end-of-the-day brainless activity for me to wind down with after hours of creating content and marketing it.
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| Channeling Charlie Sheen. |
Happy pinning!
I spend a lot of time repinning.
I spend a lot of time repinning.
Yeah you certainly *could* spend a lot of time repinning if you want 🙂 I try hard to not get sucked in for very long.
Yeah you certainly *could* spend a lot of time repinning if you want 🙂 I try hard to not get sucked in for very long.