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In just a few short years, Pinterest has become one of the top social media outlets generating more website referral traffic than Google+, YouTube and LinkedIn…combined. It boasts over 1.30 million unique users daily and has been giving search engine giants like Google a run for their money in the traffic source department.

More and more companies are turning to Pinterest as a means to site traffic and even selling product. Consumers are even  spending more money on Pinterest than it’s popular counterpart, Facebook. This is major news as tons of businesses aren’t capitalizing on all of these advantages.

So while you may see Pinterest as a fun pastime to collage your wants and dreams, entrepreneurs are seizing the opportunity to generate new business.

Interested in pinning for your business? Here are some tips and tricks to make it beneficial .

via Pinterest blog

Pinterest revealed its redesign intentions back in January. Now they’re giving everyone a peek at the new look and functionality. Members will receive invites to use the revamped site in the coming weeks.

The emphasis of the redesign is clearly to present users with more of what they’re interested in. “We added a few new things to the close-up view of pins to help you discover things you love that you might not have known about otherwise,” reads the Pinterest blog. A page will now present not just the pictures of what you were looking for, but suggest pins and boards with similar content. There were also some aesthetic changes and modifications to the way people can navigate through the site.

TheNextWeb reports that new Android and iOS apps will be coming soon too. All of this opens the door for the site to monetize at some point the site says. In February, Pinterest was able to secure $200 million in funding, bringing the company’s valuation to $2.5 billion.

SocialTimes breaks down the four things that you really need to know about the new design. Users: Are you excited about getting your invitation?

From the Pinterest homepage

Visually-focused social network Pinterest has already been making some changes in 2013. The “virtual pinboard” introduced business pages in November 2012 and has been working to make the site more about discovery and usability.

In addition to the introduction of a “news” section to help users discover other users and boards they want to follow, Pinterest also announced in a blog post that it is testing an overall new look for the site with improved navigations and larger images. A small group of users will have access to the new site before it goes out to all users.

This is a way to encourage users to spend more time browsing on the site, building the engagement necessary to attract brands. This shows maturity for Pinterest, which had reached 28 million users as of December 2012, according to comScore. But as more retailers and brands join the site, especially with the new business pages and tools, Pinterest needs to get these 28 million users to engage even more with the site.

Additionally, analytics platforms especially for Pinterest have surfaced in recent months, and are also maturing. Pinfluencer and Curalate, two of the better-known Pinterest analytics companies, both now have image recognition software on their platforms, helping with attribution on the site. This is another sign of the evolution of Pinterest from a time-wasting image site to something that provides real value for both brands and users.

As for those users, black women are a rising portion of the Pinterest-using population. Back in the summer, The Daily Dot published tips for maximizing your presence on the social network. “Quotes and pics are M-O-N-E-Y on Pinterest. Use sites likes PinWords.com to allow you to push out a high impact message with ease and you’ll be repinned like crazy,” said social media strategist Mike Street.

After Pinterest is able to build the tools that businesses want, and keep users engaged with the site, then the next step is monetization. Whether that comes in the form of advertising or a connection to ecommerce remains to be seen. But for now, Pinterest continues to be a top social site to watch.

In an effort to improve content discovery on the site, Pinterest introduced a “News” section that highlights similar content for users to see.

The new feature replaces the “Recent Activity” section on a users’ homepage and the “Activity” tab on profiles. Previously, users would see a text-based list of which of their Pins had been re-pinned by other users. Now, users will see a more traditional Pinterest page showing the boards where their content had been re-pinned. The feature is currently being rolled out slowly to all users.

In a post about the new feature, Pinterest said this switch will help users find other boards and users they may be interested in following. Notification settings can be used to get email alerts with the original text updates about re-pins and followers.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaking at today’s press event. AP Photo/Jeff Chiu

Today, Facebook hosted a press event announcing Graph Search, an internal feature that will help Facebook users find out more detailed information about their friends.

Graph Search is different than more traditional web search because it is designed to answer a question, said Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg during the announcement, not just links to answers. Users can search for people, photos, places, and interests to determine things such as “my college friends living in San Francisco” or “nearby friends who like Game of Thrones” for a viewing party, for example. Results are also ranked by relevance to the user, with close friends showing up as top results.

The search function will allow users to more easily dig through all the friends, data, and content that has been shared with them via Facebook, and it will be privacy aware, only permitting searchers to see what their friends have posted or what is made public by other users.

“When Facebook first launched, the main way most people used the site was to browse around, learn about people and make new connections,” the company said in a press release about the feature. “Graph Search takes us back to our roots and allows people to use the graph to make new connections.”

During the announcement, Zuckerberg, Tom Stocky and Lars Rasmussen, who developed the feature, demonstrated how to use Graph Search for dating, recruiting, and commercial uses, with restaurants as an example. Because Graph Search can bring to light photos of users that had previously been hidden from a user’s Timeline, Facebook is also offering tools and resources to help users understand the privacy implications.

A search function was one of the rumors floating around after Facebook announced its event last week. The media predicts Facebook will work to compete with Google in helping individuals find information and answer questions.

This is the latest news to come out of the social networking site and yet one more thing to keep track of in the constantly-changing social media landscape. Here is a handy guide, keeping you up-to-date with your favorite (and soon-to-be-favorite?) social media sites.

From StyleBlazer

We’re all about finding new tips and tricks to keep our hair and makeup on point and in 2012, we had a little help thanks to social media fave Pinterest. Our fellow pinners took to their beauty boards and shared some never-before-seen advice for StyleBlazers across the globe to try right at home.

From DIY makeup brush cleaners to manicures-made-easy, here are our top five tried and true lessons learned on Pinterest to bring into the New Year and beyond!

1. DIY Makeup Brush Cleaner

We generally try to clean our makeup brushes at least twice a month and while cosmetic companies make some great brush cleansers, a free alternative is always our preference! This simple solution had the makeup residue practically vanishing from our brushes, instantly making them squeaky clean yet keeping the bristles amazingly smooth.

Our tip: Ease up on the olive oil—oil and powder makeup is never a good combo!

Check out more new beauty tips on StyleBlazer.com.

Rui Vieira/PA Wire URN:15320554 (Press Association via AP Images)

A fight continues to brew between Twitter and Instagram with new strategies launched this week. On Monday, Twitter released updates to its iOS and Android mobile apps, now including its own photo filter and photo-editing features through Twitter Photos. Twitter now offers eight photo filters (to Instagram’s 18), auto-enhancement features for color and balance, and a birds-eye view, allowing users to see what their photo would look like with all of the filters at once.

Twitter posted a video about its updates on its blog:

Meanwhile, Instagram updated its iOS app, featuring a new, quicker camera, allowing for integration with foursquare and adding another filter called Willow. Android users will have to wait for most of the new features, but the Willow filter is available for Instagram Android users.

Everyone is snap happy with the photos these days. What are the features that you think are most important on a photo-sharing app? On Sunday, Instagram photos were no longer visible on Twitter. Twitter says that was an Instagram decision, made when it was acquired by Facebook for $1 billion earlier this year.

White House Pinterest page

The White House, President Obama, and the First Family have joined Pinterest. Starting on December 17, the account will start pinning content related to life inside the White House, including the President’s Holiday Social planned for the 17th.

On The White House’s blog, Kori Schulman, director of online engagement for the Office of Digital Strategy, wrote about the new social plan: “On Pinterest, the White House will share pins and boards that range from inspiring images and quotes to infographics that help explain key issues to details about the life inside the White House. From the very beginning, President Obama and the First Lady have taken steps to make this the most open White House in history.”

The Obama Administration can pin content ranging from home décor, parties, and more personal life inside the White House to meetings and policy events that showcase the business side of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. There are already a lot of pins featuring White House content, including photos of the current President and First Lady, as well as historical images and past presidents’ photos.

President Obama has always used social media as a way to connect with his constituents and supporters. The White House already has Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr accounts, so adding Pinterest to the mix is a smart move. According to comScore, Pinterest had 26.7 million unique visitors in October 2012.

iStockphoto

Naturally, time spent on social media is on the rise across all devices, according to the new Social Media 2012 report from Nielsen and NM Incite. Mobile is leading the way, with 34 percent of all time spent on social networks happens via mobile applications and five percent via mobile Web.

When it comes to break outs by race and ethnicity, African-American Internet users spent 8 hours and 7 minutes on social networks on their PCs in July 2012, the most time compared to all other ethnic groups. African Americans spent 8 hours and 20 minutes on social networks through mobile Web and applications, second only to Hispanic users, who spent 11 hours and 13 minutes on mobile social networks.

Nielsen also took a deeper look at Pinterest, which until now did not have much data on the audience composition of the site. According to Nielsen, 86 percent of Pinterest users who access through a PC are white, eight percent are Hispanic, six percent are African American, and three percent are Asian. When it comes to Pinterest users who access the site via the mobile app, 79 percent are white, 22 percent are Hispanic, five percent are African-American, and seven percent are Asian. (We took a look at growing interest in Pinterest just yesterday. Click here for that.)

African Americans make up 10 percent of Pinterest users who access the site via mobile Web, while 22 percent are Hispanic, 74 percent are white, and 7 percent are Asian. Additionally, female users outpace male users of Pinterest, as 70 percent of PC users, 84 percent of mobile app, and 72 percent of mobile web Pinterest users are female.

Overall, Facebook remains the top social network among all Internet users, increasing for mobile users and dropping slightly for PC users. More than 152 million PC users accessed Facebook in July 2012, 78.4 million accessed it via the mobile app and 74.3 million accessed via the mobile Web.

We find the PC figure pretty surprising given the amount of time people are spending on their smartphones these days. According to a ZDNet story that’s basically detailing the demise of Microsoft’s PC business, in the weeks after the launch of Windows 8 “sales of Microsoft-powered PCs fell 21 percent from a year earlier. Desktop PC sales are down by nine percent, while notebook sales down by 24 percent.”

What sort of device are you using most these days?

A screenshot of the African-American Brides Pinterest page on wedding gowns.

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past year or so, Pinterest was the break-out social site of 2012. In September 2012, the site came in at number 50 in comScore’s top 50 most-visited websites (not just social sites; all websites) with 25.3 million unique visitors that month. ComScore reported that Pinterest reached 26.7 million uniques in October.

The site was founded in March 2010 by CEO Ben Silberman and reached more than 10 million US monthly unique visitors in February 2012, the fastest independent site to do so, according to comScore. Additionally, we know that Pinterest skews heavily female.

However, in July 2012, the BBC reported Quantcast findings that Pinterest is also 79 percent white. Minority groups, including blacks and Hispanics, are not as represented on the site.

But, there is a growing interest in Pinterest from the black community and several entrepreneurs and social media folks have taken to the site to connect with them.

Krystle Sims, the owner of young.black.nappy, a company that sells t-shirts promoting black artists, natural hair, and Afro-centric pride, says she has seen an increase in black women not only on Pinterest, but also more interested in talking online about artistry and crafting in general. With a focus on natural black hairstyles and hair care, Sims said her target audience has been black women, ages 18 to 35, who are obsessed with natural hair or transitioning to natural hair.

On Pinterest, Sims posts images of natural hair products and styles, artwork featuring natural hair, and more personal pins including recipes, home décor, and craft ideas.

“Over the last year or so, I have noticed there are a lot more African-American women in my city and in my age range of mid-20s who are really looking for inspiration,” she told Madame Noire. “They are educated, they are looking for their purpose, they are really passionate about something, and they are really going for it and finding ways to make careers out of their passions and supporting other black women who are doing the same thing. Pinterest is a great hub for women who are doing that and looking for inspiration.”

Mike Street, a Harlem, NY-based digital strategist, has been looking into how the black community, and black women in particular, are using the site.

“We are seeing African-American women leverage the platform,” he said, though there is not yet any public demographic data on Pinterest. “There are hair and beauty bloggers who have been using it to send people back to their sites.” He added that Oprah has also done a lot with Pinterest and that brands are starting to figure out best practices for using the site.

Retailer Uniqlo used Pinterest’s visual nature and scrolling feature to launch a campaign in June that made the graphics they pinned look animated when users scrolled down the page. UNICEF took Pinterest’s aspirational nature (as users post items they want to buy, for example) to promote ways that less fortunate people around the world desire basic needs like food and clean drinking water.

The blog African-American Brides took advantage of the popularity of weddings on Pinterest and joined the site earlier this year to post engagement photos, hairstyles, and other inspirational ideas for African-American women planning their weddings. Fast Company also recently outlined how female-owned businesses have been using the site to reach out to customers.

Robin Foster, a writer for Examiner.com, uses Pinterest to share African-American history and genealogy, as well as tools and resources people can use to help find out more about their own history and genealogy. She has been working with genealogy since 1985, promoting products, tools, and resources people can use to learn more about their history.

“When I first went to Pinterest, I could not find anything on genealogy, so I thought, this is an open field,” she told Madame Noire. “People want to know who they are and where they come from, so I saw it as a good possibility to become a go-to person on Pinterest about this topic.”

She is very excited about the possibilities for Pinterest for businesses, especially since the site just launched business pages, which allow companies to use actual brand names on the site and verify the accounts. Pinterest plans to introduce more business-specific tools in the coming months.

Focusing on an African-American specific topic, she has found, actually attracts a wide variety of followers, not all of them black.

“Pinterest attracts all races and all colors of people,” she explained. “The African-American experience is one that is still being told. There are quite a lot of pictures, for example in the Library of Congress, and there is a lot of history out there that people are intrigued by, so my goal is to make that visual and make that info available so people can learn.”

Advice for Marketers
Sims’ advice for people who want to get involved with Pinterest is to just have fun with it.

“A lot of social media is planning… and there is a place for that,” she said. In her day job, Sims is a social media specialist for a distribution company. “But Pinterest, at least for now, is one of the last bastions of social media where you can have fun. Of course, think about where your links are going and make sure there is a purpose, but have fun with it.”

Foster encourages companies and business people to link together all their social media accounts. By linking Pinterest to Facebook, blogs, and other communities, the conversation can be extended beyond the visual nature of Pinterest, and you can go deeper with your communities.

The visual nature of Pinterest is what will keep the site popular for African-American women and consumers overall, Street said. “On social, photos over-index. Photos are the social currency that we exchange now.”