Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, businesses, digital marketers, educators, Web publishers, Pinterest users.

Guest post by Annie Lynsen
SmallAct

Earlier this year, I wrote about 13 nonprofit Pinterest board ideas. If you have a Pinterest account for your organization, you’ll find some inspiration below. If you don’t have a Pinterest account, take a look at how these nonprofits are leveraging this powerful visual medium.

Here are 11 more!

Photos and brief stories of heroes to your cause

1AARP does a great job of this, showcasing celebrities over 50 and other influential people. Who in your movement has made a difference over the years? This is a great place to show them off and briefly tell their stories.

Great online resources related to your cause

2For example, the National Wildlife Federation has a board aggregating live wildlife cams from around the world.

Recipes people can use for your nonprofit’s events and fundraisers

3The Northeastern Ohio Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has a board with church potluck recipes.

Photos and stories from your organization’s history

4The American Red Cross has a board about the early days of the organization’s existence, showcasing key members and events.

Recommended books and other media related to your cause

5Oceana has an interesting board of art and books related to ocean conservation — take a look above!

Research and discoveries

6The University of Minnesota shares recent scientific discoveries made at the university — I like the sensor gloves.

How-to content

7Ontario Parks teaches people how to camp with this Pinterest board. Another of their boards features recommended camping equipment – a great resource for people just starting out.

Tips from members and spokespeople

8The CDC has tips from former smokers, which serves not only as a valuable resource for people checking out their pins, but also is a great way to shine a spotlight on the people their organization serves – letting them tell their own stories.

Why you fight

9KaBOOM!, a national organization that builds playgrounds and advocates for more unstructured playtime for kids, has a cleverly titled “Board of Outrage” to highlight “absurd, bizarre, and depressing stories about the state of play.”

Fundraising ideas through Pinterest

10Do your members do any P2P fundraising? Give them ideas how to come up with the money they need to participate in your walkathon or other events with a Pinterest board. Girl Scout Troop 50170 has this helpful board of fundraising tips and ideas.

Spotlight your CEO

11Not only is this interesting content for members and donors, it’s a handy resource for media relations. Planned Parenthood has a board with the latest photos and quotes from their CEO, Cecile Richards.

Related

• 10 ways to optimize your website for Pinterest (Socialbrite)

• 3 steps to add your nonprofit’s url to Pinterest (Socialbrite)

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Attract more visitors, encourage sharing through Pinterest

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, businesses, marketers, Pinterest users.

By now you’ve heard about Pinterest, the social site that allows people to share images and videos, follow boards and people, and re-pin stuff they find interesting.

But have you optimized your website for Pinterest?

Why should you care about Pinterest?

First of all, why should you give a hoot about Pinterest? There are a few reasons, including how it’s one of the few social networks where women are the predominant user group. Plus, it’s also the fastest growing social networking site on the planet – ever.

And finally, Pinterest helps you reach your website objectives:

• Getting new visitors
• Getting visitors to stick around longer
• Getting visitors to share your goods with their friends

If you take a look at these these goals, you’ll notice that they all have one thing in common: shareable content on your website.

How people use Pinterest

When Pinterest users visit a website, they have the ability to pin photos or videos from your website by using a browser plug-in, saving an image from your website and uploading it (as shown below), or entering a URL from your website into Pinterest.

After they upload or import an image, they add a short description and select a board for the pin (shown below). They can add it to a board they’ve created or a board they’ve been invited to curate pins for.

They can also edit the description and link URL for the pin (shown below). I love doing this with photos that have the highest virality on my Facebook Page.

Repins dominate Pinterest

Keep in mind that people can also repin content from your site once it’s added to a board. In fact, most of the activity on Pinterest is repinning. What this means for you is more exposure (more inbound links) to pages on your site that have amazing images!

10 ways to optimize your website for Pinterest

Because people might be visiting your website at this moment looking for something to share on Pinterest, it makes sense to make sure your site accommodates them. Here are 10 ideas:

1. Test your website. Do this now: Copy the URLs of your most visited pages and copy them into Pinterest by clicking on Add at the top of Pinterest and then into the URL field you’ll see after you click Add A Pin in the pop-up window. (Note: You need to have a Pinterest account to do this.)
2. Fix your website. If you’re having problems getting Pinterest to pull in images, talk to your web master or head of IT (if you have one of those).
3. Use the Open Graph Meta plug-in, if you’re using WordPress, to sniff out the problems (pulling the right photo from a post or page).
4. Add featured images. Make sure each page or post has a featured image. This is one of the main image sources Pinterest will use.
5. Use infographics. Infographics take up much more vertical real estate on Pinterest than any other type of image, enabling your pin to stand apart from the crowd.
6. Get the Digg Digg plug-in. The folks over at Buffer own this plug-in, so you can bet that it’s very reliable. If you don’t use WordPress for your website, check out the Buffer Button. There’s also the Pinterest plugin I use.
7. Play nicely. Follow the five points of Pinterest etiquette, which are pretty much common sense.
8. Make sure your content is pin-worthy. Start thinking about how to make your website content (particularly images and video) remarkable, emotional and interesting.
9. Add text to images. When someone pins an image from your site, all that’s taken with them is the image. For some images on your site, it might be a good idea to add text or a URL to the image (like this one). This way, your branding and/or URL go along for the ride as people re-pin the image.
10. Verify your website. Help Pinterest users trust your website by verifying it with Pinterest.

These are a few ideas to make your website ready for Pinterest.

What else would you add?

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How nonprofits can use infographics to demonstrate supporters’ impact

Target audience: Nonprofits, NGOs, cause organizations, social enterprises, businesses, Web publishers, bloggers, social media managers, individuals.

People support your organization for one reason: They view your organization as the agent of change they seek.

If they had the resources, they’d make the changes they desire by themselves. But they don’t, which is why you’re in their lives.

So when you tell the story of your cause, you need to show how supporters ultimately create the outcomes.

Nonprofit storytelling with infographics

One powerful way to do this is with a set of infographics like the Best Friends Animal Society created.

What’s really great about this infographic is that it’s broken down into five separate infographics, which makes the information even more digestible.

Five tips for creating powerful infographics

Best Friends Animal Society does a number of things right with their infographic. Here are a few:

1. Keep it simple. The information should be instantly understood through pictures and words.
2. Make it beautiful. No one wants to share an infographic that’s ugly. Make sure you spend the money and hire a graphic artist who can create a beautiful infographic. (Here are 20 tools to create infographics, including our favorite, Canva.)
3. Make it easily shareable. Users should be able to share your infographic with one mouse click on Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter. If you use WordPress for your website, you’ll find a number of plug-ins that will add a sharing feature to images.
4. Put it everywhere. Make sure you post your infographic on your Facebook page, your Pinterest board, and even Instagram. This allows people who call these places their home to easily see it.
5. Promote it. Just because you build it doesn’t mean people will come. You need to have a marketing communications plan that uses your biggest assets, like your email list, to promotes the infographic.

Have you seen an effective infographic about a cause? Let us know in the comments section below!

The post Five tips to create powerful infographics appeared first on Socialbrite.

Verify your site to add credibility & authority

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, Web publishers — anyone with a Pinterest account and a website.

You may have missed the announcement Thursday that Pinterest is now giving website operators a way to verify your website on your Pinterest profile page. If you manage your nonprofit’s Pinterest account and want to associate it with your nonprofit’s website, follow the steps below.

The idea is that by attaching your online identity to your Pinterest account, it bring a little more authority and credibility to your pages on there. It’s a good idea to go ahead and do that, since the pinboard-style image sharing website is now the third most popular social networking site, behind only Facebook and Twitter. (We’re at http://pinterest.com/socialbrite, come say hi and show off your own boards.)

3 steps to verify, but you need access to your site

1To begin, log in to your Pinterest account and select Settings in the dropdown under your icon at the top right. Scroll down and click the Verify Website button next to your site’s url. Note that Pinterest only supports verification for top-level domains, like www.yournonprofit.org (or .com, .biz, .net, etc.).

2Pinterest will then take you to https://pinterest.com/domain/verify/, a page that should look like this:

You’ll notice the top line of the instructions includes a link for you to download a small html file. Download it. Then upload it to the root level of your website. It’s simplest to use a ftp client to upload it; make sure it’s at the root level (that is, /) so that Pinterest can find it. (If ftp scares you, find the office techie and she can do this in seconds.) Here’s ours: http://www.socialbrite.org/pinterest-70859.html

3Return to the same page as in step 2 to complete the process. Click the link that says, “Click here to complete the process.” That’s it!

When you do, and if you uploaded the file to its proper place, Pinterest will be happy and will confirm that you’ve been verified. Readers will then see a checkmark next to your domain in search results. They will also see the full website URL and checkmark on your profile page. See the image at the top of this article. Pinterest only allows one verified domain per account.

As TheNextWeb reports: “The new features comes just a week after Pinterest launched user blocking and reporting. It’s clear the service is looking to step up its image in the area of security and privacy, which is particularly important given all the hacking and spamming that’s happening on the site.”

Any questions?

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Scoop.it, Storify, Pearltrees let you become a niche authority

This is the second of a two-part series. See part 1:
• 7 smart techniques for content curation

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, businesses, educators, journalists, general public.

By now you’ve likely heard of content curation, the process of collecting and cataloging the most useful or interesting things about a topic in order to share it for the common benefit. In part 1, Beth Kanter looked at 7 smart techniques for content curation. Today we’ll explore some of the best tools for doing so.

Keep in mind, there are lots of different ways to curate. Jorn Barger started Robot Wisdom, one of the oldest blogs on the Web, back in 1995 as a compendium of pointers to the top blog posts and articles he spied; Amy Sample Ward continues that tradition for the nonprofit community today. Others use Twitter or Facebook as retweeting and sharing engines, pointing to the best items that flit across their radar screens.

More often, though, the new breed of content curation tools refers to sites and services specifically geared for finding the diamonds in the rough. (I won’t be including aggregation services like Alltop, which provide a firehose of news updates about a topic such as nonprofits.)

Here, then, are Socialbrite’s six top tools for content curation. They are free except where noted.

Scoop.it: Become an authority in your vertical

1Scoop.it (tagline: “share ideas that matter”) ranks as one of the top content curation tools right now. The service, which has both free and premium versions, styles itself as a series of online magazines centered on niche topics. Pick a topic you feel knowledgeable or passionate about and start adding to your collection: articles, blog posts, Twitter lists, videos and so on. Socialbrite’s Debra Askanse, for example, has Scoop.it pages on Facebook and Twitter best practices.

Gabriella Sannino put it well: “Scoop.it is like being your own newspaper editor.” The quality of the curators on Scoop.it is high, though you’ll need to root around a bit to find the subjects and authorities that interest you the most. Note: While you can embed it on your own site, it works better by viewing the topics on the main Scoop.it site.

Storify: Curate your next event

2Next time you’re covering a nonprofit conference or putting on an event, consider firing up a Storify account and then pick and choose the best images, tweets, blog posts, videos, etc., that others publish and tie them up with a nice ribbon — your overall take on the proceedings, of course. Storify is becoming a favorite of bloggers, journalists and Tweeps who like its curated take on current events. You can pull from blogs, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, Instagram and many other sources and then export it to your WordPress, Tumblr or Posterous blog or share it on Twitter, Facebook or Google Plus via social buttons. (Side note: I know the founder, Burt Herman, who’s a nice guy, and I always root for former-journalists-turned-entrepreneurs.)

Pearltrees: Cultivate your interests

3My vow for the fall is to spend more time with Pearltrees, which recently did a reboot and looks to be one of the most advanced tools you can add to your curation toolkit. There’s a bit of a learning curve, but here’s how it works: Your browser app lets you “pearl” the page you’re visiting. Connect your Twitter and Facebook accounts, then start organizing interests into topic folders (“pearltrees”). Any other curator expert in your topic area might ask to team up with you (and vice versa) to make your tree branches richer. You can share your pearls through Twitter, Facebook, email or embed them in your own site. You can also share pearls with colleagues or your own team. Curators, behold the potential of the pearl.

Pinterest: Share your favorite visuals

4Pinterest entreats you to “organize and share the things you love,” but it’s really all about compelling visuals. (And, by the way, here’s a Pinterest board on curation tools.) This year Pinterest has become the third most popular social network in the world, trailing only Facebook and Twitter, by making it drop-dead simple to “pin” images that you think are cool. The more serious Pinterest curators create boards around topics, like nonprofit marketing strategist Noland Hoshino. You can, too.

Delicious: Find & bookmark cool stuff

5Delicious, the first social bookmarking site, is arguably the granddaddy of the curation movement. Now that Yahoo! sold the service to YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley, there’s wind in its sails again. It’s pretty simple: Find a valuable story or post, bookmark it and share it with the community. Your tags can be used by you or anyone (if you select public rather than private). The collective body of knowledge on any topic — such as wildlife, bears or HIV prevention — is simply staggering.

Bundlr: Bundle your multimedia

6With Bundlr you can create topic pages with photos, videos, tweets and documents and then share them with everyone. I haven’t used the service but it looks to be influenced by the Pinterest craze.

BagTheWeb: Add to a knowledge network

7OK, now we’re getting a bit repetitive. BagTheWeb helps users curate Web content through a different metaphor: Create a “bag” to collect, publish and share any content from the Web. One interesting twist is that BagTheWeb enables users to build networks of bags so that topic areas can be linked together to provide rich datasets about any subject.

Other curation services worth checking

Other social curation services worth a look include:

• Chill is a video-centric curation service that lets you vote up stories (mostly locally produced video), Digg style.

• Diigo is the social bookmarking site, research tool and knowledge-sharing community I’ve been using for the past two years.

• Paper.li, Flockler, LOUD3R and Searcheeze are among the new breed of DIY instant news publications on niche topics.

• Qrait is “a real-time curation platform designed to fulfill the needs of content curators and reduce information overload for the rest of us.”

• Curation Station, a paid service, can be used to help you create streams of curated content for your community through websites, social channels, email digests, widgets and more.

• Locker Project provides users a locker, “a container for personal data, which gives the owner the ability to control how it’s protected and shared.”

Related

• Curation tools to help you cope with info-overload (Socialbrite)

• Top tools to help you curate business content (Socialmedia.biz)

• Content Curation Tools For Brands (Return on Clicks)

• 5 tools to help you master Pinterest (Socialbrite)

• My review of “Curation Nation” (jdlasica.com)

• Scoop This: A Comprehensive Guide to Scoop.it for Content Curation (Search Engine Journal)

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Twive competition pits cities against each other to see who’s most generous

Guest post by Ifdy Perez
Community manager, Razoo

More than 200 organizations are preparing to bombard the online world with Twive and Receive — Twive combines the words Twitter and Give — a 24-hour fundraising competition on June 14. Twive pits cities against each other in a competition to see which city is the most generous in America, and one of the tools these nonprofits will be using includes Pinterest, the third most-visited social network in the country.

Here’s a list of five ways you can use Pinterest to drive traffic to your online fundraiser that works both for Twive and any other fundraiser your nonprofit starts!

Pin images and videos about what you do

1Through Socialbrite’s John Haydon, I learned that the emotional part of our brains processes images better than words. Tell your nonprofit’s story by uploading pictures or videos from events your organization held, the people and communities you’ve helped, and even of your staff members. Images are all around you — you just have to look for the ones that represent what you do.

If you’re pinning a blog post, make sure you have images on there that Pinterest can capture. Also avoid any copyright issues by using images with a Creative Commons license, such as these on Flickr.

Communicate often and consistently

2For fundraising events like Twive and Receive, communicating to your donors about what you need them to do often and consistently (on Pinterest or elsewhere) is very important because the more you appear in front of them, the more they’ll remember what you’re telling them. Narrow down the primary things you need your donors to support you on. Try keeping the list to three or fewer items.

For example, you may want to ask them to “Donate and Ask Your Friends!” and provide the links so they can do it easily without any confusion. The number of times you communicate to them should be based on how you currently communicate with them. If they’re used to hearing from you once a month, start with that and build up to a couple of times a month or weekly as the event date gets closer.

Create a contest within a contest

3Creating a small contest within your overall Twive and Receive strategy could get your supporters pumped to help you win! You could offer gift cards or other rewards to the person who gets the most pins/likes related to your fundraiser. This could help boost the engagement you get on Pinterest and will get your supporters excited (to help you win a prize on Twive day). Another outcome is that you’ll be directing them to your website, which can increase donations with a strong site.

Respond to every comment

4Part of engaging your supporters is by responding to their messages to you. Answer any questions and comments they leave on your pins. They’ll notice that you acknowledged them, and this will help you build a relationship that can last beyond Twive and Receive. You’ll reinforce the message about your fundraiser by being interactive with your followers. And by doing that, you’re giving them more reason to trust you, support your fundraiser, and become lifetime donors of your organization.

Show you’re relevant and resourceful with boards

5Pinterest is a way for your nonprofit to be a resource for your followers by curating good content they’ll want to read, while you promote the good works of your organization. Think about the major topics related to your nonprofit’s audience. You can have a board of “Success Stories,” “2011 Gala Pics,” or “Video Testimonials.” Make sure the board is topical and clearly tied to your fundraiser/cause’s effort so that it builds value.

A final word

See what the 200-plus Twive and Receive participants are doing to spread the word about their fundraiser! Here’s how to sign up!

The post 5 ways to use Pinterest to promote your cause or fundraiser appeared first on Socialbrite.

Target audience: Nonprofits, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, cause organizations, brands, businesses, Web publishers — anyone with a Facebook Page.

Editor’s note: Facebook is switching over all nonprofit and business pages to the new Timeline format on Friday, March 30. Because so many organizations haven’t yet made the move, or are still figuring out the best approach, we’re devoting this week to help you get ready to make the transition smartly. Contact Socialbrite if you need help.

In this series:
• Monday: 7 tips & cheat sheets to help you implement the new Timeline
• Tuesday: How to shape your nonprofit’s message in Timeline
• Wednesday: Tips on maximizing the new Timeline

Pinterest Boards and Facebook Page Timelines have given you powerful new ways to tell stories through images.

And while Pinterest has always been about images, the new Facebook Timelines have features that are nudging you to tell a more visual story.

How Facebook is changing how you tell your story

First of all, you can use cover images to create that first brand impression. Covers can (and should) be rotated so that you can tell your story in ways that are fresh and dynamic – like you!

Highlighting allows you to create full-width updates on your page, which helps visitors avoid eyeball headaches when scrolling down your Timeline (here’s a tutorial on cleaning up your Timeline).

Milestones allow you to tell a story with a beginning, middle and now. Milestones represent the major achievements, turning points, setbacks and victories.

What story should you tell?

Your story is always being told, regardless of whether or not you decide to be the writer and director.

If you think Facebook Timelines are only about highlighting and pinning pics, you are missing the point.

Choose a story that matters!

• Bigger than you – Stories that matter are always bigger than you and your organization. It’s in the eyes of your people. It’s a story like the one GLAAD is telling with their Timeline.
• Include your supporters – Stories that matter make up the chapters that your people have written. Take a look at how Livestrong does this.
• Stay positive – Stories that matter empower and encourage people. When things seem darkest, that’s when you can brighten your own way by lighting another person’s candle!

Talk to your co-workers and constituents – face to face. Uncover the human stories that matter. Especially the ones that feel too risky or scary to tell.

What story are you telling?

Related

• How to clean up & optimize your Facebook Timeline (Socialbrite)
• Make Facebook Timeline about your community (Socialbrite)
• How to create Facebook Timeline covers for your nonprofit’s supporters to use (Socialbrite)
• 11 ways Facebook Timeline changes your content strategy (Socialbrite)
• 18 More Creative Tips to Fire Up Your Facebook Page Cover Photo (Social @ Blogging Tracker)

The post What story should you tell in Facebook Timeline? appeared first on Socialbrite.

Company logos? No. Curating inspiration? Yes.

Target audience: Nonprofits, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, cause organizations, brands, businesses, Web publishers, educators, journalists, general public.

Guest post by Noland Hoshino
[B]cause Media

Have you gone to a buffet in Las Vegas? What did you see first? The delicious food or the menu? What catches your attention in an art gallery? The magnificent art or the biography of the painter?

Pinterest is like an Ambercombie and Fitch store. Display stimulating eye candy and people will stop and notice.

You are what you pin

The popularity of Pinterest these past couple of months has drawn newbies to the social platform that was once dominated by women – but this also brings more “meh.”

What you pin onto your boards tells a lot about your interests and personality. If you pin “meh”, then people will think you’re boring. But if you pin awesome creative art, deigns, photos and puppies that stir emotions, then people will think of you as a dazzling person and will more than likely follow you.

Pinterest is about curating inspiration.

What not to pin on Pinterest

• Company logos
• Long paragraphs
• Tweets from Twitter
• Small images
• Enormously long infographics — instead, cut out sections that are interesting
• Anything that violates Pinterest’s terms of use

Pictures paint a thousand words. Seek your inner Martha Stewart or Picasso and inspire others. What types of photos or designs inspire you?

How are you using Pinterest for your nonprofit? What types of images have you seen or posted to your board? Please share your ideas in the comment below.

Related

• 12 ways to use Pinterest for your nonprofit (Socialbrite)

• What Facebook Timeline apps are really all about (Socialbrite)

The post What to pin, and what not to pin, on Pinterest appeared first on Socialbrite.

Try out the funnest visual social network on the Web

Target audience: Nonprofits, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, cause organizations, brands, businesses, Web publishers, educators, general public.

Guest post by Noland Hoshino
[B]cause Media

There is a new darling in the social media world and her name is Pinterest. It’s a virtual, interactive bulletin board where individuals, businesses, and nonprofit organizations can pin their interests and drive traffic to their website.

What is Pinterest?

Pinsterest is basically an online scrapbook that you put together while surfing the Internet. According to the website, “Pinterest is a virtual pinboard. Pinterest allows you to organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. You can browse pinboards created by other people to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.”

Although Pinterest is chiefly being marketed to women between the ages of 25 and 44, an increasing number of visitors have taken to the social platform: more than 4 million users a month, Mashable reports.

I know what you’re thinking, “Argh, not another social media platform I have to manage. I can barely keep up with updating my Facebook page, or Twitter account, or Google Plus.” But Pinterest is different, which is important to their success because the field is already crowded with so many social networks, apps and widgets, and soon-to-be copycats (MingleWing, Piccsy).

How does Pinterest work?

You build a collage of images by pinning them to your Pinterest board. It can be done in three ways: Use the Pinterest “Pin It” bookmarklet while perusing the Internet, upload your own images, or re-pin other users’ images to your Pinterest boards that you’ve created and organized.

For example, I’ve created several Pinterest boards: Nonprofits on Pinterest, Social Good Marketing, Good Designs That Shine, Hugs My Soul (Motivational Quotes), to name a few.

What makes Pinterest so interesting?

Pinterest can generate a lot of traffic to your website because pins link back to their original source. For example, if you pin an image of a product from your business’s website onto your Pinterest board and a person clicks on the image, she will be directed back to your website (huge SEO bonus points).

There’s an element of social broadcasting by re-pinning other users’ images in Pinterest, tweeting pins to Twitter and liking pins to your Facebook wall. You can also embed pins onto your website or email them to a friend.

You can pin videos, too, which is cool.

Women, who  are usually the retail buyers in a household, have flocked to Pinterest to share decorating ideas, crafts, cooking recipes, bargain products and much, much more.

12 tips to Pinterest your nonprofit’s interest

1. Create Pinterest boards with a specific purpose in mind. Example: Humane Society of New York Woof – Adopt A Dog.
2. Follow Pinterest users with similar interests with quality pins on their boards, like Nonprofit Organizations, National Wildlife Federation, Water.org, Jokolna Foundation. You can follow all boards or specific boards, such as Jennifer Windrum’s SMAC! Sock Monkeys Against Cancer, Sylwia Presley’s Nonprofits and Social Media, Miranda Carter’sCause, Jenn Howard’s Sayings or Sevenly’s Get Inspired.
3. Follow back influential people who follow you. The trick is to click “Follow All” on the individual’s profile, then unfollow specific boards that aren’t of interests to you.
4. “Like” pins or re-pin items that appeals to you. This action will show up on the user’s sidebar. It will also send an email notification to the user (if turned on).
5. Use the pin comments section to engage in conversation and leave your mark.
6. Collaborate with co-workers or team members to help build your Pinterest board by using the board edit feature “Me + Contributors.” Let’s say your organization has a project to build a house. You can call the board “The House That Love Built” and invite team leaders to post photos of tools needed, progress of the build, and volunteers.
7. Use eye-catching images to get people’s attention and re-pins. The more re-pins, the more chances you’ll have people clicking to the source website.
8. Create an online fundraising catalog. Add a “$” symbol and the amount of an item in the pin description, i.e., $7.95 or $5.00. A gray banner with the price will be displayed on the upper left corner. Your pin will automatically go into the gifts tab located at the top of the homepage.
9. Use the search box by typing in topics, people’s names, businesses, etc. Then filter search by clicking pins, boards, or people.
10. Use the @ feature in the comment box to tag specific people (like other social networks).
11. Use keywords to name your Pinterest boards, board descriptions, and pin descriptions for search engine optimization (SEO).
12. Add a Pinterest share button to your website and URL on your business cards.

What I like most about Pinterest is that it’s visually appealing and easy to use. If I’m perusing the Web and I come across a really cool image, I can “pin” the image to my Pinterest board, like I’m creating my very own lifestyle catalog. Plus, all of my friends can see what appeals to me, which is useful when buying gifts (hint, hint).

Tip: If you highlight the Web context with the left button of your mouse, then click the “Pin it” button, the highlighted text will show up in the Pinterest description box.

Like the other social media networks, Pinterest is not a place to blatantly promote your organization. You will turn people away if you constantly push your cause. Instead, pin images that capture the lifestyle and essence of your organization while building a community of potential donors and volunteers who share the same interests.

Pinterest resources

• Joe Waters: Why and How Causes Should Use Pinterest
• Beth Kanter: Pinterest: A Tool to Curate Relevant Visual Content for Your Audience
• Avi Kaplan: Steal These 42 Creative Pinterest Ideas for Nonprofts
• Mashable: Pinterest: 13 Tips and Tricks for Cutting Edge Users
• LinchpinSEO: Ideas For Marketing Your Products Using Pinterest.Com
• Bcause Media delicious Pinterest Guide and Resources
• Kelly Lieberman Scoop.it Pinterest

Note: Pinterest is still in invite-only mode. Many of your friends may already be using Pinterest and have invites to hand out. Just ask.

If your organization already has a Pinterest account, let us know in the comments so we can follow your inspiration.

How would you use Pinterest for your nonprofit? What types of images would you post to your board? How are you pinteresting? Share your ideas in the comment below.

The post 12 ways to use Pinterest for your nonprofit appeared first on Socialbrite.