Pinterest 101: All you need to start Pinteresting! (A blogger’s guide to Pinterest)

Pinterest Basics for Bloggers

Without a doubt, Pinterest is one of the most useful tools that bloggers can use to reach their goals traffic-wise and in turn achieve success with their blog.

Marketing your content and gaining new followers has never been more easier. If  you are a blogger looking at Pinterest to drive traffic to your website but do not know how to go about it, this post is for you.

In this article, I have listed down the most basic things you should know as a blogger to use Pinterest effectively for your blog.

What is Pinterest?

The most basic question about this platform is knowing actually what it is.

Pinterest describes itself as a “visual search engine”.

This is where people browse to find content in various categories ranging from Recipes, Home Decor, Travel to even finding stores to buy stuff from.

Pins

In Pinterest you find beautiful images called Pins, calling you to click them to read more about that image.

When you click on a Pin, you will be taken to the article that is attached to it. That would be another blogger’s website and that Pin is a way to advertise the blog’s content.

So, to advertise your blog’s content and find the right audience on Pinterest for your blog, you would need to create Pins for each of your articles and Pin them to relevant boards.

How to Pin from your blog post

To Pin your blog post, just add the Pin you created using Canva.com or any other app to your post. After you publish the post, use the Pinterest share button and Pin the image (pin) you created for this post to any relevant board in your account. Ideally it should be a vertical image of 735 x 1102 dimensions.

Read on to learn how to create a Pin in the first place.

Boards

Boards are nothing but containers for your Pins. Pin to boards relevant to the article’s content.

Suppose you have a Pin in an article “Top things to do in Hawaii”, you should Pin it to boards like “Travel” or “Weekend getaways in the US” or something similar.

Group Boards

You can collaborate with other bloggers to contribute Pins to a single board and it is called a Group Board.

Having a group boards helps you promote or repin other bloggers’ Pins and in turn they promote yours. This works well in your favor as Pinterest will consider it spam if you Pin only your own content repeatedly.

For advanced users, there are Tribes for similar functionality.

Now that you have nailed down the basics of this wonderful tool, it is time to learn how to use this tool to your advantage.

How to promote your blog on Pinterest

Getting people to look at your blog is the main aim of using Pinterest. When you get people to visit your website once, depending on your content, you will gain them as repeat audience.

Readers will know where to look for certain topics this way. Once you get new viewers on your website, encourage them to stay on it for some more time by giving relevant links to similar content.

1. Create an account

For all this to happen, you should first create an account on Pinterest specific to your blog with the same name as your blog possibly.

Create a few boards relevant to your interests and blogging ideas.

For example, my boards are something like “Travel”, “Books”, “Food” and more as my blog focuses on these topics mainly.

While you are at it, make it a business account, instead of creating a personal account. It is free too. Because business account has the added benefits of checking statistics on how your Pins are doing and also you can reach customer care easily if you need.

2. Create visually pleasing Pins

Use Canva to create attractive pins. Canva has great templates to copy and some free images are also available. This will be a game changer.

Create pins for every post. You can even try multiple pins for the same post.

3. Give good description

As I mentioned earlier, Pinterest works as a search engine.  So, give a keyword rich search engine friendly description to each of your pins as your readers will find your content through that.

Can you see how my description shows in the pins in the below screenshot?

4. Text on the image

Your best bet for a reader to click on your Pin is when you  have some text describing the article’s idea. A few words are enough, don’t write more. Keep it straight.

5. Make it vertical

A vertical pin gets more attention on Pinterest. 735 pixels x 1102 pixels sized pin works the best. Canva has a Pinterest graphic template. Use that.

6. Make Rich Pins

Enable Rich Pins for your blog. Check out this help article from Pinterest to learn how to do it.

Rich pins show your pin’s description right on Pinterest, a very useful thing for readers to decide whether a pin is worth clicking on or not.

For example, look at the description on my pin below.

7. Repin other bloggers’ stuff

Don’t keep pinning only your pins, else Pinterest might think you are a spammer. Pin at least 10 pins from other bloggers to every one pin of yours.

Remember to pin only stuff related to your niche. If you have any personal pins, pin them to a secret board.

8. Make new pins for old content

Make new pins for old content and refresh it by pinning this new pin. New readers will surely get on your blog this way.

9. Participate in Repin threads in Facebook groups

Find good Facebook groups to repin pins and do those threads religiously. Helps your pins get across tons of followers and also you get to pin other’s pins too to make yourself less spam-my.

10. Social share button for Pinterest on your blog

Don’t forget to use social share buttons on your blog for Pinterest. Make it easy for your readers to pin your articles. Try to get the Pin It button too.

Some bloggers choose to hide the pins from the reader to make the post look cleaner with less images. It is up to you to decide that. If you want to hide an image just use div style as hidden over that image.

I personally prefer to add a pin at the end of my post and leave it in small size.

Also read: Blogging 101: Blogging secrets you must know

All the best for your Pinterest journey, I hope you see huge traffic from your pinning efforts soon 🙂