Pinterest For Beginners – a complete guide.

So, you have a set up your blog, installed a theme, GA, plugins and published few useful contents. Now what, how to make those content visible to a large number of readers? How to attract the audience to your blog? There are many ways to attract visitors but the biggest one is Pinterest. In this Pinterest for beginners guide, I will show you everything that you need to get started.

Pinterest is the search engine where ideas and tips are shared in a visual mode called Pin. It is also a search engine with Human touch.

According to Pinterest itself, the definition is:

Pinterest is where people discover new ideas and find inspiration to do the things they love! 

Pins are ideas that help you get creative or try something new, whether you’re planning a camping trip or collecting home improvement hacks. 

Pins are saved to boards, keeping your ideas organized and easy to find. Follow other people or boards that are saving ideas you’re interested in so you can do even more of what you love. 

In the blogging world, 90% of the blogger attract their audience from Pinterest so it’s important to have a presence here and familiarise yourself with it.

Let’s begin our Pinterest for beginners Journey:

1. Business account creation
   • Create a business account or
   • Convert personal account to business account
   • Secret board
2. Update settings
   • Add keywords
   • Brief description
   • Enabled showcase you best feature button
3. Verify your website
4. Board creation
   • Set up 15-20 boards in your niche
   • Add board description using keywords
5. Group boards
   • Find and Apply for group boards
   • Template to apply for group boards
6. Create pins
   • Anatomy of a successful pins
7. Enable Rich Pins
8. Adding pins to boards

1.Pinterest for beginners -Business Account Creation

If you are already using Pinterest as a personal account then you can change it into business account with few modifications or you can set up a different account altogether. Whatever makes you comfortable 🙂

But I would recommend starting a new business account with a clean slate. It’s easier that way and you can create niche specific boards and save relevant pins to your boards. Also, save yourself from the hassle of deleting and modifying pins and boards.

When I started this blog. I created a new Pinterest account with 0 followers even though my old Pinterest account had 200+ followers but it was too much of a hassle like I said earlier.

Go to www.pinterest.com and click on continue as a business.

 

Enter your email address and other details and create your account.

If You want to convert your Personal account to a Business profile then follow the following steps:-

1. Log in to your profile
2. Follow this link to convert to a business account 

3.Fill out your information and click Done

BOOM, your Pinterest Business account is created.

Converting to a business profile will not affect your Pins, boards, and followers. If you have boards that are not niche specific then you can set it as Secret so that you don’t lose your fav pins. Secret boards don’t count against your Pinterest profile score and you’re the only one who can see it.

2.Update Settings in your account

Click on Setting at the top right-hand corner of your account and update few keywords.

In this screen, we are going to update three things-

• Add few keywords to your business name
• Your profile description and
• Enabled showcase you best feature button

In the above screenshot, I have added few keywords to my Business name like blogging, Passive income and work from home to make it more specific.

You can add keywords depending on your niche like if you are in Health and fitness niche then add healthy diets, exercise tips etc.

Under about you, write a brief description about your business, how you can help your readers. Remember, it’s not about you but it’s about how you and your business can help your audience.

The last one is the Showcase button, click on edit and start adding the boards that you want to showcase like Ana from theSheApproach has done. You can add up to 5 boards.

It’s a nice way to highlight your important boards and pins.

 

3.Verify Your Website

It’s important to verify your website with Pinterest to check your reports. Pinterest will be able to give your full report on your pin performance and which pins are attracting visitors to your website, only after you verify your website.

To know more about verifying your website and how to go about it read this article and step by step process laid out by Pinterest itself.

Or I will show you step by step, how I verified my site.

Click on settings on the homepage to see your account information.

 

Click on Claim website section on the left side and enter your website link ( www.example.com), press claim website.

 

A pop-up will appear on the screen with instruction. Select the first option – add HTML tag and copy the tag.

Go to your WordPress admin site, and then click on Appearance (on the left side of the screen), theme, and editor.

The right side of the screen shows theme files, scroll down to Theme Header and click on it.

Paste your tag here and hit update File

That’s it. Now, let Pinterest verify your site and send you a confirmation email. It’ll not take more than a day or two.

 

4.How to Create Boards

Boards are where you save and organize your Pins. Create at least 15-20 boards specific to your topic. Start saving relevant pins from Pinterest to your boards. Add a brief description of your board with keywords and Category. If you want, you can add board cover as well it.

You also need one board that’s solely devoted to your own blog posts, products, services, etc. You can showcase it as the main board like I explained above.

On your home screen below, click on boards options and click the red +sign.

A pop-up will appear, enter your board name and press create. If it’s a secret board then “ON” secret option.

Once a board is created, click on pencil icon at the top of the board to add some keywords, board description and update Category of your board.

 

It is highly advisable to add these little things so that your board is visible for its content on Pinterest feed. Also, it helps to improve the board performance thereby improving your account performance.

4.a How to Search boards using Keywords

Keywords play an important role in making your content visible on the topic. If you add a right keyword then your pin will appear under that keyword when searched.

To search a keyword to add to your profile or board, click on the search button at the top of the screen and enter your word.

Since my niche is blogging so I enter Blogging and see what happens Pinterest will automatically give me long keyword options – blogging for beginners, blogging for money etc.

TIP: This another way to find content idea or topic to write about.

5.Group Board and its importance: –

The name itself suggests that group boards are for groups means its shared, open to collaboration. Group boards are boards created by an account holder which is open to other users for contributions.

Group boards help to increase your blog traffic by giving more visibility to your pins. If you pin your pins to relevant group boards then there your pins are more likely to be seen by your audience. That’s why it’s important to be a part of many group boards to increase your blog traffic.

Group board, if used properly, can drive massive traffic to your blog.

 

 

 5.a How to find group boards and apply for it?

When I started learning about group boards most of the blog posts talked about finding through Pingroupie which is a directory for Pinterest group boards. But it’s no longer a way to go, at least I don’t find group board this way.

Another way is to go is Pinterest search bar and use keywords relating to your niche or industry. When the results pop up, change the option to ‘people’ and the results will show you people who are pinning in that niche.

Let’s say we are looking for gardening niche boards, we use “garden or garden ideas” as a keyword and change the option to people when results pop up.

Viola! You have all people in that niche. Jumped to one of their profile and browse through their boards to see if they own or are members of group boards related to your niche and request to join them.

When you find a group, you want to join check the instruction on the group board description and follow it.

Mostly, it asks you to follow the group owner profile, otherwise, he/she won’t be able to send you an invite and send an email with your name, blog name, Pinterest profile link, email address and the board name that you want to join to the email address on the description.

If there is no email address, then visit the blog and get the email address from the contact me page and send an email request to join the board.

You can also send PM on Pinterest. Sometimes, it might take a while to get a reply, have the patience or reapply after few weeks.

5.b Email Template to Join Group Board

Hi “Name”

My name is “ABC” and I Blog at “XYZ” about your niche.

I really like your pins and have followed you on Pinterest

Could you please add me to your “group name “board?

My Pinterest account:

Email address:

Thank you for your consideration

ABC

 

You can also create your own board. It’s no biggie, just add your email address and instruction that you want your collaborators to follow.

If You are not sure then check other group boards and get some ideas. be sure to change the email address. You are welcome to copy instructions from my group board – Everything About Blogging.  Be sure to change the email address.

Start promoting your group board on FB groups and on your blog.  Accept request and increase your followers.

To add a collaborator, click on the + sign on your group board and type the email address or profile name and press done. That’s it 🙂

.

 

6. How to create Beautiful Pins?

Pins are your visual representation of your blog post. It’s a signboard to attract visitors to click and come to your blog and read your post. It’s important to create attention-grabbing pins. Pins that make readers click on them.

All these fusses about Pinterest and its strategy rest on one paramount thing that is your “PIN”.

Create Stunning, inquisitive pins. Pins that are click-worthy.

I use Canva, a free software, to create my pins. Some blogger uses Pic monkey, adobe, photoshop etc.

For every post, create at least two pins and test. I create 3 pins and test which one gets more clicked on or saved.

You learn a lot and develop your style over a time by testing different fonts, colors, and backgrounds. Until you find your style, keep testing.

Read 12 Pinterest Mistakes that are killing your Blog Traffic

 

6.a There are few things to remember when creating a pin:-

• Create vertical pins, I usually create 1300 *350 or 1500*350 (size)
• Use large and easy to read font, it makes your words pop up and grabs attention
• Make sure that there is a good combination of colors, bright, contrasting colors make your text pops
• Use pretty images after all Pinterest is a visual platform but it’s not mandatory.

Few examples of beautiful and attention-grabbing pins: –

This is one of my boards see the pins, how we can make beautiful pins by Changing Font Size and making the keywords big and colorful- the popping Effect. Most of the pins have soft background and color and picture. See how my Board cover is extremely visible: it’s because of the Font type and the color contrast.

These are the few ways to make you pin visible and stand out. Start watching pins of successful bloggers and learn from them.

 

7. What are Rich Pins?

Rich Pins are pins that include your website address and meta description underneath the pin image. Rich pins also have bold descriptions when they’re showing up in a feed, making them much more noticeable than non-rich pins. And on top of that, it helps your pins stand out from the rest of the thousands of pins when people see them on the Pinterest feed and help you gain more Pinterest followers.

Here’s a visual difference between Rich Pin and Non-Rich Pin

To Know more about Rich Pins and how to apply for it, read my post How to Enable Rich Pins on Pinterest.

 

8. Let’s Add pins to your board

There are three ways to get pins to add to your boards-

1. By searching for a topic using a keyword on the search bar (explained above)
2. Or clicking on the Pinterest icon on the top left-hand side and getting suggested pins from the Pinterest smart feed.
3. By clicking on Explore icon and selecting topic like trending, Tech, Education etc

When you start following people in your niche, their pins will automatically start appearing on your Pinterest smart feed.

Start following people in your niche by clicking follow button at the top of their account.

Start Pinning

There are two ways to pin – manually and automatically using tailwind and Board booster.

I use a combination of both and it works perfectly.

It would be insane to grow your blog by only pining manually so automation is must and it makes your life so simple and helps grow your blog faster. If you do truly want to see results quickly, an automated service is necessary.

Having said that Pinterest like its platform to be more engaging then some software pinning automatically so if you pin manually once or twice a day then you’ll be greatly rewarded. I know life happens and sometimes you might not get time to do manual pinning that’s why automation is very handy.

There is an amazing book written by Carly from Mommy on purpose on manual pinning, it’s worth a read to learn manual pinning strategies.

Use my link to sign up for Tailwind and get free 100 pins and free 500 pins on Board Booster. (affiliate link)

It’s a great way to get to know the platform and deciding which one to go with.

There you go, the complete beginner’s guide to Pinterest – Pinterest for Beginners. If you read this guide properly and follow steps then you’ll definitely have a successful Pinterest account.

Pinterest for beginners is not just for a newbie but everybody can take home some good tips and information gets their foundation strong. Pinterest is one of the major traffic sources for many bloggers and it would be awesome to get the basics sorted.

Don’t forget to grab my 300+ free Pinterest boards and Facebook groups list. Sign up to get the list.

Good Luck and share this post with your blogger fans. if you need any help don’t hesitate to contact me or join my Facebook Community to network with fellow bloggers and grow your Biz.