Tailwind Pinterest marketing - 5 steps to success

Tailwind Pinterest marketing – my 5 simple steps to gaining 5 million monthly viewers and over a hundred thousand visitors to my website.

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Tailwind Pinterest marketing – my 5 simple steps to gaining 5 million monthly viewers and over 100K extra monthly visitors to my website. Get your free trial here >>

You hear the phrase ‘game changer’ a lot. Too much, probably. But I can’t think of a better way to describe what Tailwind Pinterest marketing has done for my business.

Back in 2018 I was feeling very, very overwhelmed. Defeated, even. My business partner Nicky had decided to walk away from the business after treatment for breast cancer. She (very understandably) decided to devote her time to her two very young children and focus on her recovery and well-being. We’d only just spent a lot of money developing a rebrand and shiny new website and suddenly I was on my own. It was always going to be a full-on job for the two of us. But Nicky and I had complimentary skills and we’d sketched out a plan that built on these. I was confident to oversee design, photography, branding and copywriting. What I didn’t know much (anything) about was social media or marketing. This was Nicky’s area of expertise and I felt overwhelmed at the size of the job ahead for me without her.

I thought about walking away. Maybe I should just do something else? But my passion for the whole idea was, I realised, as deep as ever. I still loved the idea, I was just scared at the enormity of the job ahead. It was time to dig deep and to find a way. I’m a very determined sort of person on the quiet. So I decided to accept the situation and to work out a strategy that would take the business forwards. One that would be sustainable with just me at the helm.

Focus on what you do best

I decided that I couldn’t be an expert in every social media and digital marketing platform all at once. I’d have to do things a step at a time and keep moving forwards that way. So, I decided to start with the platform I was most at home with – that was Pinterest. I already loved to spend time there, finding and sharing inspiration. But I needed help to create a Pinterest strategy for my business. So I decided to learn what I didn’t know.

I did some research and that’s when I found Jen Stanbrook – the queen of all things Pinterest. I signed up for her free introductory course, which was FAB! It taught me how to set everything up correctly and how to go about making and sharing pins in the right way. I worked out how to enable rich pins from my website (this is simple to do and means Pinterest will rank your pin higher in search results and also display the title of your post from the page). Jen’s two great recommendations were Tailwind (a scheduling app) and Canva (a graphic design app). I already used Photoshop, so I wasn’t sure I needed Canva, but I was hooked as soon as I started playing with templates. I now have a wide range of designs saved in Canva that I quickly adapt to create new content.

Image credit: Green & Gorgeous Flowers. Discover more here: How to Arrange Autumn Flowers

Try Tailwind for free

One of Jen’s modules was all about creating a pinning schedule and her tool of choice for doing this is the Tailwind app. So I decided to give it a try and used Jen’s affiliate link to get a free trial. If you’d like to do the same, you can use my affiliate link here.

I started saving new pins I’d made in Canva to my Pinterest boards and linking them back to my website content. Using my strongest, most engaging images I created new graphics for existing blog content and saved, and saved… I kept to the 80/20 ratio Jen recommends between my own content and inspiring content from other websites.

Tailwind Pinterest scheduling

I purposely didn’t look at the analytics for a little while because I was concentrating on creating new content to share to Pinterest. I enjoyed the whole process immensely. After an hour of concentrated work, I’d have a nice full schedule in Tailwind and could leave it to do its job. I, meanwhile, could get on with my other jobs too.

Having set everything up properly, I was strict about saving new content each week to my Tailwind schedule. I only really spent about an hour or two a week, but I did it every week, without fail, for months. I stuck to the plan and time went by.

A million monthly viewers!

It was Christmas two years ago when I noticed that my monthly viewers on Pinterest had reached 1 million! I couldn’t really believe my eyes. The analytics for my website also showed that Pinterest was sending thousand of new visitors to my site every month. It was working! So I doubled down and subscribed to the Tailwind Plus option ($14.99 a month or $119 paid annually) and carried on. Each week I saw a steady, organic growth in viewers and clicks back to my website. I bought the Active SmartLoop plan (which allows 1000 pins to be added to your smart schedule) – another time-saving essential.

No longer feeling like a beginner, and decided the time was right to sign up for next-level coaching with Jen Stanbrook. I opted for a tailor-made power hour with her and we dug deep into what was working and what I should do next.

This was exactly what I needed and I finished our hour together with a strategy to build on my early success. I knew how to use the analytics properly to gain practical insight. What was really working – not just in the last 30 days, but also over time. It was all about giving the Pinterest audience inspiration and answers to their questions. In visually arresting ways that stood out from the competition. I set about creating fresh content with what I’d learned in mind. I created punchier new blog post headings – focussing on what the content would do for my readers. Less about how I felt about it.

Within a month of the workshop with her, I’d doubled my viewers again.

I realised that simple graphics worked well sometimes, but with a really strong, engaging image, sometimes just pinning it in the right dimensions worked best of all.

A few months ago, Pinterest themselves asked if they could share (and credit) one of my pins – shown above – on their social media. The effect was instant and massive – another million views in a few days as you can see from the stats.

In May 2019 I wrote this blog post about all I’d learned about Tailwind Pinterest marketing so far: Creative business idea number 3: don’t underestimate the power of a solid Pinterest marketing strategy

Of all the apps and tools I have used to grow my business, Tailwind has been, without doubt, the most essential. Without it, I just would not have been able to build up my Pinterest audience.

Now I’ve reached over 5.5 million monthly viewers, with over 100K visitors clicking through to my website from Pinterest. Single pins I’ve shared have gained a million views alone – with thousands of clicks through to my website each month.

My website traffic has exploded thanks in no small part to Pinterest – and Tailwind. Google rewards sites that do well on Pinterest, so it really is win win. My online visibility just continues to grow – which I love to share with the ethical UK makers, growers and creatives that list in my directory. The plan that Nicky and I started out with together may have changed beyond all recognition when life threw us a massive curve ball. But the new, solo plan I set off with a few years ago is now really, really working. Best of all, Nicky is really well and her recovery remarkable.

In case you are at the point in your business journey where I was several Christmases ago, I wanted to share what I’ve learned with you. I’ve condensed it all down into 5 simple steps that will set you on the right path. After following the five steps, give it a little time and I know you’ll soon be reaping the rewards. Good luck and let me know how you get on!

I should mention that these are my personal results, but Tailwind also publishes the Typical Results of Tailwind Members every year, so you can see exactly what the average growth rate looks like for their members.

Tailwind Pinterest Marketing – my 5 key steps

1 Start with the Tailwind free trial to try it without any obligation (based on 100 scheduled Pins) and get everything set up right (Use my affiliate link by clicking here).

2 Learn the basics of Pinterest as you go. Jen Stanbrook and Kristie Hill are both really great sources of information and resources – much of it free.

3 Spend time creating fresh pins for your popular blog content and add them to your Tailwind scheduler. Be very, very strict about image and design quality. This pin for example always performs well, because the photograph is strong and the graphics simple and clear. Discover more about here: How to knit a bunny rabbit baby free pattern

Image credit: Claire Garland Dot Pebbles Knits

4 Check the analytics every month or so and do more of what’s working for you and less of what’s not. You can do this within Pinterest to a limited degree, but Tailwind or your own Google Analytics will tell you a lot more. It’s so interesting to find out which are the best performing pins (quite often not the ones you might think). Sometimes a pin can sit there quietly for a while and not perform at all well and then all of a sudden you’ll see it taking off and growing viral. I won’t pretend to be expert enough to explain how this happens. In my mind, it just does and is really exciting.

5 Use smart loops within Tailwind to make the most of your pinned content. This is a fantastic way of sharing your most popular content over the year and seasonally. Tailwind makes sure you don’t share it too often. I’d advise keeping a regular eye on how your looped pins are performing and remove any that aren’t doing well. When Pinterest recently moved the goal posts around re-sharing content, Tailwind responded and altered their process immediately. They are the experts at this, not me. They are also partners with Pinterest, which gives me peace of mind that I’m sharing in the right way for the platform. Once SmartLoop is working for you, you can pay for extra PowerUps if you need them.

Tailwind for Instagram

Whilst I didn’t focus as much, in the early days, on the other social media platforms, I did gradually go through similar learning curves with each. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Steller all have their parts to play in connecting with my community. I don’t have masses of followers on Instagram but engagement levels are great – and that’s what it’s all about isn’t it? I just wanted to quickly share another great Tailwind tool with you.

The smart bio in Tailwind for Instagram is absolutely brilliant. You can include photos and links to blog posts in your bio and it’s a dream to use. You can also, of course, use Tailwind to also schedule your Insta posts too. It’s a separate sign-up for Tailwind on the two platforms (free trials on each before signing up for a paid subscription). But you can easily switch between the two platforms from you dashboard.

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A PIN TO SAVE TO PINTEREST

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