If you look for information online, from recipes to fashion trends, it’s very likely that you’ve come across Pinterest. What is the platform about? How is Pinterest used?
You might not know how it’s used and its full power. If so, you’ve landed on the right post.
Believe it or not, Pinterest can help you make tons of money if you know how to use it correctly.
Read on to find out Pinterest’s uses beyond its pegboard capabilities and how it’s an excellent tool for business.
What is Pinterest, and how do you use it?
Pinterest is a lot like Google in that it’s a search engine but for images.
When you explore the site, you get directed to pictures you want to see based on your search queries. These pictures will often lead you to websites, blog pages, and videos.
The primary purpose of Pinterest for regular users is to use it as a pinboard.
In real life, this is akin to a pegboard you might put above your desk, post-it planks for your office, or your fridge where you put up reminders.
People also use it to collect pictures for projects. For example, you may want to get ideas for your kitchen renovation.
You may want quick tips for weight loss or fitspiration photos. Pinterest is an excellent way to consolidate ideas and goals in visual form.
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How Do You Create A Pinterest Account?
It’s not that strange if you’ve never heard of Pinterest, much less know about its potential. It’s more used in some countries than others.
To take full advantage of this wonderful platform, you first need to set up an account. It might delight you to know that it’s completely free to open a Pinterest account.
You can choose from two options, personal and business accounts.
Since I’m going to talk about how to use Pinterest for business, I suggest you open a business account. You can set up a new account on Pinterest in a matter of seconds.
The instructions are clear, and you don’t need me to get it done.
During your sign-up, you’ll be asked to fill out a profile. Pinterest will also give you instructions on how to link your profile to your blog or website.
Take your time and learn about how to create pins and what Rich Pins are all about.
You can always refer to some helpful YouTube videos explaining how you can navigate around the platform.
I’ll get to how you can make money with Pinterest shortly. Let me first fill you in on the basics.
How Do You Use Pinterest?
How your designs look plays a vital role in using Pinterest as a promotional tool. As I said before, Pinterest is a search engine for images.
To increase your chances of attracting more eyeballs, you need to make the best-looking pins you can manage.
I use Canva to design my pins (you can also use Pic Monkey).
I like the drag-and-drop styles of those platforms, and it’s very easy to resize my pins to the recommended 600px by 900px ratio.
If you’re graphic design-savvy, you can always use more complicated software like Photoshop and InDesign.
I wouldn’t say I like spending a lot of time creating pins, so I go for free easy-to-use sites like Canva.
My pins turn out professional-looking, even if graphic design isn’t one of my strongest skills.
I suggest you go to Canva and play around with it.
The free version comes with many templates and design elements, so you don’t have to upgrade your account unless you want to use the paywalled content.
Upload a royalty-free image from a site like Unsplash or pull something from Canva’s free library.
Add text and get creative with the placements. I’m sure you can come up with a cool-looking pin in minutes.
As you practice, look at the popular pins on Pinterest. See if you can come up with something similar to those pins. However, I should remind you not to replicate pins entirely because that’s theft!
Designers put a lot of work into their pins, making them all look like they’re from the same brand.
They use their brand colors and mimic the tone of their content overall. It would help if you tried to do the same thing and make all your pins look unified.
The next step is to pin your creations, which you can do manually, or you can create a pinning schedule.
Aside from creating and pinning your pins, you should also include third-party pins to vary up your content.
Pinning other people’s pins will also solidify your place in your niche.
Over time, you’ll find that you can’t be pinning throughout the day. By then, you should use a scheduler tool so that your creations get pinned automatically. I put up pins consistently and tracked my progress on Google Analytics, which increased my ranking on Pinterest pretty rapidly.
When you decide that it’s time to use a scheduling tool, make sure you choose a compatible one. Your best options are Tailwind, Buffer, and Hootsuite.
These are the top Pinterest schedules around. The one I use is Tailwind because I think it’s the best.
Here’s what I do: I use a combination of manual and scheduled pinning for maximum results.
Pinterest and Tailwind are both installed on my phone, so I never have to sit idle.
Whenever I’m waiting in line, or I have a free moment, I’m on my phone being productive with Pinterest.
With Tailwind, you can schedule your pins for a week, a month, or more. I manually pin my favorite creations, ones that I think are the most eye-catching.
To come up with more design ideas, I check out all the pins in my niche and see which ones get the most action. I’m also always on the lookout for catchy titles.
If you’re into affiliate marketing, it’s also best to schedule your affiliated pins to reach the broadest possible audience.
Doing so will help boost your sales, guaranteed.
The trick is to stay as active as you can on Pinterest. Like anything else, the more you use it, the more you’ll get the hang of it.
Don’t worry; it took me a while to learn the ropes. I’m still learning and practicing too.
Related Reading: What Is Tailwind – Read My In-Depth Tailwind Guide Here.
What are Ultimate Descriptions, keywords, and hashtags?
Sure, the image and words on a pin attract a viewer, but you shouldn’t forget about the description. It will have to stand out, too, so make it a point to use the right keywords.
How do you find the right keywords for your pin to make it easily searchable?
Pack your description with your blog titles and a bunch of commonly searched words in your niche. Don’t meander and be straight to the point.
Think of your descriptions as magnets that can convince viewers to click on pins to make their way to your site. Make sure the sentences flow naturally and include keywords that are already in your blog. Don’t just load it with nonsensical keywords.
I often use keywords in the form of a question because it tends to attract viewers. Pique the curiosity of the viewer by giving a quick overview of what’s in your blog post.
Then there’s the matter of hashtags. You can use a maximum of five hashtags, and I suggest you do so with every pin. Again, I encourage you to do research and look for the commonly used hashtags by pinners that are more popular than you right now.
How can Pinterest help make you money?
Alright, now that you’re clued in on the basics on Pinterest, I’m sure you’re eager to learn how to use the platform to make money. In this section, you’ll learn about how Pinterest is a powerful tool for enhancing your online business.
Here’s a quick overview.
It….
- Helps generate more traffic to your website.
- Will get you more members for your mailing list.
- Can help you advertise your products and services.
- Can help you earn commissions through affiliate marketing.
- Allows you to become a Pinterest Virtual Assistant.
- Connects you to influential people in your niche.
1. Pinterest helps you generate more traffic to your website.
Whether you have a blog, site, or virtual store, I’m sure you could use more visitors. Using Pinterest is one of the quickest methods you can implement to drive more traffic to your place on the web. I was able to build up a following by being consistent in posting and the quality of my pins. I also made sure to use optimal keywords, which lead to an increase in ad revenues.
Sure, you can’t rely entirely on Pinterest for more traffic. You also have to plan and implement SEO strategies for long-term organic traffic to avoid being a one-hit-wonder.
2. It will get you more members for your mailing list.
The more you direct to your site, the higher the chances of people subscribing to your mailing list. I’m sure you have excellent helpful content, and that is what makes a loyal readership. When you have a lot of valuable information to offer, people will want to get notifications from you.
The emails that you send out to your mailing list should promote products and contain affiliate links. You should also include a link back to your site.
3. Pinterest can help you advertise your products and services.
Whether you have physical or digital products to sell, Pinterest is an excellent way to promote your wares. You can make pins advertising your eBooks, printables, training courses, apparel, home goods, you name it!
Once you master the art of promoting on Pinterest, you can even bank on your marketing skills by selling your expertise through online classes and webinars.
Being a Pinterest expert can actually make you a lot of money in itself. You can offer audits, design pins, provide coaching, or publish paid resources.
If you have an online shop like on Etsy, you can promote your products by connecting your shop to Pinterest. In fact, you can advertise any skill you have on Pinterest. The more consistent you are with posting the right stuff, the more chances you’ll get discovered.
4. It can help you earn commissions through affiliate marketing.
This is the method I use the most because it makes it easy to get a passive income. All I do is design a pin once and keep earning from it as long as it’s relevant.
I took a course by Elise McDowell, and I like how she broke down selling affiliate products. At the end of the day, the process is straightforward, and I didn’t do too much to make my first affiliate sale.
5. Pinterest allows you to become a Pinterest Virtual Assistant.
Like I said before, it’s entirely possible to make a living off of being an expert on Pinterest. You can get a job as a Pinterest VA where you can create boards and use SEO to increase the traffic to your client’s website.
You can also profit off of your creative skills and design pins for clients. You’re on your first steps to becoming a Pinterest whiz. As you continue studying, you’ll be an expert in creating strategies to help small businesses expand. You can get paid handsomely to handle other people’s business accounts on Pinterest.
6. It connects you to influential people in your niche.
Networking is a vital part of a successful marketing strategy. You have to be a part of the niche’s elite. Not only will this boost your reputation, but it will also allow for effective collaborations and unique business opportunities.
As a beginner, you can be in the mix by posting your pins within your niche. Sooner than later, you’ll be recognized by a larger audience if you post consistently. It’s also easier to see who’s who on Pinterest and try to make connections with people who get more traffic than you.
I suggest that you follow and engage with popular boards in your niche. You can learn a lot from people who are further along than you in their online marketing journey. Comment on popular pins to get your brand name out there. It will help if you put some work in to make your links more visible.
Where can you learn more about how to use Pinterest effectively?
I’m a part of the Simple Pin Strategy Group on Facebook. I suggest you join in too. That group is run by Kate Ahl of Simple Pin Media. She knows everything there is to know about Pinterest, and she shares her tips and tricks with members of the group. Others can chime in and share their experiences too!
I also recommend checking out her website and subscribing to her email list. You’ll get access to her incredibly helpful Pinterest Planner, which is still used to this day. It saves me a lot of time because it encourages me to plan out my posts.
The key to a successful Pinterest marketing strategy is focus and dedication. Her planner will help you stay focused on what needs to get done every month. It enables you to keep track of what pins you have to design and the descriptions that you have to write.
If you like to take in information in the audio format, there are plenty of podcasts about Pinterest available. Kate has her own podcast, and she’s really pleasant to listen to. She regularly has guests on her podcast to take her listeners’ learning even further.
By listening to her podcast, I get to stay on track with current Pinterest trends and the platform’s ever-changing requirements. I can’t tell you how many strategies I’ve gotten from Kate’s podcast alone.
If you’d like to learn more about how to design your pins more effectively, follow Kimi Kinsey. Believe me; my pins were not that effective in the beginning. If you compare the pins I create now and my pins from back then, you would think they’re made by different people.
I got a lot of insights from Kimi, and I learned how to design my pins from her. She has a free email course that you can take, which she loads with tons of helpful information. If you want to take it a step further, you can enroll in her paid course, the Get Pinned Academy.
I recommend that you learn the ropes first and understand every aspect of Pinterest marketing. Do it all yourself first, and never outsource jobs to anyone else. This will give you a clearer idea of how your business will run in the future.
If your business becomes too much for you to handle, then it’s time to delegate tasks and pay people. I hired a Pinterest VA because I couldn’t handle all the work myself because of how rapidly my business is expanding. Because I did it all on my own at first, I know the quality of work I expect from my VA.
Why I Love Pinterest As A Marketing Platform
Pinterest is a conversion machine. I can turn a lot of the browsers in my niche into clickers and buyers very quickly. I love how Pinterest streamlines the process of discovery to conversion. With Pinterest, I get more inbound links than any other online marketing strategy I’ve implemented elsewhere.
The User Engagement on Pinterest is also incredibly high. Information shared on Pinterest gets spread like wildfire. Users are not passive, so there’s a high chance of getting viral from Pinterest. On Pinterest, people aren’t just looking at pictures. They save images, share links, and click through. People are also visual creatures; that’s why content on this platform is easy to digest.
I also keep myself in the loop simply by browsing Pinterest and learn what my audience is into these days. Traffic relies heavily on relevancy. You want to keep your content fresh and inviting.
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Final Thoughts
As Pinterest evolves even further, I can see more reasons to be on the platform and take advantage of it. Smaller businesses can go head-to-head with larger corporations simply by implementing an airtight Pinterest marketing strategy. It’s that powerful.
Pinterest is so powerful that it comes with analytics, which will help you get to know your audience better. You can make strategic moves on the platform based on what’s trending and what people in your niche are currently into.
Best of all, it’s free! Yes, Pinterest is exploring its options for paid and promoted pins, but everyone can use it effectively without having to shell out anything. Because it’s free, you’re working towards more organic traffic, which will be better for you in the long run.
I’m happy that you found your way to this post. I hope you check out Kate and Kimi and deepen your knowledge of Pinterest just like I did. They offer Pinterest services, too, if you don’t have a lot of time to work on your strategy or you want to correct some of your practices.
There you have it. I hope you click away with some of the information I’ve imparted. By now, you should have an idea of how Pinterest is used. Go on the platform and start playing around with it! Remember, implementing all the methods I listed above will help you make money actively and passively. Good luck!
