Pinterest vs. Twitter: Which is Best for my Business?

Social media is a powerful marketing tool for your business. If you haven’t started using social media to market your business then it’s about time you started. The question you now may be asking is, which social media platform should I use?

It’s a good question to ask considering how many social media platforms are now available.  You need to use the platform that is going to give you the best results for your business because each of the platforms have a different audience. We all know about Facebook but this is used more commonly to keep in touch with family and friends. Then there is LinkedIn, which is most commonly used by professionals and is great for networking. Google + tends to attract a more techie kind of crowd.

Then we have Twitter and Pinterest. Twitter is one of the most popular platforms of social media with close to 676 million registered users and 115 million monthly active users. 

Twitter is also a powerful tool for marketing. It has become wildly important for many businesses ever since it introduced paid advertising. Now many businesses are using Twitter to promote their businesses through Tweets that are promoted to customers and prospects on the network. 

However, we also have Pinterest, which is a visual social media platform. Images have taken off in the social media sphere ever since Instagram and now the fast growing Pinterest is adding to the popularity of images. Images have become a powerful way to grab people’s attention and spread messages and many businesses realise how powerful this can be for their business.

Pinterest is relatively new on the social media scene, launching in 2010, and experiencing a surge of growth in 2013. They have 70 million users worldwide but the most important statistic of all for businesses is that about 70% of users are on Pinterest to help them make a buying decision. It has also recently been announced that brands like General Mills, Expedia, and Gap are participating in the first ever paid ads on Pinterest.

So which is to be for Your Business? Pinterest of Twitter?
To put it simply, this depends entirely on your audience and where your audience is going to find your message. Keep reading.

Pintrest Perks
Just because Pinterest is gaining momentum and popularity doesn’t mean you should be using it. You need to take into consideration the type of audience you have first. If you are a business in the food, travel, or DIY crafts, then your business will benefit from using Pinterest. This is because these types of audiences are the most active on this platform. For example, cooking and dining makes up 66% of activity. On Twitter that percentage is 42%. Twitter might be strong in this field but it doesn’t even come close to Pinterest.

However, the biggest advantage of Pinterest is that 83% of its users are women. This might not mean much to you at first but consider this. Women have a better retention rate than men do and they become more active. In other words, Pinterest has the most potential for an engaging and interactive social media campaign. 

Secondly women also view Pinterest as a reliable source of information and advice so if you wanted to establish brand loyalty then this is a great place to start.

The Advantages of Twitter
This doesn’t mean that Twitter doesn’t have some incredible benefits. In terms of gender Twitter is more balanced. Twitter also has more users who live in cities and it’s the preferred choice when it comes to the tech industry. 

But Twitter’s biggest advantage is that it can be used with other social networks, websites and emails. The passive nature of Twitter means it is great for driving traffic to other social media outlets like Pinterest. This is a feature that other social media platforms don’t have and it places Twitter with a distinct advantage in this area. Twitter is also great for customer service with many people tweeting a brand with their questions rather than sending an email.

Disadvantages Pinterest and Twitter Present
Each of the platforms has their unique advantages but they also have their cons.
Arguably Pinterest’s biggest con is that it’s favoured by women. The problem with this is obvious, it’s not going to reach everyone. It has a specific niche that is not ideal for other fields like say sport. A football team would have a hard time on Pinterest for example because of the nature of the audience.

Pinterest does generate more leads than Twitter but it doesn’t drive as much traffic as Twitter. 

Twitter isn’t flawless either. One of the biggest problems with Twitter is the fact that there are millions of tweets flying around everyday so it’s easy to get lost in them all. Not only that but Tweets are limited to only 140 characters, which can be frustrating sometimes. If you have a long message you want to broadcast to the world then it is difficult to do so on Twitter.

In Conclusion
There are both pros and cons to both Pinterest and Twitter and the one you should use depends entirely on your audience. Once you’ve figured out your audience you’ll have a better idea of which social media platform to focus on and once you’ve got that figured out, you’ll have a powerful marketing tool at your disposal.

Which platform do you prefer and why?