Pinterest and Instagram are great ways to promote your business and improve your social media authority through pictures. Using images is a great way to promote your business and each of these social platforms provides you with many different options.

Setting Up Your Pinterest Account

The first step will be to create a Pinterest and Instagram account. Let’s start with Pinterest.

First visit https://www.pinterest.com/business/create/. Here you will be prompted to enter your name, your business name, and to select your business type. You also have the option of adding a website. The whole process takes less than 20 seconds.

When creating your account you will want to choose a good user name and business name as this will be one of the most prominent items on your brand page. In addition, your name will be good for SEO purposes.

Make sure that you take the time to write a quality about section. You are given 160 characters to describe your business. The purpose of the about section is to let people know what your business is and what you will do on your Pinterest page.

Next, make sure that you link your social media accounts. You will also want to add your website and get it verified. This is an important step as your full URL will appear more prominent, which will encourage more people to click on it. In addition, by verifying your website you will be able to use the analytics tool that is available.

It is also important to choose a profile image. This image should represent your brand so that your followers will be able to recognize your page more easily.

Next, create your boards.

You should give your boards unique names to make them stand out. The names need to be short, between 2-4 words. If they are longer people will not be able to see them in full and will have to click on the board. This extra step may deter them from looking at them. Make sure that you choose board cover images. Choose the best pin from each board to represent it.

You then want to start adding images and photos to the boards you created.

Hashtags are critical when it comes to photo sharing sites like Pintrest and Instagram, so make sure to insert as many relevant hashtags as you can.

For example, if you’re posting a photo of pancakes you could use hashtags such as:

#pancakes
#breakfast
#food

By hashtagging, you’re allowing members to find photos related to those tags.

Setting Up Your Instagram Account

Next, let’s look at setting up an Instagram account for your business. Getting started on Instagram is actually quite simple.

  1. First, install the app on your mobile device via the App Store or Play Store.
  2. Next, sign up for an account. It is a good idea to use the same username as your Twitter handle to keep the branding consistent.
  3. Next, you will add a profile picture, once again using the same one that you use for Twitter is a good idea. Connect your Instagram account to your other social media accounts and let your users know that they can follow you there.

The next steps are where many businesses struggle with Instagram. When creating an Instagram page, remember that it is all about images. Your images need to be a mix of fun combined with pictures of your business. Try to tell a story using your images. Don’t be afraid to get personal. Add photos of your everyday life, hobbies and what you like to do during your spare time. Then add in some of pictures of your office, your brand, and other business related items. So tie in both personal and work-related posts so that you don’t end up looking like a robot.

You can also post videos on Instagram. These videos are not like the ones that you will be posting to YouTube, but rather short, 15 second videos that are fun and entertaining for your followers. These videos can be imbedded on your website or blog. This is a great way to increase the reach of your content.

You also want to make sure you hashtag your posts, just like on Pintrest.

When creating your Instagram page, it is important to share a distinct view of the world or to create a unique visual sense. You need to get past the inherent need to make sales and focus on things that are interesting to your brand in order to target your customers. Focus on what makes images provocative, engaging, and good and choose to share these on your account.

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