Even thought Pinterest is a very visual search discovery network, it’s super important that you optimise your account for being discovered on search engines (mainly Google).
Having thousands of great looking pins will definitely make your account LOOK great, but it’s no good if you’re not discovered. Here’s top 5 tips to getting your account (and website) discovered within Pinterest and externally within the big search engines.
#1 Fill out your profile description
There’s a balance between providing a valuable keyword-rich filled description for your Pinterest Profile and one that is spammed full of search terms.
You only have 200 characters to introduce people to your account and provide them enough info on what you do so that they either 1. Visit your website 2. Follow you.
Be real, make it sound human. Google’s algorithm works in a very human way, it analyses patterns of text to understand if it sounds like a robot has written your description or whether a real person has.
Make it succinct and clear go with the “does what it says on the tin” method here. This is not a place to be clever or obtuse be direct – say exactly what it is you do and use plain English language to describe it. When people land on your profile you want them to easily know what to expect. Spell it out and make it easy for your visitors.
#2 Describe your Pins
It’s not enough to just have a keyword-rich filled profile description, but every pin on your account should describe what it is. The same rules apply as above, be human with your descriptions and well.. be descriptive!
If the pin is portraying a message, describe what that is in the pin. If it solves a problem, tell people.
Again, do not spam your keywords into the description, be specific and let Google index the page it links to so that it can see other relevant keywords.
Know your keywords. Keep a note of them and weave them in amongst descriptions do they make sense and have context. Your description should entice people to read more and be full of words they are likely to search for to find the information you have for them.
#3 Write Descriptions for Repins
This one is missed by a lot of Pinterest users. Repinning other user’s content that is relevant to your audience is great, but adding in your own descriptions to these will add a lot more value to your account and increase the chances of new followers being picked up by seeing your repin.
In your description, give your opinion on the product/recipe/article. Say why you’re repinning it and why others should check it out and repin themselves. As always, be real and add a touch of your personality/humour into your descriptions it’s a chance to engage with people do use it wisely.
#4 Be Creative with Board Names and Descriptions
It might sound like we’re beating the same drum in these tips but because Pinterest is mainly visual, spelling it out to the search algorithms is important.
Board Names is a tricky one because we’ll tell you that it’s important to keep it short, sweet and to the point. Yet you’ll go online and see Pinterest users with thousands of followers and their board names won’t reflect any keywords at all.
The main difference is that these people have already been discovered through other means, it certainly wouldn’t have been in search results through search engines. Certainly when starting out and in order to be ahead of the game, you should have descriptive Board Names and Descriptions. Think of quirky titles that capture people’s attention and increase the chances of them clicking through (avoid click bait!).
We always recommend a mix of both – have your quirky title but then a keyword explaining it in the title and description too.
Top tip: In your descriptions of your boards, think of popular search terms that people are likely to use. You can get these by searching yourself and seeing what pre-populates the search box.
#5 Confirm Your Website
Lastly but certainly not least, confirm your website on Pinterest. You can add your website in easily to your account but confirming it with a meta tag, reaffirms your credibility and trust as a brand.
You no longer get the trustworthy tick that Pinterest used to have, that’s reserved for special “verified” accounts like on Twitter, but you’ll get a nice fat invisible tick against your name for being a good reliable account.
#Bonus Tip: Link Pins to Relevant Content
Here’s a quick tip that we just HAD to include at the end.
We have seen so many Pinterest accounts that have great pins either linking to the source image file, or the main homepage of a website – providing no value to the follower and leaving a poor taste in their mouth for your pins.
Make sure that whatever you choose to pin from your website links back to content relevant to that pin.
Send people to a product description page, outlining the benefits you might have shown in the pin or send them to an article explaining more on what you’re offering in your pin.
Just think of it this way, if you google Dogs, do you want the search result to take you Cats?
(Poor example but you get the point).
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