7 Pinterest Tips from a Pinterest Ambassador
I mentioned last week that I got to check a goal off of my list for 2016 and attend a blog conference in January! I made some rookie mistakes, but also learned a ton and was able to walk away with some actionable tips and tricks to make my blog and social media biz better!
I know that blogging conferences aren’t available (or affordable) for everyone, so I took a TON of notes and plan on sharing as much as I can here. Today, I’m sharing all of the tips and tricks I learned from Alexandra from avestyles.com! She was one of the first people to really harness the power of Pinterest; so much so that she has just under 1 million followers and is one of a handful of official Pinterest ambassadors! This means she gets to go to Pinterest headquarters every year to receive training and to get information on the newest changes to the site!
Alex had plenty of interesting tips and tricks for making Pinterest work for a blogger, and I took 5 pages of notes! Below are the top 7 tips that she shared with us on how to use Pinterest as a successful tool in your blogging strategy!
7 Pinterest Tips for Growing your Pinterest Account:
Pinterest is not just for marketing.
If you want Pinterest to work for you, you can’t think about it as just a marketing tool. Pinterest is a social media community and you need to treat it as such! Don’t just upload your own content and leave it there, thinking that others will come along and share it like crazy! Pinterest will not work for you! You have to interact with the community and be social on Pinterest! This means pinning other people’s content, following others and liking, commenting on their posts!
[Tweet “Pinterest is a SOCIAL media community; in order for it to work, you must be social! Interact with others, repin other content and follow new people!”]
The Magic Number is 35.
Alex said that the number of boards to have should be between 30-35. You may read some posts that say you should split up your boards as they get bigger, but that just creates more work for you and it makes it harder for your followers to get the content they were originally following you for. For example: if someone was following my board “Blogging Tips” and then I decided to split that board up and create a new one for “Pinterest Tips” that follower wouldn’t necessarily see that new board. Then, she would be missing out on the Pinterest Tip posts that she was expecting to see! I’m working on consolidating my boards (I had over 70) and making them more general to my lifestyle, but breaking down my niche topics down! It’s really made my Pinterest game easier!
What Kinds of Boards should you Have?
I loved what Alex said about what kinds of categories you should have for your boards. I’ve always heard that you should only have boards that represent your niche and not anything more! However, Alex said that your boards should present a lifestyle and not be niche specific. Of course, you should have more boards that fit your niche, but don’t discount other categories as well! They can be very general, but you should have a food board (mine is called RECIPES TO TRY) a home decor board, a craft board, etc. Since my niche is fashion/beauty & blogging, more than half my boards are dedicated to different kinds of style, makeup and blog tips, but I still have boards dedicated to recipes, holidays and crafts. This helps my audience get a feel for my lifestyle and the other things I like!
Be Searchable
I learned that naming Pinterest boards with cutesy names does nothing for my Pinterest game. Why? Cutesy names are not searchable! In order to get your boards and your pins out in front of the biggest audience possible, you should be naming your boards general, searchable names. Think: “what would someone type into the Pinterest search bar to find this board?”
Instead of naming your food board “Tasty Yum-Yums” name it “Recipes to Try.” Or, instead of naming your makeup board “Pretty Things” name it “Makeup and Beauty Tips.”
How Often Should I be Pinning?
At least 5-10 times a day! If you want to pin more, the better, but make sure you are consistently pinning and interacting on the platform if you want it to work for you. Another thing to remember is to make sure you are pinning to all of your boards, not just loading up one board. Pin one photo to your food board, one to your beauty board and one to your blogging & biz board; making sure that you are adding to each board a little bit each day. This helps you grow your whole profile!
Right now, I have 15 Pins scheduled a day through Tailwind at optimal times. Additionally, I get on and do some “live” pinning every day (usually while I’m taking Rosie to the dog park or waiting in line for something) so, all together, I pin about 20-30 pins per day.
Rich Pins:
HAVE THEM! Not only do rich pins look more professional and legit on Pinterest, but the Smart Feed actually shows them a little bit more love! So, if you have rich pins, your chances of getting your pin out in front of others is higher! Also, once a rich pin is created, the information with that pin will never be changed (minus the actual description) so you can count on those pins ALWAYS leading back to your site.
And, having rich pins means you don’t have to have a huge watermark across the photo, showing Pinterest users where the photo came from! I still watermark my images, but can get away with putting a small one in the corner of the photo now.
Not sure how to get Rich Pins? If you are on WordPress, Shannon from Shanndelier put together this tutorial to guide you through it. IT COULD NOT BE EASIER!
On Deleting Pins:
There are a lot of Pinterest articles out there that will tell you that you should be deleting your pins if there are no repins/comments/engagement on it to help with your stats and overall success on Pinterest. The theory behind this is that when your pins have no repins, Pinterest thinks that you are not a very good pinner, but if you only have pins with engagement, Pinterest thinks you are doing a great job and will reward you by showing your stuff to more people.
Alex does NOT believe in deleting pins, especially if she has spent the time and curated a beautiful board. There have been a few studies done showing that Pins take up to 3 months to actually become circulated to the point of them being viral, so if you delete a pin within a week, you may be missing out on getting that pin out there.
Another thing to remember is that Pinterest is a visual curating tool. When someone follows you because you have beautifully curated boards, you want them to have plenty to look at. Deleting a ton of pins within weeks goes against the initial purpose of Pinterest!
Now, this isn’t to say that you should keep every pin! You want your boards to be the best of the best, so it’s okay to go through and clean out any pins that don’t meet your visual standards. You can also use the PinDoctor from BoardBooster to inspect any pins with spammy links, incorrect links or broken links to make sure your pins take your follower where they want to go when they click on the pin.
Personally, I go through and clean out pins every few months that are super old and have no repins. I also have gone through and deleted all pins that were poor quality or not on brand. But if there is a pin that I love or feel inspired by, I keep it (regardless of how many repins it has!) I spend time curating my pins, and I have had plenty of old pins all of a sudden take off.
[Tweet “To delete or not to delete pins? See what a Pinterest Ambassador has to say about it on Hey There, Chelsie!”]
Are you feeling totally inspired to kick up your Pinterest game a notch? I know I was right after I got home from the conference and listening to her! I immediately implemented her tips and since the end of January, my average daily impressions have gone up 14% and my average daily viewers have gone up 19%. The pins specifically from heytherechelsie.com went from having a daily impression of 855 to 9,415! WOAH! And, in the last 7 days alone, I’ve gained 51 new followers without participating in any Pinterest follow threads! Yippee! So, following these tips (and being CONSISTENT) really does work!
Three Things you can do TODAY to up your Pinterest game:
- Go and name ALL of your boards with searchable, generic terms. Seriously. Just go rename them right now.
- Update your board descriptions with keyword rich descriptions. Make sure you also select what category the board falls under!
- Follow 5 new people who fit into your target category and then repin a few pins from each profile. BE SOCIAL!
[Tweet “Want to up your Pinterest game? Hey There, Chelsie has 3 things you can do today to make a change she learned from a Pinterest Ambassador!”]
If you aren’t following me on Pinterest already, you can do so here! Don’t be afraid to check out my boards and get some inspiration for how to set up your profile if you need some!
Tell me; What is one thing you are going to do TODAY to up your Pinterest game? Was this post helpful to you? Would you like more posts on how to use Tailwind/my Pinterest strategy?
Lemmeknow!
