Getting Pinned Never Felt So Good: A Pinterest Story

I have been passively curious about Pinterest, but have to admit that I didn’t visit the site until this past weekend when my neighbor had an unexpected, wild experience as a result of being “pinned” on Pinterest. I decided it was time to see what the fuss is all about.

The best way I can describe Pinterest is to ask you to visualize a bulletin board of things you might clip out and pin to it if the Internet were a big multi-subject magazine. Recipe, craft and travel ideas abound on Pinterest, enhanced by beautiful photos. The social networking side of it kicks in as people, whose pinning activity you follow, add more pins and others, seeing those interesting pinned items, request to follow the pinners. So even if you don’t pin anything (me, so far), you can find your friends (like my friend Maria, fabulous quilter/artist who invited me to Pinterest) who do pin and find complete strangers who pin on topics you enjoy, and follow them.

Now my neighbor’s story: I live in a micro-hub of interior, web, jewelry and graphic designers. One of the talented graphic designers is Nancy Bradham, the creative owner of momgoodz.com; a terrific site for inspired gifts and gear. The momgoodz motto is “Cheeky gifts for overextended moms.” If that doesn’t get you smiling, the subtitle is “Why? Because I said so!” Whether we’ve said that because we were quoting our moms, or because we absolutely meant it with every stressed fiber of our being, we’ve all said it! Nancy promotes her brand locally, on her websites and on Etsy.com – a virtual marketplace for handmade goods, art and supplies.

Last Tuesday, someone discovered one of Nancy’s mugs on her momgoodz.com website and pinned it on Pinterest. It was then re-pinned 272 times in five minutes! In the next hour, Nancy received 40 sales orders! She and her husband spent a “crazy-fun night printing orders, packing mugs and thanking the social media gods!” Sales have continued to be high in this terrific example of the power of social media in the small business world.

According to a new study by Experian Hitwise, Pinterest is now the third most popular social networking site in the US, behind Facebook and Twitter.

Web traffic to Pinterest jumped 50% between this past January and February, enabling the invitation-only site to overtake LinkedIn, Tagged, and Google+ in total monthly visits.

In addition to these stats, visits to Pinterest reached nearly 21.5 million during the week ended January 28, 2012, almost 30 times the number of total visits recorded six months earlier. That is explosive growth.

Momgoodz.com seems to be experiencing a similar growth explosion! Just in time for Mothers’ Day, I highly recommend momgoodz.com for the overworked mom in your life! I’ll go over and help Nancy bubble-wrap if she gets overloaded with orders.

Keeping calm and growing the business!