Recently I decided to run a Pinterest mini-training on Instagram: 5 days to an optimized Pinterest Account. Let me tell you! It went better than I could have ever expected. I got to connect with tons of small business owners, ready to take their Pinterest account to the next level. Here is how they did it, and how in just 5 days you can optimize your Pinterest account too!

Day 1

I am going to start with just a simple why:
Why should I use Pinterest as a business??

Let’s start with what it is: Pinterest is a SEARCH ENGINE. It’s like a visual Google with the ability to save links to return to later.

There are over 300 million active users every month, with over 52% of millennials using Pinterest. In the US, over 40% of Dad’s are now using the platform to search out DIY projects for kids. With 77% of weekly pinners using the platform to discover new products or brand, there are some great odds at getting your products or services recognized both locally and globally.

Yet, only 28% of marketer’s are using Pinterest for Business. Why?

The biggest reason? They just don’t know how to use it.

Pinterest seems like a vast space, and many small businesses get lost or overwhelmed with using it.

This week I want to make Pinterest more accessible for your business.

The first thing you need to start with is a Pinterest for Business account. There are many reasons for this, but I will narrow it down to 3 important ones.

The first is because of the analytics. In the Business Manager you can see amazing stats on your pins and your account. You can use this information to better strategize your future content.

The next reason is so that you can verify your website. This allows you to easily pull new content from your website directly into your Pinterest for Business account, as well as showing your website to viewers and followers looking for more information.

Another great reason is that once your website is verified, you can also start to use Rich Pins which are a great way to get your product or service noticed (more on Rich Pins later).

You can also promote pins easily, and track the analytics on how those promotions are providing you with a return on investment.

So today I just have 1 task for you:

Create or verify that you have a Pinterest for Business account

Day 2

Wow my friends!!! The response to yesterday’s training, was far beyond what I expected. Thank you to everyone who commented or sent me a DM thanking me. If you were happy with yesterday, you are going to be even more excited about today.

Ok, on to lesson 2. Now that you have made sure that you are working with Pinterest for Business, it’s time to optimize your profile. You will do this in a few easy steps:

✅ Optimize your Title: Ensure that your title clearly matches your brand. You want people to easily connect your Pinterest account with other accounts/websites you manage.

✅ Choose a Proper Username: Try to match your username to your website and other accounts. For example: My website is www.remcreative.ca. My username for Pinterest, Facebook and Instagram is @remcreativeca. It’s easy to remember, and it creates consistency across my brand.

✅ Claim Your Website: Make sure your website is linked and verified. Pinterest has some easy to follow instructions, or you can send the information to your web designer.

✅ Claim Other Accounts: You can also claim your Instagram, YouTube and Etsy accounts. This is especially important for creating pins directly from those accounts (which we will talk about later in the week).

✅ Optimize your Profile Description- You have 160 characters to make a statement. You need to tell us succinctly who you are, what you do and who you serve. Make sure to add some of your personality. Be sure to use keywords that are used in Pinterest (the Pinterest search bar is your friend here).

Today, I want you to really work on this last point. Do a bit of research and then update your description.

Day 3

Today you are going to go CLEAN UP YOUR BOARDS!!

This is probably the hardest and longest task of the week, so I will break it down for you.

🌟 Boards and Pins: Your account should have a minimum of 15 boards, with at least 10 pins on each board (more is better). If you have a board with less than 10 pins, either make the board secret or add some pins.

ONLY include boards that are relevant to the service or product you provide. If you are a Wedding Photographer, don’t have recipe boards. Those can either be kept secret or use a personal account.

🌟 Board Titles: Make sure all your board titles are searchable terms. I see it often where someone will name a board “Blog Love” and not see much traffic to that board. That’s because it’s not a term that you search. Instead using “Blogging Tips and Tricks” will ensure traffic to that board.

You are going to need to do a little research here, and use that almighty Pinterest search bar to find relevant search terms for each board.

🌟 Board Descriptions: Make sure that all your boards have a description. The description should again use keywords found in Pinterest searches. Here you can add a # or two.

🌟 Pins: I want you to go into each board and check that all your pins have 3 things: A title, description and a URL. If they don’t, either add one or delete the PIn. Incomplete pins will deter Pinterest from including them in searches.

Day 4

Yesterday was a big task day, so today I am going to keep it simple and directly answer some of the questions asked last week.

Q1: Should I have a blog/website before I start using Pinterest?
A1: It’s definitely a good idea. The point of Pinterest is to share and save content. However, if you have an extremely active Instagram account you could directly pin your Instagram content.

Q2: Is there a guideline on how many pins should be on a board? How do I create a pin from my insta content?
A2: There is no maximum number of pins, but there is a minimum: 10 pins. If you don’t yet have 10 pins on a board, keep it secret until you do. (I will answer the second part of your question tomorrow!!)

Q3: How do I stay on top of my Pinterest and post enough quality content?
A3: In order to increase viewership, you need to be active on Pinterest daily. In addition, you need to be uploading fresh content to Pinterest, as the algorithm is currently favouring this. You can use a scheduler to help you. All my clients use Tailwind, and it is by far the best scheduler available for Pinterest.

For example, by using Tailwind for just 3 weeks on my business account, I have increased viewership from 3k to over 13k AND one of MY blog posts is my second best pin.

If you want to use Tailwind, click this link so you can save $15 which is 1 month FREE!

Q4: What am I supposed to be pinning on there? Blogs, Images from my website? Instagram content?
A4: All of the above! But more on that tomorrow…

Today, I want you to get caught up so we can talk about pinning your content to Pinterest, and driving traffic back to your website.

Because that is the goal that you should have with Pinterest: driving traffic to your website or shop, to increase sales of your product or service, and make more money!!

Day 5 | Part 1

I really hope you have learned something during the training this week, and you are excited as I am to use Pinterest for your small business.

Today I want to talk about content.

One of the questions I received was “What am I supposed to be pinning on there? Blogs, images from my website, insta content?”

The answer is: all of the above!

You should be pinning anywhere from 20-60% of your own content. That can come from blog posts, your website, content shared on Instagram, or even your #Etsystore.

Now that you have your website and your Instagram linked to your #Pinterest account, it will be so much easier to pull your content across and keep active!

You should also have the Pinterest extension on your browser, so you can pin content on the go.

For the remaining 40-80%, you should only be pinning content that is relevant to your audience.

For example, if you are a graphic designer, pinning recipes and home decor is not going to attract your ideal client.

The idea is to attract people that would be interested in your products or services, to go to your website, to sign-up to your email list, to follow you on Instagram and to buy whatever it is you are selling.

Like any marketing, you want quality over quantity.

As far as frequency goes, you do need to keep on top of your account weekly if not daily. I have said it before, but subscribing to Tailwind is one of the best ways to keep a constant flow of traffic to your Pinterest account. (Email me if you have more questions about Tailwind).

Day 5 | Part 2

Ok so we know what to pin, but some people still have questions about how.

🌱 For blogs: You can create pins right in your account by opening a new pin and adding your blogs URL. You can use images from within your blog or create new ones. It’s important to create eye catching graphics and text, to entice people to click or pin your content. I always create 3 separate graphics for each piece of content, and post them in 2-4 day intervals. You can see examples if you swipe left in the image above.

📸 From Instagram: time to use that Pinterest extension in your browser. Just open your Instagram account, click on the image you want and pin it!! Make sure to give it a catchy title and a keyword rich description. You can schedule it to post now or later right from your Pinterest business account.

🤩 Freebies: If your goal is to grow your email list, be sure to direct your Freebie pin to a landing page that makes conversion easy. You want them to easily and quickly be able to fill in their information to get your freebie.

You can use a scheduler to auto-post your pins for you, or you can schedule them out right within Pinterest. The choice is yours!!!

Bonus | Day 6

Well, I am going to sweeten it up a little more with a BONUS Pinterest training. 🙌🏻

ANALYTICS!!

If you are going to use Pinterest as a tool for your business, then it’s only fair that we talk about how to measure your success with it.

The first thing you have to do is to decide what your goals are for using Pinterest. That will help you decide which analytics are most important.

No matter your goals,here are the top 3 analytics for any business:

🖱LINK CLICKS: If you are trying to drive traffic to your website, forms, Instagram, etc. then knowing how many link clicks your pins generate is important. This will instantly tell you whether a pin is converting traffic or not, and allow you to make better decision on your marketing strategy.

🎥 CLAIMED ACCOUNTS: You can further break down your analytics, by reviewing which of your claimed accounts is doing better. Remember, you can connect your website, Instagram, YouTube and Etsy shop. No other social media platform will tell you how many people are being directed to your other accounts. If you see that your Instagram posts do better than your website, you can then try to optimize your website pins to look more like your Instagram posts. Alternatively, you can decide to post more Instagram content. It’s all up to you and your marketing strategy.

💫 ENGAGEMENTS: It’s also important to know which pins are doing well, and which are not. Why? The more engagement you have, the more distribution for your pin! In addition, you can update graphics for pins that are not doing well and repost them as fresh content (which Pinterest LOVES!!).

There you have it!! If you enjoyed my Pinterest training and want to be the first to know when my Pinterest course opens, sign up for notifications here. 5 lucky people will receive a FREE Pinterest audit 🙀

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