Just as with any other social media network or with marketing in general, a solid strategy is needed to get the most out of Pinterest. With over 100 million active monthly users, the channel is simply too large to ignore. According to a recent blog by Pinterest itself, “93% of Pinners Use Pinterest to Plan or Make Purchases.” Whether your hotel currently uses Pinterest or you are looking to improve your currently strategy, here is a Pinterest Checklist for success specifically for hotels:
Creating an Account
A Pinterest Business account is needed to take advantage of Pinterest Analytics as well as Promoted Pins if you are interested in running any ads in the future. If you are currently using a personal account for your hotel, you can easily switch it to a business account under settings. Make sure to fully fill out any information
Bio
You have 160 characters to describe your hotel in the bio. This is a little more than a tweet. Try to accurately describe your hotel and include a keyword. While your Pinterest profile already lists the hotels location, it is still a good idea to enter the city or area the hotel is in for search purposes.
Verify your website
In order to get a deeper understanding of how users are interacting with content from your website on Pinterest, you need to verify your website. Pinterest provides a code that needs to be entered on your website in order to do this. Have your webmaster enter this onto your site, and in a few days that code should be active. To see if the code is now reporting data regarding your website, visit Pinterest Analytics and the column all the way on the right should be active.
Create a hotel board
The first board that should be on your account is a board about your hotel. Use a high quality photo of the hotel as the cover photo, preferably the exterior of the hotel.
Create other boards
What is most important to guests staying at your hotel? Combine that with the most popular categories on Pinterest to create boards that are not only highly relevant to your guests but will also receive the most engagement. Some of the most popular topics on Pinterest are food, fashion, inspirational quotes, and humor. If there is a way that you can incorporate these into a board, example food places around the area, then take advantage of it.
Write great descriptions
Unlike your bio description, you have up to 500 characters to describe a board. Be sure to describe your board fully using as many descriptive words and phrases as possible.
Content
When sharing your own content on Pinterest, its good to include a mix of photos that you upload and photos that are pinned directly from your website. When uploading photos directly, keep in mind that vertical (tall) photos perform best. After uploading your photo, you will need to include a description. Once the pin is posted, be sure to go back in and add a link back to a relevant page of your website. When pinning directly from your website, be sure to edit the description in order to add complete sentences and hashtags.
Repin & Like other content
Make sure that you are active on Pinterest, just as any user would be. You don’t want to only put out your own content, but also want to share other relevant content. This can be done through repinning other user’s content. Keep an eye out for the source of these pins, as you don’t want to send your followers over to websites that are not reputable or to a competitor’s site. You can also like user’s pins, however keep in mind that all of your likes can be seen on your profile page.
Keywords are key
As you might already know, keywords play a big role on Pinterest. Keep in mind that Pinterest has an algorithm in place when it comes to both the home page as well as well as searches. The better your pins perform, the higher they will show in results. Use keywords in your pins just as you would use on your blog or website.
Website
Make sure your website has a Pinterest social media button so that users can easily find your Pinterest page if they are looking for it.
Analyze
The only way to truly know if what you are doing is working is by measuring clicks and engagement. Take a look at how your pins are performing, both on Pinterest Analytics and Google Analytics. Repeat what works well and adjust the strategy as needed.
Use this checklist to make take your hotel’s Pinterest strategy to the next level!
Arielle Sanchez is the Digital Media Manager at E-Marketing Associates, where she writes personalized copy for hotel websites, assists independent hotels with social media, and blogs regularly for the E-Marketing Associates Blog. E-Marketing Associates works exclusively with independent hotels and builds innovative online marketing products that increase direct bookings and drive top-line revenue.
