Is one of your 2020 goals to create a great Pinterest profile? We’ve got you covered!
Each month, Pinterest draws in 300 million users who are looking to shop, plan, or find inspiration across a massive range of topics.
No matter your industry, putting a top-notch Pinterest profile out into the world is an incredibly powerful way to reach new audiences, get discovered, and drive sales.
And it’s really easy to do! Here’s how to create a winning Pinterest profile in 2020:
Step #1: Create a Pinterest Profile for Your Business
Creating a killer Pinterest profile is the first step to building your presence, gaining followers, and making sales on the platform.
Whether you’re giving your Pinterest profile a refresh, or starting out from scratch, here’s a few pointers to keep in mind:
Switch to a Pinterest Business Account
If you’re serious about building a strong strategy on Pinterest, then you need to consider setting up a Pinterest business account.
An upgrade from a standard personal profile, a Pinterest business profile has tons of added features and business perks and it’s the first strategic step to elevating your presence on Pinterest.
Here are a few key reasons to make the switch to a Pinterest business account:
#1: Claim Your Website
Business accounts let you claim your website and other social accounts. This will ensure your name and profile picture will appear on every Pin with your content. It also tells Pinterest that you’re an authentic and active user, which will help with your overall ranking and discoverability!
#2: Pinterest Analytics
Business accounts also give you access to Pinterest’s built-in Analytics Dashboard, so you can check in to see how your Pins are performing via a range of statistics. This can help guide you on what’s working for your audience and what isn’t!
#3: Promoted & Rich Pin
You can also advertise with Pinterest business account, which gives you the ability to create promoted Pins and shoppable Pins to targeted audiences.
Also, Rich Pins are a real asset to brands looking to level-up their Pinterest content. While still organic content, Rich Pins provide more context about a Pin — like ingredients to a recipe — by showing extra information directly in the Pin description.
#4: Schedule Your Pins
Planning and managing your content calendar is so much easier with a business account! Once you’re set up, you can start to schedule and plan your Pins natively on the desktop version of Pinterest!
Or you can use Later’s Pinterest scheduling tool to keep a consistent publishing routine across all your social platforms, plan out weeks of content, and even schedule videos to your Pinterest profile!
You can schedule, plan and post image Pins to Pinterest for FREE with Later, and video scheduling is available on all Later paid plans.
Whatever your Pinterest goals, being on top of your content calendar and posting schedule will help you gain more followers and boost your engagement!
Think About Your Pinterest Branding
Once you’ve created your business account, it’s time to think about your Pinterest branding!
Try to make your Pinterest profile look and feel as cohesive as possible by using the same image, logo, branding, or color scheme across all your social media platforms helps with your recognizability so Pinners know to follow you!
Make Your Pinterest Profile Search-friendly
While keeping the same name across all your social media helps keep things consistent, the real benefit is that using the same name will make your Pinterest page more search-friendly.
When people search for your site or social channels on Google, your Pinterest page is more likely to show up and rank better in results — giving you an added advantage in the search results page!
The Glossier Pinterest account uses this best practice and gets over 10 million monthly views!
TIP: If you’re a smaller business and want to further optimize your name on Pinterest, a good strategy is to add a vertical bar “|” followed by a supporting description.
This will bolster the searchability of your profile simply because your name includes keywords!
Check out this solid example from KJ and Co.:
Build Out Your Pinterest Bio
As for your bio, some good guidelines to follow are to be concise, mission-focused, and sprinkle in keywords.
You can maybe use the first sentence to explain who you are, or what your business does using strategic keywords that Pinterest users may be searching for.
If you want to add a little personality, you can get creative with a slogan or quote in the second sentence, but keep the first sentence reserved for keywords.
Here, Create & Cultivate uses their bio to explain who they are and what they do:
Consider Having a Branded Hashtag for Pinterest
It’s also a good idea to place your branded hashtag in your bio, like outdoor mega-brand REI:
Not only will this potentially marry your Instagram and Pinterest strategy together under the same branded hashtag, but it gives you a great opportunity to build a community on the platform.
With a branded hashtag, your followers can search, follow and engage with the hashtag as they know exactly what content to expect when they use it. For example, REI’s #OptOutside is a perfect hashtag to showcase its adventurous side through content.
If you aren’t using a branded hashtag across your social media, start doing so now! Read here for everything you need to know about using a dedicated hashtag on Instagram — a lot of that strategy knowhow can be implemented into your Pinterest marketing!
ENGAGEMENT BOOSTING TIP: A call-to-action in your bio is also a good idea! Having a CTA in your bio is a great way to tell your future followers what they can expect, and set your Pinterest profile apart from your other social channels.
Check out Later’s Beginner’s Guide to Using Pinterest for Business for more tips on how to set up your profile and sign up to Later to get started with Pinterest scheduling!
Step #2: Start Following Accounts From Your Pinterest Profile
Just like on Instagram, who you follow on Pinterest is important!
Not only is your “following” list a direct reflection of you, but it’s also key in how you’ll appear in Pinners suggested boards and profiles to follow. Following the right people will land you in front of the right eyes, so pick strategically!
LÄRABAR’s “community” is comprised of similar brands and even competitors:
Once you follow profiles similar to yours — or add them to your community — your Pins are likely to show up in their followers’ suggested Pins.
Outside of following those who are similar to you, it’s a good idea to follow influencers, celebrities, or individuals who may fall in line with your brand, be solid supporters, or be consistent Pinners of your content.
For example, if you see a popular profile that’s amassed the type of following you’d like for yourself, go ahead and follow them, and then also scope out who they’re following!
Step #3: Create Boards for Your Pinterest Profile
When designing your Pinterest boards, you want to create them intentionally and variety is key!
Think about having a lot of specific boards, with a clear category and name. Then you can begin to fill your boards with great images (both your own and Repins from others) to make it a valuable resource for your followers.
Make sure to use strategic keywords when naming your boards, as they’ll make a world’s difference with your board’s SEO.
Everyone loves a cute board name, but try to avoid being “cute” without dimension — stay away from simply: “Yummy!” or “Fashion.”
The Everygirl’s board names provide excellent examples, with strategic names including “Winter Essentials,” “French Fashion,” and “Get Fit.”
Next, you’ll want to write good board descriptions that strategically coordinate with your board names.
Ellen DeGeneres’s board from the holidays titled “Ellen’s Gift Ideas” has a thoughtful description with good keywords: “t’s better to give than to receive. That’s why I made this list of fun holiday gifts. You can find something to give the special people in your life.”
If you want Pinners to shop your products on Pinterest, it’s ok to have boards that mix in the items you’re selling with more “inspirational” imagery.
A good example is Ban.do’s “field trippin” board, which is filled with gorgeous travel shots but also some of Ban.do’s best vacation products.
Creating boards like this is the most strategic because they’re visually interesting, well-curated, and not too salesy (i.e. they’re organic and hold more value).
Once you’ve made your fabulous new boards, you’ll want to categorize them correctly, and always save your content to the most relevant board so Pinterest can best distribute it.
As a last step, add a cover photo for each board that’s visually-appealing and reflects the story you want to tell!
TIME-SAVER TIP: Create a secret board that only you can see! As you scroll through your feed and explore other profiles throughout the day, add Pins to it to save them for later. Whenever you need more content, you can revisit your secret board to grab and post Pins on your public boards.
Check out Later’s The Ultimate Guide to Pinterest Marketing for more Pinterest board inspiration, plus tons of additional tips.
Step #4: Create Pins for Your Pinterest Profile
Get the Perfect Pin Dimensions
First, you want to make sure your image fits the 2:3 ratio — or 600×900 pixels. This is the sweet spot!
It’s important to note that super-long, vertical images no longer perform well on Pinterest, as the social platform may display these lower in your feed.
Away luggage uses the 2:3 ratio with most of their Pins:
Pinterest users are often looking for ideas and inspiration on how to solve a problem, or how to put something to work. Because of this, lifestyle images or images that incorporate a product into a contextualized environment tend to perform best.
At Later, we like to have a mix of both lifestyle and product shots in our Pinterest boards:
Create Pin Descriptions
Next, you’ll want to ace your Pin descriptions, which are critical for discovery purposes!
Make sure to include a strong call to action in your descriptions, which will help with click-through rates and boosting that Pin’s engagement. A call-to-action example may be, “For more Whole30 recipes like this one, visit our site!”
You can also include up to 20 hashtags in the description as well. Use this to your advantage!
Lastly, you’ll want to add discoverable keywords you gather from keyword research. Here’s how:
- Type in a search query on Pinterest that has to do with the Pin you’re about to publish for example, “Travel Thailand.”
- After you press enter, look to the set of suggested keywords that appear beneath the search bar to narrow your search even further.
- Add these suggested keywords to your Pins description! Think multi-word phrases rather than single words. There’s a lot of competition for general keywords, so with longer-form keywords like “travel Thailand packing tips” you may get more engagement as the competition is lower.
Give Pinterest Videos a Go
Did you know you can also Pin videos from YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok? To give your Pinterest account more dimension, create a “video playlist” board filled with either your own videos, or favorite videos from others, like Tasty:
Uploading videos to Pinterest is a great way to cross-promote your other platforms and drive more traffic to them!
Even more, you can share more information with Pinterest videos than static images, like a step-by-step tutorial or mini-workshop. Videos will also boost your audience’s retention rates as you can keep your viewers glued to your content for longer.
Schedule Pins (and video Pins!) with Later for a perfect publishing plan!
Strategically Pin to Pinterest Boards
If you know a Pin applies to more than one board, make sure you first Pin it to the board that it’s most related to in terms of keywords.
If we take our “travel Thailand” example from above, Pin any content related to that keyword first to your “Thailand Travel” board before any others. That’s the information Pinterest will prioritize within the search and feed algorithm!
From there, you can consider adding it to other boards you might have like “South-East Asia Travel”, “Island Hopping”, “Budget Travel” etc.
Source: AERIN
Use Text Overlays
Whether it’s a graphic that clicks through to a travel guide post or a step-by-step workout routine, text overlays consistently perform well on Pinterest.
As with your descriptions, use strong keywords in your overlay text, and be sure to choose relevant, high-quality images that link to your site, or a relevant post on your site, like Brydie.
With apps like Over and Canva, it’s super-simple to add text to your images. Just use one of their ready-made templates to get started, upload your images and your branded font, and you’ll have perfectly on-brand Pins for your feed!
@canva
Step #5: Pin +5 Pins Per Day When Starting Out
To get your Pinterest profile up and running, we recommend posting at least 5 Pins per day. Doing so each day for 2 weeks will fill your page with 70 Pins, so there’ll be no blank space when your audience first come across your profile and boards.
Whenever a Pinner discovers your profile, you want to have enough content to keep their attention and entice them to follow. If they see you’re active on Pinterest, the follows will, well, follow!
Words to the wise, don’t Pin all 5 new Pins at once. Space them throughout the day to optimize the Pinterest Smart Feed.
Pinterest says “Consistent, ongoing activity is the best way to build a dedicated audience on Pinterest. Your Pins will reach more people over time, and you can keep seeing results for months to come.”
And the easiest way to achieve this is with a scheduling tool like Later! Plan, schedule, and automatically publish all your Pinterest content for the day or week ahead! Sign up now — it’s free!
Step #6: Actively Engage on Pinterest
With all the inspiration to browse, it’s sometimes hard to remember that Pinterest is a social platform!
Comments, Repins, and click-through activity can go a long way if you’re looking to grow your own Pinterest profile.
So, don’t be shy about interacting with other pieces of content, and replying to comments from others!
Also, the “Tried this Pin” feature is a critical indicator to both Pinterest and other users of the ultimate value of the Pinned content. Encourage your audience in your description to utilize the “tried it” option on your Pin for that extra boost in exposure.
Voilà! Now you’re ready to grow your brand or business with a stellar Pinterest account.
While setting up a Pinterest strategy might sound daunting at first, just following these 6 steps will see your follower count grow, while making sales and driving traffic to your website!
Don’t forget — you can schedule your Pinterest content with Later for FREE — schedule your first Pin with Later now!
