Confused on the Pinterest best practices for 2024?
Are your old Pinterest strategies no longer effective?
Or maybe you’ve just started with Pinterest marketing, and want to make sure you’re doing things right.
Fantastic! Here’s the latest, direct from Pinterest themselves, on what you should do now – and going forward – to succeed on Pinterest.
The info below is updated and current as of January 2024.
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links, which means I will make a commission at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase after clicking my link.
2024 Pinterest Strategies that Work
Many of these practices are things we’ve suspected for awhile. Now Pinterest has confirmed them and is advising us to get on board.
It might take time for you to adapt. This is about a long-term trend and not overnight success.
You’ll reap long-term rewards if you jump on board sooner!
Outdated practices could get you in trouble, so listen up.
To find true Pinterest success, we need to think beyond the image and consider the entire Pinner experience – start to finish.
Of course you’ll start with a great image, and then you’ll add a title and description that invite engagement and add value.
Finally, you’ll reward the Pinner who clicks on your Pin with a great experience when they reach your website.
All these are important to your Pinterest success.
1 | Pinterest favors fresh Pins.
The emphasis on fresh content has grown through the past few years, and is firmly established now.
What do we mean by “new Pins” or “fresh Pins”?
Fresh Pins are defined by Pinterest as images or videos that they haven’t seen before.
These are fresh Pins, in my own suspected order of Pinterest’s preference, based on personal experience of results:
- A brand-new image to a just-published web page (including blog posts and product pages).
- A new and different image for a recently published web page.
- A new and different image for an older, previously published page.
You may also see success from an already-used image to a different board, a week or longer after the previous board, but this is NOT “fresh.”
Years ago, repeated Pins were considered “fresh” if they weren’t repinned on the Pinterest platform, which meant they’d get a new Pinterest URL. This is no longer the case. Fresh is all about a new and different image.
An already-used image with a different title or description is also NOT “fresh.”
However, my personal experience has been that updating and republishing a blog post and reusing the old image will see some success. How you approach this focus on fresh Pins depends on how much you rely on Pinterest traffic and how much time you can devote to making Pins for Pinterest.
Just because an image is “fresh” doesn’t guarantee success. A new image that leads to poor or irrelevant content is unlikely to be successful.
The algorithm favors more recent, more relevant content. These will be distributed more and seen by a larger audience.
Why?
Because Pinners prefer it. Pinterest wants to keep its users happy!
2 | Pinterest prefers relevant Pins.
Remember when Pinterest experts told us to create boards and share content that our audience would like, even if it wasn’t in our niche?
Yeah, forget that.
Consider relevance: be sure the Pins you create and save are relevant by ensuring your images, copy, and links are cohesive and appeal to your audience.
For this reason I suggest saving to only your most relevant Boards (never more than 10) to improve your performance.
Even better to customize the Pins to the specific boards.
Another way to increase the relevance of your content is to Pin content that Pinners are looking for. Not everything succeeds on Pinterest, so watch your analytics to see what kind of content is resonating.
Also be timely. You can use the Pinterest Trends tool to compare topics and determine which performs better which month.
To plan timely content in advance, follow the seasonal content trends in Simple Pin Media’s Pinterest Planner. It’ll help you Pin the right ideas at the right time!
3 | Duplicate Pinterest Pins sparingly.
While Pinterest (and Pinterest experts) once encouraged us to Pin our images to multiple boards, and then Pin ’em again, this is no longer the case. It’s now recommended to save to 10 or fewer highly relevant boards, and duplicate sparingly.
Pinterest is increasingly prioritizing fresh content for distribution, because Pinners respond most strongly to fresh content.
“Duplicate Pins” are Pins with an exact image/URL combination that has already been Pinned to Pinterest before (by you or anyone else).
You may still reshare your own relevant seasonal and evergreen content in moderation. It’s also OK to naturally curate relevant and high-quality content to your Boards, especially if it’s something you genuinely love or believe your audience would love.
Overall though, I recommend focusing your Pinning energy on creating new, fresh content.
If the majority of your Pinning is re-saving other people’s Pins, then I encourage you to shift your effort towards creating more Fresh Pins to maximize your distribution on Pinterest!
The easiest way to do this is with Tailwind Create. It literally takes 1.8 minutes per Pin created, and the newly-created Pins get 400% more reshares when you make a new image in Tailwind Create instead of repining an old one.
Want to know more before trying it out? Here’s how Tailwind Create works in an article on my blog.
4 | Create more new Pins to succeed on Pinterest.
What should you do if you typically only make a few new Pins each week?
If Pinterest is a strategically important channel for you, then you should invest more in creating fresh Pins, as this will help your content get the most exposure.
If you currently make one Pin for each blog post, article, product ,or other piece of content you’re creating, try experimenting with new images, titles, descriptions, or even new formats to see what engages your audience.
This could involve adjustments like changes to the background photo, different text overlay, border adjustments, or color variations, to name a few. Or tweaking them with the latest design trends.
Not only will you now have extra fresh Pins to share, but you’ll also be able to see what sort of images perform best on Pinterest!
How to make multiple Pins for one page.
The fastest way to make multiple Pins for your blog is to do it all in one sitting. You’re focused on one task, you’ve got your photos, and your website is handy.
If you’ve already got some quality blog content that only has one old, stale Pin per URL, set aside some time to make several more for those pages at the same time.
New blog post? Consider making 2-3 Pins for it before publishing.
Note: Making a dozen Pins per page isn’t guaranteed to be effective. You can still whip ’em out in one sitting – especially when using a tool like Tailwind Create – but save some for later!
Here are examples of multiple Pins I created for one sales page, over a period of a couple years. These have all been successful for me – but only because this topic was a proven winner with Pinners.
Some vary only in background color!
Try these ideas for multiple Pins:
- Instead of using one branded template, use a library of 3 to 5 templates.
- Change out the photo background.
- Crop in tight or loose on the same photo.
- Make one Pin with a photo collage.
- Use different colors from your brand on different Pins.
- Change up the text overlay, or don’t use text at all.
- Try a few different fonts.
- Pull quotes or tips from the article for a series of Pins.
Remember: The key is that the image must offer a substantially different experience or perspective for a Pinner! So use your best judgment and don’t try to make minor imperceptible changes to try to “fool” Pinterest into thinking that it’s a Fresh Pin.
If you have to look really hard to see what’s different about one image from another, that’s probably a good sign to make some more meaningful changes.
The more unique the Pins, the better! Focus on unique images to future-proof.
To make multiple Pins quickly, use Pin templates.
Get proven templates from Pinteresting Strategies, and start driving traffic to your site with pins designed to bring clicks.
The free starter kit contains the following:
- Customizable Pin templates for use in Canva or PicMonkey.
- Training videos.
- Perfect Pins checklist, so your new Pins perform
Click to get your FREE Pin Template Starter Kit.
5 | Less quantity, more quality.
Can’t keep up with the number of Pins you think you should be publishing daily, now that they need to be fresh?
Lower your expectations!
Many people have already decreased the overall volume of their Pinning while increasing the number of fresh Pins they post, and they’ve reported getting better results than before.
While it may seem counterintuitive, publishing fewer Pins by focusing on fresh content increases the distribution of your Pins, leading to more traffic and engagement.
With Pinterest’s algorithm focusing more towards new and relevant content, Pinning the same duplicate Pins over and over won’t result in any additional increase in your performance, and could actually hamper your distribution. That’s valuable time you could be spending developing new content!
I personally cut my pinning from 30-35 a day down to 5 or 6 fresher Pins, with no loss in Pinterest traffic.
Try it, I bet you’ll like it!
How Can I Follow All these Pinterest rules?!
To make it easy to follow best practices on Pinterest, help protect your account from unwanted risky behavior, and help you leverage the most effective strategies, Tailwind developed a new feature called SmartGuide.
Tailwind SmartGuide keeps you up to date on Pinterest’s best practices, so you can focus your time and energy on your business.
Initially, SmartGuide will:
- Monitor your Pinning and flag if what you’re doing might reduce your overall reach or put your account at risk
- Suggest easy fixes to maintain a healthy queue of scheduled Pins
Over time, SmartGuide will:
- Keep you up-to-date with the latest best practices on Pinterest (Tailwind works closely with them as Partners!)
- Provide easy, actionable recommendations on how to improve your strategy, maintain healthy Pinning habits, and make the most out of your Pinterest activity.
- Continually monitor your queue and make it easy to follow the latest best practices from Pinterest.
The vast majority of Tailwind members who have SmartGuide enabled and are publishing a healthy volume of Pins will see the SmartGuide “All Clear” badge, as in the screenshot below.
Here’s a screenshot of what you might see if SmartGuide detects potentially risky behavior that might reduce your distribution, so that you can make adjustments before publishing. The vast majority of Tailwind members will not see this indicator. And that’s a good thing!
Take Tailwind for a trial run!
• • • Click here to try Tailwind for Pinterest Forever FREE Plan • • •
Why these Pinterest Best Practices for 2024?
Pinterest is focused on serving their users.
They know that Pinners don’t like seeing duplicative and stale content, and that Pinners get more utility from seeing fresh, timely content.
Pinterest is always looking for ways to improve their users’ experience. As a result, duplicate Pins are not prioritized in their distribution algorithms and they are continuously shifting towards prioritizing fresh ideas.
Jump on board by creating and saving more fresh Pins now, and reap increasing rewards in the future.
Here’s what Pinterest marketers are seeing NOW
What Pinterest says is all well and good, but what people are actually seeing “in the trenches”?
I’m active in a couple groups where bloggers and business owners actively discuss their strategies and results. This is what we see happening now.
1 | Legacy Pins still drive the most traffic. These are older, successful Pins.
2 | New Pins see an initial short burst of exposure and then get quiet. It’s our hope that some of these will eventually become Legacy Pins!
3 | Video Pins get a lot of exposure. Try these top video tools to make some, and see if you don’t get great results too.
4 | Tactics that are improving results:
- Reducing the number of repeats on the same Pin.
- Increasing the amount of time between the same Pin to different boards.
So, a lot aligns with what Pinterest is saying. I hope this helps!
The Pinterest Practices Below Still Work Too!
There’s a ton of great info from this April 2018 webinar. And I updated it for 2024!
I’ve noted which practices no longer work, and removed or edited the details as appropriate.
Lots to learn!
Alisa Meredith of Tailwind interviewed Sarah Hoople Shere, Product Marketing Manager at Pinterest. Neither one missed a beat. They gave us an incredible roundup of Pinterest best practices.
I’ve summarized the interview’s main points for easy reading.
How do I get my content found on Pinterest?
1. Does it matter when I Pin?
Because of the new following feed, we may start to see a trend towards specific time of day that people interact with your Pins.
In the following tab, your content is distributed in real time to those following you. Pinterest does not give preference to those who Pin at a certain time of day. Instead, it depends on when your target audience is online and interacting with your Pins that matters.
2. How many times a day should I pin? Is there such a thing as too many Pins per day?
There’s definitely no such thing as Pinning too much*. But we prefer consistency to volume.
2024 UPDATE: Pinterest now advises to Pin no more than 25 times a day. If you do, and have seen declining results, test with less for a month and then check your results.
It’s better to Pin a similar number of times per day than to Pin a ton at once, and then nothing. Try to spread out your Pinning on daily basis.
The easiest way to accomplish this is with Tailwind. With Tailwind, you can schedule your Pins for the week (or longer), and they’ll be posted for you automatically.
• • • Click here to try Tailwind for Pinterest Forever FREE Plan • • •
Don’t inundate your followers with your own Pins. If they use the new following tab, your Pins will be seen in the order that you save them. If you add lots of duplicate content in succession, your followers may well take this as a cue to unfollow you.
3. OBSOLETE! The first 5 Pins – what’s that about?
NOTE: Pinterest took out this ridiculously confusing practice! Skip to point 4 🙂
At Pinterest’s In the Making conference, Enid said “yeah, we took that out” as it wasn’t helping and was just distracting.
In the following feed, Pinterest shows the first five Pins added by accounts that you follow. These “first five” are those Pinned after midnight UTC.
Click here to discover what time this is in your time zone.
- EDT = 8pm
- CDT = 7pm
- MDT = 6pm
- PDT = 5pm
The first five Pins are not the only Pins of yours that will be seen by your followers throughout the day. More will be shown after your followers have seen other people’s Pins.
Best practice is to make sure those “first five” are your own content, saved to your own boards.
4. In the Smartfeed, are photos and comments left a factor in search?
We’ve made the comments universal across all instances of a given Pin image. Pinterest is working to unify Pins to ensure that all comments show up on all instances of that Pin.
Pinterest believes that comments and “Tried it”s do increase engagement. The “tries” now require a photo, which gives the response credibility. I’m hoping this ends the plethora of automated comments!
5. How do I get Pins to show up in Smartfeed?
When you save a Pin on Pinterest, we distribute it to your followers first. Distributing to followers first allows Pinterest to gauge your followers’ interaction and decide which Pins will be popular.
The following tab allows us to get our content in front of our audience much sooner than before. This helps Pinterest rank our Pins for future distribution.
So, ironically, the first step to SEO (search engine optimization) on Pinterest is to make sure your content will resonate with your followers, because they’ll see it first. Make sure it’s engaging.
The next factor is using appropriate keywords so the Pin can be identified as relevant to others who would be interested in it.
6. What happens to those who change their Pinning habits? For example, they originally started with one type of content but now they are Pinning something else?
Lean into the content that’s really resonating with your audience. As long as it’s still in line with your business, it’ll ultimately lead to the right kind of followers.
Check your Pinterest analytics to discover your best content and best performing boards. This is the type of content that your audience wants to see more of.
It is not necessary or desirable to start a new Pinterest profile from scratch just because you started by Pinning one type of content and now will Pin a new type of content. Pinterest helps with content distribution to the right Pinners. In time, your content will get in front of the right audience.
7. Should we delete underperforming Pins to increase our profile’s overall engagement rate?
No, we don’t recommend deleting Pins.
Pins that aren’t performing well, or not receiving as much engagement, will not hurt the performance of your other Pins. One dud Pin might have a hard time itself, but it’s not going to bring the rest of your Pins down.
Keep in mind that underperforming Pins could potentially become popular in the future, so deleting them also deletes the chance of this happening. It’s more important to spend your time reviewing your account’s analytics to discover what type of Pins are working well for your audience.
I personally do not recommend ever deleting your own Pins – but I find taking the time to go back and assess Pin performance is time well spent. I also delete my saves of others’ Pins at this time. I won’t do this going forward though.
8. Do backlinks to boards or Pins matter?
They do not. Pinterest looks at the content of the Pin itself, where the Pin links to, what it looks like, and how rich the description is. We use that to gauge the value of your Pin. Outside backlinks to your Pins do not matter.
9. Where should we use our keywords?
The most important place to add keywords first and foremost is in your Pin descriptions.
Think about keywords from the Pinner’s mindset when they’re looking for your type of content. Use keywords about the items in the Pin itself plus themes it goes with. For example, “grilled asparagus” and “weeknight dinner recipe”.
10. Do the keywords in our profile and board descriptions help the individual Pins perform better?
They do. They give more information about all the Pins on the board. Always save a new Pin first to the most relevant board. That data travels with your Pins across Pinterest. Give your Pin all the advantages you can!
The description of the first board your Pin a new Pin to helps categorize your Pin on all of Pinterest.
Also, Pinterest has warned that saving your Pin to irrelevant boards may hurt its distribution.
11. Does it matter what you name your image that’s on the site that you’re going to Pin?
It does not. But your Pin description should include the same keywords as your landing page.
Pinterest is working to ensure that the content of the Pin matches the content of its landing page. Keyword matching is crucial for Pin performance.
I personally still recommend saving images with keywords as it helps with Google search. There’s more out there than Pinterest traffic!
12. Why should we be adding our content when it’s fresh?
We know that Pinners love fresh content. This is the concept behind our adding hashtags.
Hashtags filter content by most recent. Pinterest is testing and finding that Pinners love to see new, fresh content in this area. The following tab also allows us to quickly get our content in front of our readers.
13. What is “fresh”? Is it fresh because I just saved the Pin, created the blog post, or it’s a new image I’ve made for an old blog post?
Our favorite type of fresh content is brand new content in the world… so it’s a blog post that you just wrote. But those other categories count as well.
14. Make sure your Pin image is on the landing page it links to – why?
It doesn’t have to be the exact image. The Pin doesn’t need to be a mirror image of anything on your landing page.
It’s less about the image itself – it’s about the relevance and content of the image. The most important thing to remember is that the Pin description matches the title or content of the page it links to. The keywords should match.
15. Is there a Smartfeed advantage to pinning “live” exclusively, or even just a little, during the week versus using an approved scheduler?
No. We don’t penalize Pinners who Pin via scheduler or any approved third party tool.
But we recommend logging into your account periodically to keep up-to-date with your audience and with new Pinterest features. There is NO distribution priority given to Pins that are saved natively in Pinterest versus through a third party tool.
To be eligible to be recommended by Pinterest as someone to follow, you need to be a consistent Pinner, have a business account, and claim your website. You’re considered active if you’re saving content regularly.
Finally, the debate of manual vs. scheduled Pinning has been settled! Make your life easier – schedule content with Tailwind so you can keep active when you’re busy doing other stuff.
• • • Click here to try Tailwind for Pinterest Forever FREE Plan • • •
16. Is there any advantage, as the original Pinner, to repinning rather than Pinning a new Pin?
As the content creator, it’s best for you to save a fresh version of your Pin instead of repinning it. Be the first Pinner. Pinterest prioritizes Pins that have been created by the owner of the website that the Pin links to.
When you Pin fresh content from your own website, Pinterest gives distribution priority to that Pin. Pinterest understands that you are the creator and will give it the most relevant Pin description and hashtags. Don’t forget to save it to your most relevant board, too!
Does this mean we should never repin our own saves of our content? Correct. You should either go back to the web page to save, or upload the Pin image. Both count as “fresh” content.* A repin does not.
*2020-23 UPDATE: Repeated Pins no longer fit Pinterest’s current definition of “fresh” content. But they are preferable to repinning your own content on the Pinterest platform, which they do not want us to do. They consider it “fake engagement,” thus somewhat spammy behavior.
And guess what? Every Pin scheduled in Tailwind is posted as a new Pin – not a repin.
As far as saves from your audience, both original Pins and repins are valuable. Both tell Pinterest that the content is valuable.
17. Is it OK to Pin the same image to the same board, say after a month?
2020-24 UPDATE: NO!
We now recommend duplicating Pins sparingly. Successful Pins may be repeated once or twice per year to the same board.
Instead of resurfacing the exact same pins, it would be even better to update the Pins in some way to make them more timely, or try a slightly different spin. This will lead to better distribution and more engagement!
Don’t repeat unsuccessful Pins! Redo them.
“Looping” for its own sake isn’t recommended, but as it’s seasonally appropriate.
There’s no SEO value to repeating the same content (this won’t help it surface in search). Seasonal content makes sense to resurface.
18. Do followers matter? How can we get more engaged followers?
Followers still represent a small portion of the people you reach on Pinterest.
We now feature the total number you’re reaching every month on the new profile. The vast majority of distribution is still going to happen beyond your followers. This is why SEO is important.
2024 UPDATE: Pinterest seems to have returned to the importance of follower growth by using Idea Pins, which end by suggesting the viewer follow your account.
Nonetheless, quality is still more important than quantity. Better to have a small, engaged audience than a large unengaged one.
Pinterest recommends you if you’re a consistent Pinner, have a business account, and claim your website.
Next step is to add the Follow button to your website.
Make sure your followers on other channels know you’re on Pinterest.
Encourage your readers to use the “tried it” feature on your Pins. Embed the Pin on the blog and suggest they try it out and leave a comment. The natural step for them would be to follow you if they’re not already.
19. How much engagement takes place on our profile?
The majority of engagement takes place in the discovery areas of Pinterest.
Board covers are nice, but spend more attention on optimizing your Pins.
20. Is there any data on how much the use of hashtags improves the reach of a Pin?
2024 UPDATE: Pinterest hashtags are still suggested on the mobile app, and have randomly appeared as clickable links. There’s a remote possibility Pinterest may return to supporting them.
Hashtagged Pins do get significantly more distribution the first day they’re saved. You can add up to 20, but quality over quantity. Focus on somatic tags.
In 2018, Pinterest said that Pinners are both clicking and searching hashtags. I’m not sure this was true, but now they usually can’t click them because they’re not links.
21. Can a local business succeed on Pinterest?
No matter where you are, you can find your local audience on Pinterest. Optimize your content to how Pinners in your area will find it. Use hashtags and keywords that include your geographical area in Pin descriptions. Also in your profile description and even name.
For more clarification on many of these points, watch this ? 1-hour FB Live with Alisa from Tailwind, Kate Ahl of Simple Pin Media, and Kristie Hill of Blog Ambitions. Notes from original interview continue below.
Effective Pin Images and Descriptions
22. What’s the best Pinterest Pin size?
Optimal aspect ratio is 2:3. Taller may give less distribution and be cut off in certain parts of the app. Stick with 2:3 or lower. The restrictions differ across the app and mobile platforms. Squares work but 2:3 is best.
23. Do Pins without faces perform better?
Depends on the content category. See what works best for your brand or business.
24. What about “lifestyle” Pins?
Lifestyle images, tasteful branding, and (limited) helpful text on image are still suggested.
People need help envisioning the item in context. Tell them how they’d use it or style it. If you only have a product shot, add context in a creative description.
Tasteful branding doesn’t hurt performance and helps develop trust with an audience and carry your brand association down the line of repins.
25. Why avoid logo placement in the corners of the Pin?
Lens visual search icon will appear in a corner. We recommend top center or bottom center.
26. What kind of text is good on an image?
Text is helpful when it explains or contextualizes the image. The image may not tell the whole story of the content. The text can help set the expectation. Product images may benefit from added resonance and lifestyle relevance.
27. What’s happening with Pin descriptions?
(2018) Now descriptions should show in the feed for all users. Amount may vary as it’s being tested but full description will show when Pin is clicked. Longer, more helpful descriptions improve performance. Include a strong call to action to drive traffic. Tell them what more lies beyond.
2020-23 UPDATE: Pin descriptions have been playing a disappearing game lately. Whether or not you can see the description, Pinterest reassures us that it’s still working in the background to help your Pins get found.
28. Is it helpful to add a blast of keywords in the Pin description?
No. The description does double duty. The keywords help Pins surface in search. They also encourage Pinners to click through when they discover the Pin.
Don’t make them expect to be greeted by mumbo jumbo on the blog. Make the description sound natural, human, editorialized while containing the relevant keywords.
Other Pinterest questions
29. Should I Pin others’ content?
Start with your own original, fresh content every day to prioritize for distribution. Consistent pinning benefits you, so fill in the gaps with other content that will resonate with your followers. There’s no magic ratio of others’ content to yours. You only need to pin others’ content if you’re out of content to pin!
This is another one that I’ve been saying for ages. Those newer to Pinterest will Pin more of others’ content until they build up enough of their own.
I have a ton of my own content, so I don’t need to curate others’.
30. How can an online store owner use Pinterest effectively if they’re not blogging?
Use lifestyle images. If you just have straight product shots, optimize Pin dimensions, text on Pin, description, call to action.
31. How can businesses take advantage of Lens if they’re not in fashion or home décor?
Pin codes linked to specific boards that relate to your product. Click on the 3 dots at the top of the board to get the Pin code.
32. What’s going on with stolen Pins?
(2018) Pinterest is verifying that landing pages live up to the Pin content.
On your own Pins, file a DMCA. Can also report through Pinterest help channel. Include the Pin URL.
On others’ Pins, report that This Pin isn’t useful, the Pin doesn’t appear on the page. You can alert the content owner so they can file a DMCA.Don’t flag it as spam because that could hurt the Pin creator.
Report specific domains that are stealing content through the help channel.
UPDATE! Check out Pinterest’s Content Claiming Portal, where you can register your Pins to help control rampant copyright infringement.
Audience questions
33. What about Pins for products that are no longer available?
Update the Pin link or redirect the page on your site with similar products. Pins with broken links will eventually be penalized and taken out of circulation.
34. Should we edit the keywords of underperforming Pins?
Create a new Pin with a better description.
35. Should I add hashtags to old Pins?
No, because hashtags surface fresh content, and are only useful on brand new Pins (or maybe not, in 2024).
36. How do you find keywords?
Use Guided Search. Start with your general term like “asparagus” or “asparagus recipe.” The related words are based on what people are already searching for.
37. Distribution of content is prioritized to followers of all your boards. Group boards aren’t a hack to follower growth. Followers of the group board should see your content though.
38. (2018) Adding boards that are off your niche are fine if there’s some tangential relationship and stylistic unity. A board of a totally different category would require a strategy to grow its following – maybe embed the board in a relevant blog post.
2020-23 UPDATE: No longer recommended.
39. Audience sharing from your site does send a signal that it’s good content.
40. Monthly viewers are all people who see your Pin. Engaged viewers are those who closeup, save, or click. The sum of all unique users who take one of those actions.
41. How long does it take a Pin to “rank” for a keyword?
Hashtags and the following tab can jumpstart your distribution.
2020-23 UPDATE: Pinterest says hashtags are optional. Test them to see if they’re helpful on your Pins.
42. Does it matter where we put hashtags?
Hashtags can be incorporated in the description or placed at the end.
2020-23 UPDATE: I suggest placing them at the end if you use them.
Best Pinterest Marketing Practices Now
Incredible, right? A boatload of information. How can you incorporate it all?
Well, you probably can’t. You certainly can’t change everything at once.
I suggest starting with the big “aha’s” or what you expect will make the biggest difference to your account.
I personally recommend, and have already incorporated:
- Don’t Pin duplicate images often.
- Create multiple images per blog post or landing page.
- Pin only the best quality, fresh Pins.
- Pin at the best time for your audience so your Pins get engagement right away.
- Save to the most relevant board first.
- Be sure your board names and descriptions are keyword-optimized.
- Write strong, keyworded Pin descriptions.
- Spread out your Pinning throughout the day.
- Pin consistently!
Guess what helps me with almost all of these? Tailwind!
- Creates a fresh Pin every time you Pin.
- Pins at the best time for your audience.
- Spreads out your Pinning without being on Pinterest all day.
- Pins consistently!
I’m all about minimizing my time on social media for maximum results. Tailwind helps me do just that! Try it free and see if it helps you too.
• • • Click here to try Tailwind for Pinterest Forever FREE Plan • • •
I’m sure it will help you put these Pinterest best practices into effect.
Anna Preston says
I misspoke. I was going to do 5 pins, all DIFFERENT URLs, but to the same board on the same day. Is that allowed?
Louise Myers says
Yes
Anna Preston says
I sell products on Etsy – Christ-centered gifts and decor like blankets, tshirts, etc. So if I want to post 5 Pins today, I might pick out a shirt and do 5 different mockups or show the shirt in 5 different colors, etc. so that it is seen as a fresh pin, but each pin would have to have the same url. Can I, should I, then pin all 5 of the new fresh pins for the same shirt that will have the same url on the same date?
Louise Myers says
Never to the same URL closer than 1 week apart. Also recommended to make them “more different” from each other than just color. So make the text overlay or design different.
Jamie Royld says
Helpful tip! Thank you for sharing. I personally like to use a tool called Tailwind for this. It lets you automate every single thing for Pinterest marketing so that you can find fresh pins to pull in audiences. This is affordable too.
Louise Myers says
I like Tailwind too. Of course everyone should avoid using any tool that isn’t an approved marketing partner.
Nicole says
Hi Louise,
Thanks for sharing this valuable information. I’m trying to work on Pinterest strategy. I added a few boards but they’re currently hidden because they look bare. How many pins do you recommend I have on each board before making it public?
Louise Myers says
When you un-hide them, all the pins on the board will go into the feed at once, which is not ideal. Honestly I would just make the boards live now, one at a time, because those pins aren’t going to perform any better by waiting. Extremely rare that someone will look at your boards, but you could put a few pins from others on new boards while they’re secret, then un-hide them and pin one of your own. Not necessary tho.
September says
Thanks for sharing all this info, it’s been so helpful! I finally started my Pinterest account last week for my templates business. I read a comment below from someone saying they got banned for pinning too much and I’m worried the same might happen to me. I have 1000+ unique URLs to link to so I’ve been making 10-15 fresh pins a day and manually uploading throughout the day as I work, all different and all linked to different URLs. Do you think this will be a problem since it’s a new account? I’ve been doing this for about 7 days so far. Thanks!
Louise Myers says
I have no way to know what the limit is.
Jayden says
Hello!
Thank you so much for the awesome content.
I’m a little confused because I keep reading that you shouldn’t post more than 3-6 pins leading to the same URL/ blog post. So I assumed that’s where the repinning to different boards comes in. Should I prioritize that or creating 10+ new pins for each article?
Louise Myers says
You can test pinning the same image to different boards, and pinning 10 different images. I personally find neither of these effective. If you find one works for you, keep doing it.
Pawan Sedana says
Heyyyy this article was great and i learned alot!
Actually i was kind of so frustrated and trying to look put for the ques how many times to pin!
The reason of frustration is that my acount got suspended and i am not able to understand why.
I was completely new to pinterest. I started on 9 jan 2022.
I was posting 12 13 fresh pins daily and i almost not repeated any url for 24hours but sometimes i did it. 13 times with sometimes same url for some days and then gap of 3 4 days and after i started pinning again i got suspended.
I was devasted that why this happened. I tried to contact but nothing happened.
So i am gonna start new pinterest but i do not wanna get suspended again! I am sharing what i did and what i think, can you please guide me and help me out for my new account please!
I was posting 13 pins daily.
I repeated urls on daily basis and yes there was 20 24 hours gap for most of urls.
I pinned fresh content, not repeated anythung.
I did not pin anyone elses pin, just pinned 2 or 3 of others, rest were mine.
I used pinterest scheduler.
I linked to 3 4 youtube links directly.
And the problem i think was pinning to same urls daily or 13 times was high number for new account or i did not pin any other’s content or maybe something else!
Can you please let me know what was my mistake so that i not redo it again please!
Thankyou
Louise Myers says
Yes, 13 a day is definitely too many for a new account. Keep it under 5, maybe even 1, 2 or 3 since you’ve already lost one account. Plus, now your content is no longer fresh.
Do not repeat URLs for at least a week. In fact on a new account I’d wait at least a month. Most people have found it doesn’t help to do it more often anyway.
Everything you’ve done definitely looks suspicious to the algorithm. No one starts a new account with that volume of content to pin.
Regina says
Hello, Louise! You are my favorite Pinterest professional, I have followed you for years!
I find it interesting that repinning other people’s pins to my boards are not very helpful, as I thought it was a big part of Pinterest.
I have tons of my own content, so should I not be repinning other’s pins?
Maybe it is more of a tool for Pinterest users, but not actual content creators.
Louise Myers says
Exactly… repinning is for users, it’s not something that actually boosts your account. Repin what you want to if it suits your niche and audience. I repin stuff I want to save to secret boards!
Amy says
I publish planners and journals. I am currently creating multiple pins for each of my 2022 planners. These books also make great gifts. I have been pinning to both a Gift Ideas board and a 2022 Planners board. Should I not be doing this? Many of my planners have the same interior but different covers. Does it hurt to reuse much of the description text for multiple pins?
Louise Myers says
It’s fine to pin the same image to a limited number of boards. 2 should be fine, but I would space them out by at least 1 week.
I don’t think it hurts to reuse the description, though best practice would be to change both the image and the description to reach a different audience. Example: one geared more to bloggers, one to moms, one to fitness buffs, etc.
Katie says
Thanks Louise. Super helpful! Could you clarify point 14 – Make sure your Pin image is on the landing page it links to? I make several pin images for one blog post and I don’t want them all on the post. I think it would look wrong. (I know there’s a way to hide images but advice out there is for WordPress sites and I’m on Weebly.)
Louise Myers says
I really don’t have anything to add to the explanation on the page. It reads in part:
“It’s less about the image itself – it’s about the relevance and content of the image. The most important thing to remember is that the Pin description matches the title or content of the page it links to. The keywords should match.”
Katie says
I think I was being too literal about the heading! Sorry!! So I DON’T have to put all the pin images on the blog post as long as the keywords match, right?
Thank you for all your wonderful posts, by the way!
Louise Myers says
Correct!
Lisa | Sassy Boss says
Hi Louise,
I’ve heard from another Pinterest expert to only pin fresh pins and to only pin them once.
Do you think this is the best way to pin or is it ok to pin to 2-3 relevant boards spaced out at least 7 days apart?
Louise Myers says
Unfortunately there’s no one-size-fits-all answer. If you want to pin more than once, you should test it with your own account.
Some of the top pinners pin only once, and a lot are spacing them out by as much as 30 or 60 days.
My friend who’s repeating to another board at 60 days tested thoroughly and that’s what worked best for her account.
Nick says
Hi Louise
I create several pins for the same Blog post. I pin some of those Pins to my most relevant board and save some of those Pins to other boards that it may be relevant to as well. At times, I use the same Pin title, description and text on the Pin. Does that count as a duplicate pin.
Thanks
Louise Myers says
“Duplicate Pins are Pins with an exact image/URL combination that has already been Pinned to Pinterest before (by you or anyone else).”
It’s the image and URL combo. Changing the title, description, or board pinned to doesn’t make it not a duplicate. So as I said, duplicate sparingly for best results. It’s all about 1) new URLs 2) new images.
Susan McDonald says
Hi Loiuse,
My past practice of pinning was using Tailwind’s interval scheduling of a fresh pin 3 times in one week, to 3 different relevant boards, 2 days apart. Is that too soon now? If so why does Tailwind allow that practice? If it is too soon, then how soon can I pin that same pin to another board? Would that pin be considered fresh cause I’m using Tailwind? “Every Pin scheduled in Tailwind is posted as a new, fresh Pin – not a repin.”
Thank you so much for your help. You’re website has been instrumental to the success of my Pinterest account!
Louise Myers says
2 days is not too soon per Pinterest (ie, not spammy) but many bloggers have found better results by spacing farther apart. Unfortunately the only way to know what will work best for your account is to test it. If you do, I’d love to hear what you find!
Pins from Tailwind are not repins but they’re not “fresh pins” like Pinterest prefers now. They would definitely come after the 1-2-3 preferred I have suggested in this article – in fact I will add them to the list.
Susan McDonald says
Thanks so much for your quick response. I will keep you posted 🙂
Nikki says
Okay so my question is Fresh Pins for ecom, for example I create pins to showcase a baby blanket I want to sell, I don’t have many pictures of it so I end up using the same image but the canva template is different with different colors and backgrounds. Is this okay as far as making a fresh pin while still showcasing the same images of the blanket?
Louise Myers says
Make them as different as you can: crop, flop, different fonts, words, and colors. Then keep an eye on performance. Since you are pinning to the same URL I expect it to decline over time. Pinterest says they prioritize new URLs.
Pavi says
Hello Louise Myers🙂,
Such a great article and I am very glad that I have found all the information in one place. I’ve decided to go through this article once again tomorrow to make sure I am not missing anything. I am having a doubt.
I am a new blogger and a new Pinterest user. I didn’t start to pin on Pinterest as I am looking for the safer side to pin all the pins correctly.
As I am a new blogger, I don’t want to spend money on scheduling tools. I want to pin manually on Pinterest.
As of now, I am having 4 blog posts.
If I decided to create 10 new pins per post, can you tell me is this a better schedule to follow.
10 pins for 4 post each = 40 fresh pins
Pinning 1 new pin for each post on different boards that equals 4 new pins on day 1 (let’s say Mon). Pinning the same pin 1 of the 4 different posts to different boards (2nd round) after a 4-day gap(if I am right it is Friday).
Now pinning 2nd new pin for each of the 4 posts on different boards on day 2(Tue). Pinning the same pin 2 of the 4 different posts(2nd round) after a 4-day gap(Saturday).
And continuing this process until all the fresh pins and relevant boards ends. Is this assumption right?
Another doubt – Pinterest is saying that we should pin our pins up to 10 relevant boards. Pinning the same pin to 10 relevant boards with some time interval, whether it will be considered as 10 new pins or repins?
Another doubt – if I pin one pin from a blog post that has a unique URL how many days should I wait to pin a new fresh pin or repin the same pin for that URL on Pinterest?
Thanks for your reply in advance🙃🙃
Louise Myers says
There’s no verified answer to your questions. However, in my experience, the first pin from a new URL to the first, most relevant board is likely to get the most traction.
My suggestion to you, as a new blogger you should concentrate on creating more blog content instead of more pins for Pinterest. More blog content will be a win for search engines, Pinterest, social media, and your readers. Win-win-win-win.
Sam says
Thanks so much for this info! There’s only one thing that confuses me and I hope you can straighten me out. I know we aren’t supposed to “repin” the same exact pin from the same exact url. I know you talk about creating multiple pins for one page. Is that so that you can pin a “fresh” pin to each relevant board that comes from the same url? I’ve heard about “launching” a pin. Is that how to do it? Thanks!
Louise Myers says
I definitely recommend repeating successful pins. It’s great to have multiple pins taking different approaches but that doesn’t mean you can never use them again.
As far as “launching” a pin, that’s not an official term so you’d have to ask whoever said it what they mean.
Adrianne Jerrett says
Hi Louise,
This article is very useful. You may have covered this above in one of the queries but I couldn’t quite find the answer. I have been recommended to pin 1 fresh pin to relevant board A then B etc. up until 10 but not pin my new fresh pin until the first one has gone through all of the boards.
For someone with less content Urls at this stage this is harder to pin several times a day. The topic is photography so all the fresh pins will be completely different. Do you know if it is OK for me to pin fresh pin 2 to relevant board A etc. a few days after pinning fresh Pin 1? How long should I wait before the same URL gets pinned even with the same image?
Thank you for your amazing article!
Adrianne
Louise Myers says
I’ve seen others recommend waiting at least 2 days before pinning a new image to the same URL. I would recommend even longer if you aren’t pinning to a lot of different URLs as it could easily be taken as spammy. There are unfortunately no hard and fast rules on this, but I do mix up new pin images and don’t always wait until 1 has gone to all relevant boards (which I personally limit to about 3 to 6 boards).
Sahil says
Can we put direct affiliate link on Pinterest? If not, then what should be the procedure of promoting affiliate products there, like how many times we can promote in a day, what should be the time interval stuff like that..
Louise Myers says
You’ll be much more successful by writing a review of the products on your blog, and linking to that. Affiliate links (even IF allowed by the company) don’t do well on Pinterest. And trying to get as many out there as possible isn’t a good strategy.
Bri says
Hi Louise!
So happy to have found your page, you are my favorite resource for Pinterest guidance as you always provide in depth detail.
I wanted to clarify that if I am pinning images from someone else’s ecommerce site to one of my boards, that doesn’t count as a fresh pin right?
Also, lets say I want to pin a pair of ethically made organic hemp pants from someone else’s website. The image fits into all of the following boards I have; pants, ethical clothing, organic clothing, hemp clothing.
Would you recommend pinning to the category (pants) first and then pin it to the other boards 2 days apart? Or do you think it’s actually best to only pin to one board?
Thank you so much! <3
Louise Myers says
I would never pin someone else’s content to more than one board. Correct, these are not fresh pins. Plus, Pinterest encourages us to focus on our own content. So only pin other content for a strategic reason (for instance, if you’re in Tailwind Tribes).
Bri says
Okay great thank you! Should we change the description when repinning third party pins? I don’t have any of my own content yet, still in beginning phases but want to start pinning. Thanks!
Louise Myers says
Good for you for getting started!
I don’t recommend rewriting descriptions.
Leah Stevenson says
This article is so helpful, it will help with my Pinterest strategy I’m currently working on.
I didn’t know it’s not okay to repin the same pin again to the same board and I didn’t know about how we may be causing a problem when reporting stolen pins. I hate it when pins get stolen on Pinterest.
Louise Myers says
Pinterest says it’s okay to repin the same pin again to the same board after 6 to 12 months.