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Pinterest Resources
There’s a ton of information on Pinterest marketing around the web. Some good, some not so good. What you’re looking for is information that helps you grow your business using Pinterest in a way that doesn’t make you feel overwhelmed. That’s what we aim to do here at Simple Pin Media. We break down Pinterest marketing for you in simple, easy steps so you can tackle one element at a time without going down a crazy rabbit trail and getting lost. No one has time for that!
In this Pinterest resources page, I’ll share with you some of my most favorite tools, tips, articles and tutorials that we have used personally. These are the tools I’ve used personally or with our clients. We’ve worked with over 600 Pinterest accounts and know that you need tools that make Pinterest marketing fold seamlessly into your daily workflow.
The Simple Pin Planner
The BEST resource for Pinterest marketing is our Simple Pin Pinterest Planner. It’s packed with pages of monthly Pinterest marketing content ideas, tracking pages for stats and what to do daily, weekly and monthly on Pinterest. Download it for FREE, print it at the office supply store and take it out each time you plan your marketing.
New to Pinterest?
Before you dive headfirst into listening to Simple Pin podcasts and articles, let me guide you down the path that’s best for just starting out on Pinterest.
We have a 5-part newsletter series created just for you telling you what steps to take from opening up your account all the way through to creating your first board. Start here first. It’s intentionally designed to help you not feel overwhelmed. Just take one step at a time and I promise all the pieces will fall into place easily.
Depending on your business funding, there are a lot of Pinterest courses and eBooks. It’s tempting to want to buy them all. And after buying most of them and reviewing the information I find that it’s based on one person’s experience which leaves them with a limited perspective of what can happen for all types of businesses on Pinterest. If you are ready to invest in a course or a membership I have two options for you:
Membership: The Simple Pin Collective — this is our Pinterest marketing membership community where we teach you all about Pinterest marketing. There are video tutorials, pdf worksheets, support, feedback, coaching and me! Yep. I’m in there all the time to coach, facilitate discussion and help you move past those really tough places. We also have mentors that will answer questions quickly and provide feedback on all things Pinterest. It’s a monthly fee to join and you will receive all the latest teaching and updated information.
Course: Pinning Perfect — this is the very first course I took over six years ago when I wanted to learn more about Pinterest marketing. Melissa is a sound teacher and one that I trust implicitly. We share the same brain when it comes to Pinterest. She has several years of experience, has observed how Pinterest works for many niches and understands how to implement a strategy. It’s a one time fee with access to course updates.
This podcast/blog post goes deeper into how to find the right course/membership for you.
Please don’t rush into buying a course. Understand your learning style and what you need to help you get up and running with Pinterest marketing fast and effectively.
Helpful tools for when you’re starting out:
Tailwind — My absolute favorite scheduling program. Easy to use, great analytics, tracking, and smart scheduling. Add just one or multiple accounts. This makes remembering to pin daily super simple and one less thing to think about.
MiloTree — What’s the one thing every new person wants on Pinterest? Followers! This handy tool is installed on your website and prompts all your visitors to follow you on Pinterest. I’ve been using it now for almost four years. In that time I’ve grown almost 30K followers! Learn more about why I love this Pinterest pop up and how much my follower numbers have grown since using it.
Ready to grow on Pinterest?
You’re past setting up your profile and boards. Most likely you have a good understanding of how the platform works and you’re often left asking, “am I doing this right?” Let’s help you grow your numbers. <—- This is a newsletter series designed just for you. Each email will walk you through strategic steps to uplevel your strategy and get more eyes on your content or products.
This is an excellent time to work on your Pinterest images. What you created, in the beginning, is probably not your favorite and maybe even cringe-worthy. It’s time to nail your pin messaging and really dial in your brand awareness.
The Simple Pin Image Guide will give you all the necessary information to create the best Pinterest images the right way. Plus, it’s updated with Pinterest best practices to give you the most accurate information.
This podcast/blog post about Capturing the Pinner’s attention through images is one of the most helpful tools for our community. Our guest breaks it down into simple changes you can make to help serve your audience.
Plus, check out our Pin Portfolio from our Creative Team here at Simple Pin Media for some Pinterest image inspiration.
Our favorite design tools for Pinterest Images:
- Canva — Free and easy to use and perfect for beginners. Stock images for $1+
- Can Stock Photo — $1+ images for purchase
- PicMonkey— Paid option offering tons of features (you can try it for free for 7 days). Easy to use but stock images not available for purchase.
Other helpful tools for growing on Pinterest:
Pinterest Insights Dashboard — you have to read the data to make an informed Pinterest strategy for YOUR business. Don’t take someone else’s strategy and try to mold it into your own. It won’t work. The data tells the story of what your people like so you can create more content/products for them. This Pinterest Insights dashboard pulls up the information quickly from Google Analytics and allows you to assess and evaluate without having to dig. This is the EXACT dashboard we use for all of our clients here at Simple Pin Media.
Social Pug — this is a website plug in to help visitors share your content to Pinterest. In addition, you can designate a specific image to be pinned with the right description following the image. UPDATE: Mediavine acquired Social Pug in late 2019 and it is now Grow.
Tasty Pins plugin is a simple WordPress image optimization plugin that lets you please both the Google and Pinterest Gods. This podcast outlines why optimizing for SEO and Pinterest is smart.
Taking Pinterest Marketing to the next level
Now that you have the Pinterest marketing foundations in place, you’re growing organically and ready to take it to the next level. It’s time to optimize for growing your email list using Pinterest and Promoted Pins.
Email Marketing
I believe with my whole business heart that email marketing is alive and well. In fact, I love email marketing so much I committed to a weekly Wednesday newsletter six years ago and haven’t stopped since. Pick up your FREE Simple Pin Planner and you’ll see what the newsletter is all about and I bet you won’t want to miss one packed with all it’s Pinterest marketing goodness to serve you.
Growing your email list using Pinterest is one of the best ways to maximize the Pinterest platform. In fact, it’s the #1 reason I use it for Simple Pin Media. It’s the best tool for finding new subscribers and introducing them to my podcast and tutorials on Pinterest marketing.
Inside the Simple Pin Collective, we have an in-depth unit on how to do this as well as an expert interview with Kate Doster of Inbox Besties. She gives us powerful tools for converting Pinterest users to email subscribers by tapping into their greatest pain points. Join now to get access to this training.
Pick up Kate Doster’s Email Marketing Fairy eBook. This genius tool gives you easy templates to plug into your current email marketing system if you have one, so there’s no creating content from scratch.
For those curious, I use ConvertKit for my Simple Pin email list. It’s been almost three years and I have zero regrets switching from my previous platform.
Other people in the industry use LeadPages to be a great landing page feature for gathering email addresses.
Promoted Pins
Now onto Promoted Pins. These are Pinterest ads just like Facebook and Instagram have ads. The goal is to target new audiences for your content and gain new exposure. The beauty of Promoted Pins is once you run an ad (pin) they live there forever after you’ve turned off the spend. Here are two options for learning or managing Promoted Pins:
Take Pin Practical Promotions — All things Promoted Pins, from A to Z! Now that Pinterest has gone public, the platform will be needing more ad dollars. We have seen the add tons of great new options to the Promoted Pins platform and Monica is THE teacher you need to start seeing sales and conversions from your Promoted Pins.
Monica wrote an in-depth article about Pinterest going public in the spring of 2019 and her predictions for the platform. It’s a 15-minute read that is definitely worth your time.
If taking a course and learning Promoted Pins is not in your time-frame or wheelhouse you can outsource to our Promoted Pins team. We have a dedicated team of people ready to learn about your advertising goals and execute a Promoted Pins campaign that will increase your reach. Or you can book a one-hour consult call with our Promoted Pins director.
Pinterest for Business Tools
Pinterest has business tips on their website that can be helpful for those just starting out. however, sometimes they don’t expand to give the step-by-step that you need to implement right away. Below we will link to Pinterest for business tools as well as some of our podcasts/blog posts that expand on how to put these tools into action.
Converting to a Business Account — Learn how to convert your account from personal to business as well as clean up your Pinterest account.
How to Verify your Website on Pinterest
Creative Best Practices (from Pinterest) — How to create the best images for Pinterest and How to A/B test Pinterest Images
How to use Pinterest’s visual search tool
How to Upload Video to Pinterest
Recommended Courses & Tools
I take seriously the courses I suggest for purchase because I value your business building time. I’ve peeked inside these schools/courses to verify that the content is solid. I’ve met with the owners and work with them personally to confirm they are helpful teachers.
Genius Bloggers’ Toolkit — this mega bundle is released one time per year with a bonus 48-hour flash sale within six months of its release. It’s literally PACKED full of amazing blogging resources which can be overwhelming but they sell super slick cheat sheets to help you navigate the bundle. I’ll notify you via email but you can also get on their waiting list to be updated when the next bundle will be released.
Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing — I have heard nothing but rave reviews about this course. Blog post after blog post tell me that what Michelle teaches in this course gets the monetary results you’re looking for. If you want to learn to monetize your blog, this is the only course you need.
Food Blogger Pro — I work directly with Food Blogger Pro as an expert in their community. This is specifically designed for food bloggers both new and advanced. The information within this membership site is extensive but laid out well so you’re not overwhelmed.
Elite Blog Academy — This the mother of all blogging schools and I’ve personally seen the continued success stories this school is producing. Ruth from Living Well Spending Less is committed to helping her students learn the best way to blog and grow their business.
iPhone-o-graphy course — How to capture high-quality photos using your iPhone. I have met Chaitra and she is a great teacher. She knows her iPhone and how to use it just like a DSLR. If you’re not quite ready to make a big camera purchase but have an iPhone, this is your course.
Businesses put together a legal package for our Simple Pin community, including Website Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, and a Disclaimer Page. Even if you don’t purchase the package, it’s worth it to pop over to the landing page and get a basic understanding of what your website needs.
Outsourcing Pinterest Management
Maybe you prefer to hire out Pinterest marketing instead of figuring it out yourself. I completely understand. One of the first steps I took in my business was to hire out my Pinterest image creation. It took me HOURS and at the end, I was ready to throw my computer through the wall with the ugly Pinterest image on the screen. Here you can find a list of Pinterest Marketing services we offer here at Simple Pin Media. There’s a wide variety of offerings to fit every type of budget.
Business Management Tools
I’ve added hours of coaching, masterminds, podcasts, and books to my business learning. You can find the books and more tools I use for my podcast here in my Amazon shop.
Growing a social media management company takes time and the right tools that don’t take up all that time. Here are a few integral tools that I use to grow Simple Pin.
Freshbooks — I use this for all my invoicing needs. It takes 30 seconds and I’m done. Love it.
LastPass — This allows me to keep all my passwords secure for both me and my team.
Yesware — If you’re drowning in responding to emails, you absolutely MUST get this on your account.
ConvertKit — I use this for my Simple Pin email list but I also created a special email list for my clients so I can quickly email them updates or changes we’re making.
