Pinterest can be a powerful social media tool for building your business. Think of it as your refrigerator door filled with photos and kids’ drawings; something you want everyone to see; Grandma passing around pictures of her beautiful, intelligent grandchildren. (And, by the way, they absolutely adore their Grandma.) Pinterest, though, is even more powerful than Grandma. It helps you get more online exposure, opportunities to build your brand and traffic to your website and blog.

Start with these strategies:

• Compelling Profile – Add your business name, a profile photo, a vanity extension on your Pinterest URL, a short keyword-rich description, your city and website address. Pinterest gives you very little space to write your profile, so make it count. Confirming your website with Pinterest lets you see what people are pinning from your site and adds your logo to any pin that came from your site.

• Larger Market Reach – Create boards that will target your specific audience’s demographic. As a Realtor®, you can create boards for the communities you do business in, your listings, community events, home improvements, indoor and outdoor spaces. Food is one of the most popular searched topics, so include local restaurant news and reviews. To add a personal touch, add your own culinary creation. Use targeted keywords in your board title and description. Add a Pinterest widget or Pin It icon to your website for additional reach.

• Find Friends – Pinterest has a great feature that directs you to the best connections for you and your business. You can either follow their boards or use Facebook, Google+, Yahoo! or Outlook.com to add more friends you already have on other channels. This is a great way to build your followers for more online exposure.

• Here’s the Granny Power – Whether you upload a video, photo or graphic to one of your boards, you will find the real power of Pinterest is in adding your website link. An upload to Pinterest without a link back to your website page or post is just a refrigerator door. It’s interesting to you but will never reach anyone who doesn’t come into your kitchen. It’s the link back that drives traffic. Make the link relative to your pin. If you’re uploading a virtual tour, make sure you link it back to the page on your website where the listing exists. Likewise, when you add a pin for your blog post, make sure it’s linked back to the entire post.

Put these Pinterest strategies to work for you. You’ll get more website traffic, online exposure and relationships.

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