I am excited to share about one of the newest books in the For Dummies series. Pinterest For Dummies {written by Kelby Carr} covers everything one needs to know about Pinterest, an online pinboard that is used as a social bookmarking site. The book is written for both Pinterest newbies and those who have been on Pinterest since the beginning.
For those that have never used Pinterest before, Kelby goes over how to request an invite and how to setup a profile on the site. She then talks about how to create boards, from what to name them to what category to put them in on the site. She also talks about pinning and repinning. About 40 pages are spent on these basics. For those that have been on Pinterest a while, these pages are good to review since there are still nuggets of knowledge found in the pages.
Next, Kelby talks about how to use Pinterest to interact with others. She shows how people can find their friends on the site and how to share the things you pin. She also talks about the features of Pinterest and how to like pins and comment on pins. She then shows how to customize pins by putting price tags on product pins and how to use hashtags to make searching for items easy.
After this she goes into the many ways people are using Pinterest. Most people use Pinterest for DIY/crafts and recipes. Some use it to plan a vacation, create a wish list of products they want, or creating a board of motivational quotes. {Personally I use Pinterest the most to find recipes for my menu plan and have about 15 boards devoted to food alone.} There is really no right or wrong way to use the site and pins about any topic you can think of. I really like that Kelby also talks about using Pinterest to support causes since there are some charities and businesses offering to donate money just for pinning something and I love that!
The last chapters of the book cover more advanced topics like using Pinterest on a smartphone and controlling privacy settings. There is a whole chapter for website owners that helps them create pin-worthy content and other ways to use Pinterest to drive traffic to their sites. She also has a chapter on pin etiquette and shares her do’s and dont’s for using Pinterest.
The end of the book has a couple lists. Kelby shares a list of Pinterest users people can follow {listed by what types of things they frequently pin}. She also has a list of ten businesses that are using Pinterest effectively. As a marketer I was especially interested in reading this chapter so I could learn what is working for businesses on Pinterest.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book. I normally think of the “For Dummies” line of books as being for those that aren’t familiar with the topic but in this case I think it’s useful for everyone. I’ve been on Pinterest since before it was popular {as I am with many social networks} and I found a lot of great information in the pages. It’s also nicely organized so you can easily find the topics you want to read about.
GIVEAWAY
One person will win a copy of Pinterest For Dummies by Kelby Carr
HOW TO ENTER
{Do any or all of the following, leave a separate comment for each you do}
1) What do you use (or want to use) Pinterest for?
2) Follow me on Pinterest
3) Share this giveaway on a social network
Giveaway ends on June 24, 2012 at 11:59pm Central time. Giveaway open to US and Canada only.
(Disclosure: I received a copy of Pinterest For Dummies to review but all thoughts are my own.)