Do you use Pinterest marketing for your business or are you confused by it? So many business owners I speak to don’t have a clue. If you are one of them, read on so you can use Pinterest marketing for your business and avoid these mistakes from the beginning.
Do you use it for your business or for browsing dessert recipes? If you’re a business owner and you’re NOT using Pinterest marketing for your business, let me share some statistics with you.
- Pinterest has over 445 million monthly users
- A whopping 87% of Pinterest users have made a purchase because of something they saw on Pinterest
- 81% of Pinterest users are actually females
- Half of Pinterest users are making $50K or greater per year, with 10 percent of Pinteresting households making greater than $125K per year
- 30% of all US social media users are Pinterest users
- 60% of Pinterest users are from the US
- Average time spent on Pinterest per visit is 14.2 minutes
So where does that leave you? Can you see how you can compete with even the big brands? And if you are a product-based seller, you need buyable pins TODAY! This allows all those women with cash to spend to buy your product right on Pinterest. Can you afford NOT to be on Pinterest is the real question?
As a social media marketer, Pinterest marketing is my specialty. I LOVE it more than chocolate cake! (Well maybe not chocolate cake, but more than yellow cake definitely.) I have done Pinterest audits and reviewed a lot of accounts. Even just searching for something on Pinterest, I have come across accounts that are just thrown together and have naked boards.
That’s fine if you’re just pinning recipes or may be planning your next DIY project. But if you’re serious about marketing your business on Pinterest, please take a look at these 9 very common mistakes. The good news is, these 9 mistakes that you could be making in your Pinterest marketing, are EASY to fix.
Avoid These Top Pinterest Marketing Mistakes:
1. No Pin It button or Social Share button
Actually not seen on Pinterest itself, but it starts with your website and that is not having a “Pin It” button on your website.
This is easily done through a plugin. If you are going through all the right steps curating a perfect blog post and then a person reading it would like to save it to refer back to, they can’t because you don’t have a pin it button that allows them to save your awesome content.
Yup, this happens. You’re missing the first piece of the puzzle. How to fix it? Search plugins for “Pinterest Pin It” and multiple options will appear. It’s nothing fancy. I am sure you have seen those floating little red “PIN IT” buttons. If you don’t have them, go get the plugin installed now.
Do you want people to share your content if they really like it? Get the plugin Social Pug, which allows the blog post to be shared across multiple social media platforms. You’ll notice they are the red and blue buttons at the top and bottom of most blog posts. (If you like this post and find it helpful, please share it with others you know, Thanks!)
2. Not having a business account for Pinterest marketing
Yes, you can convert an existing personal account over to a business account. This is preferred if you already have followers. Take advantage of the growth you already have. You can keep or create new boards that will relate to your business account. Any board that doesn’t relate, you don’t have to delete, just make it a secret board so you can refer to it later.
3. A blank profile
Starting at the very top, your profile is one of the first things people see. People relate to people so a professional picture of yourself is necessary. (And by the way, it should be the same picture across all of your social media – a little social media manager tip for you ;).
Your profile will have your website address and you need to have a call to action. What do you want them to do? Sign up for your freebie on your website? Use a .bitly link since you have only a certain number of characters to play with. In the remaining space, tell people who you are or what you do. This should be where your elevator pitch goes. What are you doing for them?
Additional Pinterest Marketing tips for your profile:
Use the extra space in the business name field to fill in what you do or who you are. You can see in my “Karrie Marie || Virtual Assistant Helping Women Entrepreneurs Maximize Productivity”. Instead of just my name, Karrie Marie, I could fit in my title and what I do, which frees up space in my description for other things.
4. The first board is not YOURS with YOUR pins
Now we’ve moved to your boards. The VERY FIRST BOARD should be YOUR board with YOUR PINS! I see this quite a bit. If it’s your personal account or you’re not a blogger or in business, then ok, but we’re talking Pinterest marketing for your business here. So again, the very first board should be your board with your pins on it.
A question I get a lot is, “What if I am starting out and don’t have anything to pin?” Here are a couple of suggestions:
- Create a board regardless if you have anything to pin or not and make it a secret board. This will act as a reminder that you NEED to create CONTENT to pin.
- You can create affiliate pins right away since you don’t need blog posts to send the pin to. Make the URL your affiliate link. Plus some added money made in affiliate sales wouldn’t be a bad way to start right?
- When you do create a blog post, create 3 different looking pins for the same blog post. This is the time to experiment with what pins are attracting more repins.
- Do you have an opt-in or any kind of offer? Make a pin to drive the traffic to a landing or sales page.
- With YouTube videos, you can put the URL in to drive traffic to YouTube directly
5. Naked boards, or not enough pins
Yes, I see this all the time. Boards with 0 pins, or 5 pins. You are presenting your professional face to the world. Would you do it standing naked? Of course not. So when you are starting new boards, make them secret until you have AT LEAST 10-20 pins. Add more pins over time if you need to and then when you have at least 10, unhide the board. Viola!
6. Not using search words in the board or pin description
When you create a board and/or pin description, it should have key search words in the description. Remember that Pinterest is a search engine.
7. Not using hashtags in the pin description
Again, when you create a new board and/or a new pin, the description has hashtags. Remember that Pinterest is a search engine. You can search for subject information on either keywords or the relatively new use of hashtags.
8. Not using a call to action in your pin.
Create a call to action like, click through to read more, sign up for my freebie to learn …, click here to get my #1 recipe for chocolate cake, etc. Most people, especially if they are new to Pinterest marketing, need to be told what to do. Tell people what action you want them to take.
9. Not using a scheduler like Tailwind
And the last mistake is not using a scheduler like Tailwind. Do you really have time to live pin every day at the optimal time your audience is online? Are you going to pin them all at once or can you spread them out over time to catch a wider audience? That is one of the advantages of using a pin scheduler program like Tailwind. Spend an hour each week and use Tailwind’s schedule to find your optimal pinning times to get your pins in front of your ideal audience.
To get started automating your pinning, I recommend Tailwind hands down. Their smart schedule finds the exact time your audience is online, the board lists help you pin one pin to many boards with just one click and the Tailwind Tribes feature help you find like-minded people in your niche to help share your content. To start saving time, you can sign up using my affiliate link to sign up for Tailwind’s FREE account.
I spend literally one hour a week scheduling my pins for the following week and therefore have grown my followers and reach to almost 1 million people in a year with consistently pinning. And my content stays around forever. Can you say that about Instagram or Facebook? As fast as you are creating posts, it is getting pushed down the feed in a matter of minutes.
Are you making any of these mistakes? If you are in the beginning stages of using Pinterest marketing for your business and you want to make sure you aren’t making any of these mistakes, you can sign up for my Pinning Foundations Pinterest Course which will make sure you haven’t missed anything from the beginning or review what you have done so far.
To learn more about Pinterest, you might find these blog posts helpful:
- Why You Need Tailwind to Boost Your Pinterest Strategy
- The Ultimate Guide to Making $ on Pinterest
- How I Help My Clients Dominate Pinterest
- Clean Up Your Pinterest and Tailwind in 12 Easy Steps AND Plan Next Quarter’s Content.
If you are short on time and want me to help get you started, set up a time to talk and we can get you up and running in no time!
2 Responses
This is great information. Pinterest exhausts me sometimes.
Your welcome Lindsey! All the changes with the various platforms is overwhelming. You get used to one and then they change something. If you have any questions, just ask!