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Pinning 101: All Things Pinterest

Her Campus Placeholder Avatar Katie Niemiec
Her Campus Placeholder Avatar Vanessa Meuir
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Mizzou chapter.
Do your friends keep telling you they are “pinning” new travel hot spots or craft ideas? Or maybe they found a great new recipe on someone’s “Yummy in My Tummy” board? Confused already? Well look no further, Her Campus Mizzou has the best instructions on how to get familiar with the increasingly popular website Pinterest. It’s a virtual bulletin board where you can “pin” all your favorite foods, wedding ideas, photographs or some fun DIY projects – and those are just a few of the categories! Pinterest is a great way to organize and share the things you love with your favorite friends and family members. “Pinterest helps me organize all of the amazing, inspirational photos that I find online and don’t want to forget,” sophomore Raquel Mendez says. “It is also very helpful, as a magazine design student, to store magazine covers and features. I can organize my fashion and travel photography in a great little site instead of it taking up space on my desktop.” Let’s take a peek at how you can use it!

Step One: Where Do I Begin?
It might be a good idea to know where to start, right? This site is a bit different than most web sites. To have access to all of the features besides browsing, you must receive an invite. Visit the home page and click the red link at the top that says “Request an Invite.” All you have to do is enter your email address and wait a few days for an invite to pop up in your inbox. But there’s an easier and faster way to sign up. If you know a friend who already has a Pinterest, go ahead and give them your email. Then they can send you an invite. Feel free to get a glimpse of what the site is about before signing up.

 

 

Katie Niemiec Organizing Your Board:
This is an example of what your page will look like once you create your account and start making your boards.

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Step Two: One Fashionable Collegiette™ = My Style
Once you have accepted your invite, you will be able to create your own boards. Pinterest suggests about five to get you started. You can decide to keep the names or create your own. Once you get past that step, you can create even more boards. For example instead of just a general fashion board, you can create separate boards for tops, bottoms, accessories and hairstyles. Sophomore Kerri Williams says she uses Pinterest, “because it visually organizes my alter ego where I have unlimited money for shopping and unlimited time for crafts.” She also calls procrastination on Pinterest way more interesting and inspiring than Facebook. Like Kerri, you can create a variety of boards in addition to a fashion one – some for crafts, books, quotes or even food. Let’s be honest, ladies. We are always searching for new ways to procrastinate!

 

 

Kelsey Mirando All Things Autumn Board:
Last years campus corespondent, Kelsey Mirando, put together all her favorite fall photographs, food, and fashion to make her autumn pin board. A great inspiration for getting creative in the fall!

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Step Three: Three, Two, One, and You’re Off!
Time to start Pinning! If you don’t have many friends on Pinterest, I recommend starting out on the “Everything” or “Discussions” pages. Say you find some Oreo brownie cookies on the “Everything” page, and you just cannot wait to make them. Click on the picture once, and it will lead you to a close-up of the picture along with who posted it. Click on it again and voila! You have reached the website that teaches you how to make those mouth-watering Oreo brownie cookies. If you would like to share them with your friends, hover over the picture, click “Repin,” and then you can choose which board to pin it to. Or you can press “like,” which will add it to a separate page with all of your likes on it. By the way, there are several recipes to make those cookies on Pinterest, and let me tell you, they look absolutely delicious!

 

Kate Carter Eye Candy:
What a better way to keep track of you men than in a Pinterest pin board? Junior, Kate Carter, does just that with her Eye Candy board!

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Step Four: Location, Location, Location
The best part about Pinterest is that you can add pictures from other websites or blogs. If you go to the drop-down button under the “About” section and click “Pin It Button,” you will be guided step-by-step on how to add a “Pin It” button to your Internet toolbar. This way if you visit a wedding blog and love the bride’s dress or the gorgeous table settings, all you have to do is select the “Pin It” button and click the photos you want to add to your Pinterest.

 
Margaret Cleveland Me Likes Board:
Collegitte, Margaret Cleveland, keeps all of her craft ideas in one board. Pinterest makes it easy to organize and help with new ideas.

Now go get started with these tips, and you will be on your way to becoming the next pinning queen!

 

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Vanessa Meuir is senior majoring in magazine journalism and English. She was born in St. Louis, MO and raised in Columbia, MO where she now attends school. In addition to her involvement with Her Campus Mizzou, she works in Mizzou's athletics department and serves as a writing tutor for students on campus. She has gained most of her journalistic experience while writing and blogging for the Columbia Missourian, a local newspaper, and Vox magazine, a student-run campus magazine. She also gained some publishing experience while interning at The Missouri Review, a literary magazine. When Vanessa is not working or in class, she enjoys maintaining a personal blog that comments on reality television, spending time with her five roommates, reading and dabbling in amateur photography. Among her favorite things are diet coke, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, the Disney Channel and fuzzy socks.