Tips for Growing Your Online Business Through SEO & Pinterest
You can build an online business that grows sustainably and consistently with a smart SEO marketing strategy.
SEO is search engine optimization, and it means that your website is set up in a way that your pages and blog posts appear high up in Google keyword searches for your specific topics.
You can dramatically increase the right traffic to your website by harnessing the power of Pinterest and Google together.
Growing your reach on Pinterest, the world's largest visual search engine, works synergistically to improve your overall Google Ranking.
Google is the number one website and search engine in the world.
Billions of people use Google every day to search for what they want to know.
If your content is seen as informative, educational, and content that people are looking for, then Google will share your website links in search engine queries, bringing tons of new interested visitors to your website.
Google brings 65% of my website traffic to my website, and is my number one most important website referral source.
I love how I get messages from people who said that specific words or ideas came into their mind (my clients often tell me that search terms came to them in meditation or dreams, which is so cool), and then they Googled these specific words and found my website on the first page of Google, leading them to become clients and community members.
This is especially important information for wellness entrepreneurs, women entrepreneurs, and anyone in online business.
I've been blogging on my current website since 2013, and it's amazing how certain blog posts continue to bring thousands of new visitors to my website all the time through Google, even ones that are three or five years old.
I recently realized an interesting connection between Pinterest and Google that supports my website's SEO.
There are certain popular pins on Pinterest that bring a consistent flow of traffic to my website, often to older articles and blog posts.
While Pinterest brings in just 5% of my website traffic, I've realized that the same posts that are popular on Pinterest, are also my highest referring links from Google searches.
No one really knows exactly how Google tracks Pinterest, but since Pinterest is the most popular visual search engine, Google is definitely paying attention to what is popular on Pinterest.
If people are liking certain posts on Pinterest, then Google may decide that it's also an important link they should pay attention to, and it will increase the significance of that link in their own search engines.
That's what I believe is happening with my popular blog posts, as some of them were not highly engaged with right away when I published them, but are growing in popularity as the years go by - after their Pins gained traction on Pinterest.
Pinterest is not to be underestimated for it's power to enhance your website's SEO and help get you ranked on the first page of Google topic searches for keywords in your field of expertise.
Though Pinterest generates about 5% of all website traffic today, I believe that the more engagement you have on Pinterest, the more Google ALSO increases your website's importance, leading to 13x more targeted referrals to your site online.
There are multiple areas of influence that support your Pinterest ranking.
First, you want to have your own Pinterest page for your business.
If you already have a personal Pinterest page, turn it into a business account, or if you have a very specific niche, than create a new Pinterest page for your business.
Then be sure to verify your main website domain in your Pinterest account, so Pinterest can track all the people who are saving posts directly from your website.
This is key right here...
Make it easy for people to save your blogs and web pages directly to Pinterest themselves from your website!
Be sure to include beautiful vertically-oriented images in your blog posts that are optimized for Pinterest, so people can save your posts on their Pinterest boards.
I love using Canva for making my images for my blog posts, they already have a Pinterest template that makes it easy to create with, or you can customize your own image dimensions with ease.
On my vertical images, I use photos with a text overlay of the headline, plus maybe another one or two with specific keyword rich titles to increase potential Pinterest shares.
I can't tell you how many times I've read an article online and wanted to save the blog on Pinterest, but there were no vertical photos, or any images at all in the post.
Notice that I included a couple vertical images perfect for saving on Pinterest in this very post. Please feel free to Pin them!
Make your website Pinterestable!
This is huge, even if you are not active on Pinterest (there have been times I didn't log in or pin anything on Pinterest for a month at a time), you can still generate LOTS of Pinterest referrals from your visitors creating new Pins.
Every time someone saves a Pin directly from your website it creates a new online link to your website.
If you save your blog image to your Pinterest, then go back and share it to different boards over the next few days or weeks, it will always have the same source link.
However, when other Pinners save directly from your website to their boards, it creates new online links, thus creating more potential opportunities for that Pin to be found and saved on Pinterest, and creating more back-links to your site.
You can enable the Pin it button to appear on your images on your website when someone scrolls over them. This is very helpful for increasing engagement and Pins.
I highly recommend you have Pin It buttons active on your website - at least for your blog posts as those are the most shared content links on Pinterest!
It's so important to analyze your website statistics and search engine traffic to understand how to optimize your blog posts and SEO traffic.
Then you can apply your research to enhance your SEO, traffic, and website reach for years to come through amplifying your presence on the biggest search engines today: Google and Pinterest.
Make sure that you are going back regularly to examine your Google Analytics and Pinterest statistics to see what people are most engaged with. You can learn SO much from this!
If I was going to do something different over the last several years of growing my online business, it would be to blog more, make more Pinterestable images for my blog posts, and to have been more active on Pinterest.
I've invested a lot of time and energy over the years into various social media channels, and while Facebook is still the number one biggest social media referral for my website, Pinterest is the close second by just 1%.
The difference is that Facebook can bring in traffic to new and viral content being shared, but the traffic is not sustainable or ongoing without consistent energy input into the social media site.
However, I've had posts go viral on Facebook reaching 70k to 300k people, and while that's totally awesome, those posts eventually stop bringing high traffic once time passes, and these posts are not necessarily the ones currently bringing the most traffic to my site via Google searches today.
Yet, the posts on Pinterest that bring the most referrals to my site are ongoing for years and years, and it's the content that is popular on Pinterest that is also the posts that have increased SEO ranking on Google - which if you recall is 65% of my total traffic!
You can increase your Pinterest rank by being engaged on the platform, as Pinterest loves when people are active users.
So be sure to actively Pin your own content on your Pinterest boards, as well as sharing other people's content.
While Pinterest is a visual search engine, it's also a social network, so Pinterest LOVES when you are social and share other people's content.
All shares on your Pinterest profile, whether from your own content Pins or other's content, increases your Pinterest profile's engagement and importance, which then means that Pinterest (and Google!) give more value to ALL of your posts.
Hear more about how to create sustainable ongoing traffic to your online business through the synergy of Pinterest and Google in my video here...
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Note: This post contains affiliate links, which means I may receive a small commission, at no cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link.
Pinterest is a platform that you can post frequently on.
The more posts a day the better. I would recommend posting at least 12 pins a day, and up to 50.
It's easiest to post everyday when you use a Pinterest approved scheduler, such as Tailwind.
You can start with a free trial, and it's also an awesome platform to learn more about your Pinterest analytics, what pins and boards are performing best, and what your the best times to post are.
I use Tailwind to easily schedule Pins to multiple boards, and to create intervals between the same Pin being reposted.
Another great feature of Tailwind is the opportunity to join their Tribes, where you can network with other bloggers and Pinners in similar niches based on topics, and share Pins to the tribe for others to Pin, and a great place to source other content to re-pin in your topic as well.
In addition to scheduling posts via Tailwind, I also am sure to pop into Pinterest regularly to manually add new content and to re-pins other popular images. Being active and personally pinning and interacting on the site directly seems to help increase engagement.
You can start with a free trial of Tailwind, which gives you ability to schedule 100 Pins a month, 30 Instagram posts a month, and join 5 Tribes for free to share 30 Pins. If you like it you can upgrade to their Plus plan, which I use, and gives you unlimited scheduled Pins and more.
Always make sure whatever you Pin or re-Pin goes to a quality link!
Do not re-Pin other people's content without clicking through to see that it's a legit link. Make sure any Pins on your boards are going to active links. You don't want to have Pins that Pinterest blocks because they detect that they are spam.
I hope this inspires you to create a plan of action to harness the power of Pinterest to help take your online business or blog to the next level, and support you to have increased SEO traffic and Google rank for years to come!
A lot of people I talk to and work with are confused by Pinterest and disregard it for their business - so there's still massive opportunity for growth on this platform right now, as it's not totally saturated yet.
It's essential to approach Pinterest from a business perspective rather than a user perspective, and focus on creating many boards with attractive content for your ideal customers, rather than getting caught up browsing the recommended Pins, which can be a confusing mix of suggested content, now that the SmartFeed is in and seeing posts from the people you follow is harder.
I hope this inspires you to get more active with Pinterest and boost your SEO!