Pinterest SEO Tips (To Increase Traffic in 2020)

Want more traffic, leads and sales in 2020 and beyond?

These Pinterest SEO tips are here to help.

If you are reading this article, you most likely know what a powerful platform Pinterest is for your business. But, you also may be frustrated that you’re not getting the Pinterest results others are getting. This is where Pinterest SEO comes in.

The first thing to confirm is that Pinterest is a search engine and not a social media site. You, therefore, need to put thought and effort into SEO like you would for Google.

The great thing though is that you can drive traffic with Pinterest a lot faster than with Google, which as you know can take a long time to see results.

Let’s get into everything you need to know about Pinterest SEO so you can see your website traffic, leads and sales increase.

Related: How to Create High Performing Pinterest Pins

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How and What Do I Optimize For Pinterest SEO?

There are 3 core places you can optimize your Pinterest SEO (with the right keywords).

These include:

• Pin descriptions
• Board names & descriptions
• Your Profile (name and description)

Below I’ll be going through exactly how to optimize these sections of your Pinterest profile, plus the best ways to find keywords on Pinterest.

How Do You Use Keywords on Pinterest?

Let’s first discuss the most effective ways to find Pinterest keywords.

Finding the right keywords to include in your PIN TITLE and PIN DESCRIPTION is one of the key factors that directly impact how your pins perform.

Just like Google, Pinterest is a search engine, therefore people find your content based on their searches. Having the right keywords increases your impressions, monthly viewers and most important traffic to your website.

Pinterest Auto-Fill

The first place to look for relevant keywords to help you drive traffic is by using the Pinterest search box.

Type in a broad topic and the auto-fill box will show you the top terms people are searching for in relation to your topic. The example below for productivity shows us that quotes, tips, planner, hacks, etc are all top searches.

This is your first indicator that these topics are popular and great keywords to target.

Pinterest Suggested Keywords

Let’s walk through an example in the Money Niche.

Pinterest search: ‘make money’.  I then clicked on ‘fast’, ‘extra cash’.

This is one way to find content ideas and the right keywords to target!

The below keyword list shows in order of most popular searches. As you can see ‘fast’ is the 2^nd recommended word Pinterest is using to narrow the search for the user. This is, therefore, a great keyword to target.

General Tips for Selecting Pinterest Keywords:

• As a rule of thumb – the keywords at the beginning of the suggested keywords are the most popular
• Add complimentary descriptive keywords – look at the keyword results list for this
• Include keywords in your Pinterest title and pin description

Update: Pinterest (unfortunately) doesn’t always show these suggested keywords for every niche and topic these days. So here are a few tips:

1. Try your keyword search in a different browser. I sometimes notice that Pinterest shows the suggested keywords in Opera.
2. Use Pinterest for mobile and try your search again. Sometimes this works.
3. Use the Pinterest Trends tool

Pinterest Trends Tool

The Pinterest Trends tool can be pretty powerful and is my new go-to way of finding the best keywords to target.

This tool is the best way to find your keywords and the search volume over time is included which will help you decide the keywords to prioritize for your pin title and pin description.

To access the Pinterest Trends tool go to ‘Analytics’ in the navigation and select ‘Trends’ from the dropdown.

Then simply add a topic to the search bar and Pinterest will give you a list of related recommendations.

See the example below of the results related to ‘make money’ topics.

Related: Pinterest Analytics: What You Should Be Tracking Every Month

*Also, make sure to download your FREE printable Pinterest metrics & optimization worksheets to start tracking your numbers…

Pin Description: What Should You Include?

The biggest question I get from people is “what should I put in my pin description?”

The answer is actually quite simple. Your pin description should be made up of 4 components.

1. Keywords
2. Compelling, problem-solving copy
3. A call to action
4. Relevant Hashtags

Let’s get into this in a little more detail.

Pinterest Keywords:

Above we talked about how to find keywords, so let’s now discuss how you should be using them in your descriptions.

• You are adding keywords into your descriptions to help Pinterest users find your content in search, but also remember to write the description so it will encourage users to click on your content. Saying that, feel free to add a few more related keywords at the end of your ‘ user-friendly’ paragraph.
• Target a handful of top keywords and add in a few descriptive terms as well
• Write a different pin description for each different creative. This gives you the opportunity to target various keywords and to see what performs best for you.

Tip! When creating multiple pins for a specific blog post you CAN reuse a pin description and title, but only do this is you have another pin description (on a different pin design) that’s performing really well.

Go to your Pinterest Analytics and look at your top pins to see which pins/pin descriptions are generating the most impressions.

Compelling, Problem Solving Copy:

When writing your pin descriptions remember that (in some cases) people are reading them, so make sure to write your description in a way that is helpful and easily describes your blog post.

Also, make sure you don’t give away all the details in the pin as you want people to click through to find out more.

A Call To Action:

That’s right – in your pin description tell people what you want them to do. You could use some of these examples…

• Download now
• Learn how
• Get the tips
• Try these {enter descriptive keyword here} hacks now
• Give it a try
• Here’s what you need to know
• Read to learn how
• Grab the recipe

The topic of your blog post will help you determine the best call to action for your pin description.

Relevant Hashtags:

There still isn’t a lot of information as to how beneficial Pinterest Hashtags actually are, but here’s my theory…

Since Pinterest has hashtags as a feature why not use it?! They have hashtag capabilities set up for a reason so make sure to add them to your pin descriptions.

Want more help with Pinterest?

Check out my 2020 Pinterest Planner & Strategy Guide

How To Add Pin Descriptions to an Image in WordPress:

I notice many bloggers doing well with Pinterest pin descriptions, but they are forgetting to add the correct pin description to their pinnable image within the blog post.

This is an extremely important step for good Pinterest SEO so that when people are pinning from your blog post the correct pin description will be transferred to the pin on Pinterest.

There are two ways to add a pin description to a pinnable image in WordPress.

1. Add code to the ‘Text’ Tab of the Blog Post

All you need to do is add this code to the image…

data-pin-description=”Pinterest description goes here”

To do this, click on the image in your WordPress blog post editor (to ensure you’ve selected the image) and then click on the text tab in the upper right corner.

You will see that the image code is highlighted. It will look something like this…

Add the data-pin-description=”Pinterest description goes here” after the image size, so it will look something like this…

<a href=”http://fullcircledigital.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Lifestyle-Blog-Post-Ideas-1-1.jpg”><img class=”alignnone size-full wp-image-7901″ src=”http://fullcircledigital.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Lifestyle-Blog-Post-Ideas-1-1.jpg” alt=”100 Blog Post Topics for Lifestyle Bloggers – fullcircledigital.ca” width=”600″ height=”1000″ data-pin-description=”Pinterest description goes here”/></a>

Important! You’ll want to do this to every pinnable image in your blog post and make sure each pin description is different.

Why? By using a different pin description (targeting different keywords) you are telling Pinterest that each pin is unique. You can also test various keywords so you can see which pins perform best.

2. Use the WP Tasty Pins plugin

This plugin is handy if you want a quick and easy way to add your pin descriptions without a lot of fuss or if you are not technically inclined.

Personally, I use the WP Tasty Pins plugin on my lifestyle site (as I have a lot of older posts to update and it’s faster) and I manually add the code on this site. So, do what works for you!

The WP Tasty Pins plugin adds new fields to your image. These fields include:

• Pinterest Title – You can add a unique title here that is different from your blog post title.
• Pin Text – This is where you add your Pinterest description
• Disable Pinning – This is handy if you don’t want people pinning certain images to Pinterest, such as horizontal images that don’t do well on Pinterest.
• Pin Repin ID – I love this feature. You can add the pin ID of your best performing version of a particular pin so that when people pin from your blog post they are actually repinning your best pin and not creating a new pin.

To get the correct pin ID all you need to do is look at the URL of the pin.

https://www.pinterest.ca/pin/5981411993761105/

You simply enter the ID into the ‘Pinterest Repin ID’ box that the plugin adds. See below…

Here is a screenshot of what the plugin fields look like:

**Get WP Tasty Pins Here.

Pinterest SEO: For Boards, Profile Name & Description

Pinterest Boards

Using keywords in pin descriptions is not the only way to tell Pinterest what your content is about. You can also include the right keywords on your Pinterest boards.

This includes using keywords in:

• The board name title
• The board description

The same way that you search for the best keywords for pin descriptions is the same method for your boards.

You may love creating unique names for your Pinterest boards, but if people aren’t using those terms to search, doing this won’t help you get more viewers and followers.

Pinterest Boards Tip! Make sure your boards are niche as this is how people search – for niche-specific topics. So, if you write a lot about bullet journals, have a board for this. Or if you write a lot about productivity, get more specific and create more niche boards, i.e. Productivity for businesses, Time Management for Moms, etc.

Pinterest Profile

Use your Pinterest profile to describe how you can help your ideal audience and use all of the real estate available to you.

This includes your profile name and profile description.

Think about the content that performs best for you and use those keywords to describe what your account and content is all about.

Pinterest SEO: Final Tip

Pinterest is an art, not a science so I encourage you to test, test, test.

Test various keywords to see what performs for your content. Design multiple different pins for each article or product so you can test what designs get the best click-thru rate.

Here are some details on how to understand your Pinterest metrics so you can optimize your pins in a strategic way.

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Have Questions on Pinterest SEO?

Ask in the comments below and I’ll get back to you right away!

Related Pinterest Tips & Resources:

• Before Designing New Pinterest Images, Do These 3 Things
• Free Pinterest Pin Templates – Editable in Canva
• How To Get More Pinterest Followers in 10 Simple Steps

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