Using Pinterest as a Softer Platform to Grow Your Business (for introverts, sensitives and feminine creatives)

For feminine souls, marketing can feel overwhelming.

Strategies like being on social media, having to do outreach and being in constant creation/strategic mode feels in opposition to the natural pace and desires of the feminine soul.

Yet at the same time there’s a deep desire to have your work and services connect with people- which means being visible.

And this means finding a way to market your business.

Especially when you’re just starting out creating a new business (or if you’re further along but struggling to find regular clients and customers online) growing an audience can feel overwhelming. It can feel awkward and unnatural to start putting yourself out there on social media- especially if you have little to no audience yet (aside from family and friends who often aren’t your ideal audience).

I love to support clients with content marketing, because it’s one of the best strategies to organically draw people to your business (you can learn more about more gentle, natural approaches to content creation here).

But alongside the actual creation of content (which is the first part of content marketing), the other part is deciding how to ensure the content you create is visible to people- and more importantly the right people for your particular business.

And while I always suggest creating content on a platform you have a degree of ownership over (like your website), it’s usually also necessary to have avenues to guide your audience to this content, especially if you’re newer in business or you haven’t yet optimised your website to establish a presence on search engines.

And this is where there’s a simple platform that’s perfect for anyone who’s doesn’t feel comfortable putting their work out there on social media (or who doesn’t want to be on social media platforms at all). A platform that lets you easily market your content in a natural, organic and non-overwhelming way.

And that platform is Pinterest.

Lots of people perceive Pinterest as another social media platform, or just a place to browse home decor and weddings- but it’s so much more than this. It’s completely unique in the way it works and is one of the easiest ways to start attracting an aligned audience to your business, while not feeling the same pressure that can come up when trying to share your work on social media.

The reason for this, is because Pinterest is actually designed as a search engine, not a social media platform.

People are not there to specifically follow people (although there is that option), so much as they are there searching for specific ideas, concepts and inspiration.

When you create content on Pinterest, if you include relevant and searchable keywords, your pins will appear when people are searching.

Which means three things:

1) Your content is appearing in front of people who are actually interested and often actively looking for the type of content (and subsequent service/creations you offer).

2) Because there is no focus on followers, it never feels like you’re self-promoting or peaking directly to a limited set of people. Rather, it feels like you’re just sharing your work organically, knowing that the people who are interested in your content will delve deeper and learn who you are, while remaining basically anonymous to the people who aren’t intereted.

3) Whatever you post on Pinterest, remains searchable long after you’ve actually pinned it- especially if you’re including keywords and descriptions that people are searching for.

If we compare this to a platform like Instagram, where your content essentially disappears after 24 hours (unless someone actively visits your profile and looks through your old content), Pinterest becomes a great alternative to social media for feminine-led business owners who are looking for a softer, more sustainable way of putting their work out there.

Image from Michelle Knight

On the above graphic, you can see that blogging has an even longer life than Pinterest (which is why I always suggest starting a blog for your business). But blogging can feel frustrating when you’re starting out, because it can be hard to get traffic at first. We all know that unless you appear on the first page of Google, you won’t attract much traffic to your website.

And while showing up on the first page of Google is definitely doable, this can feel a bit overwhelming to rely on, especially if you’re starting out and you want people to start seeing your work straight away. (if you’re interested in appearing on search engines more quickly, you might like to explore my Growing a Business Without Social Media course.)

Which is why Pinterest is so useful, because it’s a far less competitive search engine that can start generating traffic to your website immediately. And if you’re consistent, it can build your traffic really quickly- even if you’re literally starting with an audience of zero.

With Pinterest, the main way that content is shared is through other people repining your content, which means that without you doing anything (except of course making good content that connects with the right people), your content can easily reach thousands of people. Even if only one pin does this, this can add countless eyes to your work, leading to website traffic, email sign ups and sales. This makes it a great platform to start with when you’re thinking about how to market your business online.

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Pinterest is the place that people come to when they’re searching for an answer to their problems. They want to be inspired, educated and informed.

Pinterest isn’t about likes, follows, sharing your life or being an influencer. It’s about creating useful, valuable and visually appealing content that can support, inspire and connect with other people. And this is like music to the feminine soul’s ears.

In the exact words of Pinterest~

Your customer isn’t coming to Pinterest to hunt for likes, or see what everybody else is doing. They’re looking to find what they actually love.

— Pinterest

Which means that Pinterest has a unique energy that feels nourishing and supportive to sensitives, introverts and feminine souls- or anyone who doesn’t feel comfortable with the more interruptive, penetrative energy of selling on social media.

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The other attraction of Pinterest, is that you can experiment very quickly to see what works and what doesn’t. Pinterest for Business has really simple backend analytics, so you can see exactly how many people have viewed or clicked through to your website from each pin. This means that if you see one Pin perform really well, you can make sure that you optimise the content that the pin is linked to. For example, if it’s a blog post, making sure that there’s an attractive and clear way for visitors to sign up for your mailing list, so they are then part of your audience- even after they leave your site and go back to Pinterest.

On Pinterest, you can pin multiple times a day without it feeling weird or invasive (and there is also a really simple way to do this without actually being on the platform all day). And because it’s a search engine, people who are organically looking for content will find your pins, rather than just relying on followers.

This is so different to social media, where the intent of the platform is to keep you scrolling and where you have to create something pretty compelling for people to click away from the platform and visit your website. Social media is also more about the person behind the content, which can be really off putting for a lot of gentler souls in business who have no desire to be an “influencer.” Whereas with Pinterest, it’s very much about the content, and what will be truly helpful and valuable to the people that you’re aiming to support through your business.

Because of this, Pinterest is the perfect place for a feminine-led soul to begin marketing.

Personally, I find Pinterest fun, inspiring and not overwhelming at all. My feminine soul loves creating graphics and content for it, and I love that I don’t have to worry about pandering to a specific audience- I can create and flow without there being the proving, striving, trying-to-be-an-influencer energy that’s so common on social media.

I don’t need to be responding to comments or trying to get followers. In fact, the key metric for Pinterest isn’t the followers at all. You can have thousands of monthly visitors to your pins even when you have zero or a handful of followers.

So, if you’re a sensitive, introverted or feminine soul in business just starting out, or if you’d like to grow your business without using traditional social media, I suggest setting up a Pinterest Business account (its completely free) so you can start creating and directing pins to your website and experimenting with the platform and different pins. You can also direct pins to your etsy store or landing page if you don’t have a website yet.

Of course, Pinterest may not be for everyone- and I have definitely seen Pinterest courses and educators out there that make it seem just as hectic as social media (eg. pin 50 times a day- ummm, what!? No, I use Pinterest to get away from that kind of insanity!)

But I find that most of the creative, feminine women in business that are drawn to my work, tend to be offering work, services and products that work really well with Pinterest, especially when it is married with a content rich website/blog.

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Hopefully this post has given you a bit more of an idea about how Pinterest can support your business visibility and growth. I do know a new platform can feel overwhelming, or like another thing you should be doing (especially if you’ve been slogging away on social media for a while without the results you’d hoped for). But I feel like Pinterest is so different, and I really want other women to know that there are other, less intense options for us to be visible and share our work online. So if you’re feeling a pull toward using Pinterest for your business, I encourage you to listen to it!

And if you’d like extra guidance, have a look at my self-led resource Growing a Business Without Social Media, where I guide you through the best way to set up your Pinterest, alongside some other key (social media free) discoverability strategies to support your business and creative work being found online in a softer way.

x

Belinda

other writings you may enjoy

Why you may be struggling to figure out your "ideal" client (and what to do instead)

Does being visible online mean I have to "show up" on social media?

Receptive vs penetrative marketing (there is a gentler, more inward way for sensitive souls to share online)

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