As bloggers, there are hundreds of platforms, programs, apps, etc. thrown at us claiming they are the “best” use of our time. How can you tell which one is worth while and effective? Today I will vouch for Pinterest’s effectiveness, and explain why bloggers should use Pinterest!
There are many misconceptions around the use of Pinterest for blogging, the main one being: “Isn’t Pinterest just social media?”
No! Pinterest is actually not social media, although it seems to be designed to feel that way. You can connect with other people, chat, and share your interests. However, rather than social media, Pinterest is actually a search engine!
If you think about it, it makes sense. Just like in Google, you type in what you are searching for, and results appear. In Pinterest, however, results are accompanied by images, giving it a more “social media” type feel.
Regardless of how you feel about using Pinterest, it is almost a necessity for bloggers to use it, and it would be silly not to!
Afterall, Pinterest is a free tool for bloggers to gain thousands and even millions of views from readers all around the world!
Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.
Need help with Pinterest? The QBB Course, Perfecting Pinterest, will provide you with all the strategies you need to know to boost your Pinterest traffic! Click here, or the image below to learn more!
Reason #1: Traffic
The most obvious reason why bloggers should use Pinterest is to gain traffic. While you can share your posts on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, those posts only get you so far.
Readers might click on your link once, then forget about it and it never gets seen again. Plus, you might only have a few hundred friends who follow you.
With Pinterest, you can reach millions of readers, and your post continues to circulate for years.
In fact, in 2020, Pinterest had 265 million monthly active users. This is more than Facebook and Twitters user count in 2017-18 combined. Wow. I bet your thousand followers on Instagram is beginning to feel like a small audience!
Now, your pin isn’t likely to be seen and clicked on by all 265 million users, but, you can bet you will get a higher reach here than anywhere else!
Some bloggers will say they want to gain traffic from Google. This is great! All bloggers should strive to rank for a handful of keywords to gain more traffic. However, especially in the beginning stages of your blog, SEO takes a long time to set in.
SEO can take up to a year or more to “work”, so you should have a backup plan of how you will get traffic to your page. Additionally, even if you are ranking on Google, half (or more) of your traffic will probably still be coming from Pinterest!
Reason #2: Pinterest has high user engagement
Another reason why bloggers should use Pinterest is because of their amazing user engagement rate. Not only are users searching for terms, they are clicking on it and interacting with posts! This is great for us bloggers to help grow our traffic.
Pinterest users engage with posts so much, that 85% of women using Pinterest use it to plan life moments. Wow! Think of the reach you have there!
Additionally, Pinterest reaches 83% of women ages 25-54- who also make up 80% of buying decisions in the household.
If you are targeting women as your focus group, you’ve got to understand what these statistics mean for you, especially if you have products to sell!
Plus, it is not just women using Pinterest- 40% of US dads use it as well, and 20% of users are men. While the majority of users are women, you can still expect to gain traffic from males as well.
Thinking of these statistics, it would seem silly not to invest time in using Pinterest to grow traffic to your blog. While it is not easy, you can expect Pinterest to do wonders for your traffic levels!
Reason #3: Pinterest Analytics
An additional reason why bloggers should use Pinterest is the analytics that come with using a business account (which is also free!)
Simply click on the analytics tab on the upper left hand corner, and you gain insight into your readers and traffic patterns!
Here, you can view trends in your impressions, clicks, saves, engagement rate, etc. for your pins and boards. This, accompanied with Google Analytics (also free!) will give you a great snapshot of your readers.
You can also see which pins and boards are getting the most views and clicks, which can help you determine what to post more of, and what your readers like!
You are also able to analyze categories and topics your readers are interested in. This can help you determine what topics you should write more about, and what topics are trending among Pinterest overall, and specific to your audience.
Lastly, you can view trends for specific topics among Pinterest. Here, you can analyze popularity among topics over time, and even what users are predicted to be interested in in the future!
Reason #4: Pins last for years
One of the coolest perks about using Pinterest is that your pins essentially never disappear! This means one of your pins from today can still be clicked on 10 years from now!
This is one of the many reasons why you should never delete pins, even if you think they aren’t getting any attention. Even if a pin is not getting any views now, doesn’t mean it wont a year from now!
By the end of a year you could have thousands of pins posted, all linking to your blog. All of these pins are now out in the open and ready for any and all visitors, at any time!
This can dramatically increase your traffic, and even maintain traffic for years to come. It is important to have a pinning strategy, however, know that pinning will only increase your chances of getting traffic!
Even if you use Pinterest for awhile and then decide to stop using it, any pins you had can still bring you traffic!
Reason #5: Blogging Inspiration
Another reason why bloggers should use Pinterest is to find inspiration for their own writing. One way to get ideas for content is to search your niche on Pinterest, and see what topics and questions are popular.
Surfing around Pinterest can help you gain insight into what users are interested in, but can also spark your own creativity. Sometimes bloggers hit a writers block, so viewing thousands of random pins can be helpful to your creativity.
Plus, maybe you will just come across an article you are interested in along the way! It is never a bad idea to expand your mind and learn something new, even if it is outside your niche.
While searching, write down any ideas or topics that frequently come up, and see if you can write a post about it! Maybe there are a lot of posts about a singular topic, but not much about an offshoot of that topic. That could be a good idea to write about!
Pinterest has everything. From recipes, travel guides, household organization, education, music, and more, you should have no problem finding inspiration here!
Reason #6: Images
One perk of using Pinterest is the fact that you can create images (or pins) related to your content. This allows bloggers to use a visual component along with their writing, which can help with promoting their material!
There are not many other platforms you can promote your content using both visuals and writing- or at least not in the way that Pinterest allows.
Pinterest relies on images for their search results. Without them, it would just be a list of links, similar to Google.
Providing images gives users a unique perspective on what the post might be about, and can be used to the bloggers advantage. Marketers and advertisers will know this can be vital in getting users to click on their pin!
Making a good pin increases the chances that a user will click on your post. Whether your post is the #1 result on Google or the last, users don’t know. They can only judge by the pin, which can be good or bad depending on your level of design knowledge!
To create pins, I use Canva which has been an amazing tool that I use pretty much every day!
Why should bloggers use pinterest?
After hearing all the incredible statistics and reasons to use Pinterest, hopefully you decide to use it to your advantage!
If you have any questions regarding how to use Pinterest, please feel free to contact me!
Additionally, feel free to follow me on Pinterest!
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