Pinterest Marketing for Beginners

Pinterest marketing for beginners – it’s time to learn how to effectively use Pinterest to market your business.

We’ve created the best Pinterest for business marketing guide to help you not only use Pinterest effectively but also to help you diversify your business marketing using this powerful platform.

Let’s jump in and look at exactly what you need to know to learn how to use Pinterest for marketing.

Why You Should Be Using Pinterest to Market Your Business

Just in case you’re still on the fence about using Pinterest, I thought I’d share some pretty powerful reasons to include the platform in your marketing.

77.1% of Pinterest users are women (aka the purchase decision-makers).
89% of users are using Pinterest as a source of purchase inspiration.
Pinterest has millions of users in each age demographic – that means your audience IS on Pinterest.
77% of Pinterest users have discovered a new brand or product – and they’re open-minded to it – look at the next point to see why!
97% of searches are unbranded – which means you don’t need big ad budgets or a well-known brand name to be successful on Pinterest.
64% of Pinterest users described the platform as a place to find ideas, products, or services they can trust.
The majority of Pinterest users don’t feel like they’re wasting time on the platform. In fact, they feel it enriches their lives by using the platform to get inspired to do things in their REAL life.

How To Use Pinterest for Beginners

Let’s dive right into learning how to use Pinterest for beginners.

Get a Business Account

Sign up for a business account – this unlocks important analytics numbers and tools so that you can track your success on the platform. It’s an absolute must so that you can see what is working and what isn’t.

You can sign up for a business account here.

Follow the Prompts

Fill out the information that Pinterest prompts when you first sign up. This is always changing so instead of including the exact details at the time of writing this, I advise you to fill in the info and pick some topics that interest you. Since you’re using this to market your business, make sure to keep things closely related to your niche.

Adjust Your Account Settings

Add your business name to the ‘account name area’
Write a description letting people know what your business is about and what they can expect from your account. (We’ll circle back to this later but first, just get something there).
Change your username to match the name of your business – this will help people find you if they’re searching for you on Pinterest.

Claim Your Website

Claiming your website is what unlocks that important analytics information. If you have more than one website, you can claim all of them which is pretty awesome!

To claim your website(s) on Pinterest simply add an HTML code to the header section.

Here is a tutorial from Pinterest that walks you through the steps for claiming your website.

You can also claim your Instagram, Etsy, and YouTube accounts if you have those.

Connect Your Shop

If you’re an eCommerce seller with a shop, you can upload your product catalog to Pinterest.

Pinterest will then display updated product listings and details such as availability, pricing, and descriptions.

Why would you want to connect your shop to Pinterest?

So that you can get your products discovered in search.

Make sure to set yourself up for success by including keyworded descriptions of your products – more on this later but just know that it helps your Pinterest SEO.

Pinterest will create product pins and you’ll be able to tag your products on pins and idea pins. That means users will be able to shop your products right from your pins.

Apply for the Verified Merchant Program

Now that you’ve connected your shop to Pinterest, it’s time to apply to the Verified Merchant Program.

Joining the VMP means you earn a blue checkmark beside your business name which lets users know you’re a vetted shop owner and a business that can be trusted.

If you’re using Shopify, you can use the app to connect your products to Pinterest. If you’re using WooCommerece, there is a plugin to add to your WordPress website that easily allows you to connect your shop to Pinterest.

Here is a helpful tutorial.

How To Use Pinterest for Marketing

Learning how to use Pinterest for marketing means you’ll be able to build traffic back to your website, products, and offers.

Since Pinterest is actually a visual search engine and not social media, we need to do a few more steps to get things set up properly.

Let’s get started learning how to use Pinterest for marketing your business on auto-pilot.

Find The Right Keywords to Target

Pinterest users use the platform to find inspiration, connect to a new idea, or solve a problem. They find information by searching for it.

That’s why you need to use keywords in your Pinterest marketing strategy.

Not using keywords is like trying to keep a boat in place without using an anchor – it just doesn’t make any sense.

The keywords you choose to target will be the foundation for your Pinterest strategy.

The reason to use keywords is actually twofold.

Keywords tell Pinterest what your account and content is about so that they know who to distribute your pins to.
Using keywords lets users connect to your content when they see your pins ranking for a given search term.

There are 5 main ways to find keywords on Pinterest:

The guided search bar – make sure to toggle the results to video so that you can see what keyword bubbles get returned for the search term. The words in the bubbles represent related search terms to the original search. It’s thought that if the terms are in colored bubbles, they’re searched more often than ones that aren’t.
If you don’t get keyword bubbles after toggling the results to ‘videos’, you can enter your term into the search bar and do the alphabet method – ex. your search term followed by a, b, c, d, and so on. Pinterest will return the top keyword combos for each letter.
Pinterest trends are another great way to find keywords. You can also see when the search term is popular – that will help you plan your content properly.
Use the Pinterest ads manager – don’t worry you won’t be launching an ad campaign. You just want to set up a campaign and get to the area where Pinterest has its keyword manager. Once there, enter your keywords and Pinterest will not only return related keywords, but also a ballpark number of searches.
The last place to find keywords on Pinterest are the related search terms after you hit enter on a search. Scroll down and Pinterest will let you know what keywords are related right in the search results.

I highly recommend you create what we call a keyword vault. This is a spreadsheet that houses all of the search terms you want to target on Pinterest. Think of it as researching once and then having a solid list of keywords to refer to over and over again. Having access to search terms will also help you decide what kind of content to create for Pinterest.

It’s most ideal to create content around what is getting searched.

RELATED READ: How To Find Keywords on Pinterest

Create Boards with Descriptions

Don’t create boards with cute names and hope for the best. Trust me, it’s not going to get you very far.

Pinterest is a visual search engine which means it uses keyword combos to identify what the piece of content is about. Make sure you’re using keywords as your board titles and then weave related search terms into your board descriptions along with your target keyword.

That way when you save a pin that links to your content, you’re setting it up for success by telling Pinterest the content is about these keywords.

Use Keywords in Your Pin Titles and Descriptions

Using keywords in your pin titles and descriptions is just as important as using them in your board names and descriptions.

Every pin and description needs to have a target keyword with secondary and relevant search terms sprinkled throughout as well.

How to Use Pinterest Effectively

Now that we understand how to use Pinterest for marketing, it’s also a good idea to look at how to use Pinterest effectively. It’s one thing to know tactics, it’s another to understand exactly how to grow your business using Pinterest marketing.

Remember Pinterest is Not Social Media

Pinterest isn’t social media. It’s not Instagram where you have to churn out neverending content to keep engagement up.

Your content also needs to be about the user and not about you (which is what Instagram marketing is for).

Pinterest is a visual search engine where people go to get inspired, discover a new idea, or solve a problem. It really is about the user and what you can do for them.

That’s why targeting keywords is so important.

They are literally the lifeline to your Pinterest marketing strategy.

Of course, there are other components to a solid Pinterest marketing strategy, but remembering that it’s a visual search engine and not typical social media will really help shape your efforts on the platform.

Remembering that it’s a visual search engine will help you learn how to use Pinterest effectively since you will know how it differs from social media.

Want to get a Pinterest marketing strategy in place? Check out our services here.

Have a Consistency Plan

It’s not a good idea to dump a whole bunch of pins onto Pinterest in one day.

Like other platforms, Pinterest success thrives off of being consistent.

Don’t worry you don’t need to be on Pinterest every day. Using an approved Pinterest scheduler like Tailwind or Planoly makes staying consistent so much easier. Pinterest also has its own native scheduler built right into the platform, so if you’re a Pinterest marketing beginner, it’s a great way to get the ball rolling.

Embed Your Pin Images in Your Website Content

You should absolutely pin your pins directly to Pinterest and you should also make sure to include them in your posts and other content.

Embedding your pins means that when someone is on your website and wants to save the post to Pinterest, they’ll be able to do so with a fully optimized, Pinterest-sized image that you created and have available for your website visitors.

Doing so makes it user-friendly for your website visitor and also lets Pinterest see that you’re a quality content creator – so much so that other people want to save content from your website to Pinterest.

An optimized Pinterest image means:

The image has a 2:3 aspect ratio or is 1000 x 1500 px in size.
Uses a clear text overlay that includes a keyword and CTA (call to action) if there is one.
Has keywords in the preset pin title and description.

Wondering exactly how to get those pin images embedded in your content? Our favorite is the social sharing plugin called Grow. You can set the image, title, and description easily while you’re creating the content. Once you’ve uploaded it to the post, the image will be there for users to pin to Pinterest.

Create Multiple Pins for Your Content

One thing that sets Pinterest apart from other platforms is the ability to create multiple pin assets for one piece of content.

We recommend creating at least 5-10 pin images per piece of content.

You could create even more especially if you find a piece of content doing very well on Pinterest – why not have more pins out there working for you?

Pinterest Marketing Strategy

There are a lot of really great ways to use Pinterest for marketing.

It will depend on what your goals are for Pinterest.

Some common Pinterest marketing goals are:

Brand awareness
Email list growth
Product sales
Increased website traffic
Expert positioning
Client acquisition
Community growth

If you’re how to create a Pinterest marketing strategy, here are a few ways to strategically use the platform:

Have a Clear Understanding of Your Customer Journey

No matter what your goal is for using Pinterest marketing, you’ll need to have a clear understanding of your customer journey.

This includes knowing what your ideal client/customer objects to, what their pain points are, and what they need in order to say yes.

Knowing your customer journey is important because of three reasons:

It will help you know which keywords to target.
It will guide your content creation.
You’ll get closer to your goals for Pinterest with a solid understanding of how you will move your ideal person through your sales funnel.

Not truly understanding your customer journey is like throwing spaghetti at the wall and hoping most of it sticks.

Your Pinterest marketing strategy depends on you understanding what makes your ideal person tick so if you want to use Pinterest effectively make sure to write down all the steps in your customer journey – trust me, it will make everything else so much easier!

Create Boards that Align with Your Content and Goals

Now that you know how important your customer journey is to your Pinterest marketing strategy, it’s time to create some boards that align with your content and goals for Pinterest.

Review your keyword list and create boards that make sense to your business. From there, make sure to include the same keywords in your pin text overlays, titles, and descriptions.

Create Scroll-Stopping Pins

We are literally inundated with so much content that making your pins stand out in the feed is so very important.

Why? Because when someone interacts with your pin, saves it, or clicks through, it sends a signal to Pinterest that this piece of content is resonating with its users.

How do you create scroll-stopping pins? This could be a post in itself but here are some quick tips to keep in mind.

Make sure to use a relevant image in your pin design that communicates what the user will find if they click through.
Use a catchy text overlay that also has your keyword.
Include a call to action.
Use white space so that the pin doesn’t look cluttered or overwhelming.

Overwhelmed at the thought of creating pins? Check out our shop here for Canva templates that you can use for your business!

Use All The Pin Types

An important part of your Pinterest marketing strategy will be making sure you use all of the different types of pin styles.

There are 3 main pin types:

Static pins – these are pins that have no moving elements. Some have a text overlay and others are stand-alone images with no writing.
Video pins – exactly as it sounds – pins that use a video to convey what the content is about. Some have a text overlay, others use video only.
Idea pins – Pinterest recently added idea pins as a way to include short-form videos on the platform. Idea pins have multiple slides and are similar to an Instagram story except the concept is to share an “idea” during the slides. They should include enough information to help the Pinterest user do the idea themselves.

Hopefully, our Pinterest marketing guide for beginners has helped you understand how the platform works. Our goal is to take you from a beginner to using Pinterest effectively to market your business.

Another thing to keep in mind is that Pinterest marketing is a long game. During the first few months, you might not see the results you’re looking for but I urge you to keep going. On average, you’ll move the needle after 3 months and start seeing better results after 6 months plus.

While you’re growing your account, make sure to adjust your Pinterest marketing strategy as you start to see what is working and what isn’t.

Learning how to use Pinterest for marketing is smart – the platform is the number one traffic driver for many of our clients. If Pinterest is the second traffic driver, it’s because Google is number one.

Not sure how to create a Pinterest marketing strategy? Book a strategy call here.

Want a team of experts to grow your Pinterest account in the background while you run your business? Check out our organic Pinterest management services.

Do you still feel like a Pinterest marketing beginner? Have some questions?

Ask your questions in the comments and we’ll be sure to help!

Elaine Timms Creative