You can hardly go anywhere without hearing about Pinterest these days. Well, what is it? And more importantly, how can Pinterest benefit your micro business? In this blog series, we are going to dive in to what Pinterest is all about and how to use it. We’ll see which businesses already use Pinterest and how YOU can take advantage of this popular medium for your micro business. Let’s get started…

© Pinterest

Pinterest is a social media website, just like Facebook or Twitter. But instead of  keeping up with what your friends are doing, people upload content in the form of “pins.” Now, what are these pins? They can be anything you like: recipes, funny photographs, the latest fashions, good books, exercise ideas, cool new products, anything! By clicking on each pin, you are linked to a website with tutorials, pictures, or more information on the subject. It’s a great idea, and other people think so too! It has exploded in popularity over the past year.

pinterest © by cambodia4kidsorg

So, why use it? Each individual user has unlimited “pinboards,” to which they save these “pins,” like the picture on the right. Think of it as a cork board that you thumbtack fun ideas to. This allows you to look back at past “pins” and also check out what your friends (or potential customers!) are interested in.

Sounds cool, right? You might be thinking, “This is awesome! How do I get started?” Right now, to become a Pinterest user, you have to be invited by someone who already has a Pinterest account. Find a friend who has Pinterest and ask them to invite you. Or you can apply to the waiting list and wait to be accepted.

I am happy to welcome Natasha to Micro Business for Teens! She has recently launched teenwebhosting.com, a great source for teens who wish to take their micro businesses to a new level through the Internet. What does it mean to create your own website? What is a web host? Is it expensive? What does a great website need? Natasha is here to share her secrets! Teens, take a look at her advice:

“So you’ve got a great idea for a fantastic online business and you’re amped to get started. What’s the first step? Planning. And as you’re drawing out the business plans in your mind, you’re going to have to think about creating a website. A lot of offline businesses build websites to advertise their business to a broader audience. If you plan on creating an online business, then getting your own top-level domain might be critical. Other than just looking cool, top-level domains will get you and your business a lot more respect and make your business easier to find. Customers are the life of any business and you are going to need a lot of life if you want success.

Now the first thing you’re going to need is a top-level domain name. When I say “top-level,” I mean that your website address will be Your-Name-Of-Choice.com (.net or .org) rather than Someone-Elses-Website-That-You-Are-Just-Borrowing-Space-From.com/Your-Name-Of-Choice.com. You can go register the domain name with some great domain registrars. Keep in mind, though, a lot of hosting plans offer free domain names. That makes things even cheaper and easier. The only problem is some offer the free domain for only a year. After a year, you will have to pay full price (usually somewhere from $10-20 for the year. Still very cheap!) However, some web hosts offer free domains FOR LIFE. That means, as long as you’re with that hosting company, you will never have to pay for the domain name! A lot of hosting companies are offering incentives like FREE DOMAINS to entice you to sign up with them. That and the prices have decreased dramatically. On teenwebhosting.com, you’ll see that there are some plans with a monthly charge less than $2 a month. And there are no hidden setup fees either!

After you’ve decided on a domain name, it’s time to look for some other features you might want in a web host. How much space are they offering? Most sites offer more than enough space. A simple webpage is about 10KB. (There are 1,024KB in 1 MB). A lot of webspaces offer 5MB and up. Quite a few offer UNLIMITED disk space. So, unless you plan on running a media intense gaming site, you should have more than enough space for multiple pages. You might want some cool extras, like certain scripts to build chat rooms or message boards, WordPress, or marketing credits at Facebook and Google. You can find all of these and more by looking through the different hosting packages.

At teenwebhosting.com, you can compare the prices and package deals with multiple companies. Finding the right company for you should be a snap! Just find the package that will offer you the most tools that will help your business and you’ll be ready to start hosting your own website. If you need some extra help, I’ll even set up your WordPress blog or first website for you after you’ve signed up with a hosting package through my site. If you’d rather do it yourself, I also have tutorials on how to work with WordPress. As soon as you’re set up, you’ll be ready to bring the traffic right into your business.”

Thanks so much, Natasha! Web hosting seems tricky, but your tips easily explain how teenage micro business owners can successfully run their own website. Be sure to follow her website for any other questions. Happy web hosting, teens!

Carol Topp, CPA