6 Mistakes To Avoid On Pinterest, As A Blogger
Hi fam, after creating my latest tutorial on how to create video pins for Pinterest, I realized that there are many mistakes people make on Pinterest and I came across some of those mistakes while I was researching for the training.
Today I was just going to share my progress on Pinterst but I decided to highlight just some of the mistakes that I have seen many bloggers make on Pinterst.
Pinterest is my favorite place to hang out and I do spend some time there because when I write a blog post, I do make sure that I create a pin or two for it. And that means I am also saving other people's pins, and that is why I notice these mistakes.
But I must admit that I have made some of these mistakes myself.
Mistake Number 1 To Avoid On Pinterest As A Blogger Not Claiming Your Website And Using One Account For Many Websites.
I am guilty of this mistake, when I first started, my Pinterest account was a private account that I had been using for many years, just for different things like searching for recipes, beauty tips, etc.
So when I started blogging seriously, I turned my private Pinterest account into a business account, which is very easy to do. Then I claimed my website. But as I ventured into other niches, I did not create Pinterest accounts for those websites, I just created boards on my account and just went on to pin pins from the other websites.
That did not work very well and my account started dropping in ranking and I dropped from 100k monthly views to 19k in a matter of 3 months. Then I went through a Pinterest course that taught me that I have to create an account for each website and claim it, which I did and I can see that this is what I should have done from start.
My main account has now started picking up again after I started pining only pins that are related to the niche of the claimed website.
Number 2 Mistake To Avoid On Pinterest As A Blogger Not Using Keywords And Hashtags
By not using your keywords and hashtags, you are missing out on the traffic that you could be driving to your website. And that means loss of potential revenue. Pinterest is a search engine just like Google, Yahoo, and Bing.
The good thing about Pinterest, they actually give information about the kinds of terms people are using to search for your topic, so take advantage of this, before you post your pin, go to the search bar on Pinterest and type your topic.
Like, let’s say your post is about how to lose weight naturally.
Type that phrase and click to see what other terms show up under that keyword and incorporate some of them in your description and hashtags.
The only difference Between Pinterest and other search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing is that Pinterest is also a visual search engine which means it also uses images to determine what your pin is about, which brings me to mistake number three.
Mistake Number 3 To Avoid On Pinterest As A Blogger, Using The Wrong Image On Your Pin.
When you create a pin that is about making money online for example, and you use an image that doesn’t match with the subject of your pin, it’s going to affect your rankings on Pinterest, because you are going to be placed together with subjects that match that image.
For example, let’s say you use an image that has food on it, you are probably going to be placed in the category of food bloggers and that will not be good for you because when someone clicks your pin and find that it has nothing to do with what they were searching for, they can even report your pin as being irrelevant.
For example, if you go to Pinterest and click a pin and go to the article that the pin directs you to, there is a feature where Pinterest asks you if you have found what you were looking for, if you answer no, then that pin will drop in rankings because Pinterest will flag it as irrelevant to the topic.
Mistake Number 4 To Avoid On Pinterest As A Blogger, Not Following The Pin Dimensions Requirements.
A couple of years ago it was very common to create super tall pins, and they used to rank very well, but in 2019 Pinterest stopped favoring tall pins and they actually started cutting them off, Now this can have a negative impact on your business if you have created such a nice pin and then it gets cut off and maybe it gets cut off at the point where you have put your branding, which means your audience will not be able to spot your pin.
Let me explain what I mean, there some bloggers myself included who choose to brand their pins by just placing the name of their website on the pin using the colors of their website.
I chose this method because I did not want to keep using the same colors on my pin. I understand there are some bloggers who prefer to use the same colors on all their pins and that is fine too. But for me, I wanted to be free to use any colors I like and just brand my pins by just using a small box that contains the colors of my website.
I felt like this gives me more freedom to get creative with my pins.
So if you create a very tall pin and it gets cut off, that means you are probably going to lose visitors because maybe people won’t get to find out what the pin is about because some of the information will be cut off.
And if it gets cut off at the point where you placed your branding, then your audince will not be able to spot your pin.
When it comes to dimensions, I always follow the 600X900 px because that is what Pinterest recommends, now I know there are some bloggers who push the envelope a little bit by making their pins taller but I chose to be on the safe side.
Number 5 Mistake To Avoid On Pinterest As A Blogger Giving Out All The Goodies On Your Pin
This is one mistake that I see a lot of Bloggers make, they create a pin and they give all the answers on the pin, and on the description, so when I see that I wonder why should I go to their website when they have already given me all the answers?
Even though you are given 500 characters to describe your pin, just do it without giving out all the information. If its a product review and your pin contains the affiliate link that will direct the reader straight to the product, then you can give as much information as possible.
But if the real review is on your website, then I think it’s wise to give them a reason to click and go to your website to read the whole review, and hopefully go ahead and click on your affiliate links, that you have placed on the review.
Number 6 mistake To Avoid On Pinterest As A Blogger. Not Taking Advantage Of Video Pins
Video pins are performing very well on Pinterest and a lot of advertisers are using video pins to promote their products. So some Bloggers have picked up on this trend and now there are more and more video pins showing up on your Pinterest feed.
So make sure you incorporate some video pins with your image pins. Check out my training on how to create video pins using Canva Here
Conclusion
Pinterest is a great source of organic traffic and its beginner-friendly, Pinterest is the only search engine in my opinion that favors new bloggers, if you create great quality pins and use your keywords correctly, Pinterest will show you some love, even if your blog is new.
You will be able to drive lots of free traffic using Pinterest which will also help you rank well on the other search engines, because when they see that your website is attracting traffic, they will also have to show you some love.
Ok, I hope you have found these tips helpful. If so please give me a like and a comment.
Thank you for your likes, comments, and for your time.
Rose
Recent Comments
71
Rose, thank you for these great Pinterest tips! It will save many of us Pinterest newbies weeks or months of waiting.
In last week's live webinar, Jay mentioned how he grew his 3 week old Pinterest account on Home safety lab to 22.3k impressions and 258 clicks. He also mentioned using Pinterest ads. Not sure how much of those results were due to Pinterest ads, but Pinterest certainly seems like a very good bet for newer websites to quickly generate traffic. Of course I will have to put this to test myself to gather further insights.
Also, would you suggest creating separate Pinterest accounts for each niche after claiming the website?
Padma
I think its a good idea to have a Pinterest account for each website you have, that was my biggest mistake that I made on Pinterest I used one Pinterest account for all my websites that affected my account and I dropped from 100k monthly views to just 19k and actually at some point I was all the way down to 15k.
That's because the Pinterest algorithm didn't know how to rank my account since I had all kinds of things going.
The more niche-targeted you are with your Pinterest account, the better you will rank.
You need to create a Pinterest account for each website you have and claim it. I know it's a lot of work especially if you have many websites, but you will get better results by doing so.
If you have a Pinterest account for make money online website, and you have claimed that website on that account if you start posting recipe pins, and makeup pins, and knitting pins, that will affect your rankings.
Because your claimed website is about making money online.
Rose this is fantastic and I have to admit that I think I am guilty of all six, maybe not all the same time but close to.
This year I intend to shake up my pinterest account and follow some training on it.
I have 'starred' you post, as I will definitely be coming back to it.
Thank you.
Thank you for this article! I think I am making a couple of these mistakes and will go back and fix them. I am new to blogging as well as to Pinterest and many other social pages, so this helps a lot when you are trying to learn more than one thing at a time.
Thank you for this post-Rose.
I have been using Pinterest for my website for a long time and I realized that I have made some of the mistakes that you mentioned in this post.
You are right about Pinterest being beginner-friendly.
I made plenty of mistakes along the way and I get about 30 engagements and 500 impressions on average per week.
Yes, I definitely think Pinterest does not discriminate against new bloggers, and you can succeed on it even if your blog is under 3 months old.
You just need to create great quality pins.
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Rose, thank you for this post that is more like a training, awesome tips! I have to say that I've been thinking about creating a new pinterest account for a few weeks.
I have three websites, completely different niches and I experienced a hug drop lately.
I thought I wouldn't need another account and also didn't want to because I have so many social media accounts already.
And it is so comfortable to click on the pinterest symbol on my top bar! Now I will have to switch accounts, won't I?
I don't like starting from scratch but I believe you are right that I'm confusing pinterest now.
Lenka
That is what I was feeling when I was using one account for all my websites.
I also have so many things going social media wise, but I had to create those Pinterest accounts for the other sites because Pinterest was not showing my content to people. And that included the content from the claimed website on that account.
So Yes I think you need to create accounts for those websites and claim them.
If you create the other accounts you are able to switch between accounts in the same tab. There is an option on your Pinterest to add account so if you add, you can just keep switching without logging in and out.
Thank you for the information, it's better than I thought then.