Pinterest can be a very powerful resource for driving traffic. I personally use Pinterest to get people to visit my blog website.
Gaining followers and engagement can be tricky. I have put together the best tips and tricks I have found for getting more followers on Pinterest.
Tip #1 It’s Not Social Media, It’s A Search Engine
While some aspects of Pinterest are social in nature, if you want to gain followers, views, repins and more you need to treat it like a search engine.
People come to Pinterest to search for things. If you take this into account when setting up your profile, titles and descriptions it will help a lot.
Focus on the keywords for your niche.
A good way to do this is to find related keywords that people are searching for.
To do this type the basic idea for what you are pinning.
For example “Affiliate Blog”.
When you do this other suggested search terms will show up. These are terms that real people are searching for, so you should work them in where you can so your pins will show up in more searches.
Basically work on your SEO or search engine optimization.
Tip #2 Brand Your Pinned Images
Adding your website or brand logo to your pinned images looks more professional and lets people know who you are and where to find you.
Tip #3 Pin Videos
Pinterest now allows you to pin videos, which I do not see many people doing. This means the market for videos on Pinterest is prime for anyone to take advantage of. Go for it!
Tip #4 Mimic What Works
Do some research on the niche you are posting in. See what the most popular posts looks like, are about and how they set up their title and description.
Without copying them, make similar content. You know it is already working so this will save you a lot of time in trial and error.
Tip #5 Join and Post on Group Boards
When looking for group boards to join I suggest joining boards that line up with you niche.
Joining large boards that do not have much direction usually just puts you with a bunch of spam and you do not want that.
Joining like minding group boards will grow your audience and help you gain follows and repins as well as trust.
Tip #6 Write With The Spirit of Pinterest
Pinterest is a place where people to find inspiration. Writing dull and lifeless titles and descriptions is not the way to go.
Be uplifting and positive as much as possible and Pinterest and its users will reward you for it.
Tip #7 Get A Business Account
Signing up for or switching over to a Pinterest business account is really pretty easy, plus it is free to do. Making this change will give you more analytical information about your Pinterest account.
Having Pinterest Business account verifies that you are are living breathing person, gives you a place to add a website on your profile, lets you set up ad campaigns on Pinterest and gives you key analytic information.
This is really a worth while tip.
Tip #8 Use Rich Pins
Rich pins just contain more keyword data than normal pins, which mean they have more SEO juice, which is good for you.
Use them.
Rich pins work 70% better than normal pins.
This is huge!
Tip # 9 Be a Master Pin Sorter
Pinterest and Pinterest users love when pins are put in relevant boards.
If you create and populate boards with multiple well placed pins you will be rewarded for it.
Tip # 10 Be Active
Pinning a ton one day out of the month is not the way to go. If you work out a schedule where you pin at least ten times everyday, this will work much better for you.
I know pinning daily is a big ask. Luckily Tailwind is here to help.
Tailwind is an awesome free service I suggest you get and use for many reasons.
Tailwind has an automatic Pinterest post scheduler. This means you can do all your pinning one day out of the month.
Just schedule the pins to be posted using Tailwind. This will post your pins throughout the month saving you time.
If you want to sign up for Tailwind you can do so by clicking on my invitation link here.
Signing up through my link gives you a free month of Tailwind Plus! It also gives me a $15 Tailwind credit.
If you sign up for Tailwind you will be given a referral code just like mine, which can earn you credit.
Tip #11 Have Beautiful Pin Images
Finding a way to create awesome pin images is pretty tough. Many successful Pinterest users use Canva, a free to use image editor, to create their pins.
Pinterest is a visually driven app, which means if you have stunning photos your pins will be more successful.
Tip #12 Have Text on Your Images
Adding text to you images increase the chance someone will either click the pin or save it for later. Not everyone reads descriptions right away but everyone can see text you add to your pins.
Tip #13 Add a Pin It Button to Your Website
A Pit It button allows your website visitors to pin any image on your site. More pins equals more traffic so this makes a lot of sense to me. I wish all website came with this built in. I know of one called Sumo Me but I am sure there are others out there.
Tip #14 Follow Your Future Followers
Gaining new followers can be tough. When I first started using Pinterest I would follow anyone hoping they would follow me back. As time as gone on I have become better at find the people who are most likely to follow me back.
To find “my future follows” I find people in my niche and look at their follows. When choosing who to follow I pick from these people. I pick only people who have pictures of their faces. This reduces the number of spam accounts I follow. I also look at the names and if they look too spammy I don’t follow them.
You can follow up to 50 every 2 hours. Over time this method will gain you followers.
Tip #15 Follow What is Trending
Following trends is a good why to gain attention. If you know what is most popular and can post something similar or even better, it is a good idea to do so. You already know people like it. Use that.
Tip #16 Have a Solid Foundation
One of the main goals when using Pinterest is getting people to look at your profile. If your profile is not set up or looks half assed it is a real turn off.
Make sure people can tell what you are about and what you can do for them. Be uplifting and friendly and avoid looking spammy at all cost. Pinterest users hate spam and they can see it from a mile away.
Having a profile set up properly goes along way to gaining new follows.
Tip #17 Have a Winning Profile Picture
Looking good is hard, but if you have a killer picture of your face as your profile picture people will connect with you on a person to person basis and this will increase their trust in you.
Knowing you are a real person is important to a lot of Pinterest users and something about a picture of the human face really does it. People like People.
Trust is important on the internet. Take every chance you have to show how trustworthy you are.
If your Pinterest account if for your business or website a logo is good, but I think a picture of your smiling face will work better.
Tip #18 Use Tailwind (again)
Like a said early, Tailwind is just an awesome tool to have when trying to gain Pinterest follows. You already know about the pin scheduler, now I am going to tell you about Tailwind Tribes.
Tailwind Tribes is just a killer idea. You join a tribe (a group of people posting pins in your niche) and share their pins. They will in turn share the pins you ask them to. Pretty cool. This stacks up pretty quickly and will get more eyes on your pins.
Tailwind Tribes has a free and a paid service. For starting out the free plan should be just fine. If over time you want to gain the paid features, just sign up for the $15 a month plan. I think it is well worth the money.
You can sign up for Tailwind by clicking my invitation link HERE.
Signing up through my link gives you a free month of Tailwind Plus! It also gives me a $15 Tailwind credit.
