A good keyword strategy optimizes your entire Pinterest account for more blog traffic and engagement.
You can use Pinterest for keyword research with their free Pinterest keyword tool in the Pinterest ads platform, and Guided Search. These tools provide tons of keyword ideas that you can use on your pins to drive traffic!
One of the best things about Pinterest is that you can get a pretty good reach without a large following, and drive traffic with pin clicks. Pinterest is a social media platform with a search function so SEO comes into play.
Pinterest SEO is also not as complex as Google SEO.
How search on Pinterest works:
Pinterest users may type in something general like “blogging” in the search bar and Pinterest would suggest relevant keywords, people, and boards to guide their discovery.
You want your Pinterest profile and content to show up when your target audience is searching for your topic!
Based on the search terms, Pinterest shows the most relevant content to answer the search query.
Pinterest’s search engine algorithm does this by matching keywords found in Pinterest profiles, board names and descriptions, and pins. So if you want to rank in the smart feed, you’ll need to do keyword optimization.
This makes Pinterest a visual search engine where keywording is necessary to rank at the top of the search feed.
Finding the right keywords that your target audience uses is crucial to a successful Pinterest marketing strategy. Keyword research on Pinterest can help you find popular search terms that your target audience uses in a visual and guided way.
How to find keyword ideas with Pinterest keyword research tools
The best way to research keyword ideas on Pinterest is to use the platform and explore its data.
- Pinterest search bar
- Pinterest keyword tool
- Related searches
- Pinterest trends
Content List
- Pinterest Search Bar
- Pinterest Keyword Tool
- Step-by-step tutorial to do Pinterest keyword research
- Use Pinterest trends to find popular and trending topics
- Keyword Optimization Strategy
- Where to add keywords in organic pins
- Write keyword-rich pin descriptions
- Include keywords in pin images
- Pinterest board titles and descriptions
- How to use Pinterest to grow blog traffic in 2022
How to use Pinterest Search Bar to find long-tail keywords
The Pinterest search bar is the easiest way to explore sub-topics and long-tail keywords. Type in a broad keyword in the search bar and use Pinterest’s topic suggestions in the colored tiles.
Clicking on each tile appends the phrase to your search term and narrows down the search results.
This is an easy way to find popular topics and long-tail keywords in your niche.
How to use Pinterest Keyword Tool
The Pinterest keyword tool is one of the best ways to find keyword ideas with search volume in your niche.
Pinterest has its own keyword research tool in the Pinterest advertising platform. This is primarily meant for advertisers to help them choose relevant keywords that can drive the most impressions.
It is a great place to do keyword research on Pinterest as the search volume data gives you an estimate of traffic potential.
Don’t worry, you don’t need to run promoted pins to access the keyword tool, but you do need a Pinterest business account. You can easily convert your personal account to a business account with Pinterest’s step-by-step instructions.
In your business hub, find the Ads tab and click on Create Ad.
This takes you to the Pinterest ad campaign setup page. Don’t worry, we won’t be creating an ad campaign.
We just have to get past this initial campaign setup page to get to the keyword tool. Select the Consideration campaign objective and click continue.
On the next page, scroll down until you see the Keywords section. This is the Pinterest keyword research tool!
The important thing is to start with the main keywords and expand from there. The best Pinterest keywords are niche relevant and have search volume.
The keyword search volume data comes directly from Pinterest which makes this keyword tool the most reliable source of data for research.
Step-by-step tutorial to do Pinterest keyword research and find related keywords
A good keyword strategy helps you create relevant content that resonates with your ideal customers. This means finding as many relevant keywords that your audience would use on Pinterest.
- Start with a generic topic and type the main keyword in the search bar
- Analyze the related keywords Pinterest suggests and search volume
- Choose 20-25 keyword ideas and save them into a spreadsheet
Pinterest keyword search volume
Pinterest suggests the most relevant keywords with the goal of increasing ad impressions in search results and Related Pins.
This is helpful for running promoted pins and also for organic Pinterest strategies too. As we are looking at keywords with the most relevance to our main keyword topic.
We can use the list of the related keywords to optimize our pins and board descriptions to show up when users search.
Search volume indicates the popularity and traffic potential of keywords.
By targeting high search volume keywords, you can reach more people and drive more pin engagement and blog traffic.
Pinterest also tells us how much the estimated audience size would be if we promote ads with those keywords, giving us a rough indication of the traffic potential.
How to use Pinterest Related Searches to discover new keyword ideas
When you search for something on Pinterest, the Related Searches near the bottom of the page will help you discover more keyword ideas.
This doesn’t narrow down your search by appending the related terms in the search bar but starts a completely new search. If you’re stuck for fresh content and ideas, spend some time here in related searches!
Use Pinterest trends to find popular and trending topics
The Pinterest trends keyword tool shows us popular keywords that people have been actively searching for on Pinterest in the last 12 months.
This is a great way to find seasonal content, popular terms and trending topics on Pinterest in the year.
For example, we can find peaks in searches over a specific period of time. In the case of remote jobs and work from home keywords, searches on Pinterest soared during the pandemic in late 2021 to early 2022.
Pinterest Predicts
Pinterest Predicts is another tool from that shows us trending topics for the future. For each topic, there’s a really useful section on the page for trending search terms.
This is from Pinterest’s analysis, based on global search data from the last 12 months.
I think this can be quite powerful when used with Pinterest trends!
Keyword optimization strategy: How to use keywords on Pinterest
The best way to do keywording is on Pinterest content directly.
Such as adding keywords on your Pinterest pins, boards, and profile.
- An important place to add keywords is in your Pinterest profile. You’ll want to use popular keywords in your Pinterest profile description.
- Target keywords with high search volume on relevant boards and pins
- Optimize your pins title with keywords and click-worthy heading
- Use complete sentences when writing a description (500 characters) on your pin description
- Add a descriptive alt text to the Pinterest images on your blog posts
- Create new Pinterest boards to target related keyword ideas and topics
- Create fresh content on your blog and publish new pins when you discover new keywords
Where to add keywords in organic Pinterest pins
There is a lot room for keyword optimization in pins. You can add keywords in the pin title, pin description, image, and destination link.
Add seed keywords in the pin title
The pin title is one of the main ways to optimize for seed keywords. The seed term should be included in the headline of your blog post which is the main keyword phrase.
You can find seed keywords with the Pinterest keyword tool in the advertising dashboard and with Related Searches at the bottom of the page.
Keywords with high search volume indicate a broad search term with high traffic potential and should definitely be included in the title.
The Related Searches topics are broad topics that make for great seed terms too.
Write keyword-rich pin descriptions
Use the pin description to summarize your page content. This is one of the best places to include different keywords and optimize a topic.
Make the most of this space to boost your pin’s topical relevance. Don’t leave it blank or just paste the pin title.
Include keywords in pin images
Did you know Pinterest uses Smart Lens technology to read your image and find related images?
That’s how Pinterest finds related pins to show you based on the pin you clicked on. So when you’re creating your pin image, include your primary keyword.
This plays an important role in your pins getting found by the right people and might boost its virality too.
Destination link
Pins are in fact links to the original source of your image on your website. That’s how Pinterest provides traffic to your website.
People view your pins and click through to the destination link. Using URL names with a keyword is a best practice for search engine optimization. The same applies to Pinterest as well.
Pinterest board titles and descriptions
Pinterest boards are where we create pins and save related pins. The best practice is to create relevant boards for specific topics on Pinterest.
Optimize each Pinterest board for a specific topic by using primary topic keywords in the board name and board description.
Most Pinterest accounts have at least 4-5 boards. This helps to segment and organize your pins. For example:
- Board 1: Main board with all your pins (i.e, LeanneWong.Co)
- Board 2: Primary blog category pins (i.e, SEO)
- Board 3: Primary blog category pins (i.e, Pinterest Tips)
- Board 4: Primary blog category pins (i.e, Content Strategy)
Each board is optimized toward a specific topic. For example, my board about SEO will contain all my SEO-related pins.
This boosts the topical relevance of my board for SEO content and boosts its ability to show up when people are searching for ‘SEO’ on Pinterest.
If you have a new content topic on your blog, it is a good idea to just create a new board on Pinterest for those pins.
How to use Pinterest to grow blog traffic
Pinterest processes more than 5 billion search queries per month.
Pins form the majority of the content that ranks, and over time, Pinterest has added more pin formats to the search results. Such as video pins, idea pins, and shoppable pins.
Keyword optimization for pins is a given and the most obvious step in Pinterest marketing strategies. But don’t forget boards and your Pinterest profile too.
Board titles are suggested at the bottom of the search suggestions, and Pinterest profiles rank at the top of the feed.
Using keywords adequately across your Pinterest account would set you up for success on this growing platform!
38 people reacted on this
Hi Leanne, great tips!
Just wondering now that the colored guided suggestions are gone (not sure if they’re gone in all accounts though), how do you suggest finding keywords.
Thanks.
Hey Larry! They are still there, just in the form of ’rounded rectangles’ under the search bar. Pinterest does want to show us related searches afterall!
Hi, thanks for this informative post, Leanne. I made a big list of keywords of varying sizes. It sounds like it’s best to focus on those that are 10k and higher. I was hoping to test certain keywords against others by creating A/B tests. But when I checked those pins, it seems Pinterest is collecting the data for all the pins in one place, and I can’t see how different versions performed. Do you know of a way to test the keywords against each other, or is it better to just do research, find good keywords, and use them? Thanks!
Hi Willow, in terms of understanding the effectiveness of keywords on organic pins, the only metrics we can look at are from Pinterest Analytics.
One way to A/B test on keywords would be to have 2 similar pins (design, URL, publish date) and use different sets of keywords for each. Such that the only differentiating factor is the keywords on the Pin Title and Pin description. And then, after a period of time (Eg, 2 weeks) check back on both pins to see how many clicks, impressions, saves each pin received.
Thank you, Leanne! For some reason, I wasn’t able to see your reply before when I checked. I appreciate it.
That’s what I did, but when I checked back it seemed like Pinterest had saved all the data for the pins I created (different pins, same website link, different keywords) in one place. Ie, when I created two different pins, they had the same stats. Now, I want to check again. I guess it’s possible that they both performed exactly the same? But that seems hard to believe.
Have you ever tried this type of test? Thank you!
Hi Willow! No worries, glad to be of help here 🙂 Hmm, do you see the individual pin stats on each of your pin? A unique pin should have its own stats, it is quite odd that different pins have the exact same stats (clicks, impressions, saves).
Does it change if you go back to the original pin when you first published and saved to the first board, and check the stats from there?
THANK YOU!! I’ve been trying for ages to locate where I can find info on keywords and your post just spelled it right out!
So happy to hear this!! Cheers.
Thank you so much for this. I’m having problems converting impressions to link clicks. Will implement these tips.
Cheers Anuli 🙂
Thank you so much for your great tips!
I would love to understand:
Should i use in the description with just keywords, and if yes, whats the best mount?
Example: ” blogging for beginners, blogging tips, blogging for money ”
Or i should write a description that contains all this keywords?
Thank you!
Hi Sofia, I would write a descriptive summary in the pin’s description. The current pin description limit is 500 characters, so I would keep to that length.
Pinterest definitely exploded my traffic on my site! Such a great tool to use for exposure.
Cheers!
I’ve been using Pinterest forever and didn’t know you could edit pins and add keywords like that. Pinning this post to refer to later!
Yay!!
Great tips. I’ve recently been focusing on Pinterest and seeing the results pay off. It is a great tool for driving traffic. Thanks for the additional tips on SEOing images and destination URL’s. Cheers.
That’s great to hear, Rosemary! Happy for you 🙂
I love using PInterest! I could really up my game with my descriptions – thanks!
Thats awesome!!
This is so helpful to me! I’m trying to grow my Pinterest but i don’t think it’s working for now
Oh no! I’ve another article on Pinterest traffic growth here, hope it helps you dear: https://www.leannewong.co/tips-pinterest-traffic-blog/
I try very hard to pick the right keywords. IT’s a lot of work but worth it!
For sure!
This is such great information. It is always so important to keep focused on pinterest as it drives so much traffic. It is not always easy, and we have to keep focused. And of course, it is so much fun!
I absolutely love Pinterest! One of the best ways to drive traffic organically.
This was incredibly helpful! I’ve been trying to grow my Pinterest account so this will be useful to me.
Cheers!
It’s a great post, but I honestly feel like I am doing these things and still don’t get the traffic I was hoping for! I will try to add even more niche keywords into my pin description and boards, thank you for this article!
Oh no! I also have another guide here on how to drive traffic from Pinterest (with more info on using Tailwind and creating viral pin images), how this would help: https://www.leannewong.co/tips-pinterest-traffic-blog/
Pinterest has always been the enigma of social medias to me. I know there is value there but, unless you are selling a craft or design service, figuring out how to utilize it has baffled me. I think your research will help. Thanks
Pinterest can be used for ANY niche! Don’t miss out on this amazing platform 🙂
These are great tips! I definitely need to get better about using keywords on my pins and overall building a better strategy!
That’s awesome, Amy!
I feel pretty foolish, I have spent so much time working on SEO for my blog articles, and then just considered Pinterest an extension of the article. I can’t wait to try out your SEO suggestions for my next pin and see how it helps. Thanks for sharing!
Cheers!
These are such great tips! Pinterest really is a great traffic driver!
Thanks, Brittany!