Becky Mansfield

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SERIES: GET ON A SCHEDULE: Pinterest Scheduling Options

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It is so important to be pinning your things!   Last week I posted a lot of great Pinterest stats (check them out if you haven’t yet!)

scheduling-pinterest

There are two options in Pinterest:
1- Pin them organically – whenever you have time.
2- Schedule them with an app.

If you go for the first one (I go back and forth between #1 and #2), just be sure to pin your stuff when your audience is on.  I pin the most in the evening, because that is when mothers of young kids have the time to get online.   I can also pin early in the morning, before her kids are up.  (my articles are mostly parenting).

If you go for scheduling, you have a lot of tools to choose from:  (almost all of them have free & paid options, or at least a “try it for free before you buy” option).

1- Board Booster.   I use this one and it is pretty easy to use.  You can also loop your material (meaning that it will re-pin for you over & over).   There is a free and paid option, depending on how often you are pinning.

2- ViralTag – The Pinterest scheduling tool, ViralTag, is one that a lot of people love.  You can pin to a board and set the time/interval that it goes out.

3- Ahalolgy– I loved this one, but my plugin kept breaking.  It made it really easy to have my pins looped.

4- Tailwind – a lot of my friends love this option, too!   The app seems to be really helpful & people swear by it!

5- ViralWoot – people love this one for the stats that it provides, really giving you insight into what is working.

There are so many more, but those are the ones that I hear about the most often.      I want to encourage you to try these out and find the best option for you.  Remember that you can’t mess things up, so just try it.   Play around with these apps and websites and really give it a good shot (if you are confused, find a video on youtube to help!)

Want more help?   Check out our books or our personal conference, where we look at your blog and tell you how you can improve it to reach your goals.

How to get the page-wide header for Twitter (& change your Twitter link colors!)

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I recently saw a few Twitter pages that were different from mine.  They were bigger, more visual, more eye-catching with a wide header for Twitter and customized link colors… and I wanted it for myself! 🙂
update twitter look
So, I looked it up and found out how to change mine.  It turns out that there was an upgrade and unless you saw it on the Today show or saw it on your social media channels, chances are that it passed you by, like it did with me.

SO- here is how you change your Twitter page to get the wide header for Twitter.

Here is my before picture (screenshot from my Twitter page)
beforeAFTER:
how to make a wide header for twitter

So- now onto the directions:
Go into your Twitter page.
Go to your gear at the top right and go to Settings:
Screen Shot 2014-04-10 at 2.56.13 PM

Now to go DESIGN:
Screen Shot 2014-04-10 at 2.57.11 PM

You can pick a theme:
Screen Shot 2014-04-10 at 2.58.04 PM

Or you can create your own (that is what I did):
Screen Shot 2014-04-10 at 2.57.44 PM

Thats it- just save the changes & you are all done.

Everything that you want to know about Google Plus – making the most of G+

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Everything that you want to know about Google Plus

This year I want to encourage you to make one of your blogging goals Google Plus. You have probably heard a lot about it or have been toying with the idea of setting it up. You may have even set up an account and tried to use it but felt it was a “ghost town” with no engagement or traffic. I am here to help.  I will help you learn about everything that you want to know about Google Plus

I love G+ and have been active on it since March of 2013. Although I am not an expert, I would love to share what I have learned and help and encourage you to start using G+.

Let’s just get this myth out of the way – G+ is a ghost town.

It is actually the second most used network behind facebook. It is used more than twitter and instagram. The common phrase to use about G+ is that FB is for the people you already know, G+ is for the people you want to know. Do you only want the same people reading your blog or do you want to grow your audience and find new people? That is what G+ is for.

Danielle wrote a great post a while back on G+ tips. I don’t want to repeat what she said, so I decided to talk about circling people and expand on communities and sharing.

Circling

The big difference with G+ is that you can circle whoever you want. You are not friends with them and it does not have to be mutual. They may or may not circle you back. But it is important to note that people you circle are the people YOU want to see things from, not vice versa. And although I do not recommend circling a bunch of random people just to have people to circle, I definitely recommend building up the people you circle. Once you have a few hundred you circle, it will feel like less of a ghost town.

When you put people into circles, try to be organized from the beginning. If they are food bloggers, have a “foodie” circle. If they are craft bloggers, make a circle specifically for them. If they are both you can put them in both circles. If you feel you have to circle someone out of obligation (your crazy cousin) and they are annoying, create an “annoying people” circle. The great thing is that no one but you can see what circle you put someone in.

Communities

These are basically groups of other plussers who share an interest. I am not too FB savvy, but I think they may be similar to groups. Communities on G+ are a great way to get to know other people.

There are thousands of communities available. Whatever topic you are interested in, there is probably a community for it. There are blogging communities, recipe communities, craft communities, mommy communities, etc. Join several communities and start to engage with the people in them.

Although you can find communities that allow you to self-promote and post links to your blog articles, I would approach these communities with caution. Most of the time they are simply a “link and leave” community. Every one just leaves links to their own posts without looking at anyone else’s. You will gain many more followers and have a much better G+ experience when you focus on the communities that do not allow link dumping.

Sharing

Sharing on G+ is another way to make your experience better. For every one of your own posts that you publish on G+, you should be sharing at least 5 of other’s posts or other original material. Posts do not always ahve to have links in them. By sharing others’ work, it will help you get to know other plussers and increase your authority with G+ (which could help with pagerank and SEO!) The more you share, the more other people might share your stuff.

Couple tips on sharing

  • Share large photos – thumbnails do not get the same attention as larger photos do.
  • If you share others’ work let them know by + mentioning them.
  • +1s are nice and a great ego boost, but commenting, sharing and +mentioning are much better for engagement.

Of course there are so many facets to G+ and one blog post is not going to be able to cover it all. If anyone has more questions, please ask. You can leave them in the comments, but also come over to G+ and you can ask me there.

Visit me (Suzy) on G+  

I would love to help answer your questions if I can. I can also recommend great communities to join and G+ influencers to follow that will make your G+ experience great.

So what more do you want to know about G+?

 

Suzy is a full-time mommy and part-time blogger. She writes at suzyhomemaker.net about real food, ingredients, nutrition and more. Follow her on Pinterest and Google+.