Late in June of 2018, I decided to start seriously marketing my blog, and in this post I’m sharing exactly how I grew my Pinterest from almost zero impressions to over 200,000 in exactly 30 days.
The steps in this post aren’t necessarily the best for newbies.
You’ll want to 1) have a Pinterest business account and 2) make sure to verify your website before you get started.
If I get enough interest, I’ll create a follow up post just for newbies and I’ll link it here.
You can also check out this blog about Pinterest Tips For Beginners that talks about some advanced Pinterest tips a lot of beginner posts don’t really talk about.
Since June 2018, countless clients have repeated this success with dramatically increased Pinterest impressions. Some of them have been seasoned online entrepreneurs. One of my most successful Pinterest students was a new blogger with a brand new blog that she monetized in under 60 days with these Pinterest tips.
Let’s Talk About Impressions
Before we get into how to increase your Pinterest impressions, let’s get a clear understanding of what exactly Pinterest impressions are. What do impressions mean on Pinterest? Do high impressions mean that your traffic is awesome? Are impressions related to your followers?
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What Does Pinterest Impressions Mean On Pinterest?
Impressions are the number of times a pin shows up in feeds, category results and search results. Viewers are the actual number of people who have seen at least one of your pins. Watching your viewers and your impressions can give you valuable information into how you can be improving your traffic.
For example, maybe your viewers are very high but your impressions are low, meaning you are not showing up in search results. This could mean that you need to increase your SEO game.
Your number of impressions are a good indication that you are being seen and that you are showing up in search results. But number of impressions does nothing to affect actual traffic and clicks to your website.
Pinterest Impressions Glossary
Here is a simple Pinterest glossary from the above:
Impressions: the number of times a pin shows up in feeds, category results and search results
Viewers: the actual number of people who have seen at least one of your pins
Clicks: How many times someone clicks on your pin and ends up on your actual website
Traffic: Viewers that end up on your website after clicking
Being Consistent
I also wanted to mention how important it is to be consistent. I’m sure you know by now that I probably did not pin lazily to a coupe boards once or twice a month and get my impressions up. Be consistent and have a pinning schedule.
Also be consistent in your branding. (We’ll talk more about branding later.) Create new Pinterest content strategy and continue to put out new relevant content for your Pinterest niche.
It can absolutely be challenging to increase your Pinterest impressions; here’s how to do it in 7 steps:
Step 1: Make It Really Easy for People to Find You
The first four steps out of these 7 steps are foundational.
What I mean by “foundational” is that these things may not result in immediate growth, but if you’re going to see growth later, these things are non-negotiable.
And the first foundational step involves making it easy for people to find you and your Pinterest account. Don’t hide your social media presence! Make sure that your website makes it ridiculously easy for people to find you on social media, especially on Pinterest.
I use WordPress.org for my website, which makes it really easy to add new plugins and functionality to my site. The plugin I use that to show my social media icons is called “Social Media Follow Buttons Bar”. Its easy and lite and I definitely recommend it.
Step 2: Make it Really Easy for People to Share You
Next, make sure it’s incredibly easy for people to share your blog posts—don’t hide your share buttons at the bottom of your post!
Put them in the sidebar, or at the top of each post so that someone doesn’t have to search when they’re trying to share.
This foundational tip comes into play big time in step 7, since you’ll be asking a lot of people to share your pins. Don’t make it hard for them.
I can’t stress this tip enough. When my coach first pointed this out to me, I didn’t realize the importance of making my posts easy to share. And now when I see websites where I have to literally HUNT for the share buttons, I feel so frustrated!
People aren’t going to try very hard to find ways to share your posts—make it dummy-proof.
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Step 3: Create Pins for All Your Blog Posts
The next thing you’ll want to do is create pins for every post. I go ahead and just add the pin in the post because I think it looks nice to have a giant, informative on-brand image in my post.
There are also ways to embed the image intro your post so it doesn’t show on the front end if you want to get fancy.
Important: When you’re creating your pins, make sure they are on brand.
I use a FREE tool called Canva.com for all of my pins, BUT…be careful. Many people use Canva and their templates, so you’ll want to make sure your pins represent YOUR brand. Use the colors, fonts and styling that are consistent with the appearance and messaging of your blog. Edit the templates to be uniquely you.
Step 4: Make Sure the Pins Can Easily Be Shared on Your Posts
This relates to step #2, but make sure that your pins are easily shared.
i downloaded another WordPress plugin called “Pinit” that puts a tiny Pinterest share icon at the top of my blog posts.
Step 5: Join As Many Relevant Group Boards as You Can
Step 5 is where we enter the pro-tips. You might have heard this tip before, but when you’re first getting started, it seems impossible to get accepted to any group boards.
It can also be difficult to FIND relevant group boards to join.
The bottom line is that group boards, regardless of what you hear Pinterest and others saying about them, are a great way to build a distribution network. When I started this journey recently, I heard a lot of people saying that group boards were dying, and that Pinterest wasn’t rewarding group board activity anymore.
Say what they will, but I’m very new to this game and saw group boards as a crucial part of my growth strategy.
Here are my tips…
- Using the search bar, search for keywords related to your niche.
- Change “all pins” to “people”.
- Look for people who have a similar audience size to you—not the largest profiles, but not necessarily the smallest either. Aim for 300-3,000 followers. These people are growing their accounts (like you!)
- Click on their profile, and see what group boards they are in.
- If there is one in your niche, read the instructions for joining, and then reach out to the board owner.
Step 6: Sign Up for Tailwind
Tailwind is an amazing tool. I pretty much only use it for pin scheduling, which isn’t that useful until you have a few group boards you’re a part of.
You can try Tailwind for free using my affiliate link!
When you’re new, you’ll want to do two things:
- Organize your group boards by topics in the “board lists” section
- Schedule your pins to post to the lists using an interval of 10 hours or so
- Add any group boards you’re accepted into to a board list
Step 7: Join As Many Facebook Groups As You Can
Lastly, you’ll want to join as many Facebook groups as possible.
You want to look for groups that deal with supporting bloggers, or specifically to Pinterest. There are many groups like this that encourage daily sharing and re-sharing, and this will help your pins show up in more boards and searches.
Final Tip:
Pinterest changes all the time, and the algorithms are always being updated. The best thing you can do to stay on top of your Pinterest impressions is to stay up to ate with changes that Pinterest is rolling out so that you can adjust your strategy as necessary.
I have had to change things up and make adjustments, but I have always found a way to maximize my impressions with the changes that Pinterest rolls out. My marketing strategy changes a little and my created pins and designs have changed over time to reflect the patterns I see in my impressions.
Above all, be flexible. If you impressions start going down, roll with the tide and make some tweaks. Join some groups to stay informed on the newest things Pinterest is up to.
Want To Elevate Your Pinterest Marketing Strategy?
Impressions don’t necessarily mean traffic to your site. You have to leave enough mystery to get people to click simply saving your pin to a board or viewing it in a search. Impressions are awesome and everything, but the real goal here is to start generating traffic to your website.
Converting impressions to clicks is the beginning of being able to monetize your platform with Pinterest. Now that you know how to get traffic to your website, you can use Pinterest to direct traffic for anything. Monetize your 5 year old website, turn your food blog into a side job or direct coaching clients to landing pages.
