Country Living’s staff makes Pinterest a group effort

Pinterest is exploding in popularity, and an offhand comment on this year’s Oscars broadcast proved it to Rachel DeSchepper, Web editor at Country Living magazine. A commentator said she’d likely see photos of celebrity fashions on the website the next morning, which perked up DeSchepper’s ears.

DeSchepper didn’t need much additional proof to know that Pinterest is a big deal. Since joining the staff as Web editor in November, she’s seen Pinterest rise to a top-five referrer of traffic to Country Living’s website—after Google, MSN, Yahoo, and bookmarks. More people come to Country Living’s site through Pinterest than through Facebook.

That’s partially because Pinterest’s users have demonstrated strong interests in a lot of what Country Living covers: home décor, food, and crafts. “Our audience is their audience,” she says.

But Country Living is doing more than relying on inertia to keep people’s eyes on its Pinterest boards. DeSchepper and the magazine’s editors are experimenting.

Teamwork