Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge! Pinterest for you book blog...

I shudder to think about how much time I've spent on Pinterest since I joined. My boards are full of ambitious recipes (cilantro lime ranch salad dressing), sewing projects I don’t have the skill set for (“make a dress out of an old sweater in a few easy steps!”) and of course funny pictures (mostly corgis looking adorable.) But I discovered a way of spending time on Pinterest without the guilt of feeling like I’m wasting time. I made a Pinterest account for my blog!

Funny Confession Ecard: The feeling of accomplishment you get when you are notified of all the repins on Pinterest. You are all welcome for my amazing finds. You. Are. Welcome.


At first I didn't know if Pinterest would make sense for a book blog. I don’t have beautiful pictures to go along with my posts like you see with so many DIY, food or lifestyle blogs. However I think there are plenty of ways to draw attention to your blog and have fun doing it.

First, when settings up your blog’s account make sure your profile picture is your blog’s logo or header. Make sure that your blog’s name is clearly displayed for easy reading.Utilize the space they give you in the banner area to put lots of information about your blog. Be sure to fill in your URL in the space provided too!

This is what I've done for boards and what I've found works for me. Be sure to tweak and change things so that it works best for you and your blog!

I have 11 boards:
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     Books Reviewed on Library Educated: I pin every book I review or talk about on Library Educated. Simple as that!

    Gear for Book Lovers: I pin things that look like good presents for book lovers. Most of it also doubles as a personal Christmas and birthday list! I try to pin a lot of things from Etsy to support the indie crafters.
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        Quotes About Books: Quotes that inspire the book lover in all of us!
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          Book Tattoos: This board has been my most popular. The tattoos are book quotes, book characters, books and more. Though I don’t have a tattoo this board makes me consider it!
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          Book Party: Party ideas that utilize book themes. Cakes, favors and decorations for weddings, baby showers and more!
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          Book Crafts: * I know that some people are divided on using books as a craft medium. I personally don’t have a problem with it if the book is damaged beyond saving or is headed to the dumpster/recycler for some reason. I made a book page garland out of old law books that were destined for a land fill and I love it!* This board contains crafts that utilize books or crafts for books.
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           Book funnies: Bookish things that make me laugh!
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     Books at home: Fun ways to display your library in your residence.
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     Books in the world: Beautiful libraries and book displays that you won’t find in an average home.
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          Posts on Library Educated: This is my newest board and it isn't fully up to date. I just pin each of my posts!
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     These Things Aren’t Book Related: A board for pins that should go on my personal Pinterest account but I haven’t switched them over yet.

     Some other board ideas: highlight favorite authors, favorite book to movie adaptations (if you have some, haha), books that you want to read, the list goes on and on!

I'm not tech savvy enough to be the one to explain how to add the “pin” buttons on your blog pictures or things like that, but if you are tech savvy enough to figure it out, I would recommend it!  Pinterest makes it very easy to make a little display board to add to your blog that shows the last few things you have pinned. I love the extra little decoration it brings to my sidebar!

There you have it: Pinterest not just a fun time waster but a great tool for your blog. It’s another venue to get your blog’s name and content out into the farther reaches of the internet. Have any Pinterest tips or tricks? I'd love to hear them in the comments!
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So your challenge, if you so choose, is to make a pinterest account for your blog and set up at least 3 boards with at least 3 pins a piece! I bet you'll be surprised by how fast they fill up! Let me know if you have a board or an account for your blog and I'll find an follow you!



29 comments:

  1. I have a pinterest but I am not sure if I would use one for my blog. I barely use the account I have now. I can see where the boards would be a wonderful showing of covers and quotes but with all the other social media/ book sites/ blogging and then normal work, I am not sure I would keep up.

    I love all of your boards though, they sound very fun.

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    1. There is so much social media out there for blogs it can be a lot to take on that AND maintain a blog AND read AND just be a functioning human, I hear ya!

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  2. Yay, I love this post! I've seen many posts about how bloggers don't feel Pinterest has any use for a book blog & considering it's one of my favorite social media channels, I've definitely written some post about how to use Pinterest for a book blog. I don't have a separate account for my blog, but definitely have around 5 boards for my blog(I figure there's not reason for separate Pinterest accounts since Pinterest allows you the option to follow specific boards & not everything from a person). It's not the biggest social media driver of traffic to my blog or the biggest community(that would be twitter), but it HAS been more helpful than one would think!

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    1. It might not drive a ton of traffic, but it's so much more fun than trying to think up another clever tweet or attention grabbing facebook post. But you make a great point about following people's specific boards if they don't want to make a whole account for their blog. I like that idea!

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  3. I just recently joined Pinterest and I'll be the first to admit that i didn't get it at first, but now it is so addictive. One of my bloggiesta projects is to organize my boards a little. They were too broad to begin with. I will definitely be taking a peak at your boards to see what's what!

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    1. hahaha it doesn't take long to suck you in, does it? Feel free to take a gander, if you need any assistance just let me know!

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  4. Thanks for these I've needed to update my pinterest for awhile:) justbrid it and have 5 plus reading boards

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    1. I'll not be on Pinterest for a week and then I'll go like a maniac for a week, it's weird like that. But woohoo for updates!

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  5. I did it! I was terribly sceptic about Pinterest. I didn't get it, and it isn't popular in my country at all! But I decided to give it a go and now I have a blog Pinterest account with 3 cool boards. They are still all book covers, but I hope to mix them up a bit in time.

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    1. You're a trend setter! Book covers are a great way to start, hope you enjoy it!

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  6. I already had a Pinterest board but it was terribly under-utilized. So I added a few boards (I only had 2) and did some pinning. I also started following you. Here my Pinterest.
    http://www.pinterest.com/time2read2/

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    1. I love the Coming Soon board, that's a great idea!

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  7. I have had a Pinterest account for a few years now and I love it!
    I think I will do this for my reading challenge as well. Thanks for the ideas.

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  8. We now have a blog Pinterest, but haven't done too much with it. Love all the suggestions, I found the easiest way to add our blog reviews was to go on Bloglovin and use their Share tool. I'm sure there's some other ways too. :)

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    1. I didn't know you could do that through bloglovin. Thanks for the tip!

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  9. I loved these ideas thanks. I have some of these but now I'm adding some of the others.

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  10. I have a Pinterest account with several book related boards, but don't think I could keep up with a separate account just for my blog. I get a little traffic from my book review board, but wouldn't say it's a huge traffic driver. Maybe someday?

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    1. Something to keep in mind for the future perhaps!

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  11. I have two Pinterest accounts already and if I added a book one I'd go crazy. I do have an I Love to Read board on my main account though. I do want to work on promoting my book blog more with Pinterest though, good tips.

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  12. Pinterest has been a great way for me to drive traffic to my blog! I'll admit, I spend more time on it than I'd like to haha!

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    1. It's a total time suck, but I'm glad you've had success with it!

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  13. I have two board on Pinterest for books. I love it. I do believe it brings traffic to my blog. I can see the traffic that comes from google analytics. Yes it's not the most traffic but it brings some to it!! Great post!

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    1. I'm glad it's bringing in traffic for you, even if it's not much. Hopefully as the idea of book blogging things on pinterest catches on there will be even more!

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  14. Great post. I love pinning and have a board for my blog and another for bookish things. It doesn't bring a lot of traffic but it does bring some. I have share icons on my posts so adding to pinterest only takes seconds.

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    1. I just added that on the blog a little bit ago and it certainly does help me to remember to pin them more!

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  15. I just set up a Pinterest account for my blog, and you were right! It filled up fast, and I'm now at eight boards and dozens of pins. I'm addicted.

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    1. oh Pinterest, it doesn't take long to get sucked in! Enjoy the new addiction :)

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Thank you so much for your comment. I'd love to talk books with you!