I’ve asked team member Mary Walewski to contribute an article this month and she introduced me to Pinterest. This relatively new social media site intrigued me because it’s all about images. I posed the question to her, “How can self-publishers use Pinterest to market books?”

I discovered this is a perfect way to quickly post portfolio samples from recent projects completed by my team. I’ve already created a set of Pinterest boards dedicated to samples of book covers, logos, business cards, speaker one sheets and branding projects.

There are many reasons why you should join interest, and Mary has listed 5 ways to use it as part of your online marketing campaign below. Please enjoy her article and links, then click on the Pinterest button below this post to view my Pinterest boards.

Five Ways to Use Pinterest to Market Books

By Mary Walewski

Pinterest is the hot new site that has joined Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn as “must” sites to be be on for social media marketing. What is Pinterest? Well, basically, Pinterest is an online image sharing site where you can ‘pin’ images from anywhere and create virtual bulletin boards. In the two years since it launched, Pinterest has grown to 10 million members, the fastest growth of any stand-alone site in history. Most of its members are women, and they are wildly enthusiastic about creating virtual image boards.

Aside from creating boards with original material, repining from other people’s boards is how you get social and how your content (with the attached url of your website) goes viral. You can also “like” other pins and post comments on them, as well as follow members.

How can you use Pinterest as part of your online marketing campaign?

1. Use Pinterest to increase traffic to your blog. Pinterest now drives more traffic to websites than YouTube, Reddit, Google+ and LinkedIn combined. Are you you using great photos in your blog posts that visitors can pin to their boards? If you have a WordPress self hosted blog, there’s a variety of Pinterest plugins that add Pin It badges to your posts and even defines what the image will look like.
2. Think out of the box and create boards around your book topic. Did you write a nonfiction book on a topic that lends itself to a picture board? If your book is fiction, could you dream up boards about the setting, the plot, or even the characters?
3. 3. Integrate your Pinterest account with your Facebook and Twitter accounts. Publishing your board updates on Facebook and Twitter makes it that much easier for more people to see your boards and possibly repin your images.
4. Pin videos to a board. Remember the stat in item #1? Pinterest is driving more traffic to websites than YouTube, Reddit, Google+ and LinkedIn combined. This is a great way to get your book trailers, interviews, and other videos circulating.
5. Create how-to boards. Pins on a board create a tutorial from your book. Nonfiction how-to’s are perfect. Fiction writers – could you diagram part of your plot? Mystery writers will have a blast – how about showing part of your plot?

As you can see, the possibilities are endless. I’ve also been hearing of contest boards used by businesses, even deals where x number of repins “unlocks” a super deal at a retail store. For more tricks and tips, check out these resources:

The 10 Commandments of Using Pinterest for Business, http://www.amyporterfield.com/2012/06/the-10-commandments-of-using-pinterest-for-business/

6 Ways to Drive More Pinterest Engagement  http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/pinterest-engagement/

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Mary Walewski of Buy The Book Marketing is a social media guide, offering training and coaching on how to effectively build your online platform using blogging, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Pinterest. Get her weekly marketing tips at .