It’s no secret that I love Pinterest. I use it almost daily yet rarely spend more than five minutes on there at a stretch. The reason I spend very little time on there is because I visit Pinterest for very specific reasons and find what I need quite quickly. While many feel it is just another time-suck in the vast array of social media platforms that are stealing minutes from us, I have found it to save me lots of time and improves my online organising.

Here are the top three things I love about Pinterest – as a mother and as a business owner.

1. Organise

As a mother

Pinterest allows me to simply and clearly organise all of the things that I find online that I think I’ll want to find again. As a homeschooling mother, I come across lots of fabulous resources and ideas in my internet wanderings and if I had to find them again, I would waste a LOT of time. Pinterest keeps them all organised for me to find again quickly. This means that if I’m teaching something to my children and suddenly remember a great activity I came across that will help them understand what I’m teaching, I can jump onto Pinterest, find what I need and be back in the school room in less than two minutes. Sweet!

Follow Eva Van Strijp’s board For the Homeschool on Pinterest.

As a business owner

Pinterest helps me to organise articles, resources and inspiration so that tI can easily come back to it when I need it. It also allows me to share rescues with our families and to quickly direct customers to what they need. For example, if I have a customer enquiry about cloth nappy leaks, I find it quicker to go to Pinterest to locate the article that it is to search my blog!

Follow Eva Van Strijp’s board Cloth Nappy Love on Pinterest.

2. Plan

As a mother

I use Pinterest extensively to plan specific projects for our home. For example, if I want to renovate a room or make changes to the courtyard, I can have a board for these projects and pin ideas and inspiration here. In particular, as a homeschooling mother, I find Pinterest gives me the capacity to plan units of study, school years or special projects. I can create a special board for any particular topic or project and then pin everything to that board that I want to use as a resource.

Follow Eva Van Strijp’s board Geography at Home on Pinterest.

As a business owner

I can use Pinterest to plan a business goal. I can keep this board secret forever or until I’m ready to share with the world. If you’re planning a product, product launch, new packaging, a store concept or a rebrand, you can use Pinterest as a virtual inboard for ideas and resources.

Follow Eva Van Strijp’s board Storage Inspiration on Pinterest.

3. Collaborate

As a mother

I love using Pinterest with family and friends, to collaborate on projects or keep a list of things we want to do. Pinterest can be particularly useful in this way if you are planning a holiday or family road trip and want to pin all of the things to do and see along the way.

As a business owner

Pinterest allows me to collaborate with colleagues on specific projects and advocacy efforts. If we have a joint advocacy campaign tabled, we can share a board to which we pin resources and ideas for our campaign. It’s a great way to collaborate without all the back and forth of emails. You can comment on each other’s pins, which keeps all of the discussion about the project in one place, AND keeps your inbox uncluttered!

There are so many great reasons to use Pinterest. If you’re a budding chef, you might like to start a board to save all of the tricks and recipes you come across. If you love photography, you could start a board for all of the photography blogs you’ve read and want to refer back to. If you’re a student, you could use it to save articles and videos about the subjects you are studying. The possibilities are endless and the platform really does represent a new way to get the most out of what we find online.

Do you use Pinterest? Tell me what you love most about it!

PS. Be sure to check back next week for some tips on getting the most out of Pinterest.

PPS. If you have no idea what Pinterest is or how to set up an account and use it, this great article will get you started.