How To Get More Pinterest Followers For Your Brand

Dorien Morin

March 1, 2015

Pinterest for Business

Pinterest is a great visual platform. It’s fun, functional and fast-paced. You brand can absolutely benefit from being on Pinterest, as long as your social media marketing goals include increased web traffic, brand recognition and online audience. Whether you decide to take on Pinterest for your brand depends on your current marketing budget and resources (money and time), your target audience and your knowledge about Pinterest and how it can work for you.

In my line of work, I notice that business owners often see Pinterest ‘as an afterthought’. It can however, be a huge contributor to your overall web traffic, and don’t we all like web traffic?

Your Brand is on Pinterest, Now What?

Once comfortable and established on platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, business owners eventually look to Pinterest for continued online success. The stats for Pinterest are impressive however, and if you’re not 100% convinced Pinterest is good for you and your business, read these two articles. ‘Why You Need To Be On Pinterest‘ by Jeff Sieh for Maximize Social Business and ‘Yes, You Need a Pinterest Business Account‘ by Elena for PR in Your Pajamas. It’s time you take a second look at Pinterest. If you are convinced your Pinterest business account can further your marketing efforts, maybe all you need is a bit of knowledge on how to go about that.

Real Pinterest Struggles

As I work with clients who are adding Pinterest to their marketing plan, the most challenging thing I have found is not the setting up of boards and pinning the first pins; the hardest thing to get started on, is building up the right Pinterest audience!

It takes time, thought, planning, effort, strategic thinking and continued presence and engagement to get a steady flow of Pinterest followers! Phew. That’s a lot of stuff and if you miss even one or two of these, your success might not be what you were expecting it to be.

My challenges aka struggles with this can not be unique. My thought process is that if I find it hard to get started on building up the right audience for brands, others might feel the same way.

What Does Your Audience Look Like?

The first step in finding the right Pinterest audience for your brand is to identify who that might be!

Male/Female
Age
Social Status
Income
Buying Habits
Needs
Interests
Location

Knowing who your ideal audience is will help you create and share the right pins to the right types of boards with the right descriptions and board names.

Don’t forget that your target audience is searching for you! You need to always make sure that what you share to Pinterest is easily found by your ideal follower in a search.

That’s Not All You Can Do to Get More Followers For Your Brand on Pinterest

Besides pinning the right pins, there are many others ways you can drive traffic and entice potential followers to follow your account.

Let’s look at these 15 ways to get more followers on your Pinterest business account:

Install the Pinterest ‘Follow Us’ Button on your website. All visitors to your website will have a one-click method to check you out on Pinterest and follow you. I recommend installing this button on the side-bar or bottom of your home page.
Install a Pinterest Board Widget on your website. This gives instant social proof that you are pinning daily. (Of course, make sure to pin daily, but that’s a given.)
Did you know you can connect your Pinterest account to other platforms? Connect it to Twitter, Facebook and/or Google+ and find followers who already know you and you have relationships with. Follow them and they most likely will recognize your brand and follow back.
Add a Pinterest link to your email signature. It’s easy to set up and it means that every piece of email that goes out has that link attached to it.
Mention your Pinterest account, a specific board or pin in your email newsletter, providing a clickable link and a call-to-action. This work great around holidays, if you’ve set up a board for that holiday.
Verify your website; it will give instant credibility on your Pinterest bio. It is crucial to you getting data on what people are pinning from your website!
Look up your most active engagers on those other platforms mentioned in tip #3 and connect with them on Pinterest. By liking, repining or commenting on a few of their pins first, you can let them know you are active on Pinterest.
Search for and follow boards with the same board names (keywords) you have for your business. This connects you with pinners with the same interest. By checking out their boards, you might find new pins to pin or ideas for what types of pins do well in your industry.
Follow pinners in your industry, your competition. You always want to know what they are doing and they might become a great source for pins for your audience.
‘Like’ pins. ‘Liking a pin’ will make it easy for you to find that pin to repin later. It also sends a notification to the pinner that their pin was ‘liked’. If they are an active Pinterest user, they should check you out. This might result in a new follower
Comment on relevant pins in your industry and add value. Relevant being the operative word. Don’t spam and leave unrelated or useless comments.
Mention other businesses by name in your comments. You do this by following that account and then starting their name with the @ sign. Their name should pop up for you to click on – much like when you tag someone on Facebook.
Cross promote Pinterest on your other platforms and ask for people to come check out a specific pin or board. Some brands do well by highlighting a ‘pin of the day’ or ‘board of the week’.
Join popular ‘Shared Boards’ in your industry. Start your own board and invite others to pin to it. Your reach will grow!
Use your Pinterest analytics to see who is pinning your pins onto which boards. Use this knowledge to go back and thank those who have pinned directly from your website. (This only works with a verified website – see tip #6)

Pinterest Patience

What it really comes down to is that old saying we all know; ‘Rome wasn’t built in one day’! Neither is your Pinterest brand audience. It takes time, dedication, knowledge and passion to grow your business Pinterest account. Keep it moving forward in the right direction by pinning daily, engaging daily and following new followers, too.

Let us know your struggles and victories on Pinterest by commenting below. We can all learn from each other.

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Dorien Morin

Nice to meet you! I am a blogger, social media consultant, business owner and mom to four kids and three dogs. In my spare time, I love to read and run marathons. Born in The Netherlands, I might see things a bit differently through my orange glasses.