How Pinterest Brought Me Over 100,000 Pageviews in the Last 3 Months

Pinterest is an online visual site where you can “pin” pictures (and videos) while following other folks and re-pinning their stuff. I joined at the end of 2011 and quickly became addicted to it. I e’em wrote a blogpost in January 2012 on how I’m obsessed with Pinterest and board creating. Back then, I only had 12 boards. That number has ballooned to 30. I got issues.

Besides the fact that it’s great for ideas and inspiration and dope recipes and stuff, Pinterest is also an amazing traffic source for websites. Last year, Pinterest actually drove more traffic to sites than Twitter and Bing, according to Sprout Social. That is no small feat at all.

And for me, I’ve seen that power first-hand. In the last 3 months, Pinterest has brought me over 100,000 pageviews. My Google Analytics told me that and you can see the screenshot below:

WHOA! Pinterest brought me more traffic than Facebook and Twitter (which are a close 4 and 5)! I saw that number and I was a believer. Yes ma’am!

Now, I wanna tell ya how I used Pinterest to do that.

1. Created a board called AwesomelyLuvvie.com: My Blog

A board on Pinterest is a way to categorize different pictures (pins). For example, some of my boards are: Red Velvet Love, My Style, Inspiring Reminders, Places to Go, My Shoe Game. In December, I created one called AwesomelyLuvvie.com: My Blog just for me to pin pictures from my posts.

The great thing about Pinterest is that if you pin a picture directly from a website, when people click it, they’re taken to the site. THAT convenience makes Pinterest awesome for traffic because when people see a pic, if they find it interesting enough or want to learn more, that single click is all they need to do.

This board has been great because I have been pinning at least one picture from each of my blogposts since December on it. And if the picture is interesting enough, people will re-pin, which means it appears on THEIR boards. Which means it’s more places for others to find it and higher chance of them clicking. And oh they’ve clicked! A LOT.

Most of my posts have more than one picture, so I pick the one that I think represents what I’m talking about best. Sometimes, I’ll pin more than one picture, but make sure the caption is different.

2. Included a “Pin it” button on my posts

One thing that has made it very easy for the pictures within my posts to be pinned is the “Pin” button that appears at the top of all my blog posts. It allows anyone who reads my blog to pin any image from any post with one click of a button.

On my 50 Dumbest Tweets of 2012 (Part 1) post, you can see that pics from it have been pinned over 9,000 times. NINE THOUSAND!

Make it easy for people to spread your work and definitely add share buttons to the top (and/or bottom) of your posts.

3. Created custom graphics for my posts

Pinterest is ALL visuals so you need to say a lot with the images you pin. When people realize that the picture will link to something useful, they are more likely to re-pin it and click. Beyond just using a picture, text can come in really handy too.

I started creating custom graphics for my posts, with the title of the post, and pinning those graphics to my boards. Or sometimes, I’d place the title of a post ON the picture I want to pin.

Examples:

and

These images also include my URL for optimum branding.

4. Pin old posts’ pictures

Related to this, another thing that has helped Pinterest send me traffic is that I’ve been going back to some of my older posts and creating graphics OR pinning the pics there. It’s easy for our archived entries to be buried but some of our past posts are GOLD. Take the opportunity to re-introduce them to people.

I created a graphic for my Skinny Girl Problems are Real post, which was really well-received when I first wrote it two years ago. Why NOT dust it off?

This was repinned 17 times and it sent me IMMEDIATE traffic! So go back to some of your old posts and pin them!

5. Verified my site

Pinterest started offering the chance for people to verify their sites so your site’s URL can show up on your profile page. If you don’t have a verified site, your website link is just a globe. Once you go the extra step, your full link shows up with a checkmark next to it.

BOOM! Great for reminding folks where to find you online AND for SEO. Plus, it also comes up in search results on Pinterest.

But the biggest PRO in getting your site verified is that you start getting analytics from Pinterest itself. They have a built-in tool now that will tell you what your most repinned and most clicked links are. It’ll also show you how traffic to your site from Pinterest has changed over time. It’s the bee’s knees.

How to verify your site in Pinterest

* Click that pencil on the bottom right, under your bio in your profile. If you don’t see the pencil, then upper right hand corner, click “settings.”

* In the field that says “website” enter your site’s URL and then hit the “verify site” button.

It will give you the option of uploading an html file to your site’s root folder or including a meta tag in your header page.

Choice 1: For those of you who know what an FTP is, and have access to your site via FTP, upload the file it gives you to the root (same place where wp-admin, wp-content is).

Choice 2: Add the meta tag to your header.php file in WordPress. Go in your dashboard. Appearance —> Editor —> Header.php (on the right hand side). When you get here, paste the tag anywhere after the code that is <head> or <head profile>.

Press “save”. And go back to Pinterest and hit “verify.” Once it detects the code or the file (or tag), you’re good to go!

For those of you who are like “I don’t know what you just said” then ask someone who is more tech-savvy to do it for you. You can also check out The Blog Maven’s post on “How to Verify Your Blog on Pinterest.” And if you’re using Blogger, then A Royal Daughter gives a great “how to.”

But before you do any of this, make sure you BACK UP your site, in case something goes awry in the process.

Antywho, these 5 things definitely helped me start winning at the Pinterest game. Give it a try! And if you liked this post, please feel free to PIN the picture below so other people can see it too. Just scroll back to the top and hit that “pin” button.

OR

Catch me at Pinterest.com/luvvieig and get addicted with me!

Pinterest is a great place for retailers, folks who sell products, and bloggers to be. Fashion bloggers have a FIELD day on there because cute outfit pics get repinned like crazy. There’s space for everyone, really. I just think that a lot of these social media platforms can really be used strategically beyond the loitering. So yeah. Getchu a piece!

Are you on Pinterest? If so, have you found some success on there? Tell a homie. And if you liked this post, please put a “SHARE” on it! 😀

P.S. Next week Tuesday, I’m teaching a webinar (online class) on Social Media Marketing: Getting Blog Traffic Through Twitter and Facebook. Getchu a piece if you’re interested in learning how to build your readership using these two top social mediums.