Imagine a magical world in which you can promote your podcast and your business online, generate lots of traffic back to your website, and you don’t need to worry about how many followers you have.

Well good news! That world exists and it’s called Pinterest, where, unlike social media, you don’t need to get caught up in vanity metrics like how many people heart your posts. That’s right, Pinterest is not a social platform, but a powerful search engine and a fantastic tool to help your ideal listeners and customers discover you.

Cara Chace, founder of the membership site the Pin Power Method, joined me on Podcasting Step by Step to talk about how you can use Pinterest to grow your podcast and your business. I loved our conversation so much, that I joined Cara’s membership. If you decide to join, too, you can do so via the affiliate links on this page to support Podcasting Step by Step.

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Cara is a very data driven person with a background in criminal investigations. In 2011, she transitioned to working in social media (for Megadeath!), but pivoted again a few years later to focus exclusively on helping clients with Pinterest.

Not only did she enjoy using Pinterest in her personal life, but she realized 80% of the traffic to her website was coming from that platform. 

What you need to know to get started with Pinterest

First of all, Pinterest is like an electronic inspiration board, or, rather, a collection of boards made up of different themes. You see things that interest you online, and then pin it to a relevant Pinterest board you’ve created for yourself. Common themes include recipes and home renovations, but these days you can find a board on anything.

People are also searching for things related to your podcast and business, and they search the platform the way they would like on Google or YouTube, though Cara says the way people search is slightly different, so have a play on the platform to learn the nuances. 

What is the same, though, is that ‘pins,’ the graphics you post to your Pinterest board, get discovered because of the keywords you use.

How Pinterest gets traffic to your website

“Every pin needs to be connected to a URL on your site,” Cara says. “Every pin that I put up is linked to a page on my website, whether that's a blog, a landing page, services, whatever it is. So your goal is to get clicks through to your website. And that is why Pinterest isn't social media. Its actual purpose is to have people go to your website from their platform.”

There are three ways to do this, according to Cara:

• Upload the graphic to your website and create a pin using the Pinterest browser extension.

• Upload the graphic to Pinterest and add the URL and keywords there, then pin to a board.

• Create the pin in Tailwind, Cara’s preferred method. “Tailwind is one of the only Pinterest approved schedulers, and it's what I use to manage and maintain Pinterest accounts.”

How to optimize pins so people click back through your website

Choose beautiful, enticing imagery and use legible text, not cutesy script that’s difficult to read. 

The graphics you create should be vertical, 1000 pixels wide by 1500 pixels tall, and the images and text must be relevant to what you’re linking to. Pinterest tech is so sophisticated, it can analyze both the words and the image to see if it’s a legit match for what you posted on your website!

To drive traffic to your website, Cara recommends using strong, keyword rich calls to action, but don’t say ‘click.’ Instead, use verbs like ‘read,’ ‘learn’, ‘how-to.’ Keep it conversational. Talk about the benefits of your content in two to three sentences. Also, “Pinterest readers love a list just like everyone else, you know, ‘five tips,’ ‘two or five ideas’...”

How to get found on Pinterest using SEO

You need to include keywords in the five places on Pinterest that are searchable:

• The About Us section on your profile 

• Board titles

• Board descriptions

• Pin titles 

• Pin descriptions

What to include on Pinterest boards

Cara recommends starting with 10 boards and only posting content relevant to your ideal listener and customer, not stuff that interests you personally if it doesn’t completely align with your business goals and what your audience wants. 

“People go on Pinterest to get ideas and be inspired. For example, I do Pinterest management marketing, but I know that my audience is also going to be interested in social media, email marketing, website design, lead magnets, and opt-ins,” Cara says. “All of those things that have to do with running an online business that they're also looking for information on. So I'm going to have boards with titles that are those more niche subject areas.”

How often you should pin

Wrong question, Cara says! Don’t think of how often you should pin, but how often you can do it consistently.

“Pillar number three of using Pinterest successfully is consistency,” Cara says. “You've got keywords, you've got graphics, and then number three is consistency. What Pinterest has told us is they value that almost more than anything else.”

That being said, if you want success in driving traffic to your website, Cara recommends posting at least five times a day. But, calm down, that doesn’t mean you’re creating a bunch of new content. You’re pinning to your best performing content. 

How do you figure that out? Glad you asked…

How to find your best performing content 

Cara looks at three things: Pinterest analytics, Tailwind analytics, and Google Analytics. 

“There's two things that I look at for creating the content for the month,” Cara says. “Number one is ‘what new content do I have out there that I want to get some pins out there for?’ And number two, ‘what is my top performing content that I want to create fresh pins for?’ And you can find all that in Google Analytics.”

Make sure that you create a business Pinterest account so you can get the analytics.

How often you can repeat pins

Pinterest doesn’t want you repinning the same graphic to the same board again and again. They want ‘fresh pins.’ But you can create new graphics that lead to the same content as much as you want, because the new graphics are considered new pins. 

You can also repin the same pin to different boards, but Cara recommends spacing this out over a week, and not to pin the same graphic on more than five to seven boards.

Again, you can use a tool like Tailwind to schedule your posts, so you could do what Cara does and bang out all your pins for a month in one go. 

Cara pins 80% her content, and 20% from other creators. Pinterest likes to see that you’re being a good community member and are not just using Pinterest as a portfolio for your own work.

“It doesn't really matter if it's podcasting or blogging or products or whatever it is...Pinterest, if you use it correctly with good keywords and good graphics and you're consistent, it’s going to get you traffic to your website. Then it's your job and your website's job to convert that traffic.”

How to convert your website traffic

OK, let’s say you’re killing it on Pinterest and it’s generating all sorts of website traffic. The next step is to get those folks on your email list so you can tell them all about your podcast and continue to build your relationship with them. 

To get them to opt-in, it helps to offer some kind of freebie, like a cheat sheet, product discount, or something else they want.

“One of the things to do when you start looking at your top content where most of this traffic is going is ask,’Is that page optimized to lead people into a funnel?’ If you are getting a lot of traffic to a blog post and there's nothing to do for the reader, once they're done reading it, well then they're going to bounce off, click back to Pinterest and they're gone.”

Get step-by-step Pinterest guidance

Congratulations, you’ve completed Pinterest 101. Ready to take the next step? Join Cara’s membership and take advantage of her perfect Pinterest roadmap and get access to her community in the Pin Power Method. 

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