I am now a Pinterest User. I got my invitation, so does that make me a guest? I’m asked to set up an account, which I can do through Facebook or Twitter. I used Facebook as I am Twitter-challenged.

I’m asked to click on certain interests so they can suggest people to follow, so it’s Twitter-like in its system of following people. I’ve clicked on: fitness, holidays, humor, pets, women’s clothing, and products, but there are other interests, too. As I investigate these social networks, I’m trying to use both sides – one as a person with a product, my own freelance editing business, and as a consumer. I want cute earrings. Pinterest is now the venue I’m plunging into. Let’s see how it goes.
Pinterest sends me people to follow that have those topics as their boards. I will peruse these boards later. Next I’m asked to create my own board. I have no idea how to do this. I’m worried that my photos aren’t pretty enough. Pinterest is really, super gorgeously pretty. I may have one or two photos in all my collection that are up to snuff.

I may need a new camera. Or at least some talent to do shoot some Pinterest quality snaps.
There is a “Pin It” button to add to my bookmarks bar (spelled bookarks, which threw me for a moment, I’ll admit.) You put your cursor on the button and drag it over to your bookmark icon at the top of your screen. A little confusing for a minute…
So says the website: Once installed in your browser, the “Pin It” button lets you grab an image from any website and add it to one of your pinboards. When you pin from a website, we automatically grab the source link so we can credit the original creator.
Years ago, I made some websites of things we loved—mostly our animals. This Pin It feature may come in handy as I pull those photos off of the old sites.
I clicked on earrings and found beautiful photos, only a few of which that actually had prices on them. Many asked me to search on websites, most particularly Etsy. I clicked on like with a few pairs of earrings and re-pinned one pair. Oops, it was pinned into Books l Like. Now, to change that!
Okay, I took those earrings out of the Books category (embarrassing!) and created my own board for Jewelry and put it under the Pinterest category Woman’s Apparel. Now I am going to pin some more stuff. When you click on the bottom link, you can go the person’s page and then it will guide you to the site where you can actually purchase the product.
I am going to build my own boards, though this seems like more fun for me (read –something of a time waster) than a way to sell my own business. I can see how this would be very helpful to those who have products that to sell. I find a lot of weight loss products for sale on the fitness boards, for instance. On pets there seems to be an abundance of photos of cute kitties and puppies. If I were selling pet products, I’d get myself a Pinterest account right away as this seems to be a niche that hasn’t been used to its best application, at least right now.
Used correctly, I’m sure Pinterest could be used effectively as a marketing tool, but it might be difficult not to get lost in the fun and beauty of it and just plain waste time.