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    How The Pinterest Algorithm Actually Works

    February 4, 2021 · Uncategorized · 0

    Pinterest is typically lumped in as a form of “social media,” but it’s actually not social media at all  – it’s a visual search engine. It doesn’t work at all like Instagram or Facebook. Pinterest has its own entirely different algorithm, best practices, and standards so if you want to start generating the free traffic and leads Pinterest is capable of providing you, you have to take the time to understand how the heck it works. 

    If getting started on Pinterest feels really overwhelming, you’re definitely not alone! Pinterest is unfamiliar territory to many. So today I want to make your life a little easier and give you a peek under the hood. After reading this post you will have a solid understanding of how the Pinterest algorithm works and the 5 factors Pinterest takes into account when deciding whether or not to show your content to its users, so you can get started with Pinterest the right way and create a strategy that actually works! 

    How Does The Pinterest Algorithm Work?

    The Pinterest search bar is one of the most used tools on Pinterest with over 2 billion searches being done every single month. The algorithm is set up to match relevant quality content to a user’s search query as they search for inspiration or solutions to their problems. Although we may never know the exact formula for how the Pinterest algorithm ranks our content in search, Pinterest has told us of 5 important algorithm ranking factors we can focus on. The following are in no particular order: 

    1. Relevance 
    2. Pin Quality 
    3. Domain Quality
    4. Pinner Quality
    5. Pin Formats

    1. Relevance (aka Pinterest Keywords)

    This is arguably one of the most important factors when ranking in search on Pinterest. Pinterest wants to show the best most relevant results to its users when they are performing a search. In order for Pinterest to consider your content relevant to the searches you want your content to show up for, you need to tell Pinterest what your pin is about. We do this using keywords. 

    Before you create a pin for your content to put on Pinterest, think about what your ideal client or customers would type into the search bar to find information or products like yours. These are the keywords or phrases you should be using for your content on Pinterest. If you’re having trouble with this, the Pinterest guided search bar can help you out when deciding the best keywords to use. Type in a broad keyword and narrow it down with the words that show up below it. An example of a good keyword in the example below would be “healthy dinner recipes” or “easy dinner recipes.”

    hint: if you’re missing the keyword bubbles, change the drop-down menu to the right of the search bar from “all pins” to “videos.” This should bring them back.

    Once you’ve decided on the keywords you would like to rank for, use these keywords throughout your profile, boards, and pins. Using relevant keywords for the content you are pinning on Pinterest helps the Pinterest search algorithm match your pins with users who are most likely to interact with your content and generate more traffic and leads to your website. 

    2. Pin Quality

    Pinterest determines a pin’s quality by how much users are interacting with it. The more people closeup, click, save, or comment on your pin, the higher Pinterest will view your pin in terms of quality content and distribute it to more of its users. So that being said, your pin design matters. It needs to be enticing and capture the attention of people scrolling their feed a mile a minute. A few things that will help you rank for pin quality are: 

    1. Text overlay with attention-grabbing headlines 
    2. High-quality images 
    3. Long vertical pins (2:3 ratio)
    4. Colors that pop 
    5. Freebie Mockup

    Another way to get a boost in engagement is to use Tailwind Communities. Tailwind Communities are groups of people in similar niches that post and share each other’s content to help get each other’s content circulating on Pinterest. This feature is only available through the Pinterest approved scheduler – Tailwind. 

    3. Domain Quality

    Similarly to Google, Pinterest scores your overall domain quality. This is basically their judgement on the overall quality of the content you put on your website. The more people interact with pins that lead to your website, the more Pinterest will view your website as a source of high quality content. Improving your domain quality on Pinterest will take time but there’s a few things you can do to speed up the process. 

    1. Create a business account and claim your website 
    2. Enable Rich Pins 
    3. Install social share buttons to encourage people to pin directly from your website 

    Pinner Quality

    Pinterest scores you on pinner quality by evaluating the content you put on Pinterest as both a creator and a curator. This means that pinner quality isn’t just based on your own pins, it’s also based on other people’s pins that you decide to pin to your account. Here’s a few things that can help improve your pinner quality: 

    1. Curate content exclusively from Tailwind Communities to ensure you’re only pinning high-quality content from others. You will know which content is popular on Pinterest thanks to a small blue flames symbol in the top-right corner of the pin. This symbol indicates how many shares this pin has had on Pinterest.
    2. Pin consistently. Don’t publish all at once, spread it out and pin a little bit every day. The easiest way to accomplish this is by using a Pinterest approved scheduler. I highly recommend using Tailwind. I use this scheduler for myself and all my clients, I wouldn’t be able to do my job without it. It also offers a lot of extra benefits (like Tailwind Communities) that come in handy. 
    3. Fresh pins… Pinterest has told us to create more fresh pins (aka a new image and URL combination) as they will be putting more emphasis on fresh pins now than repins. Don’t worry, this doesn’t mean you need to start creating 30 new blog posts a month, it simply means they want you to create more pins for each blog post. Now, don’t go crazy with this. Avoid pinning the same URL more than once on any given day. I also recommend not creating more than 6-7 pins per blog post at a time. I’ve concluded from my own experience that pinning 8+ pins to the same URL month over month causes impressions to go down as well as engagement. When I stopped pinning those URLs the next month, engagement and impressions went back up. That said, you can still pin to those URLs again in the future, just be sure to give it a little bit of a break before pinning to that URL again. 

    5. Pin Formats

    This ranking factor comes with the great Pinterest algorithm change of 2020. Pinterest now distributes story pins and video pins at a higher rate than it distributes static pins. The downside with story pins is you cannot link them to your website and video pins get fewer click-throughs due to the pause feature. Usually, a pinner clicks on a pin to go to a website but with video pins, clicking on the pin only pauses the video. This confuses the pinner and results in fewer clicks. 

    You might be wondering… “what good do these pin formats do me if I want more clicks to my website?” Stay with me, I’ll explain. Story pins and video pins are fantastic for boosting engagement with your account. Although our main goal is to get clicks to our websites, engagement with your content, in general, is important as well. The more someone engages with your content the more of your content Pinterest will show them. So if someone clicks or saves your story or video pin, the more likely Pinterest is to show more of your static pins to them as well. So definitely consider adding story and video pins to your arsenal but definitely continue to create static pins as well. 

    The Big Picture

    Now that you know more about the Pinterest algorithm and what factors to keep in mind when pinning on the platform, you’re ready to get started!If you skimmed over the post and found yourself here (no judgment) The 5 factors that affect how you rank in the Pinterest algorithm are relevance, pin quality, domain quality, pinner quality, and the use of different pin formats. 

    If you need more help getting your Pinterest account set up correctly and ready to drive loads of traffic to your website, be sure to grab your FREE copy of The Pinterest Quick Start Guide above before you go!  This guide will help you set up and optimize your Pinterest account to get you in front of your target audience and drive more traffic to your content from Pinterest. 

    If you found this guide helpful or have any questions regarding the algorithm, let me know in the comments below! 

    Hi, I’m Shaina

    The Pinterest manager and strategist here at The Pin Perspective. I help online entrepreneurs scale their business using Pinterest to gain more traffic + leads to consistently make more sales.

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    Hi, I’m Shaina

    A Pinterest manager and strategist helping online entrepreneurs get quality traffic, leads, and sales
    using Pinterest!

    Recent Posts

    • How To Clean Up And Organize Your Pinterest Boards
    • How The Pinterest Algorithm Actually Works
    • How To Setup Pinterest Rich Pins – A Beginners Guide
    • How To Grow Your Pinterest Using Tailwind Communities
    • How To Increase Followers And Engagement On Pinterest With Story Pins
    @thepinperspective
    Pinterest didn’t think there was enough chaos in Pinterest didn’t think there was enough chaos in 2020 so they decided to add a huge algorithm update to really keep us on our toes! It’s been a few months now and although we’re still trying to work out the kinks, there’s one thing that’s clear - we need to diversify the use of pin formats moving into 2021. 

In the photos above I broke down what each type of pin is and when you should use them, but I wanted to give you a little more explanation as to WHY you should consider using each of these pin formats and the benefits it can have on your account! 

📌 Static Pins - These are the easiest pins to create, which helps us stay consistent on the platform. Pinterest loves consistency and will reward you for it! 

📌 Video Pins - Video pins are killing it on Pinterest right now with 3x more views this year than last and are expected to continue to be successful moving into 2021. They tend to catch people's attention, which in turn improves visibility and engagement. There’s a huge opportunity for growth here! If you don’t use video in your content, try adding animation to your static pins to turn them into video pins! This is superrrr easy to do in canva! 

📌 Story Pins - Story pins are still in their beta phase and aren't available to everyone, or in every country, yet but if you do have access to them, you should definitely consider trying them out! These pins currently don’t have the ability to link to an external website but they are great for brand awareness and increasing overall engagement on your account. Because this is a new feature, Pinterest is pushing them out to users like wildfire and they’re getting a crazy amount of engagement. Take advantage of this! 

If you live in the US and want to try out story pins, DM me and I’ll show you how to request access! 🤗 Be on the lookout Canada, they’re coming to you next! 

📌 Carousel Pins - Up until recently carousel pins were only available to use with paid ads but you can now use them organically as well. This is a big win for product sellers because it enables you to display a collection of products or different views and colors of the same product.

Which pin are you most interested in trying out? ⬇️
    In this day and age instant gratification is basic In this day and age instant gratification is basically ingrained in our DNA 🧬 We want what we want when we want it right? The problem is, sometimes the instant gratification mentality gets in the way of our long term success. 👎🏻

When I first got started using Pinterest it was actually for a lifestyle and food blog. In my mind... I write a blog post, I put it on Pinterest, and I should instantly have hundreds of people flocking to my website to read it! In reality, that’s just not how it works and I was definitely a little disappointed... but hey you don’t know what you don’t know right? 

I decided not to give up and found out later, the results were well worth the wait. ✨

It’s not uncommon for people to come to me with the concern of low engagement in the first month of using Pinterest for their business. Pinterest is capable of driving tons of traffic to your website and funneling leads into your business - nearly on autopilot - but what a lot of people don’t realize is success won’t happen overnight. It actually takes 3 - 6 months to start seeing real results on Pinterest when you first get started using the platform. 

When done right, and given a sufficient amount of time, Pinterest can really bring home the bacon 🥓. Don’t let the 3 to 6 months waiting period deter you from the platform. Good things take time. Pinterest is definitely one of those good things with long lasting results! 

What’s your number one question when it comes to using Pinterest for your business? ⬇️
    There’s only two months left in the year! Let’ There’s only two months left in the year! Let’s make the rest of 2020 count! 

Did you know only 8% of people actually stick to the resolutions they make at the beginning of the year? Personally, I think a lot of people (myself included) give up because of overwhelm. We set huge goals for ourselves without breaking them down into actionable manageable steps and our brains say… NOPE 🤯.  

This year I decided to change things up. I started setting small monthly goals for myself and I’ve accomplished so much more than I ever thought possible. If you’re feeling overwhelmed headed into the last couple months of the year, this might help you as well! Choose a few attainable small goals, focus on one thing at a time, and take each project on step by step. 

For the last two months of the year, I’ve decided to dive into the backend of my business and head into 2021 with a bang! 

I’ll be focusing on 2 things: 

1.  My client experience - because although it’s already pretty great 💁🏻‍♀️ there’s always room for improvement and my clients deserve the absolute best! I’m talking the Pinterest management equivalent to a stay at a luxury beach front resort. mmhmm fancy! 

2. Project management organization - So I can work more efficiently and get more done in my day to day life. The more efficient I can be, the more clients I can take on, and the more impact I will have helping all you badass biz owners up level your business with Pinterest! 💃

Between client work, these two projects, AND the holidays I think I’ll be kept verrry busy but I’m so so excited to take on the work, step by step, and knock out these goals before 2020 is over! 

What do you want to accomplish in the 2020 home stretch? I’d love to hear about it! Comment below ⬇️
    Before we get the ball rolling I want to debunk on Before we get the ball rolling I want to debunk one of the biggest Pinterest myths of all time: "Pinterest is just a place where women go to find recipes, home decor, and fashion." This is just simply not true. 

For the past 10 years, I’ve been using Pinterest to plan out my entire life and there are over 400 million people on Pinterest doing the same thing - searching for all sorts of things from parenting, to online business, to fitness, to finances, to you name it. If you dream it up, it’s probably on Pinterest.

So let's get to what really matters, is Pinterest right for your business? Here's a few things you can do to find out.

📌 Do a simple search. Think about what you do, what you sell, what you blog about and type those keywords into the search bar on Pinterest. Do you see similar topics or products to what you do or sell in the results? If you find pins, boards, and other profiles similar to your business - there is a market for you on Pinterest.

📌 Ask your audience. Email your list, post in a Facebook group, do an Instagram poll. Do they use Pinterest? If your current audience is on Pinterest, odds are a lot more people just like them are using Pinterest as well. 

📌 If you have a website, check out your Google analytics. Go to Acquisition ⇒ All Traffic ⇒ Source/Medium ⇒ Enter "Pinterest" in the search bar. Are you already getting traffic from Pinterest to your website? Oooo girl, there's so much potential there! That means your audience is saving your content onto Pinterest themselves.

Side note: Did you know you can also use Pinterest to drive traffic to your Instagram, Youtube, Facebook and Etsy shops? If you don't have a website, it doesn't mean that Pinterest Isn't for you.

👍🏻 If you answered yes to even just one of these questions, it’s definitely worth considering investing some of your time into Pinterest marketing! 

👎🏻 If you answered NO to ALL 3 questions. Pinterest marketing is not for you. It would be a smart move to invest your time elsewhere. 

So, What do you think? Is Pinterest right for your business? I'd love to hear your thoughts ⬇️
    This picture was taken after a perfect day at the This picture was taken after a perfect day at the Los Angeles Flower Market 🌻 (aka my happy place) That day I brought home the cutest little pink succulent. I have to say, I regret now not taking a picture of the pretty little plant when I got it, cause well, today it’s rather grim. You see… I killed it. Killed it dead (oops!) 

Wondering how on earth I killed what is considered an unkillable plant? Because I treated it like all my other plants. It’s a plant right? Plants need water but succulents are different, if they get too much water, it will drown and result in a very very dead plant… 

Same goes for social platforms. If you’re using the same strategies and techniques you learned for Instagram or Facebook on Pinterest, it's not going to work for you. Why? Because Pinterest is different. People don’t behave in the same way on Pinterest as they do on other platforms. 

Instagram and Facebook are places for you to nurture your audience, Pinterest is a place for people to discover you. It’s the very tip top of the funnel. So if you want to be successful on Pinterest, you have to create a strategy that’s Pinterest specific.

This includes the strategies used to get people off of Pinterest and onto your content, as well as the strategies used behind the content itself to convert those people into clients or customers. 

If you’re reading this thinking, oh shit, I think I totally killed Pinterest like you killed your beloved succulent, I assure you, you’re not alone. The best part, it’s totally revivable! So if you’ve taken a shot at Pinterest in the past, I encourage you to get back out there and try again! 

It will be different this time. This time you have me on your side already cheering you on and ready to help you along the way! 💕
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