The Great Pinterest Experiment

It doesn’t take an expert to know that when you see one referrer bringing in WAY more traffic than any other, that’s one you should probably spend the most time on.  For bloggers, that one referrer is almost always the great and mighty Pinterest.  Pinterest has so many benefits:  1) Your pins can be seen by anyone, not just your followers; 2) Pinterest keeps traffic coming to older posts; 3) Studies show, Pinterest click-throughs are more likely to convert (woo-hoo!).

Because of all these reasons, I am creating a Pinterest experiment.  Mama is ALL about growth hacking.  How can I (and my clients) grow fast?  How can we not only grow fast, but grow fast with engaged followers?  That’s my priority.  However, while I feel I have cracked the code on Twitter and Instagram, Pinterest is still shrouded in mystery for me.  I’m growing, but slowly.  Slow does not equal growth hacking, so, I’m looking for a better way to grow.  Who wants to join me on my experiment?

The Great Pinterest Experiment Explained.

First, let me make it clear, we are growing our Pinterest following for our blogs and businesses – not personal.  So, this account we will be growing is going to be thought of as a curation of all things our ideal audience wants to see.  Use a personal Pinterest account for your own favorite outfits, workouts, and recipes.  This will be for them.

First Step:  Build a Pinterest Experience for Your Audience  

First thing first, make sure your name and bio is keyword rich and explains your blog or business.  You also want to use the same profile picture or logo that you use on all other social media.  Make sure your website is verified.  Make sure your social media (Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter) are connected.  You can do this in settings under “social networks.”  After that, it’s time to build your presence.

Go to analytics.pinterest.com (if you don’t already have a business Pinterest account, you’ll need to create that first).  Click on “Your Audience.”  Now, click on “Interests.”  Create a board for each of the top ten interests shown.  These boards should be keyword rich.  

• The name and description of the board should have TONS-O-KEYWORDS in it.  Include keywords that describe your audience.  For example, all of my boards have a “|Blogging and Small Business|” in the board title, so anyone searching with those words will find me because they’re my ideal audience.  
• Make sure that every board has a category it is assigned to.
• Choose a board cover that uses colors and a vibe that matches your brand.
• Keep the board secret until you have at least 10 pins on it.
• Arrange your boards (it’s just a drag and drop), so your most popular boards are at the top. (you can find your most popular board on your analytics site).

Second Step:  Show Mad Pinterest Love  

This is how you’re going to get noticed by other pinners.

• Go to your competitors and see who is following them.  Click on their profiles and follow relevant boards.  
• Comment on pins.  
• Share one or two pins as a Tweet to cross promote.
• Embed relevant Pinterest boards to blog posts or website pages to give readers more information (and to follow you of course!)
• Request to join 5 group boards a week.  You can search for group boards on pingroupie.com.
• Create your own group board and invite influencers to pin to it.
• Pin, Pin, Pin.  Experts recommend pinning 50 images a day.  I recommend Board Booster.  You can set it up so it will pin for you AND it will pin at optimal times.  I’m a binge pinner, but I always use board booster, so my pins only are shown to my audience at the best times.  How does Board Booster work?  Board Booster sets up secret board for you to binge pin to, and then Board Booster will distribute those pins to your public boards at optimal times.  You can also set up Pin sourcing.  If you like a certain board and pin from it all the time, you can set it up in Board Booster to pin from it for you.  I also like the loop feature.  It takes your old pins, deletes them, and then repins them so fresh eyes can get on them.  I’m using it for myself and my clients.  I have seen a 2,000% growth month over month in followers since using Board Booster.  Not too shabby. Sign up here with my affiliate link; you get the first 100 pins for free, after that it's only $5 a month!

Third Step:  Be Crazy Pinnable

Now that you are being seen and noticed, it’s time to make sure you’re content is Pinterest-worthy.

• Create a 735x1102 px image for every page you have on your site.  You can do this in Photoshop, Canva, or PicMonkey.  Make sure all of your images look similar, so it is obvious that it is your brand when people see it in their Pinterest feed.
• If it works for your content, use Rich pins.  They can be used for movies, recipes, articles, products, and places.  
• Take advantage of the description and add your website as a way to link to your site in addition to the source link.  I didn’t even know that the links in descriptions were clickable until I started researching this!
• Go to analytics.pinterest.com and click on “Activity from (Your Site)” and then “Repins.”  Update these pages to make sure they’re evergreen.  Do they have updated photos?  Do the links work?  Are you referencing a concert from 2013?  Update it so it’s relevant today and tomorrow and 10 years from now.  
• With the same information from above, what do those repin images have in common?  Are pins with words doing better than images?  Do those pins have a certain color theme?  Make more pins that emulate the pins that are doing well for your other posts.
• Add an incentive to your Pinterest image.  For example, if your blog post has a free worksheet that readers can download, have your Pinterest image say that.
• Create a follow button on your website.

Now, on to our challenge. The goal is to grow our followers by 50% by November 1. Can we do it?

If you're interested in joining our challenge group, click the button below. The challenge group will get a guide and a private Facebook group to talk about our strategies and how they're working. Join in on the fun!