Tips to Create Beautiful Pinterest Designs That Drive Traffic!
Today I’m sharing the various elements that go into creating high-quality Pinterest designs that will get you clicks!
These components will give you a much higher chance of enabling your pins to show up in Pinterest searches and give you more website traffic. This is the goal for everyone after all!
To make a pin successful you must remember:
- You need to keep the Pinterest algorithm happy,
- AND keep the actual Pinterest user happy.
By keeping these 2 pieces in mind will help you use Pinterest to drive more traffic to your website, blog or online store.
So, make sure to save this post so you can refer back to it when you’re creating your pins.
Before we get started, I’m going to assume you already know how to design a pin 🙂 However, if you need a little help in this department, you can download my free Pinterest pin templates here…
>> FREE Pinterest Templates – Easy to Customize in Canva
Let’s begin!
8 Tips to Design High Performing Pinterest Images
#1. Do not use the same Pinterest template for everything.
Mix it up! Different Pinterest designs and text will appeal to different people so try various background images, colours, fonts & copy and see what works for you.
I have noticed many people use one template for every single pin design. Let me tell you why I think this is a mistake:
- If you take part in Pinterest Facebook threads, your fellow bloggers will think they have already pinned your content as it all looks this same. This means fewer shares for you.
- Pinterest has visual search components that help the algorithm determine the type of content. If all your content looks the same, Pinterest will take much longer determining where to place it within Pinterest. This means less impressions for your pins.
- As you will see in the 4th tip below, it’s important to try different designs to improve your pin performance. This too relates directly to the amount of traffic you drive to your website.
>> Check out 17 of the Best Free Stock Photo Sites you can use for your pins
#2. Text in Your Pin Must Stand Out
You need to make sure the text in your pin design is easy to read. The majority of Pinterest users are scrolling through pins on their mobile devices, so if your pin designs are too fussy people will keep on scrolling.
The goal is to catch their eye and encourage them to tap to see the pin closer.
There are some easy parameters to follow for this.
- Do not use more than 2 or 3 fonts in one design.
- Consider making an important word bold or a bright colour so it stands out. Example: If your pin is about awesome bullet journals – make sure ‘bullet journals’ is made bold, not ‘awesome’. This helps people quickly understand what your pin is about.
- Be careful how you use script fonts as many are hard to read. Always look at your pins on your mobile phone and see how easy to read they are. Also, ask what other people think. 2nd opinions are a good idea.
- When using script fonts, use it for the complimentary text. In the bullet journal example above you could make the word ‘Awesome’ in a script font.
#3. Ask Yourself. Is Your Pin Helpful?
You must remember that a pin is being read by real people! Therefore it’s important to cater to the Pinterest users needs and make your communications personal to them.
When creating a pin always think about how you use Pinterest. You are looking around on Pinterest to help you accomplish a task or find a solution.
Let me ask you this. What pin title are you most likely to click on?
“How I spend my summer weekends with the family.”
“8 Fun & Affordable Summer Weekend Activities for your Family.”
I am going to bet that most people would click the 2nd example. Why?
- The pin copy is about them. It’s personal.
- It’s enticing.
- Best of all, it provides a solution and is communicated in a positive manner.
How? Someone searching for this might be in debt or on a very low budget, but this pin takes that problem, solves a problem and makes it attractive to learn more!
The general rule of thumb when writing pin copy is:
Solve a problem. Provide a Solution. Make it Easy.
Related: 200+ of the Best Pinterest Group Boards to Join by Niche
#4. Create Multiple Pin Designs for Each Post Or Product
Start with 2 or 3 Pinterest pin designs, see how they perform and then create more of what’s working.
Test out different colours, fonts, background images and designs. Trying different design techniques will give you an idea of what designs work best for your content.
You’d be surprised that even the smallest change can make an impact on your pin’s performance.
This is a key component that will help you drive more traffic to your website over time.
Note: If you use my Pinterest templates still make sure to customize your designs to keep your pins unique to your brand.
>> Grab These FREE Pinterest Templates – To help you save time!<<
#5. Test Pin Copy & The Call to Action
On top of testing the visual look of a pin, it’s just as important to test your communications within the pin design.
A call to action tells people what to do. Sometimes you might need to write ‘buy now’ or ‘learn more’ or ‘here’s how’.
Try different call to actions and see if this makes a difference to your overall pin performance and specifically your click thru rate*.
*See tip #8 for details.
#6. Do What works for You!
Test your own theories. You will get advice from everyone (including me lol) but don’t let that deter you from testing things for yourself.
Example: I have always heard that pins with images showing a face don’t do well as they are apparently distracting, yet they perform extremely well for my personal development blog content. Check out this pin that drives more people to my personal development site than any other pin!
When I started blogging I also used to hear that red never did well, yet this pin is another top performer!
I think different styles of pins can work for different styles of content, so test your own theories.
Moral of the Pin Design story:
Get creative, try new things and see what performs for you!
How are you improving your Pinterest game? Grab these 8 design tips for high performing pins. #pinterestmarketing #socialmediamarketing Click To Tweet
#7. Use The Right Keywords in Your Pin Description
Utilize Pinterest search to see what keywords people are using to search for content. Now, make sure to use these specific keywords in your pin descriptions.
How can you find the right keywords in Pinterest?
It’s super simple. Simply go to the Pinterest search bar and start typing in your query.
The results that are auto-populated are also some of the top terms people are searching for.
If you also just search for your base keyword – example ‘bullet journal’ and click enter you are given a load of relevant keyword suggestions.
These are used to help the Pinterest user narrow their search, but this also helps content publishers understand what keywords to target in their descriptions.
This is also a great way to do a little research in advance to help you come up with content ideas.
#8. Understand Your Pinterest Analytics
Figure out the click-through rate of your most popular pins. This will determine how well your content is actually performing. After all, your #1 goal is to drive traffic to your website.
Your CTR Formula: Link Clicks divided by Closeups x 100. If this number is over 50%+ you are doing well. Keep working hard to increase this number even more.
With the above example, the CTR is 68%. This is a great click-through rate, but of course, I am always testing different tactics from this page to keep increasing it!
It’s also important to look at your Pinterest metrics every month so you can see what’s performing over time. This is a great way to keep track of the traffic Pinterest is driving to your website.
*To begin tracking your Pinterest metrics, download these FREE printable Pinterest metrics & optimization worksheets…
Related: Pinterest Analytics Metrics to Track Every Month + Free Pinterest Worksheets
A final note. Designing High Performing Pinterest Pins
The above tips I have provided once implemented will give you more control over how your pins are performing. It might seem like a lot but once you start using these tips it will become second nature.
Also, know that how a pin performs is down to consumer interest.
If your topic is really niche, it may have a lower impression count, but really high link clicks or repins. Or you might have a really popular topic that has high impressions and a lower click-thru rate. This is down to stiffer competition.
By understanding what works for your pins and how they perform will enable you to understand trends and will ultimately help you improve performance over time.
Best of luck!
Yolanda
Have a Pinterest Design Question?
Leave it in the comments below!
Related Pinterest Content:
- How to Get More Pinterest Followers in 10 Steps
- Need more Pinterest Help? Sign up for an account audit.
- Pinteresting Strategies – The Popular Manual Pinning Course
- 10 Feminine Pinterest Templates – Made in Canva
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Some great tips here – I’ll be referring back to this post often. Thanks!
Hey Abbey! That’s great 🙂 So glad it’s useful for you.
I’ve been researching better ways to get my pins circulating more. This post has been the most thorough that I’ve read so far! Thank you for these wonderful tips.
Hi Shea! I’m so happy to hear this post had some info that helped 🙂 I will have a lot more to come!! Cheers 🙂
These are great tips Yolanda! I especially agree with your tip about not using the same template for every pin. I think that gets boring quickly for Pinterest users and also boring for yourself to make. I have to say designing pins is one of my favourite parts of blogging and trying different looks is what makes it interesting!
Hey Sabrina! Thanks! I’m with you. I love trying new designs. It makes my creative side happy. Oh and I can tell you love designing as it shows in the quality of your pins which are amazing 🙂
This was so helpful. I’m always trying to improve my Pinterest game! I didn’t know using different designs was helpful, Ill definitely will be trying that more.
Hi Courtney. So glad this was helpful for you!! All the best 🙂
Yolanda, I wished I had read this post two weeks ago. We just rebuilt our site which meant being stagnant for 4 months. I did use the same template to create all new pins for the entire site to keep them cohesive. But I will be following your information from this point on!
Hi Carrie! Not to worry about using 1 template for the whole site. I recommend creating multiple pins for each post anyway, so you can test out some new designs when you create more 🙂 Best of luck!!
Great tips on Pinterest pin design. I learned a thing or two here.
I am glad to know that I can change my pin styles because I am tried of using the same 3. Thanks for sharing these tips!
Absolutely! Always try new designs and ideas to see whether it impacts your performance for the better. Have fun creating new designs as well!
Great tips Yolanda. #3 is tough for me. I struggle with great captions, but focusing on your reader is key! Since I am creating multiple pins, I try to mix them up some will focus on the reader, and I may throw in one or two that don’t.
Hi Ashley. A lot of these tactics help if you are constantly testing them out and it sounds like you are! Over time you’ll be able to see a pattern in the pin designs & keywords that are working well – i.e. driving traffic!
Such amazing advice, Yolanda! You certainly know your stuff when it comes to Pinterest, and I am so grateful for your help!
Hi Alex! Thanks so much. I have always been a Pinterest lover since the beginning of time. So glad I’ve been able to help you in your business which I know is translating into great traffic. 🙂
I’m still struggling to master pin design — what I like (white text with maybe one color against a dark overlay) seems to not be what Pinterest wants or at least not what ends up in the Smartfeed. I downloaded your free templates and I really like those; they’ve given me a new direction to try with my pins. These tips have given me some ideas for my next pin design experiment.
Hi Rebecca, Yes, it’s funny sometimes pins that we personally don’t like the look of can perform wlel on Pinterest! So it’s all about testing lots of different strategies, colours, fonts. Also different people are attracted to different imagery and colours so creating multiple pins for each post is a great way to increase your impressions resulting in more traffic to your site 🙂 Best of luck and I hope you enjoy using the Pin templates!
These are great tips! Pinterest drives so much traffic having great pins is key to success. Thanks for the reminder on phrasing of the pin language.
Thanks Jennifer! I hope they help out 🙂
These are all great tips! I’ve been trying to mix up my pin designs lately because I found myself falling back into the same designs over and over again. It’s easy to get into a design rut sometimes!
Hey Emily 🙂 That’s great! Changing up your designs is the key to seeing what performs best for your content.
Great tips! I know I need to do more with Pinterest, and analyzing what pins do well is one of them. I’m sure I can learn a lot by testing; it just takes time!
Hi Colleen, Analyzing your pin performance is definitely important. That way when you are creating more pins in the future you can take learnings from past pins on what worked – and use these to create the ultimate pin design! And yes, testing does take time, but so worth it 🙂
Thanks for the detailed tips! I really appreciated this post. I struggle with making pins and this gave me a lot of new ideas! Thanks!
Hi Mandy! That’s great to hear 🙂 All the best and I hope this helps you out.
So many great tips! Thank you so much! I really love Pinterest and want it to be my number one traffic-driving tool! These are going to get me on the right path!
Hey Jenn! Pinterest is such a great platform, but definitely a lot of pieces to test and optimize so I hope this is really helpful for you 🙂 If you ever have any Pinterest related questions let me know.
Wow lots of great information. Thank you for sharing
Thanks for the feedback Jody. Not a problem – glad to hear it’s helpful!
Great tips!
I love the dropdown for your menu – is that a plugin? I need that in my life.
If you pretend like you are making an ad and select traffic and follow the steps to creating an ad, you will come to the next page, scroll down to the keywords area and you can narrow down keywords there as well. This process actually shows you how many people search that term, but it doesn’t seem to like some of the terms I grab from the Pinterest keyword tool. But if you are interested in seeing which ones rank best, run a fake ad!
How do you get so many blog comments? I’m impressed!
Hi Michelle – thanks for the note. You are right – this is another great way to find the right targeted keywords. Outside of the US this feature doesn’t seem to function the best (yet), so I’ll be running a few more tests. Thanks for the suggestion 🙂