Over the last year, a great chunk of my blog traffic has come from Pinterest. I’ve written before about how to use Pinterest for blog traffic, but today I want to write about how to get followers on Pinterest. I have over 8,000 followers, and my pins get over 2.4 million views, so I hope that this post helps you!
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How To Get Followers on Pinterest
I’m going to break this down into the different elements of being on Pinterest: your profile, your boards, interacting, and scheduling pins. I’m not going to get into what you pin (with one exception) because you do you.
Profile
You want your name on Pinterest to show who you are but also be something that would show up in search results, both within and outside of Pinterest. I have my name, but I also have “Boston lifestyle blogger.” My url is katethealmostgreat – because duh. My profile starts with a sentence that introduces who I am & what I do: “Boston lifestyle blogger & advocate for arthritis patients.” I then share what I blog about, not just because it could help people go from my Pinterest to my blog, but also because it shares what my pins from my blog are going to be about. That sentence reads, “I blog about blogging, books, health, & life.” I finish out the profile with a link to a newsletter opt-in freebie and I also have “Boston, MA,” in the location field of the profile.
Overall, you know who I am: I live in Boston, I’m a lifestyle blogger, and I’m an arthritis advocate. But you also get insight into the sort of things I pin, so when someone follows me, they’re not guessing what they’re getting.
Why social media matters for bloggers + how to grow yours
Boards
General structure – There are so many different strategies for your boards, so I’m not really going to get into what type of boards you should have, especially since that’s going to be different depending on your niche and what you enjoy seeing on Pinterest. But I do want to share what you should do for each board you do have. 1) Don’t try to cover too many broad topics in one board. If you’re not going to pin too many things about food, you can have one board for all your food pins, but if you’re going to pin many things about food, then make several boards for different subtopics of food. 2) Make it clear in the name of the board what the topic of the board is. Having cutesy names for boards can be aesthetically pleasing, but if I have no idea what your boards are actually about, why would I follow you?
3) Utilize the space in the board description! One strategy is to elaborate on what that board will be about. Another strategy is to load the description with SEO terms related to the board topic. For example, this is the description for my blogging board: “Blogging tips: blog posts ideas, tips to grow blog traffic, how to write great blog posts, increase blog traffic, grow blog traffic, affiliate programs, affiliate links, keyword research, SEO, search engine optimization, blogging tools, and more” (x). These are all terms that I got from Google Adwords as SEO keywords.
How to use SEO to stand out + free checklist
Featured boards – This is a great feature where you can get eyes on one board before all others. What this means is that this board will be the first one people see when they go to your profile. In the “overview” tab of your profile, this featured board will show up first and then your latest pins. In the “boards” tab of your profile, this board will be where you put it among your boards. My featured board is the one I have for my blog posts, which gets my posts in front of people before my repins.
Have holiday boards – A great way to eyes on your Pinterest account and to keep them there is to have boards for different holidays. Holidays do really well on Pinterest! However, make sure you don’t just have one board for all holidays you’re going to pin about (ie having Christmas, Hanukkah, and NYE all in one board) because that can get really full and messy and kind of defeats the point of having holiday boards. I have one each for Easter, Christmas, Halloween, Valentine’s Day, Thanksgiving, and summer holidays like Memorial Day, Labor Day, and Fourth of July. I have one for those three because they’re all pretty similar in how we Americans celebrate them: parades, patriotic decor, and BBQ.
How To Use Social Media Effectively for Your Blog
Interact
What this means – Don’t just pin things from your site or blog. You need to interact with others on Pinterest! Share other people’s stuff. This can mean things from other sites online or other things on Pinterest. In this section of this post, though, I’m specifically talking about interacting with other pins on Pinterest. I’m going to get into scheduling pins in a little bit, but first let’s talk about pinning other things on Pinterest itself, also known as manual pinning.
Why you should do it – First and foremost, Pinterest rewards people who use Pinterest how they designed it, but pinning things on Pinterest. The way the algorithm works now is, if you use Pinterest how they designed it, they will show your pins to more people. This works for pins that are from your site/your upload and your other pins. I’ve seen a dramatic increase in my Pinterest views and site views when I’ve manually pinned as well as scheduled pins.
How to do it – Luckily, you don’t have to spend a ton of time doing this to reap the benefits. Honestly, just spending 5 minutes a day helps. If you’re like me and need to ease into your day, spend a few minutes manually pinning while drinking your coffee in the morning. It honestly doesn’t take a lot of time, but it is absolutely worth it.
Schedule Posts
Why you should do it – Do you want to spend hours on Pinterest every single day? No? Schedule your pins! This is so, so helpful. It enables you to spend your time doing other blogging things or living your busy life. Pinterest is so helpful to blogging that you definitely need to use it, and it’s helpful to still get on a manually pin a few pins a few times a week, but scheduling can help you grow your Pinterest account, grow your blog, and stay on top of your blogging tasks.
How to do it – As I’ve mentioned before, I use Tailwind and love it. It enables you to set up a queue of pins to be posted as well as schedule individual pins to go at certain times. You can also schedule pins for a blog post that hasn’t been posted yet by uploading an image and adding the link. Additionally, Tailwind has this thing called Tailwind Tribes. While I dislike the name – we white people need to stop using the term “tribe” – it’s a great program. It’s essentially a group Pinterest board but on Tailwind, and it’s easier for the mods of the Tribe to see if people are actually following the rules that make the tribe successful, such as adding 2 pins to your queue for every 1 you add to the Tribe.
9 reasons why Tailwind is worth the money | How to get the most out of Tailwind for Pinterest
What questions do you have about using Pinterest?
Like this post? Check out:
How I Manage Social Media for My Blog, How To Use Pinterest for Blog Traffic, Why You Need a Social Media Content Calendar, 11 Blogging Tools To Try in 2019
Kate Mitchell is a blogger, chronic illness patient, and advocate who helps people understand chronic illness and helps chronic illness patients live their best lives.
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