After working tirelessly on my blog for four months, I am happy to report that my blog is finally making me money.

I see a lot of people start blogs but do not know how to monetise it or most importantly get traffic to it, so I decided to share what I have learnt in the past four months that helped me grow my blog traffic from zero to over 32,000 pageviews and made me money in the process.

Now why is blog traffic important?

Well blog traffic means that people are reading your blog. When people read your blog and find value from it, they either bookmark your blog and refer to it as an authoritative source, they use the information on your blog to help them achieve a goal or they may share your blog with their friends and family meaning that you get more traffic.

If your blog is helpful and you have also monetised it, then you can make money from it.

If you have recently started a blog and your traffic numbers are still in the double digits, then it tells me that you’re not promoting your blog enough, so not many people know that it exists.

If you are waiting for Google SEO to kick in then the harsh reality is, unless you are an expert in SEO and know all the whitehat tricks to ranking your blog in a month, then relying on Google for the most part is a big recipe for failure.

It takes a long time, for Google SEO to kick in; I would say about six months worth of blog time. But Google is not the only way for people to know your blog exists.

You must rely on other traffic generation methods.

In this post I will show you the technique I used to get traffic to my blog without Google. It is from a source that you would not even think of because not many people refer it to when they think of blogging.

That source is Pinterest.

What You Will Learn

• Why I use Pinterest
• Pinterest Facts
• How to increase traffic using Pinterest with step by step instructions
• My Pinterest strategy that I specifically used and how you can do it too
• Pinterest strategy at a glance

Why I Use Pinterest  

As an affiliate marketer I never thought of using Pinterest because I thought that people who were interested in internet marketing and learning how to build wealth on the internet, were not hanging around on Pinterest.

They always say, if you want to get the word out about what you do, then go directly to where your audience is.

Start A Successful Blog Step By Step

I certainly did not think that my audience was on Pinterest until I started following a couple named Lauren MacManus and Alex Nerney who created the blog Create And Go. Create and Go was a blog that was in my niche teaching other people how they could make money blogging.

In just seven months they were able to grow their blog from zero to $25000 a month using traffic from Pinterest.

Now when you think about Pinterest, you must think that it is for women who are interested in beauty, fashion, recipes.

I mean my sister is a fan of Pinterest and all she does is save recipes, so naturally I thought that people from Pinterest would be the least bit interested in what I had to say.

I was wrong.

Pinterest is actually my number one source of traffic with Facebook following with a smaller number of visitors.

Facts About Pinterest

Here are a few facts about Pinterest that you may not have known. There are over 200 million people on Pinterest with about half of millennials using Pinterest. So if your audience is between the ages of 20 and 35, you can find them on Pinterest.

Pinterest is also the number one destination for millennials who use it to discover trends in food, home décor and style.

Millenials are the largest consumer group in the US which means that they are big spenders. In fact 65% of them say that Pinterest helps them discover new brands and products to buy and won’t be afraid to spend generously with their wallet.

Pinterest is also growing to be a search engine meaning that more and more people are using it to find things that they would usually use Google for. Also because it is a visual platform people use it to search for inspiring ideas.

Now as a marketer why would I use this platform for my blog? Because I know that Pinterest users are looking for ideas and if I can get my content in front of their eyes, then that means that there is a highly engaged audience there with the capability of making buying decisions. Every marketer’s dream right?

Also Pinterest is well known for showcasing blogs so every blogger should at least make sure that they have a profile set up on Pinterest and use it.

How To Increase Traffic Using Pinterest With Step-By-Step Instructions

Create A Business Account

To begin using Pinterest as a traffic source you need to create an account.

I am going to assume that you are a business and your end goal is to make money from your blog. Therefore it is imperative that when you create an account that you create a business account.

The reason why you want to create a business account is because you will have access to certain analytics that will allow you to see how your account is performing.

So from my account you can see that so far I have had over 1 million viewers. From Pinterest’s perspective that simply means that my pins have reached 1 million users and so have had some visibility by these users although they did not click on my pin.

If you look on your own Pinterest account you will notice that pins accumulate in a feed. If your pin has viewers it means that your pin has appeared somewhere in this feed for other pinners to see.

Verify Your Website 

After you create a business account you must now verify your website.

In this case your website will be the site that you want to promote on Pinterest. So if that is your blog website, go ahead and verify it.

By verifying your website, Pinterest will be able to see what posts people are reading or saving for later. This helps you see what people are most attracted to, so you can create more content in that area.

For example from my website, Pinterest tells me that the most visited blog post was 16 Real Ways You Can Make Extra Money.

I can also see that the posts How To Make Money Online With Freelancing and How To Do Affiliate Marketing Without A Blog Or Website are appealing to people.

Start A Successful Blog Step By Step

So this data will inspire me to write more posts about making money in different ways.

This is how Pinterest analytics helps you write more content that your audience actually wants to read.

Rich Pins

Next apply for Rich Pins.

Rich Pins add extra detail to your pins from your website. It also makes your pins look more attractive and clickable. By it being clickable means that you have a higher chance of people actually clicking through to your website or blog.

Here is an example of what a pin looks like when rich pins are not enabled and enabled.

To apply for rich pins start here.

You will receive an email from Pinterest letting you know whether your pins have been approved. It should take less than 5 minutes but can take up to 48 hours so be patient.

Join Group Boards

After applying for Rich Pins you must join Group boards.

Group boards are boards owned by Pinterest users who agree to share their followers with other pinners.

The reason why joining group boards is effective to start getting traffic to your blog is because you have access to hundreds, sometimes thousands of followers.

So let’s say you are new to Pinterest. You may have 10 followers. By pinning to your account only, there is the possibility of just 10 people seeing your pins.

If however you join a group board that has over 10,000 followers, you have access a wider group of people and so potential for more people to see your pins and website.

If you join 5 group boards with over 10,000 followers each, that is a larger number of people who can see your pins and website.   

To join a group board start by using the Pinterest search. So whatever niche you’re in, type in that niche keyword in the search field.

Next go through the list of boards that Pinterest gives to you and look for a board with a high number of followers.

Click on the circle which represents the board’s owner.

Then look for any group board that the owner may be a part of.

This is a short cut to finding high quality group boards and means that the Pinterest user has already done the research and found quality boards to be a part of otherwise they would not have joined.

When you find a group board that matches your niche and which you’d like to be a part of follow the instructions on the board and ask for an invite.

Now here’s a pro tip. You are likely to get onto maybe 1/10 of the boards that you ask for an invite. So every ten boards you ask to join you may only get accepted to one. Therefore send as many invites as you can and keep track of those boards that you have asked for an invite and those that you have gotten approval for.

Make sure to follow up with the board owners every three days.

To give you some insight, I have made a request to 196 board owners and have been accepted to 36% of them. So remember you will not be accepted to all boards.

It’s a numbers game so the more boards you join the more boards you can get accepted to and start to pin to them.

My Pinterest Strategy That I Specifically Used and How You Can Do It Too

Finally… drum roll please.

This is the cherry on top that will show you how to actually get traffic to your blog from Pinterest.

Now that you have actually set up your Pinterest account and have joined group boards it’s time to put a strategy to work.

Pinterest likes active users so it is important, like anything else, that you remain consistent with this strategy.

1. Create Multiple Pins

Once you have a blog post, bring it onto Pinterest by saving it from your site with your URL.

When you bring the post on to Pinterest, your featured image will also come onto Pinterest as a Pin.

The key mistake that most bloggers make with Pinterest is that they do not split test the image of their pins.  This is the biggest mistake because you never know which pin people will find more appealing to click through to a blog post.

This is what helped me create a viral post within one month and gained over 3000 visitors to my blog in one day.

This particular post I split tested 3 different pin images and one of them was a hit which spread like wildfire. Can you guess which one?

To create my pins I use PicMonkey and Canva.

2. Manual Pinning and Auto Pinning

Next I utilised both manual pinning and auto pinning.

I personally believe that incorporating automatic pinning helped boost my blog visits. The reason why I say so is because I was able to automatically pin at times when my audience was most likely to engage with my content.

So at times when I was asleep, my Pinterest scheduler would pin for me.

I would therefore recommend that you get the Tailwind Auto scheduler to help you start pinning automatically.

You can actually try Tailwind for free. They allow you to pin 100 pins for free, then it is $15 per month when paid monthly or $9.99 per month when paid annually.

I would recommend that you pay annually as not only is it cheaper but you won’t have to worry about paying monthly. This is also a cost that you can write off as a business and after your free trial I am sure that you will agree that using this auto scheduler makes your life so much easier.

My strategy is pinning at least 50 times a day. So I set up 30 pins to pin automatically with Tailwind, then at key times during the day, especially after midday and in the night, I pin manually at least 20 times.

When you join enough boards, Tailwind also shows you which group boards are worth pinning to.

To spend your time wisely you should only pin to boards where your pin is likely to be repined by Pinterest users.

Tailwind’s analytics tell you which group boards are worth your time. To find this information from your Tailwind dashboard go to Track Your Brand Page then Board Insights.

Filter your boards so that group boards remain checked. Then order your boards by Virality Score.

The higher the virality score means that the board is alive and has active pinners repining your content. With more people repinning your content the more likely it is to go viral.

If you look at the Repins category it shows you how many pins were repined on that board in the last 7 days so you can also gauge the activity on the board by this metric.

These are the boards that I will pay more attention to as opposed to the boards with a lower virality score.

3. Blog Board

Pinterest rewards board owners that have virality and engagement. Pinterest rewards these board owners by showing their pins more in the Smart feeds.

For that reason I created a board with all my blog pins and repin only from that board. This tricks Pinterest’s algorithm into thinking that your board is a favourite amongst pinners and so Pinterest will show your pins more in its smart feed.

When your pins are shown more, it has more visibility and potential to be seen by more people.

This is my secret strategy and you can do the same.

Start A Successful Blog Step By Step

4. Pinterest SEO and Hashtags

Pinterest is a virtual search engine so in order for your pins to be found, it is important that you optimise your pins for SEO.

The good thing about Pinterest SEO however, is that unlike Google SEO, it does not take forever for your pins to begin ranking on Pinterest in their smart feed.

So when I type multiple streams of income you can see that my pin shows up in the smart feed because that pin is optimised.

To optimise your pin it is simple.

When saving a pin make sure that you complete the description. You should also include a few hashtags in your description.

Make sure that the description is congruent with the title of your blog post and your blog post featured image.

The right keywords on your pins is one of the most important tasks that you can do for your Pinterest account as Pinterest’s systems read their description and depending on how popular the pin is, decides to show it more in the smart feed.

This is why it is also important to implement step 3 above so that you can always repin your own pins and create its own popularity.

Wrapping It Up

As a new blogger you’re probably wondering how long you’re going to have to take to start getting readers to your blog.

It really does not have to be that hard and sometimes it takes thinking outside of the box.

I have given you a new traffic source and you have a great strategy to drive traffic to your blog with Pinterest.

Do not think that Pinterest is only for beauty, fashion or food. My blog actually proves that Pinterest traffic has an engaged audience and buyers there too.

Other niches that do tremendously well on Pinterest are:

• Personal Finance
• Travel
• Health and Wellness
• Mental Health
• Interior Designs
• Parenting

Pinterest Strategy at a Glance

• Create a Pinterest business account
• Verify your website
• Apply for rich pins
• Join group boards
• Create multiple pins for your blog posts
• Manual pin and auto pin
• Have a main blog board
• Optimise for Pinterest SEO

Follow this Pinterest strategy guide and you will have traffic to your blog in no time.

Any questions? Leave it in the comments.

Cheers