topic Re: Promoting on Pinterest in Promoting

Promoting on Pinterest

randysgrandma — Thu, 10 Feb 2022 13:24:01 GMT

I took a long break from creating and promoting. Now I am finding that Pinterest is much different than it was when I was promoting there before. Is the new format of Pinterest as effective as it was before? We now can't use tags to make our work easier to find. So I am wondering how our posts to Pinterest are ever found by people looking for specific items. Also, I have boards that I have created and am on some boards that are group boards. Some of those group boards have thousands of followers. My own boards have only hundreds of followers. Will I get better results posting to the larger group boards or to my own small boards? It seems the large followers of the group boards are mostly designers like me who seldom look at the things posted by others. Would it be a good idea to delete my items that have been there so long they are buried and repost them to bring them back to the top or would that be pointless or cheating in some way?

Thanks for any answers.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

PacifierCity — Thu, 10 Feb 2022 21:57:44 GMT

P has changed a lot in the last year...

Group boards... First off, I would not bother deleting your old pins. There is little sense in that. But I would suggest that you create a "new" pin with a different look for the product you wish to promote. P is all about new and fresh looking pins. Ones it has never seen before. Group boards carry less wight in P's world now, according to may people who claim to be P guru's. What does that mean? It probably means that pins posted to group boards won't be shown as often in the feeds that most people look at when browsing P. Many believe that posting to your own boards will result in more "impressions" (views)... or that P will show that pin more often in visitors feeds.

When one creates pins that have a url that does not land on a Z product url, the description one writes stays with the pin. It is the title and description that are searchable and what is written therein is what people searching P find. If one simply uses the P button under the share function in your back end or the P button under a product on a product page, P uses the general Z product description and not the designer written one. (at least I haven't seen this change back yet.) Generally speaking, this is not helpful if one is trying to promote the art that is displayed on the product. The title a designer created does stay though, so a little bit of the designers verbiage does get through to the pin. Being able to create a pin for your product that leads to a blog or website, etc, should be more beneficial then linking it back to a Z product page... in theory.

Is using P as effective as before? That is impossible to answer... It really depends on how you use P, how you pin, and where your pins go. If you simply use Z's P pinning tools, then you will probably find that doing so is less beneficial than it was before. If you create your own unique/fresh pins and drive traffic to a blog, etc... you may find that using P is more beneficial than before.

Or you could be in limbo as so many of us are and just keep trying new things, different style pins, different landing urls, hoping that things will improve.

In the last year I/we have seen a major drop in traffic (impressions), a decent drop in linkovers, and a decent reduction in referrals... but, even after walking away for about 3 months, the referrals kept coming in. So I/we are going to keep at it because it makes good business sense for us.

Hope some of the above is helpful

.....................

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

SandyMDesigns — Mon, 14 Feb 2022 17:10:30 GMT

What @PacifierCity mentioned is the information that I was given last year. It is what I have been doing since the changes (except this year). I am in more groups than my own boards.

Last year, I deleted about half of the groups and archive the rest. Leaving only my boards. I made more videos, more custom pins that lead to my blog. Seen the traffic drop to what is now laughable. None of what I did bring traffic, nor customers. This year, I brought back the groups I achieved and now pin in those as well. I do get more views this way but it is still not working.

Many people will swear that Pinterest worked for them then and now.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

randysgrandma — Tue, 15 Feb 2022 12:56:23 GMT

I have been watching my stats on Pinterest. The numbers go way up when I post on group boards that have thousands of followers and goes way down when I post only on mine that have only hundreds of followers. I still am of the opinion that Pinterest viewers are mostly lookers just passing some time and not serious buyers. But I don't know where else to promote. I will not bother my friends and family on Facebook because I know they are not potential buyers. I am not and will not on and will not join Twitter, Tik Tok or any of the other teeny bopper sites. I can't blog. I have tried it and my mind goes blank. What I put on a blog is boring even to me. 😃 So I don't even bother. I am so glad that others promote my stuff since most of my sales come from third party promotions.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

SandyMDesigns — Tue, 15 Feb 2022 15:28:48 GMT

I have two blogs and occasionally write on some sites. But I am not sure that it is worth it either. I have to agree with you.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

mylittleeden — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 03:57:57 GMT

I post directly using the zazzle links, I am more interested in getting my products and art out to public, not worried so much about referrals but of course they are nice. I use mainly group boards too on pinterest. But I miss the text not being for my particular items but auto generated and generic. With the loss of tags and editing I rarely get anything from pinterest anymore, referral wise but do get some traffic in. Hopefully some will chime in with a better solution but still quick ways to use it now. I posted a drawstring bag today it is showing in stock at zazzle, but it reads on pinterest as out of stock 🙁 and gives no description of the item either. I feel promoting is for those specialist out there not us that are better just designing. Here is what I got.

Link here shows drawstrings are in stock? https://www.zazzle.com/echidna_walking_with_a_flower_custom_name_pink_drawstring_bag-256532881347141581?rf=238346800477376990 T

How can we stop this sort of thing from happening, can Zazzle help us, better?

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

randysgrandma — Sun, 20 Feb 2022 13:39:40 GMT

A couple of days ago I posted a newly designed product on Pinterest. Within an hour it showed 2.2K views. That cannot possibly be right.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

angelafuller729 — Mon, 21 Feb 2022 14:34:16 GMT

Pinterest accounts for 98% of my promoting/sharing efforts
80% of my pins are on my own boards
Views are inexplainable lol - my acct in the last year has hit 1M+ to 156k views, doing nothing different ...
But people are clicking through! I've earned the highest amount of referrals this month than I have in any other year ($200+ just in referral fees)
Titles and Descriptions are important. Pinterest treats them differently on individual products than they do on collections. Pic 1 is of a single product listing - my design description doesn't show, and Zazzle's product description only shows if you expand the product details arrow, however, Pic 2 shows if you post a link to a collection, your collection title and descriptions show . **Adding Pic 3 - because I also create pins in Canva. In this instance, I linked it back to a collection, which auto-adds the collection description.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

PAZP — Sun, 13 Mar 2022 14:40:25 GMT

Most of us pinning have seen a huge drop in impressions in recent time. Even when we go into analytics overview and click the “Include Saved Pins” it looks like an improvement but its still much less than we’ve seen especially those of us who have been on there for years.

I’m just curious if over the last week or two you’ve seen the majority of new pins that show ZERO views. Even when my stats went down over time I have a few views.

So far this month I’ve only had one referral which is way down too.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

angelafuller729 — Sun, 13 Mar 2022 17:10:16 GMT

My views are up a bit over the last two weeks, but yeah, it takes 2-3 days for the majority to even register as having any views. Outbound clicks are up 50% this past week but vast majority are related to Ukraine or holidays. Saved pins up 13% - no particular category stands out lol

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

Marcia — Sun, 13 Mar 2022 18:18:12 GMT

I've been getting that as well for the past few days. Really makes me wondering why I've even spending time pinning daily. I'm hoping it's a glitch.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

Marcia — Mon, 14 Mar 2022 02:18:12 GMT

Ok, this is super depressing – I wrote to pinterest help this morning regarding the fact that I've gotten 0 views on pretty much all of the pins I've pinned in the last 2 days. (Pinning directly from Zazzle – I know, my bad but I previously I'd been getting SOME views...) This is the response I received back this afternoon:

"Hi there,

Like other organic distribution platforms, engagement can increase or decrease over time. Pinterest takes different factors into consideration to distribute your Pins such as language, location, seasons, holidays, formats, trending topics, and type of Pin. When your Pin gets seen by someone, they can engage with it in different ways. Pinterest uses that engagement information to determine what content is most relevant to share with people.

Keep in mind, there's no set engagement window for Pins. It's possible that a Pin can gain engagement hours, days, months, or even years after its first published. This means you might see a brand new Pin have success right away, or older, previously published Pins suddenly increase in engagement.

If you see a discrepancy with your analytics, here are a few troubleshooting steps:

Create regularly: Create Pins frequently and consistently to grow your following and increase your reach. Aim to create original content at least once a week. You can schedule Pins up to two weeks in advance that can be published in the future.
Create your own Pins: Publish your own Pins with fresh, new content instead of saving other people’s Pins you find on Pinterest to see this reflected in your analytics. Pinterest no longer defaults to showing both published and saved Pins data in Analytics.Include saved Pins: The Analytics Overview page shows only published Pins data by default. Check the box next to Include saved Pins under the filters to include stats for Pins you’ve saved that are not linked to any of your claimed domains.

For more troubleshooting recommendations and a list of best practices, take a look at this Help Center article.

Thanks,
The Pinterest Team"

SERIOUSLY??? (BTW, anyone else notice this happening?) Should we not pin directly from Zazzle at all anymore? Ever?

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

PAZP — Mon, 14 Mar 2022 02:37:11 GMT

I do make the majority of my own pins simply so it is the 1000 x 1500 size. I even change that up a bit to see what happens. I've made idea pins and video pins. The idea pins have done well. The video pins used to do well but not so much anymore. I pin daily and lately have tried pinning at least five a day. So that reply you received @Marcia is basically telling me to do what I'm doing but I'm seeing A LOT of zero impressions.

All that said, I've had to referrals so far this month so someone is finding the pins.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

Marcia — Mon, 14 Mar 2022 02:48:32 GMT

Sounds like you've been doing exactly what they want you to do. I've been pinning every product I make, that's why I pin directly from Zazzle. Occasionally I have made my own pins & I know I should be doing that a lot more. But after I've pinned I'd immediately see 1-7 impressions. And now, absolutely nothing, even the next day. Interesting that you're also seeing a number of 0 impressions, even with your own pins. Oddly enough today I had 2 referrals, which is a rarity for me. But then again, these were things I pinned awhile ago, when I was getting impressions. Ugh – I hate this – I just want to make products & not think about the promotion aspect...

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

PAZP — Mon, 14 Mar 2022 14:09:53 GMT

This is exactly what I was seeing like you @Marcia ".... after I've pinned I'd immediately see 1-7 impressions. And now, absolutely nothing, even the next day. ".

I'm hoping it's just another Pinterest adjustment that settles out and we start seeing impressions again.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

SORS — Tue, 15 Mar 2022 04:11:34 GMT

Hi! I read an email from a Pinterest guru this morning and she said that Pinterest is having a glitch and that is why people are seeing 0 views on the pins. Hopefully Pinterest will get this fixed soon.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

Marcia — Tue, 15 Mar 2022 04:26:03 GMT

That's what I was hoping. I did pin tonight out of habit & noticed once again I immediately got a few views on each brand new pin. And the pins that I've been pinning the past few days are also showing views. Even though I received the above response from Pinterest help. lol

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

PAZP — Tue, 15 Mar 2022 12:03:31 GMT

THANK YOU SO MUCH for sharing that news @SORS
I feel a bit better about it now.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

PAZP — Wed, 16 Mar 2022 17:03:12 GMT

Lately when I go to my Pinterest accounts there are recommendations for specific boards. Today I saw a blast from the past that made me think of how many links are no longer any good.

This was the recommendation for one of my birthday boards.

Re: Promoting on Pinterest

angelafuller729 — Wed, 16 Mar 2022 17:21:46 GMT

I spent about 2 hrs yesterday cleaning up old boards/pins. Saw an increase of +2,000 views overnight.