Between you and me, First name / bestie, the Pinterest of yesteryears is long gone
And while there may be some things I miss, I'm here to tell you that the "all-powerful and terrifying" Pinterest algorithm is actually here to help you
It doesn't hate you, and it certainly isn't out to "get" you.
Pinterest's goal is to keep its users engaging with the platform...
..which means keeping them happy...
..by making it easy to find and consume the content they're looking for.
As a business marketing on Pinterest, you can work with the algorithm by providing it as MUCH information as possible to make that process easier
That's what we call Pinterest SEO, baby.
To truly understand how the Pinterest algorithm works, it's essential to understand Pinterest SEO and the overall framework of how Pinterest content is categorized and distributed.
With so many different components at play (profiles, boards, pins, oh my!), let's use one of my favorite analogies to break it all down.
🏠 Pinterest is like a house. Here's how.
Your Pinterest profile is the actual home. It's where everything lives.
The rooms of your Pinterest house are your boards. They're different containers for different content.
Your boards could be general ("Marketing Tips") or uber-specific ("Modern Showit Web Design for Photographers").
Your boards are important because your Pinterest account is a home, not a minimalist open floor-plan studio apartment. The rooms in your house give context and tell visitors what to expect and do in each space.
When Pinterest sends its algorithm robots into your account, you want to make it easy for them to understand their surroundings.
You can think of your individual pins like your belongings or pieces of decor.
Some things, like a toothbrush, might have ONE specific place they belong — the bathroom — while others, like a throw pillow, might have a few different places they can "fit"
The same is true of your pins.
Just like decorating your house, sometimes you have to try a few places before you find the best look. In other words, try pinning similar pieces of content to multiple different, relevant boards.
The point of all of these rooms and items is to organize your Pinterest content and make it ridiculously easy for Pinterest to understand your content
Creating boards and pinning content to those boards (instead of just your profile) gives Pinterest extra SEO context that's crucial when it comes to getting your pin properly distributed in the algorithm.
Now that we have this framework in mind, here's what happens when you publish a pin on Pinterest
Pinterest crawls your pin for relevant data, including:
- Pin title + description
- Text on the pin graphic
- Visual similarities of the graphic to other pins of similar topics
- The board title + description you're pinning to
- The other pins in that board
- Your link's meta description
- If that link has been pinned before (by you or another user)
All that information helps it decide what your pin is all about, and Pinterest assigns your pin different "interests"
Then, when a user searches for something on Pinterest, the algorithm uses the search term given plus the user's past engagement activity to return what they think the user wants.
If your content matches what the user is searching for, bada-bing, bada-boom, you've reached a new potential client and the algorithm has successfully done its job for all parties! 🎉
Alright First name / bestie, I did promise this was going to be a back to basics series, and of course here I go writing one of my longest emails to date???
