10 Pinterest Mistakes That Will Make You Regret Your Pinning Habit

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When it comes to generating traffic, Pinterest is the best. There is no denying the fact that many bloggers are making a full-time income using Pinterest only.

If you haven’t tried Pinterest, NOW is the time my friend.

Why am I saying so?

Well, here is how Pinterest has been growing over time:

And the fact that many people still don’t know how powerful the platform is, starting right now is ideal.

Now, if you have been struggling with traffic, here is the RAW potential of Pinterest.

This is how much traffic a single pin can generate in 1 MONTH. Though it doesn’t seem to be a lot, the exponential effect is huge. This is because a single Pin can bring traffic for at least 1 year.

So, if you constantly add new pins, you can potentially generate anywhere between 50,000 – 100,000 sessions per MONTH.

Pretty cool, isn’t it?

That being said, the most common Pinterest mistake beginners make is that they treat Pinterest as a social media platform. The thing is: If you treat Pinterest as a search engine, you will have way more opportunities to generate enormous traffic to your website.

Vital Pinterest mistakes that you should avoid

1. Not doing proper research before using Pinterest

This is something I wished someone had told me when I first started my blog. Had I done my research before, I would have been much further when it comes to generating traffic.

There are definitely certain NICHES and KEYWORDS that have huge potential on the platform.

According to Tailwind, here are a few niches that perform really well on Pinterest:

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Food and Drink
Home Decor
Travel
Holidays and Events
Weddings
Women’s Fashion
Hair and Beauty
Health and Fitness
Diy and Crafts
Entertainment

Now, if your niche is not on this list it doesn’t mean that you cannot generate a lot of traffic. You just have to do a little research to know the monthly searches on Pinterest for a specific keyword.

Let’s do that, shall we?

If you head over to Pinterest ads and type any keyword it will give you an estimate for the monthly search of that keyword:

Suppose your niche is about Blogging. If you type “Blogging”, you will get these results:

As you can see, Pinterest is telling me that all these Keywords have more than 5 million searches per month, which is a good indication of a good keyword.

Pro tip: You can create a few pieces of content for Pinterest only. What I mean is that you can create a few contents for your blog that is targeted at Pinterest only.

This is something that I have been doing this year and it is working really well.

SPECIAL NOTE: 95% of aspiring bloggers who start a blog fail. Do you know why?

It's because they are not using the right blogging strategy and they don't know the REAL TIMELINE for a blog.

Did you know, that you can build a successful blog by spending only 1- 2 hours per day on your blog? Well, if you use MY BLOGGING STRATEGY, you will be able to do that.

2. Spending time following and unfollowing people

There is a special reason why I don’t use Instagram at all. The follow-unfollow thing is really annoying and in the end, it doesn’t make any impact.

Actually many people believe that if they can follow a lot of people on Pinterest they will get more traffic.

But the truth is: Having more followers doesn’t guarantee more traffic and impression.

A smart way to use your time wisely is to add new pins instead of trying to get more followers.

Now, I don’t mean that you shouldn’t follow anyone.

The only people who you should follow are those who are closely related to your niche. This will help you get more insights into what they are doing and you can also save some of their pins whenever you create a new board.

3. Not optimizing your profile

For your profile to get to the right audience, you must optimize it. This is something that you can easily overlook, but it can have a huge impact on how your profile actually performs.

For instance, here is what my profile looks like:

As you can see, I don’t have many followers, but my monthly impressions are around 750k.

Also, I have a proper Profile name and description that will:

Help Pinterest to understand my profile better.
Help people to know what kind of information they will get if they follow me.

Also, in the description, I have used keywords that will help my profile get more exposure. Here are the keywords that are helping me get more traffic:

“Smart ways to make money online. Learn how you can work from home and build a successful business“.

4. Not using a business account

Having a business account is crucial if you want to track your performance and get data about how your profile is performing.

The thing is: There are a few benefits that you will get when you use a Business account.

For instance:

You will have access to Pinterest analytics.
You will be able to promote your pins for more traffic.
You will be able to use Rich pins which will increase your reach significantly.

That being said, if you want to get more exposure be sure to claim and convert your website to Pinterest.

5. Spending too much time on the platform

Pinterest likes it when you spend time on the platform. But spending hours on Pinterest doesn’t help to generate more traffic.

Actually, you should spend only 10-15 mins per day on the platform.

The trick is to be on the platform when your users are active. This is when you can add new pins or save your old pins to some group boards.

Usually, I spend only around 5-7 mins in the morning and in the afternoon. This helps me to be on the platform when my followers are online and it also helps when I add new pins.

6. Relying solely on manual pinning

Manual pinning is really good when your profile is new. It really helps to get more exposure and traction.

For someone who is just starting out, it is recommended to add around 10 pins per day manually.

But once your account is a few months old and you get enough information about which pins are working, it will be time to create more pins.

The trick with Pinterest is to add pins that perform really well more often.

For instance, I have around 110 blog posts for which I have created a lot of pins. On the surface, it makes sense to add every blog post on Pinterest.

But the thing is: Only around 15-20 blog posts are performing really well on Pinterest.

Following the 80/20 rule, I add those 15-20 blog posts more often than all the other pins. This simple trick is actually working really well.

That being said, I add anywhere between 20-30 pins per day which help me get a lot of traffic than adding only 5 pins per day.

Now, if I chose to add those pins manually it will be really time-consuming.

That is why I use Tailwind which helps me spread my pins on at different times during the day.

The trick is to use both manual pinning and a pin scheduler to maximize your traffic.

For instance, let’s have a look at the optimum times that Tailwind suggests I should add my pins.

As you can see, there are times that I cannot really add the pins manually. This is where Tailwind does an excellent job.

Actually, Tailwind is the official partner for Pinterest. It means that it’s the only pin scheduler that you can use that will guarantee your account doesn’t get suspended.

If you can invest in Tailwind it will really help you out. But you can also use your free account to get a 20-pin schedule per month and see how it works for you.

Though manual pinning gave me some initial momentum, my profile started to grow exponentially once I started to use Tailwind.

Here is how much traffic my top 10 pins generate in only 1 month:

As you can see, my top 10 pins generated around 13,000 clicks.

That’s why it’s vital to use Tailwind and Tailwind Communities for your blog traffic exponentially.

7. Creating Board covers

Board covers look really fantastic but they are a complete waste of time.

I am sure you didn’t know that. Right?

The thing is: Creating beautiful boards doesn’t impact your impressions and traffic in any way.

Well, if you like board covers and you have the time you can surely create them.

But, when it comes to getting results, you should be focusing more on creating new pins and adding them to all your relevant boards.

When it comes to building an online business, focusing only on a few important tasks is crucial to reaching your goal.

So, instead of focusing on creating board covers, you can make fresh pins using Canva, which will help you generate more traffic.

8. Not creating enough Fresh Pins

Previously Pinterest used to favor old pins which had more shares and clicks. But with the recent algorithm update, it now favors fresh pins which contain new images.

The truth is: Pinterest doesn’t care about what your profile looks like. It must constantly provide new pins to its users so that they keep using the platform.

Can you imagine, whenever you enter Pinterest, you see the same pin over and over again? Would you be interested to use Pinterest?

Of course not.

This is why you should always create fresh pins so that Pinterest can leverage those pins for you.

Fresh Pins = More traffic

9. Pinning other’s people content

If you read about Pinterest traffic, you will find a lot of bloggers claiming that you should pin other people’s content. Now the ratio they usually suggest is 80% of other people’s pins and 20% of your pins. After a few months, you can change it to 80% of your pins and 20 % of other people’s pins.

On the surface it makes sense, but it doesn’t really help that much.

So what should you do?

Well, if your profile is brand new and you have created new boards, it makes sense to pin other people’s content to these boards.

But once you have added 10 pins, you should start to add your own pin to these boards.

Adding other people’s content won’t bring any traffic to your blog. It’s that simple.

Here is what I do: Every day I add only 1 pin that is not mine. That’s it. If I see something that will be relevant to my board, I will save it. Also, I save pins from people who are generating way more traffic than my profile. This will ensure that I have only high-quality pins on my boards.

What matters most on Pinterest is to stay CONSISTENT with your pinning schedule.

If you follow these 4 simple steps over and over again, you are guaranteed to generate a lot of traffic:

Create good content that GENUINELY solves people’s problems.
Publish at least 2 blog posts per week.
Pin your articles to the RELEVANT board only.
Once a month, analyze your pins and see which 20% of pins are generating the most traffic. Double down on those types of pins.

There is a thing that is called domain authority that is a very important part of the Pinterest algorithm. The more content you will create, the more authority your blog will get, which will increase your impressions and traffic.

10. Not using keywords on your pins

This is something that many people don’t actually think is important. But it’s among the most important thing that you can do to increase your traffic significantly.

Now, you must be wondering how you can use keywords effectively, right?

Let me show you how I do it.

Let’s say I have a blog post on ” How to make money blogging“. I need to find a few keywords that match this query.

So, when I do a quick search on Pinterest, I get these results:

Now, I will do another search with ” Make money blogging”.

With just 2 different types of searches I now have these keywords:

Earn money blogging
Earn money blogging fast
How to earn money blogging
How to earn money from blogging
How to earn money by blogging
Earn money from blogging
How to earn money through blogging
Make money blogging
Make money blogging for beginners
Make money blogging fast
Make money blogging passive income

Once I have my list of related keywords, I will create new pins for EACH keyword. This will allow my 1 blog post to appear for 11 different types of search queries on Pinterest.

I am sure, this is something you never thought about.

Give it a try, you will see a massive difference in your traffic.

Final thoughts: 10 Pinterest Mistakes That Will Make You Regret Your Pinning Habit

There you have it. The 10 Pinterest mistakes you should avoid if you want success on the platform. These mistakes will cost you a lot of time which can be spent adding new content more often.

If you follow the tips above, I am sure you will grow faster and become a successful blogger sooner than you realized.

I hope that this blog post has given you enough insights so that you can leverage Pinterest and more traffic to your new website.

Trust me, Pinterest is really powerful if you use it effectively.

That being said, if you want to master Pinterest, there are the resources that will help you a lot:

See you soon!