Daily Archives: March 9, 2013

ProBlogger Challenge: Create a Pinterest Persona | Mt Kisco Realtor

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I struggled a lot when I first started managing the Pinterest account for Digital Photography School.

I knew that I wanted to focus on visual curation, and that I wanted to provide a comprehensive overview of techniques and tools. There were so many possible boards I could create and I didn’t know what was the best tactic or idea. Should I spin this topic off into a separate board? Should I avoid creating this board altogether?

Then I accidentally stumbled across the concept of a Pinterest persona. My partner and myself are amateur photographers and I found myself asking whether I would be interested in the content that I was pinning. If it didn’t seem relevant then I wouldn’t pin it. This saved me so much time when making decisions and has allowed the DPS brand to maintain a very consistent focus.

It’s what today’s Challenge is all about.

mannequins

Image by SebastianDooris, licensed under Creative Commons

What is a Pinterest persona?

A Pinterest persona is simply a description of the type of person you are targeting with your Pinterest account. This is very similar to the concept of a blog persona. The difference is that Pinterest users have a different level of savvy and you want different behaviour from different groups.

Darren has previously written about creating reader profiles/personas to help with your blogging and identified the many benefits:

  • It personalizes the blogging experience.
  • It informs my writing.
  • It identifies opportunities.
  • It can be helpful for recruiting advertisers.
  • It identifies ways to connect with your readership.
  • It will identify opportunities to monetize your blog.

I recommend that you check out that article and see the type of profiles he created for Digital Photography School readers. I adapted these for my Pinterest Personas, and you can adapt them for yours, too.

Your persona description should include information about:

  • how people discover your boards
  • why they repin certain types of pins
  • why they use Pinterest in general
  • what inspires them to leave comments
  • why they like a pin.

I recommend you wait at least a month after starting your Pinterest account before creating personas.

How can you create a persona?

What creating a pinning persona, ask what actions you want people to take when they visit your Pinterest account.

Read this article at the Social@Ogilvy blog. It helps you figure out how your users differ from your blog’s profile. The author recommends that you answer three key questions:

  • How does the person behave in social media?
  • Who influences the users in social media?
  • How will the users engage with the brand or branded content?

You can figure this out by monitoring the types of people that currently interact with your profile. You will notice different behaviours for different types of people. You can then create profiles based around these.

You may notice their needs are different than you thought they were. You may also notice that your Pinterest account isn’t currently meeting their needs. This is fine—it’s all part of the normal Pinterest learning curve.

Your challenge

Your challenge is to create two or three profiles based around the types of people that your Pinterest account is targeting. These won’t be set in stone—instead, they will evolve as you learn more about your followers.

Your next step is to evaluate your Pinterest account and see if you are meeting the needs of these types of people. Be objective. If you’re not serving all of them well, what can you do to better cater to your followers? What changes will you have to make to your Pinterest workflow to accommodate them?

Over to you

Do you have social personas to help you with your account? Are you having any trouble creating them? Let me know in the comments and I’ll see how I can help you.

via problogger.net

Social Media Image Sizing Cheat Sheet | North Salem Real Estate

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Make sure that you have attractive, consistent visual branding across all of your social media platforms.

social media profile sizing cheat sheet facebook twitter google plus youtube linkedin pinterest infographic Social Media Image Sizing Cheat Sheet [Infographic]

Visual marketing is a breakout trend on social media sites. Companies need to “show” instead of “tell”, and social networks are tapping into our desire for beautiful imagery and design. While content is a huge driver of  awareness, dazzling visual depictions create awareness and differentiation on a more visceral level.

Whether you’re just getting started with social media marketing or you’re a veteran, setting up profiles on all of the various social media sites can be a daunting process. It requires good planning and execution to ensure that your brand has a consistent visual voice on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.

A huge part of the process is working with the various images you want to use across all of your channels in order to stand out from the crowd, increase engagement, and inspire viral marketing and sharing. The problem is that each social network has its own unique layout requirements.

LunaMetrics, a consulting firm that helps its clients with Google Analytics, SEO, PPC, and social media, has created a great resource to keep on hand: An infographic that contains specific information about the correct and best sizes for each of your images on the most popular social media platforms.

This embedded infographic will be updated regularly as sizing changes are implemented across social networks, so you’ll always see the latest version — no more out-of-date information! Check it out below for all the essential image-sizing dimensions.

The Ultimate Complete Social Media Sizing Cheat Sheet1 Social Media Image Sizing Cheat Sheet [Infographic]

 

pixel Social Media Image Sizing Cheat Sheet [Infographic]

Tagged as: Cheat Sheet, Facebook, Infographics, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Social Media, Social media marketing

via pamorama.net

Zillow Agrees: Inventory Crunch Easing | Katonah Homes

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Two days after rival web site Trulia announced it had detected signs that the year-long decline in inventories was slowing, Zillow said that the crunch could be beginning to ease somewhat.

Trulia’s chief economist Jeff Kolko said Monday that Trulia’s seasonally adjusted quarter-over-quarter change in inventory is negative, but no longer falling as sharply as it did a few months ago.  The quarter-over-quarter decline in inventory has been at a 14-21 percent annualized rate since October 2012, compared with a 23-29 percent annualized rate from March 2012 to September 2012.

Zillow’s Stan Humphries said that the overall number of homes listed for sale nationwide on Zillow was down 16.6 percent year-over-year in late February. Zillow looked at all homes available for sale on Zillow on Feb. 24, 2013, and compared it to the number of homes available on Feb. 24, 2012. The analysis covers homes nationally and in the 99 largest metro areas covered by Zillow, and across bottom, middle and top price tiers.

Nationwide, the greatest year-over-year decreases in inventory were among more expensive homes, with the availability of top-tier properties falling 20.5 percent year-over-year. That was followed by middle-tier homes (-17.2 percent year-over-year) and bottom-tier homes (-9.1 percent year-over-year). Only five metro areas showed more homes for sale overall last month than in February 2012: El Paso, TX (+18.5 percent); Albuquerque, NM (+8.1 percent); Little Rock, AR (+7.7 percent); Fort Myers, FL (+1.5 percent); and Youngstown, OH (+0.2 percent).

“The supply of for-sale listings continues to dry up, driven in part by potential sellers trapped in negative equity and homeowners who won’t sell out of fear they won’t be able to find a suitable home to buy later,” said Humphries. “But the impact of constrained inventory will create the solution to the problem. Over the past year, inventory tightness has contributed to increases in home values in many markets. As home values rise, some homeowners will be freed from negative equity and able to list their homes, which will contribute to an easing of the inventory crunch. While this inventory is coming, it may still be a frustrating spring for buyers vying for what inventory is available. It’s important to be patient and not commit to paying beyond one’s comfort level in the heat of negotiations.”

Large California metros experienced the biggest decrease in homes for sale over the past year. Among the 30 largest metros covered by Zillow, four of the top five in inventory contraction are located in California: Sacramento (-48 percent); Los Angeles (-45.7 percent); San Francisco (-40.9 percent); and San Diego (-39.4 percent). Minneapolis-St. Paul (-36.7 percent) rounded out the top five.

But while the overall number of homes listed for sale in February was down significantly year-over-year almost across the board, the national drop was actually less severe than in January. In January, the number of for-sale listings was down 17.5 percent year-over-year, which could indicate an easing of the inventory crunch. Almost two-thirds (63) of the areas surveyed showed a smaller year-over-year decline in for-sale homes in February than in January.

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Year-over-year % Change In Homes For Sale Listed On Zillow, Feb. 24, 2013 vs. Feb. 24, 2012
Metro AreaBottom-Tier HomesMiddle-Tier HomesTop-Tier HomesAll Homes
UNITED STATES-9.1%-17.2%-20.5%-16.6%
New York-13.3%-23.2%-19.3%-18.9%
Los Angeles-56.8%-42.4%-38.2%-45.7%
Chicago-11.5%-15.2%-19.8%-16.2%
Dallas-Fort Worth-9.8%-20.6%-24.6%-20.7%
Philadelphia-8.2%-18.3%-25.2%-18.1%
Houston-16.6%-26.5%-25.5%-23.7%
Washington, DC-26.0%-21.4%-22.7%-23.3%
Miami-Fort Lauderdale18.1%3.5%-20.9%-6.9%
Atlanta-44.3%-33.9%-23.2%-32.1%
Boston-19.1%-28.2%-24.4%-24.2%
San Francisco-51.0%-40.0%-34.9%-40.9%
Detroit-18.3%-23.0%-24.4%-21.9%
Riverside, CA-38.2%-43.7%-29.6%-36.2%
Phoenix-42.2%-22.5%-20.7%-26.4%
Seattle-31.7%-13.2%-19.5%-21.2%
Minneapolis-St Paul-44.6%-31.2%-34.7%-36.7%
San Diego-43.0%-43.8%-32.1%-39.4%
Tampa, FL-15.0%-21.6%-22.1%-20.1%
St. Louis-7.0%-10.4%-19.9%-13.2%
Baltimore-16.4%-18.1%-16.3%-16.9%
Denver-27.0%-30.7%-35.6%-32.1%
Pittsburgh-2.5%-5.4%-4.0%-4.0%
Portland, OR-24.5%-15.1%-21.7%-20.5%
Sacramento, CA-61.5%-53.2%-33.4%-48.0%
Orlando, FL-28.6%-35.6%-21.5%-27.1%
Cincinnati6.2%0.9%-7.0%-0.5%
San Antonio-16.1%-21.3%-18.7%-18.7%
Cleveland-4.6%-7.4%-18.0%-10.5%
Kansas City-23.0%-32.4%-37.9%-32.4%
Las Vegas-30.3%-34.2%-31.2%-32.1%
via realestateeconomywatch.com