Social media is becoming increasingly focused on high quality images and videos, and Pinterest is leading the pack – with Instagram, Snapchat and Vine close on the social media site’s heels. Even with all the competition, Pinterest continues to experience terrific growth and it should be included with your marketing efforts in the New Year if you want to secure more share of the market and reach out to your primary audience in all new ways. The following 2014 updates for Pinterest will help you stand out on everyone’s favorite picture-pinning social media platform.
Unique Content
Most of the Pinterest updates worth mentioning are designed to improve the quality of the content on the site, as well alter how people engage with the content they find. The pictures are bigger, there is a revamped settings page and a few old features have been completely removed. Use these updates for Pinterest to your advantage by providing your audience with engaging photos, videos and infographics that truly stand out. The world is going visual in 2014 and that means that this coming year is a great time to really supercharge your visual marketing efforts; and using these Pinterest updates to their maximum potential is a good place to start.
Larger Images
2014 updates for Pinterest include larger images. If you click on an image in Pinterest now, you will notice that they have indeed increased in size when compared to previous site designs. The new width for Pinterest images is 735 pixels wide. That’s a 135 pixel increase that could work in your favor, provided you can select the proper photos that effectively resonate with your Pinterest followers.
Categories Have Moved
If you used Pinterest in the past, you may have noticed that the categories section is not where it used to be. In an effort to make the site more user-friendly, the categories are now included in a dropdown box that is located on the left hand side of the screen, right next to the search box.
New Buttons
The most recent Pinterest updates include all new buttons. Try hovering over a pin and you will notice a new and improved Pin It button. You may also notice that the comment button is no longer where it used to be. If you want to leave comments on Pinterest user entries, you will have to open the pin and then scroll all the way to the bottom. Whether it’s an improvement or a detriment depends on the individual, but you may also notice that you can no longer leave comments on the Pinterest home page or the individual category pages.
If you click and enlarge a pin, you will now have the option of clicking straight through to the website associated with that pin. There is also a ‘related pins’ sidebar that makes finding preferred content a breeze.
New Settings Page
As part of the 2014 updates for Pinterest, you will notice that there is now an expanded settings page. Here you can establish your privacy settings, as well as your preferences for receiving emails from the Pinterest platform.
Removed Features
If we’re going to mention Pinterest updates, it wouldn’t be fair to omit the features that have been completely removed. Lovers of the hashtag are going to be disappointed, because there are no more hashtags allowed on the site. You can include a number sign with your posts, but doing so won’t make your content any more searchable or linkable.
Marketers might not like the fact that 2014 updates for Pinterest have done away with links. The only links that are allowed are the ones you leave on your profile, and of course the ones that lead directly to your other social network profiles. Unfortunately, this leaves links that are left in pin descriptions and comments, which are now completely prohibited.
Other removed features include embed links (you must now use Pinterest’s provided embed link in order to directly link pins), the ability to Tweet at the same time as a pin and the ability to Facebook Like a board. Profile descriptions have also been shortened to 160 characters maximum.
2014 Updates for Pinterest Analytics
If you are a blogger, business owner or marketing manager, you will now have access to Pinterest analytics that will allow you to determine what’s working and what’s not.
You must first verify your business account, after which you will be able to determine how many pins are generated from your website, how many repins, impressions, and pin clicks you have received, the most recent repinned and clicked pins from your site and much more. The inclusion of a new and improved analytics program shows that Pinterest is paying attention to Internet marketers and wants IM professionals and regular users alike to have a much more streamlined and improved social media experience. With these updates for Pinterest and attention-grabbing content your audience can’t wait to pin, you should go far with your marketing efforts in the New Year.
